Last January, former U.S. Attorney Wev Shea and former Alaska House Representative Ethan Berkowitz presented a document, called Ethics White Paper, to Gov. Sarah Palin. The governor had requested this bi-partisan team to come up with comprehensive recommendations for ethical reform in the Executive and Legislative branches of our state government.
At the time the paper was presented, the legislature was in a session which began with two Mat-Su Valley legislators, Sen. Lyda Green of Palmer, and Rep. Vic Kohring of Wasilla, claiming that the need for reform in the legislature was being over-emphasized, and that the Senate and House were capable of policing their own. On the day the paper was presented, legislators were attending clinics and workshops on ethics. And the session ended with one of those two Valley legislators being marched into Federal Court in handcuffs.
For all the good the workshops and clinics did the solons, one might have had them write "I will not cheat my constituents or take bribes or pretend to lobby when I'm just feathering my friggin' nest" 10,000 times on a blackboard. Or a whiteboard.
Alaska Common Ground and the League of Women Voters held educational seminars for the public in Juneau and Anchorage. The one in Anchorage was moderated by retired U.A.A. Professor, Dr. Steve Aufrecht, who discussed the event at the time on his blog.
Some of the recommendations of the White Paper were considered by the legislature during the 2007 regular session, fewer were incorporated into their subsequent reform bill.
As was seen in the 2007 Special Session of the legislature, some members took reform more seriously than others, as the big oil enablers tried every method they could to keep the governor's proposed fee structure for the removal of our non-renewable resources from coming into effect.
I read about the White Paper back when it came out, but only started reading it today. You can download it as a PDF here.
In light of information U.S. Senate candidate and former Alaska Representative Ray Metcalfe has been sharing with me about his past as a dogged and courageous advocate of legislative reform, I've been looking into the history of other legislators and former legislators in this regard. None has a greater claim to having been instrumental in moving the public and law enforcement agencies toward acting on the egregious nature of the ethical and criminal violations of our elected officials than has Metcalfe. The only other legislator to make remotely similar claims has been Berkowitz.
Metcalfe has taken issue both with the recommendations of the January 2007 White Paper, and with the Berkowitz camp's meme that Ethan's objections during the first 2006 Special Session of the Legislature were meaningful in the ways Berkowitz and his supporters present them.
At the time of the White Paper's introduction in Juneau, Metcalfe was critical, stating to the Juneau Empire's Pat Forgey that Metcalfe
ha[d] recommended abolishing the Alaska Public Offices Commission and creating a new agency within the judicial branch of government.
The new commission would be protected from legislative influence, and also would handle the duties of the current Ethics Committee of the Legislature.
Members of the new commission would be appointed by the Supreme Court instead of political parties, he said. Metcalfe wants to see any investigations handled by trained criminal investigators with the Alaska State Troopers, who have union protection.
"The new commission should be empowered to address all public corruption in whatever form it takes," Metcalfe told APOC earlier this month.
In regard to Berkowitz's contention that his objections to Veco lobbying during the summer of 2006 were meaningful, Metcalfe has sent me more information regarding Berkowitz's handling of documents previously provided Ethan by Ray:
Philip:
I thought you might be interested in my response to an inquiry I received regarding Ethan.
Question was:
I ran into Ethan this week and he told me that you had been telling others that he was not responsive to your initial complaints about Ben’s impropriety when he was in the legislature. Will you please call him and talk with him about this, rather than getting Diane Benson all worked up about it. Will you please call him at 279-5659.
Reply:
I am sorry to say this but, I probably left a dozen personal messages, some hand delivered with documents, some by phone, some by email, asking Ethan to lend a hand. He had my number and an invitation to return a call for about three years.
He has ignored every call, every email, and every document I hand delivered to his office. The heavy lifting was over and the posse was rumored to be on its way by the time he finally said something on the House Floor.
He even came to Ted's defense on matters of the corruption I was trying to expose.
When the raids had come and gone, and it was safe to come out of the closet, he tried to pretend he was part of the battle and part of the solution with his ridiculous "White Paper" that offered no solutions for anything. He didn't call me for advice on that either.
Several people have called me and ask how this happened, what the hurdles were in forcing the issue to the surface, and what they can do to help make sure it doesn't happen again. Some are taking meaningful steps to such ends. Some are writing books. Ethan has blown me off as an irritating gadfly at every opportunity and to this day has expressed no interest in any advice I might have.
RM
One of the interesting things to me about this affair is the contrast between a very cautious incrementalist like Berkowitz and a fairly revolutionary figure like Metcalfe. The election of Sarah Palin and her growing popularity seem to indicate Alaskans are more accepting of the latter mode than the former right now.
photo of Berkowitz, Palin and Shea by Brain Wallace - Juneau Empire
4 comments:
Philip, You raise an issue I've been wrestling with for years. I think that Ray Metcalfe has done incredibly important work for the state of Alaska by digging into these issues and never letting go despite his getting the Teresa Obermeyer treatment from most people.
And at the Ethics session you reference, I specifically thanked him in front of everyone (even if I mistakenly said Jake first) for what he'd done.
You compare Ray Metcalfe to Ethan Berkowitz and Sarah Palin. I think each have qualities that make them admirable, but they are different qualities.
While I've met all three, I don't profess to know more than media reported personas. The obvious quality Metcalfe has displayed publicly is his ability to focus on an issue, dig deep, get the important information, and not let go. Berkowitz seems to be very bright, sincere, and more strategic. Palin is very warm and open, she doesn't pretend to know everything, but she has shown a good sense of right and wrong and she stands by her guns.
You say at the end
"One of the interesting things to me about this affair is the contrast between a very cautious incrementalist like Berkowitz and a fairly revolutionary figure like Metcalfe. The election of Sarah Palin and her growing popularity seem to indicate Alaskans are more accepting of the latter mode than the former right now."
I think you've missed the point here. I don't think Palin is a revolutionary. She was personally in the middle of bad stuff. As an ethical person, she had to either go along with corruption, or at least turn a blind eye, or stand up and do something. She chose to stand up and resign, because, she said, she couldn't be part of it. Her outing Ruedrich was an explanation for her resignation not a vendetta - otherwise he wouldn't still be head of the Republican party.
Ray, on the other hand, was on the outside. He was out of the legislature,
"Former state representative, Ray Metcalfe formed the Republican Moderate Party in 1986 to oppose the influence of the Religious Right over the Republican Party." from Community Forum, KSKA
Instead of building his party and focusing on what it was going to do right, he has spent his time digging up the wrong doings of his former party colleagues - though not necessarily the religious right wingers among them. There is nothing wrong with this. In fact, we are all better off for it. But this is different from what Palin did. She extracted herself from a difficult situation. She did make that an important part of her campaign, that is true. But she was running for governor against the sitting Republican governor, she had no choice.
Actually calling Metcalfe revolutionary is probably misleading too. Rather, he has been very conservative. He's been saying, "This is what is right, these are the laws. These politicians are breaking the law. We need to hold them accountable for that." This is a traditional Republican law and order platform - though it is unusual for the focus to be on white collar crime rather than street crime.
Meanwhile, I suspect Berkowitz - assuming the account of his 'ignoring' all Metcalfe's communications is accurate - was calculating what sort of political hits he would take if he supported Metcalfe. As a member of the minority he could take potshots without any problem, but to go on a crusade against the most powerful people in the state? This is a call each of us have to make. How close to the cliff do we get? If we get too close and fall over, well, we're out of the game and can do no good. If we do other things that are productive until the timing is better - maybe we get roped up before getting near the cliff - then that may be a more strategic use of our time.
In any case, whether safe or not, his protest against Weyhrauch's vote change in the house sounded very genuine.
But each of us have a mix of characteristics. Along with Metcalfe's persistence comes an intensity that I think makes a lot of people feel uncomfortable. On the other hand Palin is just nice and warm and fuzzy. And I think that when it comes to elections, the first hurdle is whether people feel comfortable with you, whether they feel they can trust you. If you don't pass that test (and the voters don't have to be right in their judgment) then your other qualities really don't matter.
As I said in my post about the FBI surveillance, we have this double value system. We believe in doing the right thing, but we also have lots of negative words for people who turn in wrong doers - tattle tails, squealors, finks, etc.
steve,
When Palin went up against Ruedrich while she was chairing AOGCC, she put herself into the position of confronting not just an unethical member of her commission, but a legendary "enforcer" of Party discipline. The Alaska GOP ran - up until Palin's rise - the most disciplined, doctrinaire GOP organization in the Pacific NW. Palin was put under a lot of pressure between her initial complaint and resignation. I wouldn't characterize the pressure as "vendetta," just typical GOP Alaska power politics, and how they deal with girls.
By choosing to run for Governor in 2006, Palin ran against Ruedrich's machine. Then, after winning the GOP primary, she refused Ruedrich's help.
I know a lot of people from all over the political spectrum who campaigned for Palin. Her organization ended up being "revolutionary" rather than "incrementalist" both out of necessity and in terms of some platform planks. In some ways, Palin's 2006 campaigns were unlike any GOP campaign in the country that year, as they had major anti-corruption planks and emphasized issues important to the middle class.
Ray Metcalfe objected to the takeover of the national GOP in the 80s by the Falwellites, but also objected at that same time to the way the state does business with the oil companies.
I left the GOP in 1982 for the former reason - the changes in their national approach with the advent of the theocrats.
Both Ray Metcalfe and Sarah Palin reacted to corrupt practices, if you accept that Metcalfe was bright enough to see that the rise of the evangelical right was power driven, rather than idea driven. Some of us believed from the start that the Bible belt aspect of the GOP" Southern Strategy" was cynical and hypocritical, rather than sincere. I still do.
Metcalfe has evolved toward the left, as has Palin, but Palin's religious background and the makeup of her constituency, a hefty part of which is made up of Evangelicals and Fundamentalists, keeps her in the GOP.
Both Palin and Metcalfe have tackled political corruption. Metcalfe's engagement has been far longer, more detailed and tedious. Palin's rise has been almost mercurial - Palin was in college when Ray began to feel uncomfortable with GOP cynicism and corruption.
The only Alaskan to win statewide office from a 3rd party perch was Wally Hickel, a multi-millionaire. I don't think the Republican Moderates have been unsuccessful because Ray wasn't "building his party and focusing on what it was going to do right." They just don't work - 3rd, 4th, 5th parties - unless they're well-funded.
I guess I took a roundabout way to get to my point - which was about your final comment in the original where you implied that Metcalfe may ride the same political wave Palin's riding.
Whether it is revolutionary action (at best I'd call it counter-revolutionary since the cynical right had hi-jacked the Republican party, and both Metcalfe and Palin, at different times and in different ways were trying to bring it back to where it had been) or not, wasn't my real point. And I was skating on thin ice using my media gleaned knowledge.
I was really questioning your conclusion that perhaps Metcalfe might be closer to what Alaskans want since they love Palin. Palin was lucky to have taken on the party at just the right time - when the indictments were about to come down. But equally important in her election and current popularity is her personality. And Ray Metcalfe has never struck me as warm and fuzzy, rather his intensity makes people uncomfortable. I learned in junior high that being right doesn't necessarily win you votes. I think Halcro has also called a lot of stuff exactly right, but his telling people all the time that he told us so tends to irritate people. Most of us don't like to have it rubbed in. So what I was trying to say was I am doubtful that Metcalfe will ride that wave.
steve,
Each wave is different, as surfers can attest. We can't see this one yet, 'cause the weather that is going to create it hasn't happened.
The purpose of the post was to draw attention to how far ethics reform has yet to go. I finished reading the "White Paper," and have to agree with Ray Metcalfe that it doesn't go far enough and has structural flaws. Still too much input in the structure from the people who are being monitored. Ray wanted the investigating agency isolated and insulated from retribution.
I wasn't troubled about Ethan's posture on ethics until Ray described to me in early December how he'd distributed information similar to what is coming out in the Federal corruption cases, long before the formal charges related to these issues were made.
As I registered in my first post about Ray's distribution list, nobody knows whether or not Berkowitz or JAKE Metcalfe didn't march right down to the nearest FBI office the second he finished carefully reading RAY's packet.
Re Ray Metcalfe's intensity compared to Sarah Palin's postives - it certainly does hold Ray back. But he's running against a guy whose warm fuzzies are becoming increasingly hard to find.
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