As swarms of reporters descend on the Loussac, UAA Consortium, and Mat-Su College libraries, to go through micro-fiche rolls of old copies of the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, coverage of Sarah Palin's possible candidacy on the GOP ticket for vice president of the United States, along with the oldest man to run for that office for the first time, has turned a corner. Judy reminded me, as we walked around the outskirts of Wasilla today, canvassing for Obama, that when Palin was first elected mayor there in 1996, she had to hire a city manager. When her predecessors had occupied the office, they did that job themselves. There went $60,000 per year. And so it has continued to go for her.
CNN seemed to turn this new corner this evening, in both the Anderson Cooper coverage of Palin, and in the panel Larry King put together.
Air America's Ed Schultz, who decided over the weekend to come up here for a town hall meeting at the Wendy Williamson Auditorium before the middle of September, was on King's show. He jumped all over the conservative talkng heads, who obviously weren't prepared to say more than "she cut taxes, stopped the bridge to nowhere, fought corruption in her own party, stood up to Ted Stevens," and "has been a fine commander-in-chief of the Alaska National Guard."The Nation's Ari Berman, today cited Talking Points Memo, which has been highly reliant on Alaska bloggers and journalists in keeping track of Palin's ethical lapses, brought up a name I have been stressing in conversations and e-mails with journalists on this since early Saturday - Sen. Thomas Eagleton.
Another name stressed in these forums have been Harriet Meiers. Watching CNN's Krya Philips, whose husband is a bigtime GOP operative try to spin and minimize Troopergate reminded me of her early reports on the Meiers Supreme Court nomination.
I've heard some Alaskans are starting office pools on when she's pulled from the ticket. My guess is a week from tomorrow.
10 comments:
I read the 1972 10-page TIME article on Eagleton and some of it sounded very familiar to current times...
...however, isn't it administratively much more difficult to remove a candidate after the convention?
Anyway, heartfelt thanks to all progressive Alaskans for defending truth and hopefully saving us from national and international disaster. Lives are at stake here.
You know she's going to leave the ticket for "family reasons" because the "leftist bloggers" were so mean to her daughter. As a "concerned and loving mother" she'll have no choice, because nothing is more important than her children.
The country will snicker, and move on.
After all is said and done, it's too bad that Alaska will be known for Palin, "Northern Exposure", Oil and Moose.
Hopefully, the Alaskan bloggers can continue to show us all what it means to be an Alaskan and live in 49th state.
How big a deal is the Alaska Independence Party membership? I realize that Alaska politics looks nothing like politics in the Lower 48, but these folks look pretty wacky.
Of course, it's over ten years ago, and in this election, the only thing from more than ten years ago that matters is POW status.
BTW... Ed Schultz is not on Air America. He's part of the Jones Radio Group. He is on XM on America Left - which used to be called Air America, but really wasn't. (I'm listening to him right now on XM)
His website says that he will be in Anchorage on Sept 13 at the Williamson Auditorium.
CH in ND
In response to the question about the Alaska Independence Party, it was founded by Joe Voegler. Joe got murdered by a crazy guy around 1993. Sometimes we'd eat breakfast at the same place where Joe would hold court. I think Joe was a very intelligent, highly educated, far, far, far right guy. He spoke passionately.
Back then, AIP was even more focused on secession and anarchy than they are now. If Palin was a member of AIP in the 1990s, there is a good chance she may have advocated secession-- it wouldn't have made sense to belong to AIP if you opposed their principles.
Wikipedia discusses Joe Voegler and AIP. AIP's website has the basic points of their platform.
Palin was in her 30s when she was a member, and apparently she left and joined the republicans so she could have a realistic chance of getting elected Mayor. But when she chose to join AIP, she was a big girl-- she made a mature decision.
I wonder if Palin could now honestly swear an oath of office to the United States.
"The Intrade prediction market has opened trading on whether "Sarah Palin [is] to be withdrawn as Republican VP nominee before 2008 presidential election." At 8:55 am, Tuesday morning, the market is selling the prediction at 18 a share and rising. That means 18 percent of traders think there is a chance that Palin will be removed from the ticket."
Katherine Zaleski
Huffington Post
2 Sep 2008
Hey, polarbear, I checked it out on the intrade website. It's actually now down to 12.9 a share. It's risen quite a bit since the morning, but it's really not very high. We'll have to see how long the drip, drip, drip continues.
I think both McCain and Palin are too stubborn to admit it's a mistake. My heart goes out to her family, because they had little say in this and they are in the meat grinder, too.
Phil,
Thanks for your sane and clear coverage of these crazy days, as well as your continued work for Obama.
Peace
Put me down for a week from Friday.
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