I had a hard time embracing the term "anklebiters" or the image of me as a "chihuahua."
All of my wisest friends told me I that needed to seek acceptance. They reminded me that everything about the Palinistas, Palinbots, whatever you want to call them was myopic and ill-conceived. Their nickname for those of us Alaska citizens who refused to stand by while Sarah Palin gutted the Alaska Statutes was no exception. However, if there was a positive in being an "anklebiter" I still needed convincing.
One day I watched while some local folks walked their dogs. They had two large husky-mix-mutts and one tiny little chihuahua. Even though the little dog had to take about four steps for every one the other dogs took, it was quite clear that the chihuahua was the alpha dog of the group. That fact was made evident when the dogs were playing and the little dog had clearly had enough. The other big dogs rolled over on their backs while the "anklebiter" stood over them and barked authoritatively.
Now that's a tough chihuahua image I could get behind!
Yesterday, if you believe Sarah Palin, that visual metaphor proved itself true in a national way. My fellow "chihuahua warriors" and I were blamed for driving Governor Palin out of office...a charge I'm sure was meant to infuriate her followers and intimidate us into future silence.
Good luck with that. My plans haven't changed.
--I'll continue to push for the records request that was bought and paid for by the government- transparency-loving readers of the Alaska blogs.
--I'll continue following through with the comments I submitted in protest/response to the dismissal of the Arctic Cat ethics complaint.
--As other requests are answered, I will continue to take appropriate action if the information warrants it.
Don't get me wrong, I've had this blog since 2005 and I am QUITE ready to write again about the large variety of political and other issues that I used to cover that were NOT related to Sarah Palin. I expected to be able to ease up a bit after the Democratic Convention ended August 28, 2008. However, then came August 29th and Sarah Palin's rise to the McCain/Palin ticket. I expected to be able to ease up after the election in November but Palin's antics increased.
Alaska bloggers have been in overdrive for over a year minus those right-wing-fantasy checks from George Soros or David Axelrod.
So it's much to my surprise that, after the initial relief of her resignation wore off, I discovered that I feel much the same way as the other long-term or lifetime Alaskans I spoke to yesterday. It's like being part of a big group of kids playing together in a playground. Suddenly the spoiled-rotten kid shows up. You know which one I'm talking about...the teacher's daughter who can do no wrong, acting like she owns the place. She has big bully friends and family who push kids off of whatever piece of equipment SHE wants to play on. She cries huge crocodile tears to the authorities if she doesn't get her way. She throws all of her lunch wrappers and garbage around. She breaks a lot of the playground equipment.
And then she leaves the mess for everyone else to clean up.
Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell is stepping into that impending disaster. While his relationship with Palin is all hearts and flowers right now, he should "gird his loins" and don the rest of his armor in preparation for his future, frequent trips under the Palin bus. If/when anyone in the future tries to hold Palin accountable for the problems in Alaska, Sarah will declare that everything was "fine" when she left.
Yeah, right.
There is much speculation as to "why." Why is she leaving office? Is there something on the horizon? I don't know the answer to that. However, I DO know what the answer is NOT. This has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with intentionally caring about the good of the State of Alaska. Palin has repeatedly proven her apathy about her own state by years of ignoring/sidestepping the desperate needs of Rural Alaska, through rejecting real solutions to Alaska's epidemic Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault problem, by stacking the deck so that the Executive Branch Ethics Act is only a bunch of words on paper as it applies to her...the list goes on and on. The fact that Palin's departure REALLY IS good for Alaska is just a happy coincidence that suits her purpose.
I've seen much of the speculation out there regarding the REAL reasons...including from many of my smart, witty Alaskan media and blogger friends. All of that speculation has merit and as I know nothing that can contradict it, I won't. However, I will add that while the possibility exists that there really is something HUGE (whether positive or negative) on a collision course with Sarah's ambitions, it's also just as likely:
--She learned some new piece of information (or finally read Andrew Halcro's blog) pointing out that AGIA is destined to be a failure. Since that is the ONLY ACCOMPLISHMENT of her Governorship, that would be disasterous.
--She received some advance information that the next poll of Alaskans will show that her popularity has dipped below 50%. If the indicators were there that she might not be able to win re-election that could kill her career.
--She knew the complaints and investigations would continue over the next 18 months and, contrary to worrying about "the money Alaskans will spend," she knows that some of this stuff is definitely going to stick. (Palin doesn't seem to think that Executive Branch and APOC financial and gift reporting rules apply to her.)
--Perhaps something happening within her family that will demand she's out of the spotlight for awhile.
--However, there is one delicious possibility that my husband asked me about...one that has me MOST curious. While Palin and crew are trying desperately to claim that all ethics complaints are over, I know that there was still one pending...the complaint against the Governor regarding using her office for financial benefit through the Legal Defense Fund.
Hypothetically, what if all of the ethics complaints really ARE over...and several days ago, PALIN WAS TOLD THAT AS GOVERNOR, RECEIVING MONEY FROM THE LEGAL DEFENSE FUND WAS DECLARED UNETHICAL? One of the options to resolve a potential violation in the Executive Branch Ethics Act is to achieve resolution between the investigator and the complainee. What if, the only way to a) keep the money or NOT HAVE TO PAY IT BACK and b) to keep her "perfect record" of "no wrongdoing" was to leave the Governor's office?
Palin has put the very-expensive Mr. Van Flein as a layer between her and everyone else. He's appeared weekly, sometimes multiple times per week on the Eddie Burke Show. He's the one who had all the contact with Arctic Cat complaint investigator Tom Daniel so I can only assume that's true for all the other complaints. He is part of every media interview these days...almost as much as Stapleton. Isn't it interesting that we haven't heard a peep out of him in the last two days?
Losing access to that money would be disasterous!!! Paying the money back would mean financial ruin!!
You may ask: we know the disposition of all the other complaints, why wouldn't we know this?
The answer is two-fold: 1)We don't know whether or not the dispositions of all other complaints were made public because THE GOVERNOR HAS TO WAIVE CONFIDENTIALITY for the information to be revealed, especially if the filer did not make their complaint public in the beginning, and 2) There are also other resolutions under the Ethics Act to potential violations where NOT EVEN THE FILER IS NOTIFIED.
If this hypothetical scenario is real, THERE IS NO WAY SHE WOULD WAIVE CONFIDENTIALITY and she would choose the MOST CONFIDENTIAL resolution possible to keep the information secret...just the way she likes it...hypothetically.
What would that mean for the complaint-filer? He/she either would never know what the resolution was or wouldn't be able to tell ANYONE if he/she did know!!!! As one who filed a complaint myself, I can IMAGINE how crazy-making that would be! The Governor could go out and lie about a "complaint being dismissed" and the filer would be powerless to do or say ANYTHING...hypothetically, of course!
Frankly, while the last scenario would explain a lot about this sudden announcement, I don't know if it or any of the other possibilities is true. However, it's nice to think that she finally had to pay a price for her lack of ethical backbone.
It's an especially nice thought for a chihuahua warrior! |
