The Mudflats

The sun is shining, the days are longer, the snow is melting.  It’s that time of year.  Step outside and breathe deep. Ahhhhhh…. Nothing like the smell of property tax assessments in the morning.  Nobody really likes it, but we realize that our communities need things like roads, and firefighters, and we at least realize that we’re all members of the community, and we all share this burden for the benefit of all.  We don’t presume that we can shirk our own responsibility and just assume that we can cheat, not pay what we owe, and make other people pay our way.  That would be just plain wrong.  Expecting others to pay your way while you sit back and chuckle at getting away with it  is what conservatives like Sarah Palin call a “sense of entitlement.”

For those who have been wondering about what value the Mat-Su Borough will assess Sarah and Todd Palin’s cabin, wonder no more.

According to the Mat-Su Frontiersman:

MAT-SU — It’s property tax season and the official assessors say values remained flat in 2009.

Dave Dunivan is head of the Mat-Su Borough Division of Assessment. He said the borough is required to assess each property at full market value, and values have been steady over the past three years.

“Values remain flat” unless, of course, you are the Palins in which case you’ve seen the value on your recreational cabin on Safari Lake go from a self-reported $0 to $99,700.

So, it’s not worthless after all?  Go figure.  You’ll recall that the Palins have for years been claiming a $12,000 property value for the parcel of land itself, but a $0 building value for the cabin that sits on the land.  But after first reporting on that finding here, the Matanuska Susitna Borough assessors did a fly-over of the cabin and have now reported its actual value at just shy of $100,000. (low whistle)  Pretty fancy for a lowly recreational cabin and outbuildings that the owners reported as worthless just the year before. And the year before that. And the year before that. And the…. (you get the idea)

Thanks to the anonymous tipster who sent Mudflats an envelope containing the public information that had escaped the attention of the mainstream media, the story went viral, getting picked up by the Associated Press within hours, and even being closely followed internationally since that time.

The Palins have until March 30 to appeal the assessment, and they are not liable to pay for past years omissions. According to Dave Dunivan, the head of the Mat-Su Borough of Assessment, the Borough often compares its assessed value of a building to the actual price when the building sells. “Nine times out of ten we are within 5-6% of the sale price if our information is correct,” he stated.  This would mean that it’s likely the Palin cabin’s practical value falls somewhere between $93,718. and $105,682.

As an example of how seriously the ex-almost-one-term governor holds the paying of one’s property taxes, and how much she scorns those who shirk their civic duty, we are reminded of an incident that happened several years ago.

In 2004, it came to light that Republican Rep. Vic Kohring owed the borough $2,277 in unpaid property taxes on property he owns off Knik-Goose Bay Road, according to borough records. “That bothered former Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin enough that she declined a campaign request to do a pro-Kohring TV commercial. As a former mayor, Palin said, it made her uncomfortable to back someone with unpaid taxes when the city relies on property taxes.” [Anchorage Daily News (Alaska), 10/28/04]

The discomfort the former mayor feels about depriving the community of needed revenue apparently only applies to what other people do.

“Bush’s Brain,” advisor Karl Rove had a few words of advice for the Facebook blogger/Fox commentator Sarah Palin today. If she’s getting ready to run for the White House in 2012, she better start now.

Politico did not elaborate on how exactly Rove suggested this should occur, but we can assume it means doing a lot of reading.

Acknowledging that the politics of the day will change between now and then, he still said there’s not a moment to lose.

“This is her year to get ready for the hot spotlight that will fall on her…I don’t know if she wants to, she certainly can, she did very well in the 63 days she was on the national stage,” Rove said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Really?  Was it only 63 days?  Those for whom that 63 days felt like a lifetime cannot fathom an entire four-year Palin presidency.

But will she or won’t she?  That’s the question that nobody seems to be able to answer for sure.  Keeping us guessing keeps her in the spotlight, however, and speculation alone has fueled sales of her book, anticipation of her next book, and supported six figure speaking engagements across the land – to loggers, and bowlers, and liquor wholesalers, and NASCAR fans alike.  So, even if Palin is not planning to sit in the political dunking booth to which she would be permanently confined in the run up to the 2012 election, she benefits handsomely from not telling us that.

Palm Pilot to Nowhere

Palin’s still on the palm thing.  At a speech in Orlando, she referenced yet again the infamous palm writing incident where she had to write the words “Energy, Tax Cuts, and Lift America’s Spirits” on her hand so she’d remember the three things she’d do if she were President of the United States.  Palin the presidential wannabe described the incident by saying she was “busted for using a poor man’s TelePrompter,” and went on to elaborate, “I was just kicking it old school.  It’s the way we used to do it.”   Your assignment for the weekend is to find another human being who is closer to 50 than 40 who uses the phrase ”kicking it old school” without humiliating their children by trying to sound like one of them, and failing miserably.

She also told the audience to get a Bible and look up Isaiah 49:16, which reads, “Behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands.”  ”If writing on one’s palm was good enough for God, then it’s good enough for the rest of us,” she spake.  Hmm.  Drowning almost every living thing on Earth was good enough for God too.  So was turning people into pillars of salt.  And there was lots of smiting going on there for a while, if I remember correctly.  Can we expect her to start striking people dead?  The “it’s good enough for God so it’s good enough for me” defense might be interesting in a court of law.

Say Uncle!

Lookie! Uncle Ted (aka almost convicTED Stevens) is back! He popped out of his hidey hole today to make an announcement endorsing a bullet line to bring natural gas from Alaska to Alaska via an Alaskan route. Some might say he’s a bit late to that party. Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Walker has been saying this since anyone can remember, and is running his campaign on that issue above all others. And AGIA takes another body blow. Will we have to fork over Palin’s half a billion dollars to exit the Trans Canada agreement after all? Stay tuned…

Cawfey Tawk

Across America, the thinking man’s answer to the Tea Party movement will be seeing gatherings springing up everywhere. Started by a very clever and impassioned Facebooker, the Coffee Party has a mission:

MISSION: The Coffee Party Movement gives voice to Americans who want to see cooperation in government. We recognize that the federal government is not the enemy of the people, but the expression of our collective will, and that we must participate in the democratic process in order to address the challenges that we face as Americans. As voters and grassroots volunteers, we will support leaders who work toward positive solutions, and hold accountable those who obstruct them.

***There’s a Coffee Party at 10am in Wasilla at the Metro Cafe, and one at 7pm in Anchorage at the Cafe del Mundo on Benson. Wherever you are, you can check for locations near you at Coffee Party USA.***

Good Wife Goes Rogue Rouge

On this week’s episode of “The Good Wife“  Going Rouge makes an appearance!   A backwoods ballistic expert flirts with a lawyer and as part of his flirtation he sends her a lavishly gift-wrapped copy of Sarah Palin’s  Going Rogue.   She responds by sending him a copy of Going Rouge – An American Nightmare!  I hear it got a great cover shot.  

Congratulations, Senator Begich!

Congratulations to Senator Begich for landing a spot on the Senate Budget Committee!  Nice!

Acknowledging his continuing efforts to address the federal budget deficit and growing debt, the Senate approved his appointment to a vacant seat on the Senate Budget Committee, effective Tuesday night.  He joins the Budget Committee with a focus on fiscal responsibility. During his first year in office, he has supported the Senate’s adoption of “Pay-Go” rules, Congressional and Presidential efforts to establish a federal debt commission, a Presidential suspension of discretionary spending, and numerous initiatives promoting transparency and efficiency in government spending.

For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow

Today is the birthday of one of my favorite members of Congress – Alan Grayson. He is living, breathing proof that it is medically possible to be a registered Democrat and also have a spine. He appears to be no worse the wear for having this spine, and to show support for him, there’s an effort to get donations to his campaign. He’s 52 years old, so if you would like to send a symbolic $52 to his campaign, or any amount you see fit, click HERE. This guy is fighting the good fight every day, not only for members of his district, but for all of us. Last week he introduced a simple four-page bill to let all Americans buy into Medicare. It has 50 cosponsors already. You can support the bill at WeWantMedicare.com. And he’s even leading the GOP primary poll in which only Republicans in his district were surveyed! I guess everyone loves a spine.

It’s All Mine

Ah, the loophole.  They always seem to find them, don’t they?  Well there’s a loophole in George W. Bush’s 2002 Clean Water Act that allows mines to dump waste in America’s waters.  But the good news is that the EPA has the authority to close the loophole.  EarthWorks is organizing a call-in day on Monday, March 15 when concerned citizens will call the White House and urge action.  This loophole is allowing the Kensington Mine near Juneau to destroy a freshwater lake by calling this mining waste “fill” and dumping it, untreated into the lake.  It’s also allowing mountaintop removal coal mines to dump their waste into the streams of Appalachia. 

So get ready to enter a new contact into your cell phone, or put it on your speed dial.  It’s the White House!  I think every American should have the White House on speed dial!  202-456-1414.  Call it and ask your president to restore the Clean Water Act’s prohibition on dumping mining waste into clean water.

If there’s one thing that Sarah Palin did during her brief try-out as Alaska’s governor, she showed us where the leaks were. I’ve compared her short time in office to the rental of one of those “blower doors” you can rent and attach to an open door of a building to show you where the leaks are. It basically “sucks the air out of the room” (not unlike the ex-gov herself), and you can put your hand up to light switches or the edges of windows, or outlets and feel a stream of cold air coming through.

One of those streams of cold air revealed by the Palin administration came in the form of email accounts. The state is set up nicely with an email system that has the suffix .gov. Any emails ending in .gov are used to keep a record of state business as part of the public record. It’s our government after all. Remember that “of the people, by the people, for the people” stuff?   Well .gov emails belong to US. And that’s why they’re not supposed to be used for partisan political purposes, or campaigning for your next term in office. And you really shouldn’t be on there talking about fantasy football, or sending steamy messages to your date last night, or talking about the Oscars. During work hours, you’re supposed to be doing the people’s work. And those emails on the .gov account don’t really belong to you and are subject to disclosure to the public via records requests.

That’s why people do personal business on their personal email accounts. But what about running government business on a personal account? What about pipeline negotiations, or board appointments, or accounts of what happened in meetings, or budget issues, or things that people may need to look up at some time in the future?   What about the public, who wants to know what their public officials are talking about, or doing with their time, or what was said on a particular issue like game management, or mining, or oil and gas, or taxes, or any other legislation?  And what about the historical record?  What if you, as a member of the public, fill out a public records request to find out information about something, and you’re told there’s nothing there. And what if there really is something there, but it’s been discussed on an email exchange between Governor@hotmail.com and AttorneyGeneral@mosquito.net? Or Commissioner@yahoo.com and Mayor@gmail.com?

That’s what Andree McLeod was worried about when it came to light that Sarah Palin was doing business with administration officials outside of the state email system. It came to national attention during the early days of the McCain Palin campaign, in September of 2008. That’s when we got the news that a hacker had gotten in to then Governor Palin’s private Yahoo! account, where it was very obvious she’d been doing business.   Other than the fact that a Yahoo! account sounds less than gubernatorial, and is less than transparent, security can also be a problem. All the hacker had to do, was to answer the super-secret “only she would know” question to reset the password. Ready for the question?

Q. Where did you meet your husband?
A. Wasilla High

And that was that. When choosing a security question, it’s usually a good idea not to make it something to which the answer can be looked up in a recently published biography, and that you’ve discussed openly in interviews.

I don’t know what that scene must have been like – the young hacker, sitting in his dorm room, like Matthew  Broderick in War Games, cracking his knuckles, staring at the screen and typing in “Wasilla High” [enter] BINGO! I’m sure it was a thrilling and terrifying moment for the young hacker. The Holy Grail on the first try.

I’m sure  David Kernell, University of Tennessee student and son of long-term Tennessee state legislator Mike Kernell (D) now thinks it probably wasn’t such a great idea. 

[He] faces a four-count indictment accusing him of stealing Palin’s identity, improperly accessing her personal e-mail account, allowing at least one other person to access it and trying to wipe from his laptop evidence of his alleged crimes.

Back in Alaska, government watchdog Andree McLeod sued, saying that it should be illegal for the people’s business to be conducted on private email accounts.  Today, Judge Patrick McKay refused to reconsider his ruling stating that it was not forbidden for state business to be conducted on these accounts.  Material on state business should be submitted for archiving, he said, but the rules allow for some interpretation. Room for interpretation.  Hmmm.  It’ll have to be hammered out in the legislature, apparently.

“We realize that under the current law, e-mails that should be preserved can disappear, thus hiding ‘bad motives,’ but it is not this court’s role to overturn an unambiguous, properly enacted law,” McKay wrote.

McLeod’s attorney, Don Mitchell, said Thursday morning that he’d been out of town and hadn’t reviewed the decision. He has said McLeod could appeal to the state Supreme Court.

The attorney for a University of Tennessee student accused of hacking into the account on Wednesday challenged search warrants in the case. Wade Davies, attorney for David C. Kernell, questioned a magistrate’s authority to issue search warrants for Internet companies outside Tennessee.

McLeod and her attorney Don Mitchell are now considering whether to appeal the decision to the Alaska Supreme Court.

And while an army of Palin devotees lauds this ruling as having come down in favor of the almost-one-term ex-governor, the current governor Sean Parnell (R), has at least said:

When executive branch employees conduct state business through email they must, whenever feasible, use the state’s electronic mail system. In some circumstances, employees may need to use, or may inadvertently use, private email accounts to conduct state business….

This statement may prevent future government business from being Palinized, escaping the state’s archiving process, and slipping away into the Yahoo! cyberspace black hole – at least whenever it is “feasible.”  He, unlike the perennial Palin cheering squad, may realize that this isn’t actually a McLeod v. Palin death match.  It’s about issues of transparency and accountability that affect all Alaskans, regardless of political partyaffiliation.  So, until this can be addressed in the legislature, we can hope for ‘feasibility’ – at least until the end of Parnell’s term.

Other questions of legality will be addressed in a courtroom in Knoxville, Tennessee later next month.  That’s when alleged victim Sarah Palin will take the stand and give testimony under oath.  This ought to be interesting.  I wonder how many attorneys out there wish they were Wade Davies, the Tennessee attorney who will be the one asking the questions.  Sources who know say she may be in for a rough day.

Kernell’s defense attorney, Wade Davies, wants Palin to bring any documents relating to that account – when it was opened, how it could be accessed and why and who was allowed to use it.

“I don’t want to get in the position where at the last minute there are questions about whether (subpoenas) were properly delivered,” Davies told U.S. Magistrate Judge Clifford Shirley on Wednesday when seeking the legal OK to electronically serve witnesses, including Palin.

Federal prosecutors have insisted Davies’ records request of Palin is a veiled fishing expedition. Shirley will hear more about the subpoena debate at a March 24 hearing.

So, grab your Sharpies and circle March 24 on your political calendar.  And then circle April 20.  That’s the day of the trial. More news on the Alaska side of this story as it develops.