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Friday, January 28, 2022

Send in the GOP Clowns

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It’s politics as usual in Juneau. As Alaska burns, Alaska Republicans bloviate.

We’re staring down the barrel of multibillion-dollar state budget deficits as far into the future as we can see. Are the Republicans majorities in the Legislature acknowledging that their misguided spending and tax policies got us into this fix? Are they prepared to set a new course?

Not bloody likely. Rather than rolling up their sleeves, trying to come up with constructive solutions, they’re trotting out the usual gimmicks to divert public attention from their failures. So, by the lights of legislative leaders, what’s the big problem in Alaska?

President Barack Obama and “federal overreach.”

Why, you might ask, has “federal overreach” become such a crisis in just the last year? For the previous five years – since the inauguration of President Obama — we’ve actually seen unprecedented progress in oil development in the Arctic. For the first time in our history, exploration in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas actually got underway – until Shell Oil ran aground.

Also for the first time, we’re seeing progress in developing the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.

But something happened in November. Something like an election, where we tossed out Sen. Mark Begich – the guy who did more to advance oil development on Alaska’s federal lands and waters than the combination of every Murkowski you can name. But Sen. Lisa Murkowski just had to have a partner who could match her ineffectiveness, so we obliged by putting Capt. Zero’s first lieutenant, Dan Sullivan, into the U.S. Senate. Sullivan campaigned on a platform of “government is bad,” and by golly, he’s doing everything he can to prove he was right.

Back to the “overreach” crisis. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has never been open for development. It’s unlikely that it ever will be open for development. Republicans say this is the fault of Democrats, apparently forgetting that when the U.S. House and Senate had solid Republican majorities, which included the late Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young, and a Republican former oil man named George W. Bush in the White House, they didn’t open ANWR.

I’m sure you recall that Sen. John McCain, Obama’s opponent, opposed opening ANWR.

So was Obama’s recent statement that ANWR should remain a refuge a big shock to Alaska? No. Apparently it just offers the perfect grandstanding opportunity for every Republican without a real idea.

And when they aren’t rewriting Dr. Seuss or butchering “The Cremation of Sam McGee” on the state Senate floor, our legislative geniuses are demonstrating their vision for Alaska’s future by calling for the state to illegally bulldoze a road through a federal wildlife refuge. Now there’s an idea that will put a dent on our state’s biggest challenges.

Need another example of Republican cluelessness in this Legislature? Sen. Charlie Huggins has been complaining about Gov. Bill Walker’s appointment of Bob Doehl as deputy commissioner of the Department of Military & Veterans Affairs. Col. Doehl is a decorated National Guardsman who served for more than 30 years, rising to vice commander of the Air National Guard’s 176th Wing — until he was driven out of the guard for challenging the corruption under Gen. Tom Katkus and went on to work on veteran’s issues for Sen. Begich.

Huggins has been publicly wringing his hands that Doehl is a “political operative” whose appointment involves “politics.”

Let’s take a moment to note that Huggins couldn’t have been more silent if he’d been dead all during the time the guard was turning sexual assault into an intramural sport. Nor did Huggins express any concern about Doehl’s predecessor, McHugh Pierre, a pure political hack (former spokesman for the Alaska Republican Party) with zero military experience.

Fellow, Alaskans, we’re in deep doo-doo and we’ve put control of the Legislature in the hands of people who can’t spell statesmanship, much less practice it. Godspeed, Gov. Walker, you’re gonna need it.

Cross-posted from ADN.com

Comments

comments

Comments
11 Responses to “Send in the GOP Clowns”
  1. Winski says:

    Humm… Sounds like a job for the Vominator !!! Parachute GOP State Explosion and Scorced Earth Specialist, Sam Brownback….into Faurbanks, or Jeaneu or Anchorage and POOF ! The state will be broke by the end of 2015…all the government projects will be closed. Allthe schools will be closed, and you probably loose 65-75 % of you population., the fisheries will be poluted beyond repair, poached for Japanese and Russian fish frye parties, and 6-9 month exports of the rest of the rest of the fish to Asia…

    All fixed !!! No money.. No state roduct. No more oil companies. No booze.. No education. No families.. No NOTHING. ALASASL. ALL GONE. ALL USED UP..Fill up the truck and head back to Kansas. Bye bye Monkey queen. You’r DONE !!

  2. aaqooauk says:

    25yrs ago politicians were walking around with honeybuckets claiming that they are going to put the honeybuckets into the museum,now today they want rural Alaska in the museums,unless of course you have some form of wealth under your toes.

  3. mike from iowa says:

    When you’re right,you’re right,Shane me old piglet. That is Obama as you whitey wingnuts wish he was-as pure ass white as you are. Or are you color blind and stoopid for real?

  4. AKjah says:

    Thank you Ms Shannyn for this piece. I remember maps from the 60’s which depicted ANWR as the “arctic naval oil reserve”. Now why would it not be open for drilling if not for the continuance of that under standing.
    I know it makes no sense for the navy, who are sitting ducks for the advanced missile systems the Russians have developed. But for the most part it is a huge store, one could call an ace in the hole.

    My view of our legislature is a sad one. But cheer up we are too small a state of people to break into more than a few fiefdoms.

  5. mike from iowa says:

    https://marquetteeducator.wordpress.com/2015/02/09/an-open-letter-to-governor-walker/

    Wingnut Wisconsin Wienie Goobernor Scott Walker gets the beatdown of his happy little life from a former Teacher of the Year and she torches his lying shorts about his lies. Great read. and inspirational.as well.

  6. mike from iowa says:

    Thank you Ms Moore for shining more light upon the evil doers of your state. Although your state is much different in many ways from other wingnut ruined strongholds,koch bros agenda is dreadfully monotonously similar in Alaska,Texas,South Dakota,Wisconsin,Ala-damn-bama,Georgia,Florida and …..well ….you know the drill.

    Saw an interesting piece on iowa’s Sinatorial election where,thanks to the koch bros,a first time novice,former KGB agent Joni “Ivana Kuturnutzo” Ernst (wjho claims to be a farm wife with hog castrating experience) had 14 million dollars more in outside of iowa spending than her opponent in a contest that spent nearly 80 million dollars.Kuturnutzov is Ernst’s maiden name.(a friend made that up)

  7. laurainnocal says:

    What a mess. I didn’t even realize that ANYONE wanted ANWR developed. Thought that barn door was closed a decade ago. Is it the intrinsic nature of the geography in AK to be so fractured?

  8. Zyxomma says:

    This is why voting matters. Voting does not take place every four years when the Electoral College (which is an archaic institution from the early days of our republic, when voters were rural and illiterate) picks a POTUS.

    Make sure you’re registered, and vote in every primary and every general, every year.

    • Mo says:

      Every single sane voter in Alaska could turn out and vote, yet still lose to the majority Republican electorate – ignorant, belligerent, poster children for the Dunning-Kruger Effect. [of which a prime specimen can be observed in this site’s devoted hur-hur-hur Tweeter]