She DID NOT flip on the bridge to nowhere, you cannot show any credible evidence that she did, the official record shows that she refused the money... you made the accusation, but you cannot back it up... show me any legitimate official record where she did not refuse the money...
Read the article GZ...for Pete's sake. The down payment for the bridge was already in the Alaska State Treasury. It's still there....She did not send it back.She supported the bridge in Ketchican when running for Governor. Then she didn't any more.
The money from congress stays and wasn't sent back.
Now, should she have? It's basically free money authorized by Congress but with no distinct earmark, as before. So it can be used for other projects. But please, please, don't make it look like she fought against that bridge from day one and then when her opposition was sustained by the public outcry took the money and sent it back to Washington D.C. and said: (as she claimed in her first speech) "If Alaskans want a bridge, we'll build it outselves".
Well, maybe they will end up building it themselves...but she kept the downpayment on that particular earmark.
From the article, and not denied by the Alaska State Treasurer:
Congress eventually removed the earmark language but the money still went to Alaska, leaving it up to the administration of then-Gov. Frank Murkowski to decide whether to go ahead with the bridges or spend the money on something else.
In September, 2006, Palin showed up in Ketchikan on her gubernatorial campaign and said the bridge was essential for the town’s prosperity.
She said she could feel the town’s pain at being derided as a "nowhere" by prominent politicians, noting that her home town, Wasilla, had recently been insulted by the state Senate president, Ben Stevens.
"OK, you’ve got valley trash standing here in the middle of nowhere," Palin said, according to an account in the Ketchikan Daily News. "I think we’re going to make a good team as we progress that bridge project."
One year later, Ketchikan’s Republican leaders said they were blindsided by Palin’s decision to pull the plug.
Palin spokeswoman Sharon Leighow said Saturday that as projected costs for the Ketchikan bridge rose to nearly $400 million, administration officials were telling Ketchikan that the project looked less likely. Local leaders shouldn’t have been surprised when Palin announced she was turning to less-costly alternatives, Leighow said. Indeed, Leighow produced a report quoting Palin, late in the governor’s race, indicating she would also consider alternatives to a bridge.
Andrew Halcro, who ran against Palin in 2006, told the Associated Press Saturday that Palin changed her views after she was elected to make a national splash. |
