Mayor Sarah Palin... God's Will Be Done
* Sarah Palin became Governor of Alaska less than 2 years ago. Sarah Palin claims her arctic state is a "microcosm of America" (ABC interview with Charlie Gibson). No disrespect meant to Alaska, but that's a real stretch.
* As Mayor of a town of about 6000 people, Sarah Palin pulled in $27 million in federal "pork." She increased taxes. She increased the budget from $7.6 million to $13.6 million and put the town into $22 million in debt (Alaska Journal-1, AP-8, Washington Post-12). As an ironic aside, Palin's rationale for digging her tiny town into debt to build a major sports complex (among other things) was that government should be in the business of "preventing social ills" - i.e. the proposed sports facilities would stop teens from getting into drugs, sex and crime (CBS-10, Palin's email to the Wasilla City Council-12). Oh yea, and she began building this huge complex on somebody's private property which turned into a costly legal mess and the City eventually just took it under "eminent domain" powers (Wall Street Journal-7).
* Palin's beloved Wasilla federal pork was publicly attacked at least 3 different times by Senator McCain, in years gone by (LA Times-14). We'll get to her state-level pork requests later.
* When running for Mayor, she allegedly suggested that she'd be the "first christian Mayor." The current Mayor was not an active church guy and his name was John Stein (i.e. sounded Jewish). Even though he was Christian, the implication is that the town needed a "real" christian leader (NY Times-31). A wonderful way to rise to political power.
:) Enjoy this 1995 mayoral campaign ad youtube.com
* As Mayor, one of the first things she did was to spend $50,000 on redecorating her office (without city council approval). When her political mentor, the guy who selected her and groomed her, confronted her on this she allegedly responded that "I'm the mayor, I can do whatever I want until the courts tell me I can't." Yes folks, her own political mentor tells us this, and added: "That's Sarah. She just has no respect for rules and regulations." (Salon-23)
* As Mayor, she didn't actually have the managerial duties that most Mayors do. In Alaska, due to the spread in population, there are "Borough" governments akin to County systems. They take care of planning, fire departments, ambulances, property taxes and stuff like that. Even so, Palin had to hire a city manager to keep her own mess in order. She apparently wasn't all that good at managing what little she had to manage (Salon-23), other than to spend spend spend and raise taxes.
* As Mayor and activist, she sought to install creationists in the government and worked hard to take over a local school board (Salon-28). She also advocated for creationism as a gubernatorial candidate (LA Times-32).
* As Mayor, she told a local minister that she believes "dinosaurs and humans walked the Earth at the same time," some 6000 years ago (Salon-28). Hmmm.
* As Mayor and activist, she pressured a public librarian on censoring books and may have fired her for challenging the notion (Anchorage Daily News-24, ABC TV report-25).
* Under Palin's tenure, Wasilla rape victims were forced to pay for their own forensic evidence kits. This was such an outrage, that the state felt the need to pass a law banning the practice (Anchorage Daily News-30).
* Palin strongly opposes abortion even in cases of rape and incest... even as children (Anchorage Daily News-26). It should be added that the next President is likely to have the opportunity to replace the 2 oldest US Supreme Court justices. Justice Stevens is age 88ish & Justice Ginsberg is age 75ish. Both are progressive. The court already leans right.
* Palin is lying about her fringe Pentecostal background and somewhat alarming affiliations. On August 29th, when asked what church she attended she claimed: "A non-denominational Bible church. I was baptized Catholic as a newborn and then my family started going to non-denominational churches throughout our life." (Time magazine-27). Non-denominational throughout her life? This is a lie. She spent most of her life in a fringe Pentecostal church with views so radical that they are considered heresy by mainstream evangelicals & fundamentalists: faith healing; being possessed by the supernatural holy ghost and speaking in tongues; teaching prophesy & gnosticism; christian theocracy & dominionism, etc. While she did switch to a more non-denominational church in 2002, she maintains strong relations with the fringe Pentecostals: she attends their services when in the capital; she funnels public funds their way; her pentecostal pastor resided over her inauguration as Governor; and, she continues to make appearances at the church. She even recently participated in an anti-witchcraft ceremony they had to bless her new political career - I kid you not, see the video (youtube-29).
* Palin's fringe pentecostal community is a major player in the "Third Wave" dominionist movement (look it up). This is the theological home of "Joel's Army" and you can see for yourself what preachers like Rodney Howard-Browne are about by a simple search for videos which include him calling to take over government and speaking in tongues. They believe the Apocalypse is very soon and that they have special insight into & role within God's plan. Palin's own home church recruits youth to learn how to prophesize (about the coming apocalypse) and how to go out into the world to do God's work. The famous video of her speaking about Iraq being "god's will" was for a graduating class of such recruits. See for yourself (youtube-29)
* She believes in the ability to prophesize about God's Will. She said the Iraq war was "god's will." She also said her proposed Alaskan pipeline was "god's will." (Youtube-21). She also said that there are signs unfolding today and implied that her rise to power in Alaska is something special, having to do with growing up in that Pentecostal church. (Youtube-29).
:) Enjoy this video exploring her pentecostal roots & her sense of prophesy youtube.com
* Sarah Palin has had long-time affiliations with the Alaskan Independence Party (secessionists that don't see Alaska as true part of the USA). Her husband was a formal member of the Party for 7 years. They both attended conventions. Even as Governor, she openly supported the Party. There's even a nice video of her, as Governor, addressing one of their conventions (LA Times-33, Youtube-34).
* Palin does not believe climate change is caused by human behavior (ABC News-35).
:) Enjoy this 1995 video of her gum chewing. god loving Sarah youtube.com
* A judge had to tell Mayor Palin to stop slandering and harassing her sister's ex-husband, in 2005, and that it had risen to the point of being "child abuse" during custody proceedings (Newsweek-43). That's how bad it had become. This happens to be the same guy at the center of the current investigation about her abusing her power as Governor to seek personal vengeance. She continues to slander him in her defense, saying he's "a threat to the first family" (Charlie Gibson interview on ABC, Newsweek-43)). This is problematic, considering that the custody proceedings have yet to end.
* Palin couldn't let go of her small town grudge. Palin's own ethics adviser told her, months ago, to come clean in this investigation of abuse of power (Wall Street Journal-46). The committee running this "Trooper gate" investigation has a majority of Republicans. The Republican state representative from her home town of Wasilla cast the deciding vote to subpoena 13 affiliates of Palin on this matter (AP-44, Anchorage Daily News-42). Palin's response has been to hide behind lawyers, making contradictory claims, telling everybody not to cooperate and to generally stall the investigation (Youtube-47). The investigation has reportedly expanded into other abuses, including illegal compromise of confidential information and perhaps obstruction (AP-45). |
