Fighting Back with Truth
Now that Sarah Palin has taken the gloves off with her sarcastic-laden speech with very little details as to what she and McCain will do for this country, we would be wise to take a look at her record. She touted her experience as a mayor being “something like a community organizer only with responsibility.” So let’s see what she was responsible for:
As Mayor
During her term in office, Palin cut property taxes and other small taxes on business. But as the Anchorage Daily News points out, “She wasn’t doing this by shrinking government.” During her tenure, the budget of Wasilla (population 5,469 in 2000) “apart from capital projects and debt, rose from $3.9 million in fiscal 1996 to $5.8 million.”
Palin also successfully pushed through a sales tax increase in Wasilla, which went to fund a $15 million sports complex. However, a land dispute over the sight of the complex led to “years of legal wrangling” and cost Wasilla almost $1.7 million, “a lot more than the roughly $125,000 the city would have paid in 1998 if it had closed a deal to buy the property outright.” Wasilla is still facing budget shortfalls from the case today.
When Palin left office in 2002, Wasilla had “racked up nearly $20 million in long-term debt,” or roughly $3,000 of debt per resident.
As a Reformer
As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the a largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."
Note: She may have rejected the “bridge to nowhere” but kept the funds!!!!
She is currently under investigation for abusive power. It’s something she is prone to do as she fired individuals whom she felt didn’t support her while mayor of Wasilla. Considering what the Bush administration did to the Justice Department, this is not a good sign.
Advocate for family and children
She claims that parents with special needs children will have an advocate and friend in the White House. Well, as governor, she cut funds for special needs education from $8.26 million to $3.15 million. That’s a great friend to have, in a ‘hunting buddy of Dick Cheney’ kind of way.
Lies, Lies and more Lies
Major legislation by Obama: legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year.
Obama on Taxes
The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded.
Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families.
He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.
In conclusion
Obama’s main charge about McCain is that he represents another four years of Bush/Cheney. We know that McCain is with Bush 90% of the time. McCain has tried to distance himself from the Bush legacy. However, he now has Bush cronies running his campaign, he believes in Bush’s approach to the economy and on how the war should be conducted. He has a neo-con partisan on the ticket with him. So what’s the difference between Bush/Cheney and McCain/Palin – lipstick!!!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/04/ap-attacks-praise-stretch_n_123771.html
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/3/163229/8631/847/584963
2:05 PM There was some character attacks at the DNC too, let's be honest, that's just politics I suppose so I generally don't pay it any mind. Since both sides do it, I usually call it a "wash".
As far as getting specific about policy, I was able to get the gist of what their plans were and she did talk about their energy policy, a key issue, in a specific way.
I won't address the rest concerning her term in office, but will say that Palin's record is obviously sufficiently conservative to garner support of the McCain ticket and wake the Republican base from the election-season slumber, so Obama supporters should be on their guard.
I am also not convinced that going after Palin is the best strategy. The constant comparison between VP candidate Palin and Presidential candidate Obama, something we have been forced into by the "experience" issue, is very lop-sided and in a way has made the whole race either "Palin vs. Obama" or "Palin vs. Biden". This doesn't server either side very well in my opinion.
I think McCain needs to do well at the RNC tonight to get his name back into people's minds, not just yard signs. He needs to take credit for the Palin pick and get specific about policy, because Rudy and Sarah "Pit Bull" Palin did the dirty work of calling Obama out on his experience.
3:04 PM I'm not trying to compare her record to Obama's. I'm just comparing her record to her rhetoric. I think it's only right that we point out her LIES. But yes, the focus must get back to McCain. He will have to put out a vision for the country. Without it, he will be left to the shadow on Palin whom I suspect has already started the countdown to the day she runs for President.
And you are right, her record is conservative. She left office with a deficit, is under investigation for ethics violation - so yes she is Conservative.
5:29 PM LOL! Nice shot! Didn't see that coming...
7:22 AM james - i came here from dee's blog...I just had to say how proud I was of you last night re: the Bears! Brought tears to my eyes to see your power in play. You ARE going to get them to the SuperBowl! Thank you! ;)
(kelli fm www.meinplace.com)
7:35 AM kelli,
thank you very much. people thought i forgot to take my medication when i picked the bears to beat the colts.
super bowl, baby!!!!
10:50 PM James you are from Chicago and you want to accuse Palin of corruption and inefficiency in government???
Daley
Rezko
Farrakhan
Ayers
Dohrn
Wright
BTW, if Jeremiah hates whitey so much and according to your ilk we are the devil why did he have an affair with a married white woman???
Since we are on that topic, let's talk about Barry's daddy...
24 year old Barack Obama, Sr. who impregnated a 17 yr. old girl before they were married only to leave them a couple of years later for Harvard.
Sr. was married with children back in Kenya (wasn't a goat herder either), he went on to marry another couple of women, have about 8 kids, as well as mistresses...wow, he should have been an NBA player!!!
He was a bigamist, a drunk, wife beater and above all a Socialist...let's not forget PM Raila Odinga, Barry's cousin, who has a son named Fidel and is trying to implement Sharia in Kenya.
You scumbags are looking for an October surprise in Alaska, you are clueless about the Trooper Gate investigation but your buddy Rezko pleads out in late October, and has been seen in meetings with the DA....
You are a coward just like your Muslim master, Barack Hussein Obama, who is willing to go out and bootlick his heroes:
Raul Castro
Hugo Chavez
Ahmedinejad
Hamas
Hezbollah
UBL
Saudi Arabia
Palestinians
6:48 PM James, do you have a response???
Sorry, you are probably celebrating today with Jeremiah Wright, Ayers, Louis Farrakhan!!!!
Your Muslim interloper master was on CNN, getting softballs and, as usual, acting centrist and contradicting himself,,,,
Ugh, Ugh, Ugh, sorry above my pay grade....
This is a joke....we will resist socialism, we will resist Sharia, we will resist your thug...
2:02 PM Dear carlos,
That is the funniest parody of an unhinged, mouthbreathing, idiotarian Gooper I've ever read.
Thank for a good belly laugh today.
3:20 PM Carlos,
I have a job so there are long periods where I do not have an opportunity to come here. Besides, you didn't really say anything worth responding to.
5:57 PM James, I am surprised you even bothered with Carlos, a perfect picture of a sunny, positive, loving GOP person if I've ever read one!
But hey, you left out Palin increasing the fee/tax on oil companies to pay Alaska citizens for the right use Alaska oil to make millions of bucks.
Isn't that in effect, a windfall profits tax?
And if so, why is it not also good for the people of Texas, or anywhere else to be able to do the same?
After all, it is our oil as citizens isn't it?
just askin' is all.
d.
7:21 AM Hey James, off topic a little here but I am working on a future post.
Is stretching the truth politically lying?
Straight up yes or no.
No Obama or McCain comparisons.
7:43 AM dave, i'll make sure i comment on that.