Forget the Gulf, Tap the Arctic!

Gulf-Arctic Cartoon, originally uploaded by rbtenorio.

In his speech on the Gulf oil spill on Wednesday, President Obama noted that oil companies are running out of options to drill undersea. He said that due to American demand, "oil companies are drilling a mile beneath the surface of the ocean -- because we’re running out of places to drill on land and in shallow water."
Well, Satan has a simple solution for this conundrum: Tap the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He explains this strategy to the president in the latest episode of "The Devil Made Me Blog It."

Sarah Palin and Chanukah

Palin Chanukah Cartoon, originally uploaded by rbtenorio.

We've already heard one Republican's take on Chanukah -- Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah. What words of wisdom might Sarah Palin have to offer? Find out in the latest episode of "The Devil Made Me Blog It"!

Palin's Pipeline to Somewhere

Palin Pipeline Cartoon, originally uploaded by rbtenorio.

We're counting down the days to Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's final day in office, and it seems fair to recognize her biggest project at the helm -- a natural gas pipeline. On board for the job is Exxon Mobil, who we hope will do a far better job than the Exxon Valdez did transporting oil in Alaska on a fateful March day 20 years ago. Read more in "The Devil Made Me Blog It"!

Palin charts path of least assistance

On April 28, the office of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin addressed the $929 million in economic stimulus funds sent from Washington to the Last Frontier. (It could have been more, but she rejected $28.6 million extra.) She said, "I have been clear and consistent about my concerns with accepting economic stimulus funds as our nation incurs tremendous debt." She detailed those concerns: "(We) must acknowledge that these are one-time, temporary funds, that the federal government is deeply in debt, and that we must borrow money from other countries to fund much of government."
It's easy to paint Palin as a maverick here. After all, you could also characterize a tax rebate as a "one-time, temporary fund," but that probably wouldn't stop Americans from accepting it, and it didn't stop President Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, from using it. But when federal aid expands from a $300 tax rebate to a $929 million relief package, some folks start complaining. And whether consciously or not, Palin may be appealing to this constituency, which the president of the American Enterprise Institute characterized as

homeowners who didn't walk away from their mortgages, small business owners who don't want corporate welfare and bankers who kept their heads during the frenzy and don't need bailouts. They were the people who were doing the important things right -- and who are now watching elected politicians reward those who did the important things wrong.

Perhaps Palin will become a leader of this movement as she jockeys for position in the 2012 GOP presidential field. But there are complicating factors. While she urged against federal aid, she welcomed aid from a different source -- the Rev. Franklin Graham, son of evangelical pastor Billy Graham. Some might wonder why she considers it acceptable to welcome private assistance but not public aid, given that the former can fluctuate depending upon the economy. And despite Palin's reluctance on aid from DC, all she could do in the end was distance herself from the state legislature ... which ultimately accepted federal funds.

Frankie Goes to Alaska, Will Chavez Follow?

Last month, Gov. Sarah Palin accompanied the Rev. Franklin Graham, son of famed pastor Billy Graham, on a relief mission to western Alaska. Franklin Graham is president and CEO of a nondenominational evangelical Christian aid organization, Samaritan's Purse, and it was in that capacity that he distributed 7,700 pounds of food (with almost 40,000 more potentially on the way) to needy people in two southwestern villages, Marshall and Russian Mission. Alaska's governor, a potential 2010 Republican nominee for president, wants to see more such efforts.
"Palin says government is not the answer and we should depend more on public-private partnerships to reach out to people in need," KTUU reported.
But will Palin draw the line on certain partnerships, as some of her constituents have done in the past? Three years ago, Alaskans made headlines for refusing offers of another commodity -- oil -- from the Venezuelan state-subsidized company Citgo, shortly after Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez called then-US President George W. Bush "the devil."
"The Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, a native nonprofit organization that would have handled the heating oil donation on behalf of 291 households in Nelson Lagoon, Atka, St. Paul and St. George, rejected the offer because of the insults Chavez has hurled at Bush," Fox News reported.
Since then, Alaska's gotten a new governor (Frank Murkowski was in charge then), America's gotten a new president ... and conditions among the poor in Alaska seem to have stayed as bad as they were three years ago. "For years, Alaska natives have accused the state and federal governments of sending too little money to their tiny, far-flung communities, where fuel and grocery prices are bloated by the high costs of delivery by plane and barge," Fox noted during the Chavez controversy. And even though Palin and Graham brought food last month, "the village of Marshall says it needs more long-term solutions," KTUU reported. "The high cost of fuel has made it a harsh winter."
We shall see whether the situation gets dire enough for Palin to welcome Chavez to the Last Frontier.

(Hat tip to my Ohio source who mentioned Alaskans' rejection of Chavez.)

Palin's Progress

Guess who else gave a front-and-center speech recently? Former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin!
While she and Sen. John McCain couldn't get elected to the first and second highest offices in the country last fall, Palin remains governor of Alaska. It was in that capacity that she spoke on Jan. 22 -- two days after the man she and McCain lost to in November, Barack Obama, delivered his inaugural address as our nation's 44th president.
I don't think Palin received nearly as much press coverage giving her State of the State address as Obama did on the National Mall. But in the midst of some tasteless remarks to The Hill, conservative pundit Ann Coulter predicts Palin will stay a force in the Republican Party, and so do I. So what can we glean from Palin's speech?

• Vivid imagery. Palin bookends her plan for Alaska with stirring symbols of her state. "Today, when challenges may seem as high as Mt. McKinley, and change as constant as the mighty Yukon flows, and political events send shockwaves through our foundation like the ’64 quake – what do Alaskans do?" she asks. "We climb Denali, we forge the river, we rebuild a stronger foundation on higher ground." And for those who liked her pit-bull-with-lipstick remarks at the Republican National Convention, she now compares herself to a grizzly bear and Alaskans to musk oxen. "Just like our musk ox, they circle up to protect their future when they are challenged," she says. "We’ve got to do the same."
• Experience. On the campaign trail, Palin drew criticism for her lack of experience, as the Democratic vice-presidential nominee, Joe Biden, brought a 30-year Senate career to his ticket. And indeed, Palin has only held office as governor since Dec. 2006. Yet her speech showed that she has experience on the state, national, and even international levels. "We’re building viable personal use and commercial fisheries in some of the most controversial and complex fisheries in the world, dealing with half a dozen foreign countries, including Japan, Russia and Canada," she trumpeted. Why couldn't she have told that to Katie Couric instead of saying she could see Russia from her backyard?
• Props to evangelicals. Those of us who know our Bible will recognize the following allusion. "Unfortunately," Prophet Palin says, "some focus only on potential obstacles when they discuss projects like the gasline: the giants in the land preventing us from gathering fruit. But as I recall, we’ve already slain a few giants." Sounds like Palin knows her Book of Numbers. In Chapter 13, Moses, prompted by the LORD, sends 12 spies into the Promised Land with orders to "bring of the fruit of the land." Instead, many of these spies report that Canaan contains "the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight." If Palin can connect a gasline to Scripture, think of what she can do with national issues!

So, does this speech -- and her timely establishment of a political action committee, SarahPAC -- represent another step toward Palin's own Promised Land in Washington, DC? We'll see. But it looks like she's making this journey thoughtfully. Moses never made it to Canaan ... but then again, he never thought of setting up a PAC on the way there.