Palin’s Alaska National Guard aviation units among ‘the most poorly staffed in the nation.’
Palin’s Alaska National Guard aviation units among ‘the most poorly staffed in the nation.’
In a interview yesterday with ABC News, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) “has been in charge [of the Alaska National Guard] and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities.” But the Associated Press reports today that under Palin’s leadership, the Alaska National Guard has experienced a “crisis level” personnel shortage:
[S]ix months ago, Air Force Maj. Gen. Craig Campbell, the Alaska Guard’s top officer, warned in an internal memo that “missions are at risk.” The lack of qualified airmen, Campbell said, “has reached a crisis level.”
The situation has improved since the March 1 memo was written, Campbell said Wednesday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press — but not enough to eliminate his concern that shortages will result in the “burnout” of troops the Guard already has.
More on Palin’s record in The Sarah Palin Digest.
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Notice any parallels?
Heed the warning ladies and gentleman!
September 4th, 2008 at 7:49 pmPalin’s got a state with a 1,400 mile border with Canada (the US border with Mexico is 1,800 total miles) and endless international coastline close to Russia.
How does Palin feel about defending US borders?
Sounds like the Alask Air National Guard isn’t going to be doing much guarding of the nation…
Will she advocate a wall along the 1,400 miles of border with Canada?
September 4th, 2008 at 7:51 pmThe gift that just keeps on giving….
September 4th, 2008 at 7:55 pmHere’s what people who KNOW Sarah Palin have to say:
Dear friends,
So many people have asked me about what I know about Sarah Palin in the
last 2 days that I decided to write something up . . .
Basically, Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton have only 2 things in
common: their gender and their good looks. :)
You have my permission to forward this to your friends/email contacts
with my name and email address attached, but please do not post it on
any websites, as there are too many kooks out there . . .
Thanks,
Anne
ABOUT SARAH PALIN
I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992.
Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a
first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her
father was my child’s favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a
first name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more
City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the
residents of the city.
She is enormously popular; in every way she’s like the most popular
girl in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice and
won’t vote for her can’t quit smiling when talking about her because
she is a “babe”.
It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She
kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents
for seven months.
She is “pro-life”. She recently gave birth to a Down’s syndrome baby.
There is no cover-up involved, here; Trig is her baby.
She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.
She is savvy. She doesn’t take positions; she just “puts things out
there” and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.
Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a
champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palin’s kind of job is highly
sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his
work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or
so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their
major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever been anything
like that of native Alaskans.
Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters.
She’s smart.
Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000
(at the time), and less than 2 years as governor of a state with about
670,000 residents.
During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running
this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been
pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had
gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings which had
given rise to a recall campaign.
Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a “fiscal conservative”. During her 6
years as Mayor, she increased general government expenditures by over
33%. During those same 6 years the amount of taxes collected by the
City increased by 38%. This was during a period of low inflation
(1996-2002). She reduced progressive property taxes and increased a
regressive sales tax which taxed even food. The tax cuts that she
promoted benefited large corporate property owners way more than they
benefited residents.
The huge increases in tax revenues during her mayoral administration
weren’t enough to fund everything on her wish list though, borrowed
money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero debt, but left it
with indebtedness of over $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage
the voters to borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said
she supported? The sewage treatment plant that the city lacked? or a
new library? No. $1m for a park. $15m-plus for construction of a
multi-use sports complex which she rushed through to build on a piece
of property that the City didn’t even have clear title to, that was
still in litigation 7 yrs later–to the delight of the lawyers
involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the
community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she claimed it
would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5m for road projects that
could have been done in 5-7 yrs without any borrowing.
While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office
redecorated more than once.
These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city.
As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus
in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will
make us energy independent and increase efficiency, as Governor she
proposed distribution of this surplus to every individual in the state.
In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she
recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects, even while
she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend today’s
surplus, borrow for needs.
She’s not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas
or compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren’t generated by
her or her staff. Ideas weren’t evaluated on their merits, but on the
basis of who proposed them.
While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected
City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing from
the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents
rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin’s
attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew
her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the
Librarian are on her enemies list to this day.
Sarah complained about the “old boy’s club” when she first ran for
Mayor, so what did she bring Wasilla? A new set of “old boys”. Palin
fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the City and as
Governor she hired or elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people,
creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally
grateful and fiercely loyal–loyal to the point of abusing their power
to further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the
case of pressuring the State’s top cop (see below).
As Mayor, Sarah fired Wasilla’s Police Chief because he “intimidated”
her, she told the press. As Governor, her recent firing of Alaska’s top
cop has the ring of familiarity about it. He served at her pleasure
and she had every legal right to fire him, but it’s pretty clear that
an important factor in her decision to fire him was because he wouldn’t
fire her sister’s ex-husband, a State Trooper. Under investigation
for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than 2 dozen
contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that she
later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to
replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded
for sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew
her support.
She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in
help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town
introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council
became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She
abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn’t
like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.
Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything
publicly about her.
When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got
the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one
of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no
background in oil & gas issues. Within months of scoring this great
job which paid $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the
high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the
structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this
Commission (who was also the State Chair of the Republican Party)
engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some
undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all
her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and
garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a
gutsy fighter against the “old boys’ club” when she dramatically quit,
exposing this man’s ethics violations (for which he was fined).
As Mayor, she had her hand stuck out as far as anyone for pork from
Senator Ted Stevens. Lately, she has castigated his pork-barrel
politics and publicly humiliated him. She only opposed the “bridge to
nowhere” after it became clear that it would be unwise not to.
As Governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget
guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing
projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative
action restored most of these projects–which had been vetoed simply
because she was not aware of their importance–but with the unobservant
she had gained a reputation as “anti-pork”.
She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The State party
leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated
them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a
fiscal conservative.
Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah.
They call her “Sarah Barracuda” because of her unbridled ambition and
predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly
stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made
point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah’s
mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and
experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.
As Governor, she stepped outside of the box and put together of package
of legislation known as “AGIA” that forced the oil companies to march
to the beat of her drum.
Like most Alaskans, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge. She has questioned if the loss of sea ice is linked to
global warming. She campaigned “as a private citizen” against a state
initiaitive that would have either a) protected salmon streams from
pollution from mines, or b) tied up in the courts all mining in the
state (depending on who you listen to). She has pushed the State’s
lawsuit against the Dept. of the Interior’s decision to list polar
bears as threatened species.
McCain is the oldest person to ever run for President; Sarah will be a
heartbeat away from being President.
There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more
knowledgeable and experienced than she.
However, there’s a lot of people who have underestimated her and are
regretting it.
from The Washinton Independent
September 4th, 2008 at 8:00 pmOh, man, I hate to say this but…..
Cheap shot.
Army Aviation has an overall good retention rate, but there are key personnel shortages across the board, especially in rated commissioned officers. And, unlike California or New York or Georgia, Alaska’s not prime recruiting ground for aviators – there are a lot of bush pilots, but military pilots are in shorter supply.
I’d love for this to be a good example of Palin’s failure, but unfortunately it’s structural within the system.
September 4th, 2008 at 8:03 pmGood point, Hemlock, but why then are they pointing to her ‘commander in chiefyness’ by framing her as the AANG commandant?
September 4th, 2008 at 8:13 pmsatirev, do you have a link for that article about the intellectually challenged Sarah?
September 4th, 2008 at 9:09 pmA suggestion: Put a link up on the SP Digest page to Steve Benen’s list of McCain’s flip-flops at The Carpetbagger Report. It would be useful to have all the idiocy available in one location.
September 4th, 2008 at 9:32 pm“Members of the Alaska Army and Air Guard have been sent to Iraq, Afghanistan, the Horn of Africa and other overseas locations before and since Palin was sworn in as governor in December 2006. They’ve handled duties ranging from training the Afghan National Army to communications support. When on these federal missions, National Guard troops are under the command of the Defense Department and not their governors.”
(No mention was made in article about how much Alaska Army and Air Guard equipment has been deployed overseas along with guard personnel. Many states are facing shortfalls in guard personnel and equipment, especially with so many being put under the command of the Defense Department and shipped overseas. Also, the regular military is having a serious retention problem where officers are concerned. I figure state national guard units, especially those tapped regularly for overseas duty, are facing the same problem.)
And…
“As for his promotion, Campbell said that following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, governors around the country became concerned the president could call Guard members to federal service for a state emergency without the governor’s consent. That raised the possibility the troops would not be controlled by the governor.”
The article also fails to mention that the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress, about one year after Hurricane Katrina (and Louisiana Gov. Blanco’s refusal to turn over control of her state’s national guards units –and her state’s security– to the Bush administration), passed a bill which Bush signed giving Bush the authority, in case of an emergency (as declared by him), to bypass state governors and federalize all security in their state.
All fifty state governors, both Republicans and Democrats, vehemently protested this anti-U.S. Constitution, anti-states’ rights legislation before it was passed and signed into law, but to no avail.
Thus, during Hurricane Gustav, Bush federalized the federal disaster relief, with the U.S. Northern Command running the show…with none of the state governors in the path of Gustav having any control over their state’s security, their state’s national guard…kind of like the statement in the first paragraph above: “When on these federal missions, National Guard troops are under the command of the Defense Department and not their governors,” no longer just limited to overseas duty assignments, but here at home, in our own backyard, making it possible for federal troops to flood into any state (over the objections of any state governor)…or with security contracted out to crony Republican “security” companies like Blackwater (once again bypassing any state’s governor in the process).
September 4th, 2008 at 9:46 pmOh, and to make a comparison:
What Bush, Cheney and the Republican-controlled Congress did (relative to the state governors and their control over their state’s national guard units and state security in case of an emergency) reminds me of how things were done in the old Soviet Union, the USSR.
The Bush/Cheney administration has been/is like the Kremlin.
The Republican-controlled Congress back in 2006 was like the Soviet Politburo…rubber-stamping everything the Kremlin ordered done.
The Eastern Bloc “soviet socialist republics” during the lifetime of the USSR were kind of like our own states, and the leaders, and citizens, of these “soviet socialist republics” were treated the same way the Bush/Cheney administration (Kremlin) and the Republican-controlled Congress (Soviet Politburo) has been treating our own states in the U.S., heavy-handed, bypassing state governors, illegal wiretapping without warrants, etc. etc. etc..
Gee, I hadn’t realized that after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the tearing down of the Berlin Wall that a bunch of Republicans, mainly the neo-con ones, turned into a bunch of Communists. Go figure.
September 4th, 2008 at 10:03 pm