Impressive, not impressive... WTF?!

Such was my reaction to the ongoing news today.

Impressive - Ken Salazar.
(from the Anchorage Daily News)

Not impressive - Palin rural advisor John Moller
(from the Fairbanks Daily News Miner)

WTF?! - Palin's latest action regarding her appointment craziness.
(from the ADN)

And I do mean crazy.

Mudflats and Celtic Diva do the best job of summing this up, I think, but let me sum up the Palin madness of late. This being just ONE of the issues she's seem to gone nutty over lately.

State Sen. Kim Elton took a job with the Obama administration, so it's up to Palin to appoint a new senator, which the democratic senators must confirm. The dems only submitted one name to her as a suggestion, a state representative who has spoken out against Palin's actions in the past.

Palin ignores this, and appoints a man who was registered as a republican until just a few weeks before. Naturally, the dems reject him. The Juneau dems submit FOUR names to Palin for consideration. Palin ignores this, and appoints a nice, unknown guy who has never run for public office. Naturally, the dems reject him.

The craziness took a whole new turn today, when Palin, who, by law, must appoint ONE person, "submits" three names to the dems. Just in this, she's not following the law. Need more crazy? TWO of the names are of people the dems have already rejected. The third person is yet another unknown, yet ANOTHER guy who wasn't even registered as a democrat until last month!

Mudflats and Celtic Diva do a better job of how many legal issues (not even taking in the ethical ones!) Palin caused with this latest, most bizarre act.

One of the more mind-numbing parts of this to me is why Palin is getting so frustrated for the dems not choosing her strange choices to represent Juneau, when she's never come up with a good reason for why she's not choosing any of the names the dems submitted. Why are her choices for a voice for Juneau more qualified than those the dems are submitting?

The people of Juneau voted, they voted democrat, and by law they need a democratic replacement. TWO of the names she's submitted weren't even democrats until March. With the end of the legislative session just days away, they have had no voice this session. WTF?

For the other two issues I was following today - or at least heard about - Salazar and Moller.

I removed the embedded video because it automatically started playing a commercial every time the blog was opened... annoying. So, here's the first of the two-part interview KTUU did of Salazar. For the second part, click here, or visit the KTUU site (they have some other coverage as well.)

Ken Salazar is the new Secretary for the Interior. He was up here to talk about oil (and this is the big reason Alaskans care about him right now) and offshore drilling, visiting Dillingham and Anchorage.

Although I'm SURE there's many thousands of Alaskans who will not agree with me here, it was gratifying to see how many Alaskans do. His visit to Dillingham was overwhelmed with local opposition to offshore drilling, and many, many Native people stood up to make sure he knew they opposed it.

So many times we hear the big voices with lots of money behind them, including many Native corporation voices, who are all for drilling and profit. I can understand these positions - jobs and revenue, building communities (though not as much as you'd think) and... well, more money.

But rarely is the local voice heard with much volume, and I'm very glad Salazar took the time to head to Dillingham. He made a point of saying the Dillingham trip was his desire and idea, to visit a rural location (you know, the people who will feel the NEGATIVE effects of oil accidents - because Anchorage sure won't) and hear what they had to say. I cringed to hear him say the ANWR bit (it's not going to happen,) NOT because I support drilling in ANWR, but because I knew at that moment about half of Alaska shut their ears to him. He had some intelligent things to say, very well thought out.

I've had some hope for this guy, as I was down in Colorado where he presented local Native tribes to open up the Democratic National Convention. Because, though I do have interest in the oil part of his job, like all Alaskans, he's also the Secretary over the Bureau of Indian Affairs. I was a little disappointed he didn't get to visit any Native sites or organizations up here, but I'm more glad he crammed Dillingham AND Anchorage into his "one city" visit. I just hope he'll come back to take a look at what we're doing with Native issues, health care, culture, social services, etc. up here soon.

For Moller... sigh.

This is the guy Palin appointed as her rural advisor, and I had some hope as he "describes himself as Alaskan Native" (I don't know what that means) and comes from rural Alaska.

I won't say much about his lackluster interview with the Fairbanks Daily News Miner on Sunday, because most of it was a lot of "I'm not really going to answer that question with anything but 'we'll see.'"

But his subsistence answer was strange to me:

Q: What about subsistence issues?
A: AFN (Alaska Federation of Natives) has had a position on subsistence. It doesn’t align with our constitution. If it’s going to be addressed, it needs to be addressed as a whole, the Legislature and the administration — that’s if it’s going to be addressed.

Uhh....

First... that's not an answer. Second, why are we bringing up the AFN stance? Natives don't all get a vote in the AFN, so it's not the end-all or be-all for Native people. It's an important organization for sure, but ask the average Joe Native what AFN's stance is on subsistence and 9 out of 10 wouldn't be able to tell you. Third... I don't even understand what the last part of that answer means!

So it's snowing on Easter, the volcano is still erupting, earthquakes are shaking my house, and Alaska politics are doing the impossible - getting even nuttier.

Is there a nice, boring state I can hide out in for awhile? Just until I'm sure we're not getting sucked into some wierd 8th dimension of a black hole? Anyone?

_

Alaska villages facing a generational problem

Today at the Alaska Federation of Natives Convention, Alaska Native leaders will be talking about the problem of inmigration. I have heard this covered in various Anchorage Daily News articles and on the local news, but much of the local coverage is focused on the local problems - more stress and impact on Anchorage. Mayor Begich and Superintendent Comeau recently released a letter to Governor Palin regarding the problem. Senator Murkowski had a meeting in Septmeber about it. This coverage and local focus isn't a problem - all politics is local. Mayor Begich yesterday in his newsletter:

Human Service Providers Focus on New Rural Residents.
As evidence mounts of a large number of rural Alaskans moving to Anchorage, Mayor Mark Begich is working with local agencies to improve public services, from affordable housing to food assistance. Begich met with about a dozen Anchorage human service agency officials last week. They reported hundreds of rural Alaskans moving to Anchorage, in part because of skyrocketing energy prices and lack of economic opportunities. The Anchorage School District has more than 420 new rural students and other agencies report increased demand for services. The officials are compiling their new service needs and plan to seek assistance from the State, which provides modest support at best.

And though this is a problem, it doesn't begin to touch the problem in the villages. The stress on the cities may be a problem - MAY, because I can't figure why a huge population increase is a "boom" and measure of progress sometimes, and just a stress on the city in others.

In any case, it is the villages that are really losing on this one. Just in school funding alone, each student lost is lost funding. There are some villages - big villages even - that are now at half the students they were just a few years ago. They are having to shut down classes, buildings, and in one case, at least, the principal of the high school became principal of k-12. Then, with further lost students, the superintendent became the principal. They're losing positions, classes, resources and students left and right. And that's just the effect on the schools, not the rest of the community.

The reasons for the inmigration are many, but the huge influx right now is mostly due to energy costs. Juneau has been fairly notorious lately for its high energy costs. Yet a nearby village's energy costs - after subsidies - is literally eight times the cost. A family in the village will spend several hundred dollars a month on electricity alone. Total energy costs for some families exceed $2,000 a month. Add that to less jobs, and lower paying to begin with, and you've got an energy crisis that is not an inconvenience - it is truly a crisis.

Jobs, leadership, a generation of children - so much is being lost from the villages, yet I think the economic impact is being focused on even more than the long-term effects. The cultural loss, the leadership loss, the impacts of children who might be raised in smaller classrooms with a culturally relevant base who will now be raised in a huge classroom with no cultural base - I can't even begin to cover all the impacts, really.

I don't think we will see the true effects for some years, maybe the next generation. But we have the evidence of the past - and not such a long time ago past - that shows us what can happen when a generation of people is suddenly apart from its cultural base.