We’ve had such an overwhelming response to our first article on rumors and myths about Gov. Palin that we’re doing a follow up. Below are myths and rumors, and the facts in response to each of them.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080904/ap_on_el_pr/cvn_fact_checkPALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."
THE FACTS: 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 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."
PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform — not even in the state senate."
THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass 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. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.
PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."
THE FACTS: 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.
MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.
THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state — by population.
MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.
THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's National Guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.
FORMER ARKANSAS GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."
THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.
FORMER MASSACHUSETTS GOV. MITT ROMNEY: "We need change, all right — change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington — throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin."
THE FACTS: A Back-to-the-Future moment. George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, has been president for nearly eight years. And until last year, Republicans controlled Congress. Only since January 2007 have Democrats been in charge of the House and Senate.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — When presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain introduced Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate last Friday, the Arizona senator emphasized her role as the commander in chief of the Alaska National Guard.
Later, when questions were raised about Palin's lack of experience in national and international affairs, the McCain campaign pointed again to her military command experience as governor. Some reporters have tried to follow up.
"Can you tell me one decision that she made as commander in chief of the Alaska National Guard ?" CNN journalist Campbell Brown asked Monday while interviewing McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds . "Just one?"
Bounds couldn't, because Palin has never personally ordered the state guard to do anything.
Instead, here's what he said: "Any decision she has made as the commander of the ( Alaska ) National Guard that's deployed overseas is more of a decision than Barack Obama's been making as he's been running for president for the last two years."
However, the governor has no command authority overseas or anywhere in the United States other than Alaska , said Maj. Gen. Craig Campbell , the service commander of the Alaska National Guard .
"When members of the National Guard are federalized, they work for the president," Campbell said Wednesday. "It's not just overseas. They could be federalized to go to other states or they could even be federalized in the state."
Occasions in which Palin retains command authority over the 4,200-member Alaska National Guard are whenever the Guard responds to in-state natural disasters and civic emergencies, said Campbell, who also serves as the commissioner of the state Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.
Some examples?
"We've deployed individuals in state service all over the state under Sarah Palin ," he said. "We had defense men down in Seward for the (Mount) Marathon run doing security.
"Out west and northwest we had erosion problems, and the National Guard was involved in some of the protection out there. About three days ago, the Army National Guard picked up a lady from Little Diomede (Island) . . . at the request of state troopers."
Did Palin directly approve each of those activities?
No, Campbell said. The governor has granted him the authority to act on his own in most cases, including life-or-death emergencies — when a quick response is required — and minor day-to-day operations.
"Some authorities have been given to me that she has acknowledged that I can execute," he said. "For others I have to ask her each time."
The recent decision to deploy a C-17 cargo plane from the Alaska Air National Guard to Louisiana to assist during the Hurricane Gustav response was an occasion in which Campbell briefed the governor's office and sought its approval, he said. Chief of Staff Mike Nizich signed off on it.
Last year, Palin journeyed abroad to visit 500 members of the Alaska Army National Guard who were stationed in northern Kuwait for 15 months. She also stopped at a U.S. military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, to visit wounded Alaskans, including regular Army troops based at Fort Richardson.
The journey marked the first time that Palin had traveled overseas, according to Sharon Leighow, a spokeswoman in the governor's office.
The flooding that occurred in Fairbanks in late July — for which the Guard sent trucks north to provide clean drinking water — didn't require the governor's approval, Campbell said.
Natural disasters are fairly sporadic, said Jeremy Zidek, the public information officer for the state Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, which is part of Campbell's department.
Last year, during Palin's first year as governor, there wasn't much action, Zidek said. "Thankfully, we didn't have any major disasters."
In 2006, however, during former Gov. Frank Murkowski's last year in office, the Guard assisted at a tragic fire at a schoolhouse and church in Hooper Bay.
The Alaska National Guard receives about 75 percent of its funding from the federal government, Campbell said. All the federal funding is pre-allocated by Congress.
The state maintains Army National Guard bases in 76 locations in Alaska and Air National Guard bases in three locations.
(Bryson reports for the Anchorage Daily News.)
From the Associated Press and Wall Street Journal:
Contrary to rumors, here are the facts of Palin's positions:
GAY RIGHTS
Dec. 30, 2006
Despite her personal views to the contrary, she announced she would accept the state Supreme Court order that the state must provide benefits to same-sex partners. ...
It's unfortunate that the Legislature and Gov. Palin support a million-dollar special advisory election in April to stir up public opinion on prohibiting benefits for same-sex partners of public employees. Less than one-half of one percent of state employees have applied for the benefits, and it certainly seems that Alaska has more important issues to debate than this.
TROOPERGATE FOLLOW-UP
July 24, 2008
If it comes to the point that you have to say, "I am not a sex harasser," then you have no business being the state's top cop. The facts unfolding about new Public Safety Commissioner Chuck Kopp confirm that he is not the person for the job. ...
Gov. Sarah Palin should withdraw the appointment and take time to carefully vet possible replacements before choosing a new commissioner. If she doesn't, the Legislature should reject his appointment.
Kopp was quickly appointed the day after the governor fired Walt Monegan -- and the firing is proving to be a political disaster for Palin in its own right, regardless of who might replace him. For no apparent reason, she sacked a popular career cop with a reputation as a straight shooter.
POLAR BEARS
May 28, 2008
Alaska's political leaders generally condemned the listing of the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
Gov. Sarah Palin joined the deniers and plans to launch a legal counteroffensive. The state will file suit against the listing decision, she says, because the science is "uncertain," "unproven" and "arbitrary." ...
All this oppositional energy and effort is sadly misplaced. Instead of fighting the listing, Alaska's political leaders should be fighting to reduce the threat of global warming.
THE FISCAL RECORD
Aug. 5, 2008
The last time the legislature's spending impulses got so far out of control, Gov. Sarah Palin stepped in to exercise some "adult supervision" with her veto pen.
That probably won't happen again -- because Palin helped start the frenzy.
She floated a plan to give every bona fide Alaskan $1,200 worth of energy debit cards over the next year. Add in electricity subsidies and a holiday on the state's 8-cent-a-gallon gas tax, and Gov. Palin invited lawmakers to spend more than $1 billion.
The party was on.
IS THERE A "PALIN BOUNCE"?
Yes and no. Yes, there was an upsurge in the polling since Palin’s name was placed in nomination, and yes, there has been a strong surge in donations since Palin’s speech on Wednesday evening. Unfortunately for the Republicans, both the polling surge and the strong surge in donations went to the Democrats. In the first 24 hours after Palin’s speech, the Obama campaign
received 8 million dollars in new donations (CNN reports it as $10 million). And the polls are now showing Obama above the 50% mark for the first time, with the more conservative polls showing Obama at 51%, McCain 43%, and one poll showing Obama at 51%, McCain 37%. Yahoo’s Election 08 Political Dashboard shows Obama at 61.8%, McCain at 39.3%, and shows Obama with 311 Electoral Votes, McCain with 224 Electoral Votes (270 needed to win).
DID PALIN GET MORE VOTES THAN JOE BIDEN?
Huckabee told conventioneers and TV viewers that Palin got more votes when she ran for mayor of Wasilla than Biden did running for president. Not even close. The tally: Biden, 79,754, despite withdrawing from the race after the Iowa caucuses. Palin, 909 in her 1999 race, 651 in 1996. (Factcheck.org)
NAKED PHOTOS? HOMEMADE PORN?
There are numerous rumors of naked photos from a Hustler photo spread, and videos of homemade pornography by Sarah Palin. To date, there is no substance to these rumors. Just because a woman is glamorous does not mean she engages in these practices. Such rumors should not be spread without proof in hand.
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