Sarah Palin lies

Record Contradicts Palin's 'Bridge' Claims

Wall Street Journal
September 9, 2008

The Bridge to Nowhere argument isn't going much of anywhere.

Despite significant evidence to the contrary, the McCain campaign continues to assert that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin told the federal government "thanks but no thanks" to the now-famous bridge to an island in her home state.

The McCain campaign released a television advertisement Monday morning titled "Original Mavericks." The narrator of the 30-second spot boasts about the pair: "He fights pork-barrel spending. She stopped the Bridge to Nowhere."

Gov. Palin, who John McCain named as his running mate less than two weeks ago, quickly adopted a stump line bragging about her opposition to the pork-barrel project Sen. McCain routinely decries.

But Gov. Palin's claim comes with a serious caveat. She endorsed the multimillion dollar project during her gubernatorial race in 2006. And while she did take part in stopping the project after it became a national scandal, she did not return the federal money. She just allocated it elsewhere.

Why is this one issue such a big deal? Sen. McCain's anti-earmarks stance has been paramount to his campaign. The Arizona senator has blamed everything from the Minneapolis bridge collapse to Hurricane Katrina on Congress's willingness to stuff bills full of pork barrel spending.

As such, Gov. Palin's image as a "reformer" is part of the storyline the McCain campaign needs to complement the top of its ticket.

Sen. McCain regularly charges that Sen. Obama has requested nearly a billion dollars in earmarks. Sen. Obama's actual total for his four years in office is slightly lower at $860 million, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, which does not include $78 million for projects that were of national interest and requested by many lawmakers. Sen. Obama did not request any earmarks for fiscal year 2009. For her part, on behalf of the State of Alaska, Gov. Palin has requested $453 million over her two years in office. That does not include any requests made by the Alaska Railroad or the University of Alaska.

Still, Brandon?

What she was saying... over and over again until recently... is that she had said "Thanks but no thanks to that Bridge to Nowhere." That's just not true.

If anything, she said "please??" and then when Congress said no she said "fine, but thanks for the money!" Which she kept.

That's the short version -- if you're actually still arguing that it's not a flat-out lie I'm happy to do a longer version. It's been a couple of days though (just saw this) and I'll see if you have recognized that it's a lie yet first.

Meanwhile, new lies (Palin or McCain? Not clear who lied more but will put it here since it's ABOUT Palin):

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/09/she-lied-about.html

...Former Gov. Frank Murkowski in his recommended budget to Gov. Sarah Palin included $195 million for Ketchikan’s bridges. That proposed funding is not in Palin’s recommended budget.

The project has been criticized nationally as a “road to nowhere.”

In 2005, Congress stripped off earmarks of federal funds for the Gravina bridge but sent the $223 million to the state. Much of that money was diverted to other state projects. Only $91 million of federal receipts was left for the Gravina Island bridge in the state’s FY07 enacted capital budget.

Charles Fedullo, Palin’s deputy press secretary, said there is not money in Palin’s capital budget for the project at this time.

“The governor introduced the base capital budget with projects only that would leverage additional federal dollars,” Fedullo said....

...She also took some bold steps, such as canceling the Gravina bridge project, derided nationally as a "Bridge to Nowhere," a move that alienated some in Ketchikan, one of Southeast Alaska's most Republican communities...

Brandon - your take on the issue seems to be in conflict with that of the Wall Street Journal (hardly a lefty rag):

Quote:

Record Contradicts Palin's 'Bridge' Claims

Wall Street Journal
September 9, 2008

The Bridge to Nowhere argument isn't going much of anywhere.

Despite significant evidence to the contrary, the McCain campaign continues to assert that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin told the federal government "thanks but no thanks" to the now-famous bridge to an island in her home state.

The McCain campaign released a television advertisement Monday morning titled "Original Mavericks." The narrator of the 30-second spot boasts about the pair: "He fights pork-barrel spending. She stopped the Bridge to Nowhere."

Gov. Palin, who John McCain named as his running mate less than two weeks ago, quickly adopted a stump line bragging about her opposition to the pork-barrel project Sen. McCain routinely decries.

But Gov. Palin's claim comes with a serious caveat. She endorsed the multimillion dollar project during her gubernatorial race in 2006. And while she did take part in stopping the project after it became a national scandal, she did not return the federal money. She just allocated it elsewhere.

The WSJ article points out that the anti-earmarks message is at the heart of the McCain campaign:

Quote:

Why is this one issue such a big deal? Sen. McCain's anti-earmarks stance has been paramount to his campaign. The Arizona senator has blamed everything from the Minneapolis bridge collapse to Hurricane Katrina on Congress's willingness to stuff bills full of pork barrel spending.

As such, Gov. Palin's image as a "reformer" is part of the storyline the McCain campaign needs to complement the top of its ticket.

But then it compares the actual records of Palin and Obama on soliciting earmarks - and keep in mind here that Illinois has a population 19 times the size of Alaska's:

Quote:

Sen. McCain regularly charges that Sen. Obama has requested nearly a billion dollars in earmarks. Sen. Obama's actual total for his four years in office is slightly lower at $860 million, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, which does not include $78 million for projects that were of national interest and requested by many lawmakers. Sen. Obama did not request any earmarks for fiscal year 2009. For her part, on behalf of the State of Alaska, Gov. Palin has requested $453 million over her two years in office. That does not include any requests made by the Alaska Railroad or the University of Alaska.

sozobe wrote:

Still, Brandon?

What she was saying... over and over again until recently... is that she had said "Thanks but no thanks to that Bridge to Nowhere." That's just not true.

If anything, she said "please??" and then when Congress said no she said "fine, but thanks for the money!" Which she kept.

That's the short version -- if you're actually still arguing that it's not a flat-out lie I'm happy to do a longer version. It's been a couple of days though (just saw this) and I'll see if you have recognized that it's a lie yet first.

Meanwhile, new lies (Palin or McCain? Not clear who lied more but will put it here since it's ABOUT Palin):

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/09/she-lied-about.html

Yes, as difficult as it is to believe, I still haven't accepted the undeniable truth of your position. I'll reproduce a few quotations of I posted earlier in this thread:

From 3/31/2007:

Quote:

...Former Gov. Frank Murkowski in his recommended budget to Gov. Sarah Palin included $195 million for Ketchikan’s bridges. That proposed funding is not in Palin’s recommended budget.

The project has been criticized nationally as a “road to nowhere.”

In 2005, Congress stripped off earmarks of federal funds for the Gravina bridge but sent the $223 million to the state. Much of that money was diverted to other state projects. Only $91 million of federal receipts was left for the Gravina Island bridge in the state’s FY07 enacted capital budget.

Charles Fedullo, Palin’s deputy press secretary, said there is not money in Palin’s capital budget for the project at this time.

“The governor introduced the base capital budget with projects only that would leverage additional federal dollars,” Fedullo said....

http://www.constructionequipmentguide.com/story.asp?story=8393&headline=Alaska%20Increases%20Project%20Costs%20for%20Ketchikan%20Bridge

and from 12/16/2007:

Quote:

...She also took some bold steps, such as canceling the Gravina bridge project, derided nationally as a "Bridge to Nowhere," a move that alienated some in Ketchikan, one of Southeast Alaska's most Republican communities...

http://alaskalegislature.com/stories/121607/leg_20071216020.shtml

Therefore, even if she supported the thing at some early point, she did indeed turn against it and refuse to fund it. Therefore, when she claims to have rejected the project, she is being truthful.

Of course, everyone knows that McCain and Palin are evil liars, and Obama and Biden are Christ-like saviors.

...Former Gov. Frank Murkowski in his recommended budget to Gov. Sarah Palin included $195 million for Ketchikan’s bridges. That proposed funding is not in Palin’s recommended budget.

As to the matter of the "bridge to nowhere," the two contemporaneous quotations about the issue which I have now posted twice in this thread demonstrate that Governor Palin is simply stating a fact when she claims to have refused to fund the bridge.

"The last straw," her lawyer argued, came when he planned a trip to Washington, D.C., to seek federal funds for an aggressive anti-sexual-violence program. The project, expected to cost from $10 million to $20 million a year for five years, would have been the first of its kind in Alaska, which leads the nation in reported forcible rape.

The McCain-Palin campaign echoed the charge in a press release it distributed Monday, concurrent with Palin's legal filing. "Mr. Monegan persisted in planning to make the unauthorized lobbying trip to D.C.," the release stated.

But the governor's staff authorized the trip, according to an internal travel document from the Department of Public Safety, released Friday in response to an open records request.

Note -- the Palin campaign does have an answer. It says that the trip was authorized in a general way but that the specifics weren't authorized. It all seems pretty suspect to me, but it seems to be a "hmm" rather than an outright "busted" at this point.

Sec. 39.20.140. Travel costs and travel outside the state.

(a) The Department of Administration may not pay an official or employee for per diem or transportation costs unless the travel is clearly necessary to benefit the state.

* * *
e) Every official and employee shall, unless otherwise authorized by law to travel outside the state, obtain prior approval for travel outside the state from the head of the official's or employee's department or from an immediate supervisor, or from the Department of Administration if the official or employee is not within a department or is not under the direct supervision of an official or supervisor.

Palin's Latest Smear

The McCain campaign has been running misleading commercials using a portion of of an Obama quote -- "just air-raiding villages and killing civilians" -- to sow doubts about Obama's patriotism. Today, Sarah Palin took the deception a step farther, accusing Obama of having said that American soldiers "target [italics mine] and kill civilians in Afghanistan." NBC's First Read reports Palin's quote without correcting it.

What Obama actually said was this: "We've got to get the job done there, and that requires us to have enough troops so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians, which is causing enormous pressure over there." The point was clear and obvious. Without enough troops on the ground, we're reduced to using too many airstrikes, which creates more civilian casualties and damages our standing. No sane person would disagree. And to claim that Obama charged troops with targeting civilians is a straightforward lie.

--Jonathan Chait

It not only ignores logic, but it supports the evidence that they are liars who wish to "steal" the highest office of our land.

As to "winking," it must be nice to be able to call a person a liar without ever having to give a single verifiable instance of the person telling a lie.

Or, to reply to you in your own way, I can say that after reviewing your posts from the past few years, I am very disappointed to see that you wink at falsehoods. Don't you know that honesty is the best policy? I hope you'll re-think your dishonest behavior.