Palin is a very clever distraction.

Foxfyre wrote:

I also have no problem with those who do not share my views on a personal level. I do not want those who share my views or those who do not share my views forcing their personal views on me at any level.

On a political level, I do not require that a candate share my views on a personal level so long as he or she understands basic constitutional principles, appreciates and defends the best of our traditional values that have made our nation a great nation, governs according to the rule of law, and appoints judges who base their rulings on Constitutional principle and the law.

I've been a member of this forum over 4 years, and your words are not true. You want your party in power precisely so you can pack the SC with those who share your ideology and thus impose your ideology on the rest of us.

Debra Law wrote:

Palin is a moron.

And yet she is much smarter than Obama.

Last year, former Gov. Frank Murkowski settled in principle with BP, Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips on fiscal terms " taxes and royalties " for producing the North Slope gas.

It would have frozen oil taxes for 30 years and gas taxes for up to 45 years for the three major oil companies.

Still, last year's deal did not guarantee a pipeline would get built; the hope was it would enable producers to move forward with a pipeline.

The line would ultimately have delivered 4.5 billion cubic feet (130 million cubic meters) of natural gas a day, which is about 7 percent of the current U.S. demand.

But state lawmakers felt the deal had too many giveaways for big firms, including locking in the tax rates, and stripped the state of its sovereignty and constitutional powers. The Legislature never voted on the deal.

That led Palin, who took office last December, and her administration to chart a different course in January. Rather than negotiate with one group, her plans called for new guidelines designed to stimulate competition among oil and pipeline companies.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22044490/

On a political level, I do not require that a candate share my views on a personal level so long as he or she understands basic constitutional principles. . . .

Alaska could revoke leases for oil fields like Prudhoe Bay if top energy companies refuse to participate in a government natural gas pipeline plan, Gov Sarah Palin told Reuters in an interview.

Exxon Mobil Corp, BP Plc and ConocoPhillips together control more than 35 trillion cubic feet of known gas reserves on the Alaska North Slope.

But the companies declined to participate in a process backed by Palin to jump-start a long-delayed gas pipeline, arguing they needed a long-term tax deal from the state first.

Palin called the refusal "unconstitutional."

"When the conditions of these leases are not met, especially after decades, it is time to open them up and allow other companies to come in here and compete for the right to tap the resources," the Republican governor told Reuters this week in an interview.

Hmmm. I don't believe I've ever read the Alaskan Constitution. I wonder if Debra has?

Quote:

Last year, former Gov. Frank Murkowski settled in principle with BP, Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips on fiscal terms " taxes and royalties " for producing the North Slope gas.

It would have frozen oil taxes for 30 years and gas taxes for up to 45 years for the three major oil companies.

Still, last year's deal did not guarantee a pipeline would get built; the hope was it would enable producers to move forward with a pipeline.

The line would ultimately have delivered 4.5 billion cubic feet (130 million cubic meters) of natural gas a day, which is about 7 percent of the current U.S. demand.

But state lawmakers felt the deal had too many giveaways for big firms, including locking in the tax rates, and stripped the state of its sovereignty and constitutional powers. The Legislature never voted on the deal.

That led Palin, who took office last December, and her administration to chart a different course in January. Rather than negotiate with one group, her plans called for new guidelines designed to stimulate competition among oil and pipeline companies.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22044490/

The assumption that a State, in exempting certain property from taxation, relinquishes a part of its sovereign power, is unfounded. The taxing power may select its objects of taxation; and this is generally regulated by the amount necessary to answer the purposes of the State. Now the exemption of property from taxation is a question of policy and not of power. A sound currency should be a desirable object to every government; and this in our country is secured generally through the instrumentality of a well-regulated system of banking. To establish such institutions as shall meet the public wants and secure the public confidence, inducements must be held out to capitalists to invest their funds. They must know the rate of interest to be charged by by the bank, the time the charter shall run, the liabilities of the company, the rate of taxation, and other privileges necessary to a successful banking operation. . . .

There is no constitutional objection to the exercise of the power to make a binding contract by a State. It necessarily exists in its sovereignty, and it has been so held by all the courts in this country. A denial of this is a denial of State sovereignty. It takes from the State a power essential to the discharge of its functions as sovereign. If it do not possess this attribute, it could not communicate it to others. There is no power possessed by it more essential than this. Through the instrumentality of contracts, the machinery of the government is carried on. Money is borrowed, and obligations given for payment. Contracts are made with individuals, who give bonds to the State. So in the granting of charters. If there be any force in the argument, it applies to contracts made with individuals, the same as with corporations. But it is said the State cannot barter away any part of its sovereignty. No one ever contended that it could.

A State, in granting privileges to a bank, with a view of affording a sound currency, or of advancing any policy connected with the public interest, exercises its sovereignty, and for a public purpose, of which it is the exclusive judge. Under such circumstances, a contract made for a specific tax, as in the case before us, is binding. This tax continues, although all other banks should be exempted from taxation. Having the power to make the contract, and rights becoming vested under it, it can no more be disregarded nor set aside by a subsequent legislature, than a grant for land. This act, so far from parting with any portion of the sovereignty, is an exercise of it. Can any one deny this power to the legislature? Has it not a right to select the objects of taxation and determine the amount? To deny either of these, is to take away State sovereignty. [57 U.S. 369, 390] It must be admitted that the State has the sovereign power to do this, and it would have the sovereign power to impair or annul a contract so made, had not the Constitution of the United States inhibited the exercise of such a power. The vague and undefined and indefinable notion, that every exemption from taxation or a specific tax, which withdraws certain objects from the general tax law, affects the sovereignty of the State, is indefensible.