Palin: Cap and Tax Dead End

From Governor Palin’s op ed in today’s Washington Post:

There is no shortage of threats to our economy. America's unemployment rate recently hit its highest mark in more than 25 years and is expected to continue climbing. Worries are widespread that even when the economy finally rebounds, the recovery won't bring jobs. Our nation's debt is unsustainable, and the federal government's reach into the private sector is unprecedented.
. . .

Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion over eight years. So much for creating jobs.
. . .
In addition to immediately increasing unemployment in the energy sector, even more American jobs will be threatened by the rising cost of doing business under the cap-and-tax plan. For example, the cost of farming will certainly increase, driving down farm incomes while driving up grocery prices. The costs of manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will also increase.

The ironic beauty in this plan? Soon, even the most ardent liberal will understand supply-side economics.

The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet. As the president eloquently puts it, their electricity bills will "necessarily skyrocket." So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year.

Even Warren Buffett, an ardent Obama supporter, admitted that under the cap-and-tax scheme, "poor people are going to pay a lot more for electricity."
. . .

We must move in a new direction. We are ripe for economic growth and energy independence if we responsibly tap the resources that God created right underfoot on American soil. Just as important, we have more desire and ability to protect the environment than any foreign nation from which we purchase energy today.
. . .

Of course, Alaska is not the sole source of American energy. Many states have abundant coal, whose technology is continuously making it into a cleaner energy source. Westerners literally sit on mountains of oil and gas, and every state can consider the possibility of nuclear energy.

We have an important choice to make. Do we want to control our energy supply and its environmental impact? Or, do we want to outsource it to China, Russia and Saudi Arabia? Make no mistake: President Obama's plan will result in the latter.

For so many reasons, we can't afford to kill responsible domestic energy production or clobber every American consumer with higher prices.

Can America produce more of its own energy through strategic investments that protect the environment, revive our economy and secure our nation?

Yes, we can. Just not with Barack Obama's energy cap-and-tax plan.

Cross posted at The Next Right

Oregon Unemployment Rate Doubles in a Year

Oregon’s 12.2% unemployment rate for June, 2009, is more than double the 5.9% rate for June, 2008. It's also almost 30% higher than the 9.5% June national average.

A year ago Oregon's rate was very close to the 5.5% national average. Why has Oregon's unemployment rate grown so much faster than the national average?

The Oregonian doesn’t seem to have noticed the report that came out today from economist David Cooke of the Oregon Employment Department. Nothing so far about the report on the OregonLive web site.

The Sad Decline of Peggy Noonan

Peggy Noonan is consumed by hatred of Sarah Palin. Why? Who knows.

Her current column is not only full of anti-Palin opinion, but Noonan doesn't even get basic facts right.

Some easy to fact check Noonan wrong assertions:

1. Sarah Palin is middle class not working class.

"To wit, 'I love her because she's so working-class.' This is a favorite of some party intellectuals. She is not working class, never was, and even she, avid claimer of advantage that she is, never claimed to be and just lets others say it. Her father was a teacher and school track coach, her mother the school secretary. They were middle-class figures of respect, stability and local status. I think intellectuals call her working-class because they see the makeup, the hair, the heels and the sleds and think they're working class 'tropes.' Because, you know, that's what they teach in 'Ways of the Working Class' at Yale and Dartmouth."

I don't know what they taught Noonan at Fairleigh Dickinson about the working class, but Sarah Palin hasn't lived with her parents for a long, long time. She married Todd Palin over two decades ago. He is a working class union member laboring in the Alaskan oil fields. He, like other Eskimo ancestry working class people, adds to his family's living by commercial fishing. Not by "supervising" employees, but by doing the manual labor himself.

And Sarah has been working right along side him. Not as secretary and bookkeeper, but actually doing the backbreaking work of catching the fish, hauling them in and getting them ready for processing.

As governor and first dude of Alaska, they also have a foot in middle class family life. But the Palin family has made a good chunk of its living for the vast majority of the past two decades as a working class family.

To say that the Palins are not working class because Sarah's father was a teacher, is like saying the John Edwards family is working class, though John works as a lawyer, has made mega-bucks and lives in a mansion, because his father was working class. I would hope that even Noonan would admit that an assertion that John Edwards is really working class because his father was is ridiculous and bone-headed.

2. Sarah doesn't read.

"She couldn't say what she read because she didn't read anything. She was utterly unconcerned by all this and seemed in fact rather proud of it: It was evidence of her authenticity."

Peggy has a hard time with research. Here's a a clip from the Charlie Rose show done in early September, 2008, where Palin talks easily and at some length in the short answer format about some of her favorite authors--before the Couric interview*.



3. Palin polls high among only "some members" of the Republican base.

"McCain-Palin lost. Mrs. Palin has now stepped down, but she continues to poll high among some members of the Republican base, some of whom have taken to telling themselves Palin myths."

If you call 76% (45% very favorable and 31% somewhat favorable) "some", I guess Noonan is right. More truthful would be for Noonan to identify her own group as "some" members of the Republican base, since only 21% of Republicans share her view and they don't even equal the minority faction of Palin's favorable ratings. That's what the latest Rasmussen poll shows.

Maybe Noonan doesn't know how to do internet research and Rasmussen and Charlie Rose are beyond her abilities. More likely Noonan's hatred has blinded not only her judgment, but her ability to present the truth. Sad that Noonan's talent is now being used to such ends.

[*Not to mention that Couric's question was a doofus question in the internet era. Anyone who says they have two or three main sources of information doesn't do internet research well. They're Yahoo news types who get their information from headlines and news crawls at the bottom of cable news screens. It's like saying after the invention of the printing press that you have two or three books that are your main sources of information. I'm not even a professional in the news or commentary business, and I have a sidebar with 60 sources I consider important--and that doesn't count the hundreds of others I've linked to in my posts and used in my research. Get real.]

Bankruptcy of the Conservative Media

John Ziegler has a piece on the media and Sarah Palin. Most of it is focused on the bias in the media as well as how ignorant reporters/commentators are about her and her accomplishments. A key point: the lack of comment on how a previous mid-term resignation was the key to understanding her political values as well as her future political success.

But, to me the most interesting part of Ziegler’s piece is pointing out the current moral bankruptcy in conservative media. Though conservative pundits admit that Palin has been savaged unfairly by the media and hit with numerous groundless ethical complaints, they are not outraged at media hit pieces or groundless and costly ethical complaints from political enemies (the perps) but criticize Palin (the victim) for any fighting back. They call it whining.

Apparently they have no problem with the half a million dollars Palin is having to pay out of her own pocket* (a working class pocket–unlike their upper middle class media elite pocket) or that her children are being mercilessly slimed and lampooned. One wonders how their media outlets (not to mention each of them personally even with their media salaries) would react to half million dollar hits. National Review has donation drives at least annually. How would it do with a half a million in legal bills this year and maybe double or triple that in the next year and a half?

Ziegler:

“There’s a lot of blame to go around for how and why this has been allowed to happen, but I want to make special mention of some my conservative media “friends” (that is just an expression, I don’t really have many friends in the media) who have once again revealed just how weak, shortsighted and willing to sell out they really are. Regardless of what you think of Sarah Palin, every single conservative who attacks her by buying into media-created falsehoods so they can curry favor with the media elite should be seen as traitors to the movement. You have been duped and used as cover for a public lynching.”
. . .

“Could someone PLEASE show me just ONE legitimate example (no one making the claim has even bothered to try) of where Palin has “whined” about something that has been said about her publicly?! Are these people saying you can’t set the record straight about lies? Are you not supposed to fight back against illegitimate attacks? Gee, that strategy worked so well for President Bush. And these are the so called leaders of the movement? No wonder we are where we are.”

How many times did conservative commentators “whine” about how President Bush didn’t stand up to his critics? That they were the ones who had to defend him. When Sarah Palin from time to time defends her family and herself, she is a whiner. Well, what is the right strategy? Respond? Don’t respond? The bankruptcy of conservative media is in this as well. No ideas on what to do. Only criticism for the paths chosen by those who are actually on the firing line.

Interesting that a political outsider from Alaska could show not only the bankruptcy of the left but of elites on the right as well.

*not to mention the millions of dollars it's costing Alaskan taxpayers

H/T Conservatives4Palin

UPDATE: Case in point is Anthony Dick at National Review Online's The Corner:

". . .[John Fund] offers a few lines on the unfair treatment Palin has received from the national media: 'She made many mistakes after suddenly being thrust into the national spotlight last year, but hasn’t merited the sneering contempt visited upon her by national reporters. She simply was not their kind of feminist — and they disdained the politically incorrect life choices she had made.'

"But it wasn’t just the choices she made; it was the way she presented herself in conformance with the stereotype of the red-state simpleton. The fact that this stereotype is unfair does not justify conservative politicians in ignoring its power."
. . .
"Overcoming these prejudices is, if not a prerequisite, at least a very helpful vehicle for receiving a fair hearing on the merits. Bill Buckley was, of course, a master at this project. Sarah Palin seems either completely oblivious to it, or else too indignant to play that game."

No, it's Anthony Dick and his buddies who won't play the game. Bill Buckley was a master at disarming the left, but he didn't just stand up for himself. That was one of the purposes of NR--to stand up for conservative principles and conservative candidates and do heavy lifting in the public forum on their behalf.

John Fund is doing the heavy lifting while Anthony Dick is saying "It ain't my job."

Palin Resignation = Quitting. A Guy/Power Thing?

It has been interesting to see reactions from some conservative male leaders. Rich Lowry, previously charmed by a wink from Palin, is angry about her resignation. Lowry calls her reasoning disingenuous and thinks the resignation is purely the result of self-interest. On the local level Lars Larson thinks she’s a quitter. Even normally good sense Mark Steyn thinks she’s “cutting bait”. (Though I note that he doesn’t have the “cutting bait” posting linked at his steynonline site anymore.)

Could this be a “guy” thing? Men are used to plunging straight forward come what may. That’s part of masculine heroics–at least for those who have a foot in the power structure. But women, down through the centuries, know that many times the best way through is going around because if you aren’t as physically strong or don’t have the good old boys network and legal system on your side, a frontal assault is a losing assault. You end up worse off than you started.

Actually, most people out of power know that. So do people who are out gunned. Consider the American revolution. The British fought straight up in lines–-like real men. They had the men, equipment and supplies to win. The Americans fought by using cover, striking when it looked like they could do damage and retreating when necessary–which was more often than not. Were they quitters? Cowards? The British thought so. Still, they did risk their lives, fortunes and sacred honor in fighting for political freedom against the odds.

Unconventional tactics are sometimes the result of true courage as well as being the best way to achieve victory.

Bloggers 69% Positive about Palin after Announcement

According to U.S. News and World Report blogger response to Governor Palin after her resignation statement has become strongly positive. Zeta Interactive found that posts on Palin have swung to 69% positive after her resignation announcement compared to 54% negative before.

H/T Conservatives4Palin

Palin: 76% of Republicans Still Favorable

The latest Rasmussen poll, taken after Palin's announcement of resignation, shows she is still viewed favorably by 3/4ths of Republicans. Palin leads among Republicans in the very favorable category (45%), and is only beaten out by Mike Huckabee when "very favorable" and "somewhat favorable" categories are combined (78% Huckabee and 76% Palin). Only 21% have an unfavorable opinion of Palin.

Considering that 66% of Republicans identify themselves as conservatives (and 27% moderates and 5% liberals), Palin seems to have won almost all the conservatives with liberals and most of the moderates being those unhappy with her.

Unfortunately National Review's editor Rich Lowry has decided to lead conservatives by slamming Palin for being disingenuous and self-interested. Here’s Lowry on Palin’s resignation:

"It’s just too absurd. Palin mentioned Alaska or Alaskans 34 times in a 17-minute statement that must be a new record in the history of protesting too much. Palin says she hates politics as usual, and true to her word, on July 3 she staged a spectacle in politics as unusual. But she still proved adept at the traditional political art of extreme disingenuousness." [How many times did Reagan refer to California or Californians in his gubernatorial speeches or to America or Americans in his presidential speeches?–Protested too much?]

"She didn’t want to put Alaska through the hell of a lame-duck governor who would “hit the road, draw the paycheck, and ‘milk it.’” Never mind that if she feared becoming a lame duck, she could run for re-election — especially if “serving [Alaska’s] people is the greatest honor I could imagine.” Or that she could endeavor to work her hardest at her job until her last day in office. That may sound outlandish, but it’s been done before." [If serving the people of California was such a great honor for Ronald Reagan, why didn’t he run for senator or representative from California after being governor?]

"Sarah Palin’s words served only to throw a tissue of rationalization over a calculated choice made in her personal self-interest. In all likelihood, Palin is going to embrace her political celebrity with gusto, freed from the burdens of the geographic isolation of the Alaska governorship and its (relative to national politics) petty distractions. Her decision wasn’t particularly public-spirited, but neither was it crazy. She has seen her opportunities, and she’s going to take them." [Just as Reagan’s words only threw a “tissue of rationalization over a calculated choice” made in his personal self-interest. Reagan embraced political celebrity with gusto, freed from the burdens of the California governorship and its petty distractions. Reagan’s decision wasn’t particularly public-spirited, but neither was it crazy. He had seen his opportunities, and he took them.]

This may be Lowry's honest venting, but it’s not too smart either in political terms of getting a conservative elected president–-or for National Review. When you rely on conservative readers and spit in the eye of 76% of the party that is mostly made up of conservatives, that's like spitting into the wind. Good luck on that.

Poor National Review seems less and less to be leading conservatives than defying them.

Cross posted at The Next Right