Palin may not be perfect but she is one of the rare politicians who has actually taken some steps to try and be more responsible with government spending.

Her policies have not been perfect but with very few exceptions (Jeff Flake, Tom Coburn, etc) they have been vastly superior to what other politicians have done in similar situations.

I find it interesting that Palin is getting flack for not doing more especially when one considers the fact that the vast majority of politicians have done nothing or worse.

You said

Namely, the state government’s dependence on oil companies (which she exacerbated by promoting drilling over alternative energy and by enacting windfall profit taxes)

There is a lot of magical thinking about alternative energy and the economic benefits it may or may not provide.

It is impossible to evaluate the assertion that promoting drilling over alternative energy hurt alaska's economy without some actual evidence.

We do have evidence from Europe that alternative energy is not any sort of an economic driver.

Congress's Energy Debate

Europe has instituted the (TJIT NOTE: alternative energy) policies that the Democrats insist be part of any consideration of drilling.

Europe’s unemployment rate is officially somewhat less than twice our own...

Renewable energy kings Spain (Number One wind energy producer in the world) and Germany (Number Three, behind the U.S.) claim 9.9-percent and 7.4-percent unemployment, respectively

Europe, specifically, has not created net jobs through these taxes and mandates, and windmill manufacturer Vestas even closed plants there recently.

I doubt I've posted 10 comments here in all the years James has hosted Outside the Beltway. In fact, I usually don't bother reading the comments. With the predictable, loud, repetitive, and disruptive antics of two regulars here in particular, it's just not worth the aggravation to me. (That doesn't mean I advocate banning them or anything like that. I just find them sufficiently repulsive to me to not make the effort to wade through or by them.) I see it's too late to give you the short version, I've undoubtedly provided you too much information in response, and ticked off any number of people along the way, but that's the way life is sometimes.

P.S. Alex - If you absolutely must repeat talking points, save yourself some embarrassment and spend a few seconds checking into them before you post them. I see you brought up the now-infamous 527 committee Palin supposedly "ran." (She didn't run it, BTW, she was one of several "directors.") Do you have any idea how much money they raised, Alex? How much money they spent? Well, Alex the amount raised was Zero dollars (as in $0.00) and the amount spent was Zero dollars ($0.00). Some scandal.

You said,

Hey, don't blame me--Sarah Palin is the one who said while campaigning for governor that alternative energy is essential for Alaska, and then vetoed every alternative energy project that came across her desk. (With one exception--she vetoed the Fire Island wind farm in 2007, but let it through when it came up again in 2008.)

Could you provide more information on the projects she vetoed?

It could have been an absolutely correct decision to veto the projects based on technical, ecological, or economic reasons.

It is impossible to evaluate the correctness of the vetos without that information and my first instinct is to assume they were good vetos absent contrary information.

Severance taxes apply to a lot of things not just oil and gas.

For example, here is a link that gives the tax rates for timber in Louisiana

Severance tax rates set on 2001 stumpage

Here is a link to some of the actions the state of texas gives severance tax credits for

Texas Severance Tax Incentives

Tax law can be complicated but it is not accurate to call a severance tax a windfall profits tax.

This is another inaccurate meme started by partisan hacks. You are not a partisan hack but the folks on the blogs and in the media who got the the misinformation circulating for you to come across it are partisan hacks.

One factor you and almost everyone else is missing in this discussion is that the federal government owns a massive percentage of the land in Alaska. This has a significant impact on the ability of the state to raise revenue because the federal government does not pay taxes on those lands.

The practice of federal moneys going to a state like alaska are not automatically acceptable.

However, the acceptability federal money going to alaska needs to be evaluated

1. Based on what it is being used for

2. Balanced against the fact that the federal government owns massive amounts of land that can't be used in economically productive ways.

Additionally the fact that the government has a lot of activity in alaska (military activity and land holdings) is going to skew alaska's consumption of federal dollars higher.

The seniority of the republican congressional delegation from alaska is going to skew it a lot higher.

Besides, if I was looking for an echo chamber, why would I be here? Try and think things through a bit more...

Oooo, another "some say..."
But hey, keep digging and slinging any feces you can find hoping it will stick.

Talking Points Memo (my source) is as credible as any political blog out there. Josh Marshall has a Polk Award for Journalism. The link won't clear James' spam filter, but just put "Talking Points Memo" into Google. It should take 5 seconds to have the complete article in front of you.

But hey, keep up with the "poop" lines charles, its at least as interesting as anything else you have to say.

Palin Wants Independent Trooper-Gate Probe Called Off
By Zachary Roth - September 3, 2008, 10:09AM
In the latest sign that Sarah Palin's promised cooperation with the Trooper-Gate investigation is failing to materialize, her lawyer is now demanding that the entire case be taken out of the hands of the independent prosecutor hired by Alaska lawmakers, and given over to a state personnel board -- whose three members were appointed by the governor herself.

Yes, well, there were reports that Trig was really her daughter's baby too. Seriousness of the charge, don't ya know? But hey, keep digging and slinging any feces you can find hoping it will stick.

This tactic is abominable and you might want to think about the bad karma you're accruing.

Thanks for the info. On the surface, it does not seem unreasonable for the state to derive additional revenue from oil extracted from state owned lands based on increases in oil prices.

On another tack regarding Palin, there are reports that her newly hired lawyer is now stonewalling the state investigation that she was supposedly eager to cooperate with.

Thanks for the info. I'm going to need to dig into this deeper, but I'll probably end up doing a separate post about it. I still think it's problematic for Alaska to increase its revenue dependency on the oil companies, though.

Maybe so, but at the same time I don't think it is unreasonable for a State to want recompense for the loss of valuable non-renewable resources.

Also, if you look at Palin's press release archive as governor you'll find one where she praises parts of Obama's energy policy, but specifically poo-poo's a national windfall profits tax.

And lastly, this is indeed a tax on profits...but then so are corporate profit taxes. And for any State if the corporations in that state increase their profits the revenues from corporate profits also increase. I don't think anyone would call corporat profits tax windfall profits tax. Because if so, then there is no need for a seperate windfall profits tax as all companies already pay corporate profit taxes.

And as a general disclaimer: I don't particularly like Palin. I don't like her idea of teaching creationism side-by-side with evolution. I don't care for her stance on abortion. While her views on the Drug War are more progressive than most conservatives of her type, I still find them bad. I'm not defending her because of any party loyalty or other nonsense. I just don't think it is right to call this a windfall profits tax.

Thanks for the info. I'm going to need to dig into this deeper, but I'll probably end up doing a separate post about it. I still think it's problematic for Alaska to increase its revenue dependency on the oil companies, though.

RW,

If you'll note the article I mentioned to Steve, it labeled this a "windfall profits tax." I took the article at its word. How is that dishonest?

Charles,

I think you are not giving her near enough, aw heck, no credit for opposing the likes of Murkowski, Young and Stevens.

Murkowski, definitely. Credit where credit is due. Don't know enough about her dealings with Young yet, but I'm looking into it.. As far as Stevens goes, he campaigned with her for governor and endorsed her. She ran a pro-Stevens 527 group, and she relied on him to bring earmarks into the state when she was governor. Her anti-Stevens bona fides don't seem to be there.

So far, Palin seems like a capable enough politician. Just not a "reformer" in the McCain mode.

That is a DoE report on the North Slope of Alaska. If you search on severance you find the following text,

Severance taxes are levied on all oil and gas production from all state onshore property and adjacent state waters.