Redstate

at what point do we stop voting for these irresponsible "conservatives" in general elections.  Unseating a senator (or house member)in a primary is virtually impossible, so they only thing we have left is to vote them out in generals and replace them in open primaries.  I will gladly take 2 years of Speaker Pelosi (and hopefully a good dose of the president's dusty veto pen) in order to get an actual conservative majority in place in 2008.

but the Senate's a lot harder to deal with.  For one, you have to deal with the Democrat you put in for 6 years.  And that's the minimum.  It's not hard to get re-elected in the Senate, even as a Democrat in a red state.  Look at my own state of Indiana, one of the most Republican states in the nation, per presidential elections.  But at the same time we were voting to re-elect George W Bush by a large margin, we were re-electing Senator Evan Bayh by an even larger number.  The same Evan Bayh who's voting record is almost identical to the John Kerry we were rejecting.

Ted Stevens has got to be the Club for Growth's #1 target when he comes up for re-election in 2008!

THIS MAN IS AN ABSOLUTE, ABJECT EMBARASSMENT!!

If Gov. Murkowski loses the primary this election cycle, there may be some very recent precedence for this in Alaska.

I pray that the Club for Growth is out beating the bushes in ANWR for a candidate to run against Stevens in 2008.

While I join in the outrage, I have to ask: is anyone really surprised?  From "Campaign Finance Reform" that squelches speech but doesn't blunt the money trough to massive vote-buying giveaways that are the norm rather than the outrageous exception, it's par for the course.

Congress, in general, and the Senate, in specific, resembles nothing so much as a red light district, with congresscritters lurking under streetlights to sell their wares.

Eligible to run against Stevens who wants to and has a hope of getting even a respectable amount of votes.  The defeats handed out to his opponents are merely embarrassing, they're horrifying.

Alaskans love him and we will continue to elect him until he goes senile  (btw, no one willing to run against him is with him and us on ANWR, last I checked).

if he wants to.  Anyone who runs in the Republican primary will just be doing a name ID gambit.  The only Democrat that could credibly oppose him is former governor Knowles and he couldn't beat Lisa Murkowski, notwithstanding her controversial appointment.

Stevens will never forgive the people who reneged on ANILCA and keep ANWR locked up.  Nor will he forgive Left Coast CongressCritters for their self-serving opposition to the bridges, particularly the Knik Arm Bridge.

The United States happily looted Alaska for a century, longer if you include the pre-acquisition otter trade.  The United States has never spent a dime in Alaska that wasn't in its direct military interest until very recent years.  Stevens will be a deal maker where he can and an obstructionist where he has to be to secure the interests, even the parochial interests, of Alaska, and we will return him to office as long as we can prop him up for the vote.

Ted Stevens played "get along, go along" one time; when he capitulated to the Democrats and moderates on ANILCA in 1980: he got screwed and Alaska got screwed.  Stevens came the closest he ever has to losing his seat over it, and Alaska lost a good chunk of its economic future.  Won't get fooled again.  Self interest is our "first principle."

Stevens needs to be stripped of all his power, put on meaningless committees (or at least committees where he doesn't have his hand on any money - kinda like thieves usually don't get hired as tellers), and then let's see how long he ends up staying in the Senate when he doesn't have the ability to herd ungodly amounts of pork into Alaska.

Maybe replace Chaffee with Stevens on the Foreign Relations Committee, and put him on some natural resources committee so he can crusade for ANWR there. But keep his grubby little hands far, FAR away from the cookie jar.

And while you're at it, do some real research on Stevens and the effects of what he has done.  You're shooting from the hip without any background info.

and the Hoover Dam, and all the irrigation and water supply systems in CA, and all the freeways all over the country?  There were 4000 people on the other side of the Golden Gate when it was built.

The Lower 48 has a 300 year head start on federally financed "internal improvements."

Stevens represents a state that was a ruthlessly exploited colonial possession for the the first one hundred years of US ownership and the US spent virtually nothing on the territory and state that wasn't directly related to its military needs or its constitutional obligation to Indians until very, very recently.

We'll give up federal spending when the good people of Louisiana tax themselves to repay the US for the levees or the good people of California vote a tax to pay for their freeways and water systems.

You're either a complete hypocrite or you don't know what you're talking about, maybe both.

between giving Ted Stevens $9 billion in pork or even one hour of Nancy Pelosi, I'll open my, and your, checkbook.

My friend, to think that changing the leadership of the House or Senate is going to result in restrained spending is to engage in Martian Logic. The reason senators and representatives do this is because their constituents love it. Pork is bipartisan.

The other part that bothers me is that the senate GOP after all these years has not taken measures to change the appropriation process. Supplementals, after the budget has passed, should not be allowed outside of emergencies.

What a smug move by Stevens. But as others have said, hardly suprising.

of being a conservative, never run as one, never elected to be one.  He takes positions that ally him with conservatives on national defense and development, sometimes on some social issues.

He is unabashedly an old-line Statist Republican.  His mentor and longtime closest ally was Scoop Jackson.  Both the elder and current Senator Murkowski were/are about the same ideologically, though Lisa may be even a little more liberal on some issues.

He is exactly what his constituents want him to be.  We'll save our "conservatism" for State and local elections.

but the whole issue here is the larding of emergency supplementals with gratuitous projects.

Alaska has a GSP of $31 billion, Louisiana has a GSP of $140 billion, California has a GSP of $1.55 trillion. Now, using that information, which states pay more taxes? Think the states that pay more taxes might have a valid reason for bringing some of those dollars back to their state? Think maybe California pumps more dollars into the U.S. economy than Alaska, that with its ports, military bases, businesses, much much higher population, that it might require more infrastructure?

Oh yeah, the Golden Gate Bridge was paid for through bonds and tolls, not federal funds. And the Hoover Dam cost $49 million ($676 million after adjusting for inflation). Very reasonable for something that provides so much benefit for so many. As for the levees in Louisiana, I never had a problem helping to pay for them, they were an attempt to keep a city with a rich history from flooding. Oh yeah, freeways, states do, in part, pay for their own freeways, California does at least, can't really speak for the others.

Well, just some food for thought.

Louisiana was a sovereign for 150 years before Alaska became a state and has enjoyed all the return from the greatest river trade in the world and all the benefits of its development.  California was admitted to statehood little more than a decade after acquisition and almost immediately upon the discover of gold there.  As a sovereign it has enjoyed all the benefits of its vast natural wealth and of untold billions in military and industrial spending by the US.  I can keep the examples going almost ad infinitum.

Huge private fortunes were made in New England in the Golden Round otter trade before and after acqisition and the only thing Alaska got was the otter stocks almost wiped out and the Aleut people enslaved.  Huge private fortunes were made in exploiting Alaska's gold and copper and hardly a dime stayed here; the district and territory had no taxing power and most of the labor was transient and imported.  The Ports of Seattle and San Francisco to this day ruthlessly exploit shipping to Alaska (and Hawaii) through the Jones Act requirement of piratical American bottom shipping.  Huge private fortunes in Seattle and San Francisco were made in the Alaska salmon fishery.  All one needed was the right connection in DC and one got exclusive rights to the mouths of rivers in which to place traps and staff them with imported labor and with armed guards to keep the locals away from the fish.  I can go on almost ad infinitum.

The greatest opposition to Alaska statehood were the private companies living on these corrupt monopolies and the Congressmen who represented the states benefitting from it.

From even before 1867 until 1959, Alaska got the meagerest scraps from the ruthless and distructive exploitation of its resources.  Had Alaska derived any benefit from tapping its resources, it would have the roads, bridges, powerlines and other infrastructure that the rest of the country takes for granted.  The rest of the nation, and especially the states of WA and CA, got a century of vast wealth without spending a dime on Alaska.  I am unashamed of trying to get some of it back.

True dat. i suspect as time goes on and organizations like the Club for Growth gets more powerful, the number of people like Stevens that can make it through a primary successfully will drop. I have little exact proof, but I suspect that primary voters are getting less sympathetic to porkers. For example, the CfG has a high success rate this cycle. If this continues into the future, they will extend their fight to more races. We don't have to get every single irresponsible senator and rep out, just most, and the repercussions will favor more responsible spending.

I demand reparations!  When will you be satisfied that you and Alaska have recouped all that you have lost?

...there are MANY, MANY constituents who do not love pork.

But a good test of this will be Ricketts v. Nelson in Nebraska this year. We'll see how well Ricketts does running against Nelson's pork.

...then that event cannot come too swiftly.

Have brought Alaska's infrastructure up to the level of the Lower 48.

And we don't really need to cry reparations, Stevens is doing just fine about that...

Mostly, though, I think we'd be satisfied with the opening of ANWR on Our (and the Native Corporations') terms and getting complete control over the rest of our natural resources...

of Alabama for exploiting my resources for centuries before I was born.  

They owe me!!!!!

wrt Stevens is that we Alaskans don't really much Care what folks in the Lower 48 have to say about our representatives.

We believe that all acts/bills need be weighed between What is Best For Alaska and What is Best For America.  In a Tie, Alaska wins right out.

When the inhabitants of the region where the Kennicott Copper Mine was have paved roads, grid power, running water, and sewers.  The only place they do is Cordova and Valdez and only since statehood and with state and local funds, and Cordova still has no road link to anywhere.

When all the residents of Southeast Alaska where untold fortunes were made of the richest gold mines in the world and off the richest fisheries in the world have grid power and mainland road links.

When all the residents of the Southwest Coast where untold fortunes were made off the otter trade have roads where practicable, grid power, running water, and sewers.

When all the residents of the Interior and Seward Peninsula where untold fortunes were made off mining have roads that go anywhere, grid power, water, and sewers.

As to myself, I don't need a thing; I'm a pretty well off retired Republican political appointee.  My state needs a lot.

to see ANWR opened.  Most here can agree on that.  It would be great for our country and even better for Alaskans.  I do not begrudge Alaskans improving their state, lifestyle, etc.  I do find it disheartening that Stevens and some residents of the state think the only way to do so is to squeeze every penny possible out of the federal government.

I'd really rather just get what we need to be able to do it ourselves.  i don't really trust the vast majority of people/politicians from the Lower 48.  Regardless of Party.

but as long as they expect us to live in their "park" that can't be developed, I can be picturesque and they can pay for it.

Ok, and what does that have to do with the Hoover Dam and the Golden Gate Bridge? The Hoover Dam was lobbied for extensively, and proven to be an economic boon. It was also a very reasonable expense, even after adjusting for inflation. What interstate benefit does Ted Stevens' Bridge To Nowhere provide? Face it, Alaska's a remote state with a low population, which doesn't require much infrastructure. As far as I know, there's not even a statewide electrical system in Alaska, because it was deemed uneconomical.

I'm trying really really hard to not make a comment about forty acres and a mule, but you're not making it easy for me.

That's a great way to look at it.  Alaska first, US second.  If only you could have more than the two senatoors alotted you by the Constitution.  Perhaps Stevens can propose a constitutional amendment to make that so.  I don't mean to be snippy but come on.  There seems to be a massive inferiority complex coming from you and Achance.

[Smiles for the camera while feeding a tourist to the bears]

We just happen to love our State.  Something most folks in the Lower 48 don't seem to do anymore.

After all, I place a similar scale before All laws that I look at:

My Family 1st.  Anyone else 2nd.

Now that could get traction...

it has a foothold in Washington already.

Alaska's lack of development is the direct result of federal mismanagement and, often, corruption.  Unlike other territory acquired by the United States, Alaska was willfully denied any right to self-governance precisely because of the political power of those who wanted to exploit the resources.

Alaska was maintained as a military district with no self-governance from 1867 until the Organic Act of 1912 and had only the most limited self-governance as a territory from 1912 until 1959.  Consequently, it had no opportunity to transfer land into private hands and develop a tax and revenue base that would allow it to provide essential infrastructure.

Corporate interests from the Morgans and Gugenheims on down lobbied (I choose that term because you used it with regard to Hoover Dam, actually they mostly just bought it.) heavily against any self governance for Alaska precisely to prevent taxation and regulation and were very successful at it.  Alaska was denied statehood far longer than any other district or territory that possessed a resource base that would assure viability.  California was a state in little more than a decade after it was ceded by Mexico and was thus able to sustain and develop itself from its resources.

Even after statehood, the US drug its feet at every opportunity in transferring land to State ownership and still has not fully completed the process.  Vast resource provinces were locked away as parks and National Forests, some for good reason, many not.  The Chugach Forest for example was created in the early 20th Century at the behest of eastern coal interests and the railroads in order to prevent development of Alaska coal to provide for the then still coal burning Pacific Fleet.  Even in modern times the US has used ANILCA to deprive the state of management of resources in vast areas and for many Alaskans the use of ANILCA to prevent oil development was close to the last straw.

So, were it not for federal policy, Alaska would have what every other state has had for many decades or even centuries; self government and control of its resources and revenues.  Therefore, since they didn't allow it then, the US can pay for it now or allow us the means to do it ourselves.  Even with the limited control we have now, we are no longer the smallest state nor the poorest; and we were able to do that in a little over thiry years.

As to Knik Arm Bridge: Anchorage is the largest air cargo port in the world because of its location on the great circle route to the Orient.  The Alaska Highway was built to connect a series of military airfields on that route.  There is a body of cargo that is not valuable enough to ship air freight but is too valuable to slog accross the Pacific to Seattle, SF, or LA and on by rail.  Fast container ships can take the great circle route from the Orient to Anchorage and the containers can be transferred to trucks and traverse the Alaska Highway to the interior US, saving time and money.  The bridge is an essential link so that the cargo does not have to be transported through urban Anchorage and over fifty miles around Knik Arm.  That is the interstate purpose and the reason for vehement opposition from our old friends in Washington and California.  And maybe the Ketchikan Bridge is pork, but it's no tastier than any other pork in the federal budget.

but election after election proves they are either not smart or interested enough to vote.

we're doing quite well at the federal trough and not at all sorry about it.

We can also do blue eyed Arab pretty well too; one hiccup in Alaska's oil production and the Escalades become lawn ornaments.  Don't like $3 gas, try $10.

we'll do Weekend at Bernie's as long as we can get his hand to the button.

It's no wonder the Federal government is as big and expensive as it is. This attitude explains it all... It certainly isn't unique to Alaska, though you don't often hear it being espoused by "conservatives."

of issues but that was funny.

but I've been at or near policy level in the Alaska government for the last twenty years.  On in-state issues, my conservative credentials don't have quotation marks around them.  The Left in Juneau viscerally hates me and the public employee unions have put a price on my head in every gubernatorial election.  They almost collected it when Knowles was elected, but I went to work for the Republican controlled Legislature.  I came back in '99 and set the table for Murkowski's administration in Knowles' waning days and became his Director of Labor Relations.  I kept the unions off the streets, out of politics, and, most importantly,out of the '04 US Senate race.  Like the Federalis said of Pancho Villa, the unions always said they "coulda had me any day." They never got me though, I'm running out some leave and on my terms reach the exalted state of "retired" on July 1.

That said, we look out for our State.  We know the rules and apparently play the game better than most; since the house is burning, we'll keep warm.  Change the rules or change the game and I'll buy in, but I'm not going to stand on theory or even principle and watch my state suffer while others gain.  If the money is going somewhere, it might as well go here.

As people feel the same way as you (and they certainly do, whether they are from New York or Mississippi or West Virginia), the federal government will get bigger and bigger, consume more and more resources, and usurp more and more power from the states.

So "looking out for your state" results in you sending more and more of your money to DC and handing over more and more control to DC over what you can do with it, and even using the money to force you to do things they have no business, constitutionally, forcing you to do.

No more Alaska politicians should be on any committee that has any power to spend money. They are HORRIBLE!

What I've seen expressed on this thread by Alaskans is truly breath-taking. Y'all are NOT CONSERVATIVES!

Didn't he say they'd need a stretcher for him?

at the State level.  If you'll look at my posts on the Congressman's thread about line item veto, you see what I believe about a small government agenda.  Make it a national agenda, get elected on it, and I'm there; until then, I play by the rules currently established.  As I said, change the rules or the game, but until you can, don't expect anybody to play by other rules; it is foolishly self-defeating.

Unlike what I sense from most here, I've never had the luxury of being an ideologue; that's easy if you don't have power over a government.  Thinking and blogging aren't the same as governing: governing is the art of the possible.

You have to remember your principles and your promises and be as true as you CAN to them; you take the steps that are available to be taken in the direction you need to go.  You don't just stop because you can't get to where you need to be in one step.

the bears need fed.

Or better yet, when you've actually held elected or appointed office for a while, come talk to me about it.  I'm not running anything or running for anything anymore, so I don't have to suck up and I can tell you what anybody who has to do more than talk about government really thinks about ideologues and "thinkers."

Suggestions of death on this blog are off-limits.

Period.

End of story.

Argument on this point is a profoundly bad idea.

relate to post #22?  Both Raven and I let that slide.  I never suggested that I would feed anyone to the bears; they don't need any help in dealing with people who don't know anything about this country.

If you'll look at my posts on the Congressman's thread about line item veto, you see what I believe about a small government agenda.  Make it a national agenda, get elected on it, and I'm there; until then, I play by the rules currently established.  As I said, change the rules or the game, but until you can, don't expect anybody to play by other rules; it is foolishly self-defeating.

And it is never going to happen because of widespread attitudes like this one. Everybody tries to game the system for as much free stuff as they can get and the end result is government that is far too big and just keeps getting bigger every day. Either they want free stuff for their hometown, a fat ethanol check from the government, corporate welfare for their employer, or free prescription drugs. The compromise is always to just give everybody everything. Attempts to rationalize it by responding that "everyone else is doing it" or "that's the way the system works" or "we need our reparations" don't make it any better. We need people willing to stand up on principle and forgo the chance to score a bunch of free stuff long enough to dismantle the system.

I don't see a Ted Stevens account.

Not only that -- and putting to the side that we allow slightly more leeway for public figures than for fellow commenters -- what he said doesn't affect what you said.

Now, here you are arguing, which I asked you not to do. Hopefully, we don't have to repeat that now much ballyhooed scene from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

and defeatist about it, the saddest literature is that of the Silver Period Romans lamenting the loss of the Republic and trying to find a way back to the Republic and its personal values.  They never did.

Our forefathers sought to recreate the Roman Republic with a few lessons about republican democracy thrown in.  The WBTS established the American Empire and the result has largely been the same.  Find favor with the Emperor, and your company gets the business or your province gets the trade.  Maybe that is just the natural order of the evolution of civil societies.

All Marcus Auerelius' charge to Maximus to restore the Republic did was get Maximus first enslaved and then killed, but he did die beautifully for the Senate and People of Rome.  (And, yes, I know that's not really the way it happened, but it is pretty much true metaphorically.)  Show me a Maximus and I'll ride with him, and when I feel the sun on my back, I'll know I'm dead.

Of Pork is preferential to Anything Anyone else can or will offer us.

Stevens has provided too much for us and isn't even so tacky as to toss his name on everything he earmarks.

EZ is also, apparently, EZ on the brain.  Not worth responding to.  Ignore him.

Debate with real debaters.

I hope I'm not traceably related to this guy.

That was good stuff.

By the way, when i run to become his replacement, do you suppose you could find your way to be my campaign manager?  Or choose one for me?

I'm not sure if I want to hope you are.

Though, you Could be traceably related to Kennedy, McCain, Specter...

My mother's family is from Arkansas, and my father's is from West Virginia.

I could be related to Clinton and Byrd, heh.

when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." --

Winston Churchill

It is because of "Republicans" like you and Achance that illustrate why we need the Club for Growth so desperately.

Y'all are totally clueless as to all of the ill-effects of runaway federal spending that's not spent on what governments are actually SUPPOSED to do - defend our national and homeland security.

What's your email address?  It's not in your profile.

If you don't want to let everyone on RS know it, you can email it to me at mine...

Just don't know what you're talking about.  Have a good day.

You're out over the edge here a bit, I think. I've waited at the embarrassment of a bus stop Stevens had constructed in Fairbanks for like $11 million or whatever it was. I also have lived in enough different places in Alaska to know that, regardless of the level of infrastructure, most places in Alaska simply are not going to grow to the point that these expenditures are going to be justified. Even with all the resources currently up there, and the ridiculous wages that are paid to those willing to extract those resources, you can't get people to move up there.

For instance, when I lived in Valdez (this would have been about 18 years ago, so these figures should be adjusted for inflation), the fish cannery there paid $17 an hour as a starting wage - and that was for the kids who were not yet 18 and thus couldn't work as "slimers." They would also allow them to work as much overtime as they wanted. In a single summer, a college student could (and many did) easily walk away with $20,000 to pay for school for the whole year and have spending money. Depending on their level of desperation, the cannery would also pay a travel stipend to foot the bill for getting up there and back. And yet, every year they were incredibly short of labor. Maybe things have changed statewide since I left, in which case I'm open to correction.

I understand that Alaska's infrastructure needs are unique and not understandable to anyone who hasn't lived there, but even taking that into account, Stevens takes pork to a whole new level. And I say this as someone who's ridden on campaign floats with him on two separate occasions.

This thread should also be educational....

If Anchorage was  further developed, how much of an economic threat would it be to CA and WA ports and terminals?

What do you think of the Kansas City railroad guy who wants to

put a cargo port on the Mexican Pacific coast and wants to  transport international goods  by rail through Mexico to Kansas City?

Disarmament is no fun if it's unilateral.

Let it go.

Could put a Significant dent in WAs and CAs import/export monopoly on the West Coast.

Japan and Russia and China and anyone else on the Great Circle (aka Ring of Fire) trade routes could get their goods to Anchorage Faster and More Easily than to the other states.

From Anchorage said freight could reach its destination in under a week via either air transit (would require a Freight-only airport for the likely volume) or the AlCan Highway (which needs, Desperately, to be improved and widened along its entire length).

Wouldn't have much effect on Human transportation.  people still like to fly into/out of sunny LA and such.

So long as Customs (ALL CUSTOMS) is done at the border for any ground or water transit, I'm good with it.  Makes sense.

Just, as you should know, Alaska's particular issues mean that everything happens to cost more thn it really should (how DO you build a freeway through perma-frost?).

What we want can pretty much be wrapped up in 1 staement: Give Alaskans Control Of Alaskan Resources.

With the money available from those sources, we can do everything ourselves (as you should also know).  And we would really rather decide Inhouse rather than in DC what is a justifiable expense.

And as for getting people to move up there, not many of us are really sure If we want folks to immigrate to AK.  But a little advertising and folks will Flock.  How many people do You know that aren't willing to move for $17/hr starting wages?

Understaffed?  Purely because Alaska has More jobs than bodies.  Especially during the summer...

I'm not so sure I want to hope that you are Not related to him.

You seem to be a decent enough sort, and seem to tend to think before typing...

It's not the Federal government's job to hand out money to the states. AK or anybody else. That is the problem. Not that AK gets too much... that anybody gets anything.

I agree that the Feds have far too much land locked up in Alaska (and everywhere else). Most of it should be auctioned off or handed to the state.

As far as state control goes, standing at the trough in DC is not how you get it. That's how DC gets to determine what the states do. They hold the states hostage with that money.

• There's a long list of "Do x or we will withhold y funds" demands that have been made by the Feds. This is always their plan B, to usurp power from the states that even their massively expansive interpretation of the ICC isn't capable of supporting.
  
• Often, a portion of the money has to be put up by the state. We built a 12 mile train track here with a couple electric trains on it for the better part of a billion dollars. About half of that money was Federal. The rest came from the state. We would've never built that line if it wasn't for all the Federal money that was available. The argument was "Look at all this free money we're going to lose, if we don't do this now!" This leads to additional state money being wasted on top of all the federal money that is wasted in the process. Did I mention that line will continue to cost the state money in perpetuity and do zero to solve our horrible congestion problems?
  
• The money has to be used for certain things, which may not make any sense. Our largest earmark in the last obscene transportation bill was to expand a highway in the middle of nowhere that our own state DOT said did not need to be expanded. At all. It wasn't even being considered. But that highway was in the Congressman's district, which is what really matters.

It is foolish for any conservative to talk about this Federal redistribution of funds in a good way. Only bad (lots and lots of bad) comes of it.

It may be clouded by my zeal to defend My state and My senator from the uninformed, but it has come out before and is peeking out in this thread that I Don't Want Federal Dollars.

Federal Dollars invariably bring Federal Contractors who Invariably don't know what they are doing and invariably irritate us and the Natives.

But if we Don't have the funds ourselves to get done what we Need to get done (and these earmarked projects in AK are only related to the Highway and railway you reference by being earmarked projects), the Feds are the only ones we can go to.

Give us control of Our resources and we can step back from the trough.

Until then...

and Honor

that it is not the Fed's job to hand out money, just as I believe that it is not the Fed's job to confiscate money from the States and their people in order to be able to hand it out to other States.  I have a bunch of ancestors planted in Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland  because of objecting to that, among other things.

That said, it does!  And so long as it does; Me First!

move; take the highest value seaborne traffic.  Sorta what the Japanese did to the US car market.

I disagree with Raven a little about the Alaska Highway (AlCan); it is pretty serviceable for truck traffic and that's an "if you build it, they will come" thing.  Even where the road is less than ideal, 40 mph is a bunch faster than a container ship can go and it's a shorter route.  The road will get improved as necessary.

No real difference in the people traffic.  Anchorage was once the refueling stop for all trans Pacific and trans Polar passenger flights.  With the advent of the 747SP and its progeny, the passenger flights can go to the Orient nonstop.  The freighters can either haul paying freight or more fuel, so they stop in ANC to refuel and we try to keep the fuel price attractive.

Alaska's economy has not moved an inch since you were there in the mid-80s.  Between the oil price crash, Clinton's destruction of the timber industry, envirowhacko interferance with any development, and political stasis during the Knowles administration, the Alaska economy entirely missed the '90s.  Other than Davis-Bacon work, you don't attract anybody here on wages anymore.

Betcha dollars to donuts that cannery was Seattle owned and they made no attempt to recruit in Alaska; that's the history and one of the reasons we love SEA so much.

Frankly, I think some of Stevens' pork is well over the top, and I find it disgusting that his name is on the ANC airport - you ought to have to die to get your name on a building.  That said, Stevens played the good soldier on ANILCA and he and the State got screwed.  Seems he took Scarlet's view and resolved, "I'll never be poor again."

and you don't know what you're talking about.  You are caught up in the silly amateur ideological arguments about how many conservative angels can sit on the head of a smaller government pin.  That is fine for poli-sci classes and blogs; governments aren't run that way.  I wish they were and when they are, I'll be much happier running one.  Until then, I'm going to run mine the way it is; you really don't want to rewire the controls while the thing's running down the road.

As I invited you before, go hold an elected or appointed position for a while and after a couple of legislative sessions, come back and talk to me about ideological purity.

Some of us want to get principle a more prominent position in the Party.

on that principle and get a majority with you.  I don't disagree with you ideologically, but until you get a governing majority on that principle, your principled minority are just lambs for the slaughter on the alter of ideological purity.  They'll lose the next primary, in either party, for their failure to "do something" for the district.

If you can elect a governing majority organized around your principles, you only have opposition from the other party.  Until you do, you have opposition in both.

An acquaintance and I were visiting.  She is about 35 and single and we were discussing marital prospects.  She said she had moved to Alaska because someone had told her that the odds were good up there, due to the high ratio of men:women.  She returned and told me, "Well, yes, the odds are good, but girlfriend, let me tell you, the goods are odd!"

We laughed.

Sorry Achance and Raven

about the women, e.g. seeking woman with boat who can cook, send picture of boat.

Seriously, the typical longtime Alaskan man is a macho a*h*e in the eyes of most urban women.  Not to say that we aren't courteous, even deferential to women; a very large percentage of Alaskans are expatriate Southerners, but if she can't carry on a conversation, cook, clean, handle the lines without me yelling at her, filet a fish, and bait her own hook, I ain't interested in her for more than a couple hours - well actually less these days.

Back in the Pipeline days I had to go to DC a lot.  What a joy it was to show up in a Georgetown bar in a Pendleton, button fly Levi's, Tony's, and an Alaska union jacket.  The men made more room than you'd have gotten with a D-9 Cat and the women just found you fascinating - ladies love outlaws.  Fortunately, I always knew I was leaving soon and didn't have to take them with me.

I'm confident that Club for Growth is building that majority, block by block. And the more Ted Stevens and Don Young spend, the more Club for Growth candidates get elected.

my money is on Ted and Don or their successors being right on the bandwagon with it; you take the rules you're handed.