The obvious case against legislative confirmation for Bethany Marcum on the University of Alaska Board of Regents got even stronger Friday with a ruling by the Alaska Supreme Court reinforcing the conclusion that she played a key role in unconstitutional gerrymandering while serving on the Alaska Redistricting Board.
Read MoreFour months ago Dunleavy said that carbon sequestration would solve our financial problems and that there was no need to talk about taxes. Or gore any oxen.
“The reason we landed on this is it doesn’t gore any ox,” Dunleavy said at a December press conference, a miracle substitute for the tired talk about taxes. He claimed the state could start collecting money within months.
Read MoreWhile the imaginary Alaska Office of Food Security continues in stealth mode, the recommendations of the emergency food security task force have failed to draw any public notice from Gov. Mike Dunleavy.
The Alaska Office of Food Security, which Dunleavy claimed to have created last fall, led by his campaign PR man, does not have a website on which to post the findings of the food security task force. The task force finished its work in early March.
Read MoreThe Alaska Permanent Fund board of directors made a reasonable call Wednesday in putting a cap on in-state investments at $200 million, the amount they have already committed to about 20 investments, some of them with tenuous ties to the Alaska economy.
The potential for political corruption and conflicts of interest are two of the biggest problems with this program. Those problems remain even with the fund now saying it won’t add to the pot of money aimed at promoting Alaska projects.
Read MoreSullivan has introduced a Senate resolution that says the “Vietnam war was an extremely divisive issue back home in the United States, as a result of biased and shameful attacks from the media, academia, politicians and many others.”
What’s really shameful is that Sullivan is unaware of one of the most important lessons of that disastrous chapter in our history.
Read MoreThe bellicose claims of Sen. Dan Sullivan about the future of Taiwan must be treated with skepticism because he speaks in an oversimplified manner that overlooks a complicating factor—the danger of a World War. According to Sullivan, if China attacks Taiwan, the U.S. should promise to repel China.
Read MoreGov. Mike Dunleavy said it would be a “knee-jerk reaction” to subsidize child care providers as some legislators are proposing to keep more providers in business and make the service more affordable for families struggling to care for their kids while working outside the home.
Instead of acting, Dunleavy chose his preferred reflexive behavior—he created a task force to study how to improve child care and pay people more to care for children.
Read MoreIt’s not clear what the governor’s Office of Food Security has done since last September. It is an exaggeration to call whatever it is an “office.” It exists on paper, using “existing personnel and monetary resources,” Dunleavy’s order said.
The office has no phone number, website, email address, physical address or office that I can find. There is no Office of Food Security listed in the state list of offices. There is no contact information for the ghost office.
Read MoreThe state House, which is tied up in budget knots as I write this Wednesday, is struggling to approve a budget with a deficit of a half-billion dollars or more.
Three of the provisions in SB 114, the oil tax bill sponsored by Sen. Bill Wielechowski, would cover most or all of that shortfall, anywhere from $400 million to $600 million. These ideas are not getting enough attention.
Read MoreThe Ted Stevens Foundation and UAA Chancellor Sean Parnell signed an agreement under which the Stevens family and the foundation will be able to continue to sanitize the papers of Ted Stevens, a massive collection of thousands of boxes that is to be donated to UAA.
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