Monthly Archives: October 2013

Busting the myth of small government conservatism in Alaska and beyond

myths factsThe New York Times confirms what many in Alaska already knew: we’re a big government state that hates big government. Another way of looking at it: we’re a big government state that’s completely hypocritical about our hatred of big government.

But at least we’re not alone.

The paper has a graphic and corresponding story about how, with few exceptions, states with a larger government presence are states which vote Republican, at least in the last presidential race. And the opposite is also true. Out of the 15 states with the lowest level of government employment, only two — Indiana and Tennessee — voted Republican.

The NYT made a graphic of government employment in all states. 24.9 percent of employed Alaskans work for the government. Only Wyoming beats Alaska, with 25.2 more government workers as a percentage of all employees. New Mexico, which did not vote Republican in the last election, comes in third.

The average percentage of government workers in all states is 16 percent.

Another interesting factoid from the NYT: since Republican Sean Parnell has been governor,  total government employment in the state has risen 3.9 percent.

Digging into those numbers shows that in 2012, there were 15,858 state employees, according to the Alaska Department of Labor. That’s more than a 5 percent increase since 2007, when the state had 15,064 employees. Not coincidentally, that was the year that oil prices began their rise, from $60 dollars a barrel to more than $100.

In 2007, the governor’s office, for one, employed 133 people. Five years later, in 2012, the governor’s office employed 143 people. That’s more than a 7.5 percent increase.

Also, since 2007, the average monthly salary of workers in the governor’s office has risen more than 20 percent, from $5238 a month to $6297 a month.

In the private sector, which Republicans laud, the increase was only about 17 percent during the same time period.

So much for small government conservatism.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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PPP polls show GOP could lose control of House in 2014. Should you believe it?

A series of polls commissioned by the Democratic group MoveOn.org Political Action Committee has Democrats and some in the media all abuzz about the effects the government shutdown might have on the 2014 midterm elections. The polls, conducted by Public Policy Polling, or PPP, show that control of the U.S. House of Representatives may be in reach of the Democrats.

For Democrats to regain control of the House, 17 seats would need to change to their favor. The PPP polls show that Republican incumbents are behind in 17 of the districts across the country analyzed.

That might well be true, and the most recent PPP polls might accurately reflect the population of the districts. However, the group’s record in Alaska might shed some light on whether or not the numbers should be trusted.

PPP got it way wrong in the last big Senate race in 2010. That race, however, was a difficult one and others also missed the mark. More recently, however, the group polled in Alaska about gun control. It showed that U.S. Sen. Mark Begich lost support in Alaska as a result of his vote against it. But the poll was badly flawed. Democrats were over represented by a whopping 9 percent, women were over-represented by 12 percent, and the firm just couldn’t figure out the nonpartisan/Alaska Independent Party thing.

Other polls that PPP has conducted in Alaska are similarly flawed.

In the wake of the firm withholding a poll about the recall of a Democratic state senator in Colorado, others in the media are beginning to write about PPP’s suspect methodology.

Uber pollster Nate Silver tweeted that the main problem with group’s polls is that “their approach to polling is extremely ad hoc. Ultimately, that ad-hockery stems from a lack of appreciation/understanding for the statistical fundamentals behind polling.”

In The New Republic, Nate Cohen writes the following:

After examining PPP’s polls from 2012 and conducting a lengthy exchange with PPP’s director, I’ve found that PPP withheld controversial elements of its methodology, to the extent it even has one, and treated its data inconsistently. The racial composition of PPP’s surveys was informed by whether respondents voted for Obama or John McCain in 2008, even though it wasn’t stated in its methodology. PPP then deleted the question from detailed releases to avoid criticism. Throughout its seemingly successful run, PPP used amateurish weighting techniques that distorted its samples—embracing a unique, ad hoc philosophy that, time and time again, seemed to save PPP from producing outlying results. The end result is unscientific and unsettling.

Elsewhere in the piece, Cohn indicates that PPP tweaks the methodology to get the answers it wants.

I don’t know the effect that the current slate of polls will have on the shutdown or on the midterm elections. But I do know that if PPP is trying to help Democrats in Republican districts, which appears to be the case, flawed polls will backfire eventually. They will confirm what many suspect: the group, and the party associated with it, are all big liars.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com 

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Thank God it’s Friday: The wishing Lester Lunceford well edition

Thank god it's fridayWhat a busy week. With the government shutdown on Tuesday, I have mostly been focused on the shores of the Potomac and our nation’s capitol. That, and trying and failing to sign up for the federal health exchange. So, I thought that my Friday’s facts column would cover all the things this week that I wanted to write about, but didn’t get around to.

  • Earlier this week, the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority – Alaska Energy Authority board of directors met and elected new officers. The two new leaders are among the three newest members of the board. The new chair is Dana Pruhs, President of Pruhs Construction and Meridian Investments. The vice-chair is Russell Dick of Juneau and is employed by Sealaska Corporation.
  • The DOD decision to keep the F-16 squadron in Fairbanks was heralded by Alaska’s statewide officials and local officials in Fairbanks and North Pole. Another voice, who testified earlier in support of keeping the squadron in Fairbanks and praised the decision was Anchorage Mayor Dan Sullivan – – or should I say, Dan Sullivan for Lt. Governor. It’s funny how parochialism goes the way of the dodo when you’re running for statewide office.
  • Tuesday was local election day for many. Probably the most covered race was the liquor tax referendum in the Matanuska-Susitna borough which failed overwhelmingly. While much of the coverage of this race was really good, solid reporting, I felt that a big piece of the story was never told. Conventional wisdom might suggest that the Valley is a hot bed of anti-tax sentiment; but, look what happened in this election alone – – Wasilla passed a tax increase, Houston voters had a chance to eliminate a sales tax on fireworks and didn’t , the borough voters approved a bond package and according to polls, 54 percent of Valley voters supported the proposed liquor tax increase referendum. Even the Frontiersmen and Anchorage Daily News provided editorial support to the referendum. So, what possessed voters to kill the liquor tax increase by a margin of 63.7 percent to 36.3 percent? My answer is that Republican campaign consultant Art Hackney enlisted an Obama style door-to-door campaign that identified and targeted voters. It is a quiet type campaign that flies under the radar, like a drone. The other side was totally outgunned. Its political consultant didn’t know what hit him. Until it did.
  • Probably the other most interesting and watched race in the Valley was the Wasilla City Council race where former state Rep. Vic Kohring, a convicted felon, attempted a political comeback only to be rebuffed by his neighbors by a 2 to 1 margin.
  • Other Valley races of note included the Palmer mayor’s race where incumbent DeLana Johnson narrowly defeated challenger Linda Combs, whose husband preceded Johnson as mayor. To many people’s surprise, former Green Party U.S. Senate candidate Jim Sykes appears to have narrowly won a seat on the Mat-Su borough assembly. Even with all the talk of patriotism that comes out of the Valley, less than 20 percent of the registered voters in the borough voted.
  • In Fairbanks with one of the lowest turnouts for the city in at least a decade, John Eberhart, an attorney for the Tanana Chiefs Conference, appears to have a lead over downtown business owner and political conservative, Vivian Stiver, with plenty of absentee ballots that could still change the outcome of the election.
  • In Homer, the electorate voted to repeal a city code banning plastic shopping bags and Juneau elected Kate Troll to their assembly.  Troll has previously served on the Ketchikan borough assembly before relocating to Juneau. And finally with some sadness, I have to report that Lester Lunceford, who was the mayor of Whittier that got recalled just a few weeks ago, lost in his write-in bid for city council.
  • For many Alaskans, receipt of their Permanent Fund Dividend checks was probably the most significant event of the week. A lot of checks worth $900 each hit mail boxes or were direct deposits for many Alaskans. Already many businesses are clamoring for our checks by advertising “special pfd offers”. Here’s a trivia data point about pfd offers: Neal Bergt’s Markair, which is now defunct, was the company that pioneered the first PFD deal. Many companies quickly followed suit that year and have continued to do so every October since. This year, even Slayer, an American thrash metal band known for their colorful lyrics, are offering a PFD special for their Sullivan arena concert scheduled for later this month and Alaska Airlines is offering all sorts of specials.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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Running out of patience with the healthcare exchange

So-called open enrollment for the Affordable Care Act is on its fourth day. And still technical “glitches” abound. When I go to the federal exchange website, it tells me to wait. And it keeps me waiting, and waiting. I make breakfast and I’m still waiting. I talk to a friend and I’m still waiting.

I just checked again: “We have a lot of visitors on the site right now. Please stay on this page,” some federal bureaucrat tells me, one among the hundreds of thousands of people who are desperate to see if at long last, I will be able to afford insurance on the private market

This is what ObamaCare looks like. Is this the future of healthcare? Yikes.

In a telephonic town hall on Wednesday night, U.S. Sen. Mark Begich urged people to be patient with the problems. He said that he’s going through the same frustrations. He said that had the state built its own exchange instead of relying on the federal government, things might have gone more smoothly. I have my doubts. If the state set up its own exchange, the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services would have been in charge. And if their testimony in front of legislators is any indication, they’re a model for government dysfunction.

Miracle! I’ve just created an account. For security purposes, I get to choose questions like my parents’ anniversary, my favorite food, my favorite pet. Except I don’t know my parents’ anniversary. What kind of daughter doesn’t remember when their parents got married? Then again, they’ve been divorced for more than 20 years. Speaking of divorce. Don’t go there. Think about your favorite food, instead.

This morning, my favorite food as I waited to sign up for the exchanges was chia seeds and oatmeal, but last night I convinced myself that it was a kale salad from a bag at Costco. Which one’s really, truly my favorite?

Moment of truth: I don’t like either. Chia and oatmeal are slimy and kale is bitter. The only thing worse than lying to yourself about what you like to eat is having to admit that you’re lying to yourself… I do love the sausage and cinnamon sugar toast that my mother used to make for me before she and my father divorced.

Divorce! There is no worse word than divorce.

Except I’d like to say it over and over right now to the federal bureaucrat who’s making me wait to sign up for the health insurance plan that I was promised, and that I’ve spent no small amount of time and political capital evangelizing for.

Then there’s the favorite pet issue. Good lord, what federal agent of guilt thought up these security questions?

If you must know, and they must, the favorite pet is the cat, who went with the ex-husband, as will the health insurance come January.

I’m still waiting. I suspected there might be problems with the system, but I was comforted when I learned that private businesses, like Enroll Alaska, an affiliate of Northrim Bank, was going to get into the act. Banks are efficient. Bankers take care of things. If I were really hungry I’d go to a banker. If there was any way to straighten out this mess, they’d do it.

Enroll’s most recent Facebook post says this:

The Federal Marketplace/Exchange is technically open but none of our agents have been able to get into the system to run quotes. Please bare with us as we work through the technical difficulties and we’ll be sure to let everyone know once the system is fully functional. Thank you for your patience!

It’s now 2 p.m. The feds are still telling me to wait. The morning guilts are gone. They’re replaced by a slow, steady anger for making me go through all of this for nothing. I’m done being funny. I’m giving up for the day. I, and no doubt, thousands like me.

This better be fixed soon, or we’re going to divorce it forever.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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Quote of the day: God save Congress

“Have mercy upon us oh God, and save us from the madness…Deliver us from the hypocrisy of attempting to sound reasonable while being unreasonable.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-M7oXWTPf0

U.S. Senate Chaplain Barry C. Black in his opening prayer Thursday morning.

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Wielechowski wants state Medicaid report released. Says he’ll go to court if necessary.

Gov. Sean Parnell’s administration has for six months declined to make public a report that the state paid for to analyze the effect Medicaid expansion would have on the state. The Department of Health and Social Services paid $80,000 to the Lewin Group, a consulting firm based in Virginia, to write the report. It’s been completed since April, but DHSS won’t release the report until the agency analyzes it.

Alaska state Sen. Bill Wielechowski recently requested the report from DHSS. He was denied. He’s appealing that decision. If he doesn’t receive it, he’ll take it to court, he said.

Wielechowski was told that the report will be made public “once DHSS has completed its analysis and submitted its recommendations to the governor.” Others, including this reporter, have requested the report and have received the same response.

Parnell has not made clear whether or not he would accept funding from the federal government in order to expand Medicaid, a state program that pitches in for health insurance for low income Alaskans and that receives matching federal funds. The report, presumably, will have some impact on Parnell’s decision.

As part of the Affordable Care Act, the federal government has offered up to 90 percent of the money to expand the program. The Lewin Group has completed a similar study for New Hampshire. It found that although not accepting the funds would reduce state Medicaid spending, it would reduce the number of uninsured in the state, and increase federal revenues by $1.8 to $2.7 billion in New Hampshire between 2014 and 2020.

A separate report commissioned by the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium estimated that if the state accepts expansion, 41,500 uninsured Alaskans will become eligible for Medicaid in 2014 and bring an estimated $1.1 billion in new federal revenue to the state over the next seven years,.

Parnell has said that he’ll make his decision on whether or not to expand the program when he presents his budget at the end of the year.

DHSS did not say when it would release the report. According to the Alaska’s Public Records Act, public records need to be released no later than 10 days after requesting them. Not all records are public, however. Some can remain private because they are considered “deliberative” and contain “opinions, recommendations, or advice about policy.”

Legislative lawyers told Wielechowski that the report is not a deliberative document because it contains no advice about policy.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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Government shutdown: Begich has harsh words for Republicans

Senate race fightIn a wide ranging telephonic town hall meeting on Wednesday evening, U.S. Sen. Mark Begich answered questions from Alaskans across the state about the government shutdown, the Affordable Care Act, the debt ceiling, and the effects all of this has on Alaska.

Begich has clashed in the past with Democrats. However, on the shutdown, he’s sticking with his party and he had harsh words for Republicans on Wednesday. “All the gimmicks are coming from the other side,” he said. “These are the kind of shenanigans that Alaskans and Americans all across the country are fed up with.”

The shutdown is in its third day. Federal employees all across the country are furloughed. Veterans’ benefits are being held up, so are checks for those applying for Social Security and disability. According to J.P. Morgan analysts, furloughs will reduce national income by a total of $1.3 billion per week. As a result, the shutdown could shave 0.12 percent off fourth quarter GDP growth for each week it goes on.

Why? Because House Republicans want to defund or delay the onset of the Affordable Care Act as a condition of allowing a budget bill to pass.

To be more specific, an increasingly shrinking number of House Republicans, including Speaker of the House John Boehner, won’t allow a bill on the House floor that would separate funding for the Affordable Care Act from the rest of the budget.

If allowed, such a bill, or a “clean continuing resolution,” would likely pass with the support of more centrist Republicans and those who are up for reelection in more moderate districts.

Begich urged callers to email and call the rest of the congressional delegation to push to get a bill on the floor, particularly Rep. Don Young. He indicated that Young might vote for such a measure, but hasn’t yet said so publicly.

Young was unavailable for comment late on Wednesday evening. In response to a question about whether or not Young would vote for a budget absent conditions on the health care bill, Young’s spokesperson Mike Anderson said that there hasn’t been such a bill yet offered. However, in response to a question about the shutdown on Wednesday afternoon, Young told reporters that if it were up to the Alaska delegation, the crisis would be averted.

Begich also spent time busting a myth: neither Begich, nor any member of Congress get exemptions from signing up for insurance through the exchanges. In fact , he said, they are the only employees in the country who are actually required to get their insurance through the exchanges.

The federal exchange website has been overwhelmed and glitches have been widely reported. One caller expressed frustration over the glitches. Begich said that he too experienced problems when he tried to sign up.

Unlike many other states, Parnell opted to allow the federal government to create the exchange for the state. Had Alaska chosen to create its own exchange, like Washington state did, there would likely be fewer issues, Begich said.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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How much is the shutdown costing the country?

From the Washington Post: 

“In a research note Tuesday, J.P. Morgan analysts estimated that federal furloughs will reduce national income by a total of $1.3 billion per week. As a result, the shutdown could shave 0.12 percent off fourth quarter GDP growth for each week it goes on. That forecast doesn’t account for any knock-on effects on the private sector or dent in economic confidence, which are harder to quantify. All that lost income could be recouped if Congress later agrees to give those 770,000 furloughed federal workers back pay. But for now, that’s very much uncertain. Republicans in Congress are split on whether to agree to retroactive pay to workers who get furloughed.”

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Palin and Koch brothers make shutdown jokes while children are turned away for cancer treatment

You might have seen Sarah Palin’s supposed “funny” Facebook post about how the government shutdown will affect the country. With the government shut down, who will, “block responsible resource development, spy on me, waste my money…” she posted. The Alaskan chapter of Americans for Prosperity, the Koch brother-funded political group, also had fun with the federal-workers-are-worthless meme on its Facebook page.

Palin can afford to have fun, and the Koch brothers have enough money to buy fun all around. Others can’t. Not all Americans are spending their days in a Wasilla fortress or in mansions across the country. To some, the shutdown is life or death. The following heartbreaking paragraph from the The Wall Street Journal highlights what the government shutdown means for some Americans:

At the National Institutes of Health, nearly three-quarters of the staff was furloughed. One result: director Francis Collins said about 200 patients who otherwise would be admitted to the NIH Clinical Center into clinical trials each week will be turned away. This includes about 30 children, most of them cancer patients, he said.

Not so funny now, huh?

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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Begich holds fast with Democrats over shutdown

chess moveSince being elected in 2008, Sen. Mark Begich has often bumped heads with his Democratic Senate colleagues. He did so over gun control, for one. He’s repeatedly voted against environmental issues that Democrats have pushed for.

But now, he’s holding fast and true with his fellow Democrats who are blaming Republicans for shutting the federal government down over the funding of the Affordable Care Act, an act, it should be noted, that Congress passed, has been litigated up to the Supreme court, and has gone through an election cycle.

It’s also something that Alaskans are against, by and large, for now at least.

So why is Begich, who’s up for a tough reelection in 2014 sticking with the Dems on this? Principle no doubt plays into it. He likely truly believes that Republican entrenchment on this is wrong for the country. But Begich is nothing if not a political animal. He has one of the best political noses in the state, and the political winds he’s smelling are telling him that this one is a winner.

I couldn’t find anybody who’s polled on the shutdown in Alaska, but feelings here aren’t likely radically different than feelings across the country: no matter how much people object to the health care law, they have consistently told pollsters that they are not in favor of tying government operations to defunding the law. Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake probably put it best when he said, “Obamacare is not popular, but we’ve managed to find the one thing that’s less popular than Obamacare.”

Republican Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, who’s running for Begich’s seat, believes otherwise, apparently. He has said that if he were elected, he would “stand” with those Republican senators most entrenched, senators that even Republican stalwarts like John McCain and Richard Burr, to name just a few, believe have gone too far.

He’s since walked some of that back, maybe, although it’s been hard figure out exactly where he stands. Indeed, Roll Call writer Stu Rothenberg, who interviewed four Republican Senate candidates about the shutdown, said that among all of them, Mead was the most “difficult to pin down.”

Tea Party favorite Joe Miller, who is also running, is not difficult to pin down. He’d fight to end the health care law for as long as they’d have him in the Senate.

Former Department of Natural Resources Commissioner, Dan Sullivan, who has for weeks dithered about running, may be the smartest of the three. He’s not answering questions about the mess. He doesn’t have to. For now, he’s a private citizen dithering away like the rest of us. And by the time he might have to, the worst will likely be over, and he’ll get to play statesman.

Begich is holding a telephonic town hall on the government shutdown on Wednesday evening. Expect strong words from him about entrenched Republicans. It’s a winner and he knows it.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.ccom 

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Quote of the day: A conservative gets pushed out of the party

“When I think of the Republican Party, I don’t think of principled conservative legislators who are men and women of vision strategy. I think of ideologues who are prepared to wreck things to get their way. They have confused prudence — the queen of virtues, and the cardinal virtue of conservative politics — with weakness. I know I’m very much a minority among conservatives in this, but the behavior of Congressional Republicans pushed me out of the party two years ago, even though I almost always vote Republican, or withhold my vote.”

Rod Dreher, editor of The American Conservative.

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Alaska Railroad asking state for $40 million for safety upgrades

railroadThe Alaska Railroad Corp. is requesting that Gov. Sean Parnell include $40 million in his fiscal year 2015 budget submission for safety improvements to passenger service. The railroad is making the request to comply with federally mandated passenger safety upgrades. According to the railroad’s budget request, more than $150 million total will be required to complete the federal mandate by 2018.

The federal mandate “is too big a lift for our current financial situation to support,” railroad spokesman Tim Sullivan said.

Parnell will present his budget later this year.

The mandates were established by Congress in 2008 in response to train accidents. They are supposed to make rail service safer.

The railroad has already spent $63.8 million on the program, it says. That number includes $19.1 it received from the legislature last year, an appropriation that was requested by Parnell in the final hours of the legislative session without time for committee review or public comment. All told, the railroad will need an additional $69.7 million from 2015 to 2018 to complete the project.

The $40 million is for both fiscal year 2015 and 2016.

“At stake is the continuation of Alaska Railroad passenger service,” Sullivan said.

Roughly 400,000 people a year ride the railroad. About 60 percent of those passengers come to Alaska via cruise ships. It’s unclear how many Alaskans take the train. The direct financial impact to Alaska if the passenger service is disrupted is also unclear. The railroad is working on an impact study, Sullivan said.

A disruption would undoubtedly impact businesses and communities that rely on tourism.

The railroad and all its assets were transferred from federal to state hands in 1985 and was established as a state-owned corporation. Those assets now total about $989 million and include about 500 miles of railroad line and about 36,000 acres of land, about half of which are available for lease, and which accounted for roughly $10 million of the railroad’s revenue in 2012.

It does not pay state or corporate income taxes, nor any property taxes.

Its total revenue in 2012 was $190.4 million, including about $40 million of federal government grants.

According to the railroad’s annual report, operating revenues exceeded operating expenses by $3.8 million.

Unlike the Alaska Housing Finance Corp., another state corporation, the Legislature has no say over the railroad’s budget, and it doesn’t pay annual dividends to the state. The intent was for the corporation to use any profits to be self-sustaining. However since 1996, it has relied on federal grants to make ends meet, and state appropriations in the last few years for capital projects.

In the past, there have been discussions about giving the Legislature more control over the railroad’s budget through the Executive Budget Act, which the railroad has always strenuously opposed on grounds that they weren’t asking for or needed state appropriations.

Contact Amanda Coyne amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

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