kadmium

We’ve elected a governor who I just can’t stand. Every time I see him, he makes me think of a slightly tipsy, just-becoming-belligerent frat boy.

I believe he was elected primarily because he promised he wouldn’t institute an income tax, wouldn’t allow the Permanent Fund to be touched, and would build a bunch of new roads. He never once revealed any details about how he would accomplish all this. All he ever said was that he was going to encourage development, meaning natural resources development, which means oil, gas, timber, and mining.

The Permanent Fund Dividend is a golden calf and Alaskans pay no state tax of any kind. No state sales tax, no state property tax, no income tax. (Some localities have a small sales tax, and all localities have some sort of property tax.) Alaskans seem

Fran Ulmer (Democrat) and Diane Benson (Green) both acknowledged that state services have been on the downturn for years, and that the Permanent Fund can no longer carry the state; that there would have to be some sort of tax program instituted. You would have thought they said we could turn the state around by eating babies.

Murkowski (and his running partner Loren Leman) ran around the state promising that there would not be a need for any new taxes and that the PFD would be protected — that our free ride would continue. Sound familiar? Bush the Elder promised no new taxes and had to eat those words, GW gave everyone a “tax rebate” that was nothing more than a sham loan.

I’m going on record here saying that by the end of Murkowski’s term as governor, Alaska will have some sort of state tax program.