Look at it this way, folks...
If Sarah Palin is the best the GOP can do...then the Republican Party is seriously, seriously, seriously fucked up.
Zero foreign policy experience, and a person who quit the only real Executive job she ever had.
Obama had zero foreign experience and only did 147 days as a junior Senator by default. Palin accomplished way more than Obama could ever imagined when she was governor from Dec 4, 2006 to July 26, 2009, some 965 days in office. Again.......965 days. In fact, she accomplished more in office than the 2 previous governors attempted. That is why she held a 93% approval rating and was chosen to be the VP pick. .........
....Idiot. She became popular in Alaska because she taxed the big oil companies and "spread the wealth around" by sending every resident a check for $1200 to help with winter heating bills.
You send me a check for $1200 and I will give you a 93% approval rating, too.
And I suspect McCain regrets the day he first heard her name in 2008. She phucked his campaign.
You are a liar. Alaskans were receiving Oil and Gas checks at least 30 years before she got in office. It was former Governor Murkowski who raised taxes on the oil companies. Palin reformed his disasterous tax plan. Only when oil went over a hundred dollars a barrel did she give the citizens a one time check for $1,200 and what was wrong with doing that?
From the Wall Street Journal
What Palin Really Did To the Oil Industry - WSJ.com
In 2006, then Gov. Frank Murkowski, a Republican, proposed changing the state's tax on oil from a gross-revenue to a net-revenue basis. Instead of creaming 10% off the top -- which was how the mature oil fields were taxed --
Mr. Murkowski pushed to tax oil companies on their profits only, at a rate of 22.5%. The change in tax regime was meant to encourage investment in and development of new fields.
In effect, the state would become the oil companies' development partner. It would participate in the upside of oil and gas exploration, but only after the companies had recovered the enormous upfront costs of drilling new wells.
These costs are considerable. In Alaska, the locations are remote, the climate is extreme, the infrastructure mostly nonexistent, the environmental rules the strictest in the world, and there is only a short work season of three or four months a year. The costs make any project very risky.
Mr. Murkowski's plan turned into a disaster. It depended much on trust, but it lacked the transparency and predictability needed to win public confidence.
One year after it went into effect, the Petroleum Profits Tax brought in far less revenue than expected and the state suffered a revenue crunch.
Somehow, the legislature had never properly defined accounting procedures and permissible deductions -- and the deductions came in much higher than expected. Meanwhile, as the shortfall appeared, a number of state legislators were on trial, under indictment, or under investigation for bribery by the FBI. These included some who should have done due diligence for the taxpayer on the proposal they enacted.
As a new governor in 2007, Mrs. Palin stepped in to address the fiscal crisis and restore accountability. Working with Democrats and Republicans alike, she chose a 25% profits tax. But in lean years the state reverts to a 10% gross revenue tax on legacy fields that do not require massive continuing inputs of new capital.
Relative to the old system, Mrs. Palin's plan -- called "Alaska's Clear and Equitable Share" (ACES) -- improves incentives for developing new resources.
It ensures the state does well in boom times -- as it is doing now -- when oil prices are high. But it also hedges against low prices in the future by ensuring that oil companies exposed to commodity price swings don't face a crushing tax burden when commodity prices fall.
Her plan includes an escalator clause that gives the state a larger share of revenues when oil prices rise. This is common to production-sharing agreements all over the world.
