Posted by The Mudflats on March 23, 2012 · 31 Comments
The sun hangs longer in the sky. Sunrise to sunset, the time of sunlight now dominates the pie graph in my ‘daylight’ app on my iPhone. We Alaskans feel the undeniable stirrings of light and life. After the long darkness that tests our psyche at the depths of winter, most of us welcome the forces of the spring solstice. Tell me, then, why I am feeling so depressed; so uninspired? Here is a hint: politics. By most measures, we Alaskans are among the most fortunate human beings alive…ever. We live in the wealthiest state (per capita) in the wealthiest nation…
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Posted by The Mudflats on March 22, 2012 · 66 Comments
Rep. Alan Dick has issued a “clarifying statement” to The Mudflats in response to communications his office has received regarding the article Help, Help! There’s an Elephant in My Uterus! The statement, including an apology, was issued via the House Majority Secretary, and was intended to clarify comments Dick made during a HESS committee meeting on March 13. In that meeting, Dick stated, as reported in the article (emphasis was Rep. Dick’s): “If I thought that the man’s signature was required… required, in order for a woman to have an abortion, I’d have a little more peace about it…” He also stated in…
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Category Alaska Legislature, Election 2012, Ethics, Headlines, Health Care Reform · Tags abortion law, abortion notification, abortion permission, Alaska GOP, Alaska HESS, Planned Parenthood, Rep. Alan Dick, The Mudflats
Posted by The Mudflats on March 21, 2012 · 9 Comments
In Anchorage, home to more than half of Alaska’s sparse population, it’s a big deal when legislators come to town. No matter how much an Anchorageite loves Juneau, there is still a little peevishness that our capital city isn’t accessible by road, and takes a $500 plane ticket to reach. We cherish those opportunities (like the special session that happened in Anchorage a couple years ago) when we can pull our boots on, and get involved in the public process right in our own back yard. And so, hundreds packed the Assembly chambers at the Loussac Library a couple…
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Posted by The Mudflats on March 20, 2012 · 150 Comments
Alaska has become the latest state to fall victim to the Republican War on Women. It’s difficult to imagine today that Alaska was once at the forefront of women’s rights, and reproductive choice, but in 1913, the Alaska Territorial Legislature gave women the right to vote as its first official act. In 1970, a successful state-wide grassroots movement to reform Alaska’s abortion law, made Alaska the third state in the country to make abortion legal and safe, three years before Roe v. Wade. Alaska has a proud history of individual choice, privacy, and non-governmental interference in its citizens’ personal lives….
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Category Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Election 2012, Headlines, Health Care Reform, Nation, Rural Issues · Tags Alaska abortion, Alaska HB363, Alaska republicans, Alaska SB191, Alaska ultrasound bill, Alaska war on women
Posted by The Mudflats on March 15, 2012 · 12 Comments
by Mel Green (Originally posted at Bent Alaska) Nearly 1,100 Alaskans — about 75% of contributors — have so far donated to One Anchorage, a March 7 press release announced. But it didn’t take long for anti-LGBT leader Jim Minnery to claim that “Outside Gay Rights Funds Bankroll Prop. 5 Supporters,” completely ignoring One Anchorage’s numerous in-state contributors. Minnery, president of the antigay/antitrans Alaska Family Council and chair of its associated 501(c)(4) advocacy organization Alaska Family Action, is also chair of the anti-Proposition 5 group “Protect Your Rights — Vote No on 5.” Proposition 5, the Anchorage Equal Rights Initiative,…
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Category Alaska, Election 2012, LGBT, Mayor Dan Sullivan, Skulduggery, Strategery, Teabaggery, Whackjobbery · Tags ACLU, Alaska Family Council, Anchorage Baptist Temple, APOC, Bent Alaska, Jerry Prevo, Jim Minnery, LGBT, Mel Green, One Anchorage, Proposition 5
Posted by The Mudflats on March 14, 2012 · 10 Comments
by Linda Kellen Biegel Tim Meyers stands at the front of room 306 at the UAA/APU Consortium Library. He’s the next guest presenter for the session: Sustainable Agriculture in Rural Alaska at the Alaska Botanical Garden’s Spring Conference. The title of the Conference is “Extend the Season, Expand Your Mind” in honor of guest gpeaker, former TV gardener and 40-year organic farming rock star, Eliot Coleman. But if Coleman is a national star, Tim Meyers is the hometown hero. Meyers’ cold-weather farming is being studied by the University of Alaska, who have provided him with interns to train in his…
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Category Agriculture, Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Anchorage School Board, Anchorage School District, Education, Election 2012, Resource Development, Roll your eyes into it · Tags Alaska, Alaska Botanical Garden, Alaska education, Alaska Grown, Alaska Legislature, Alaska politics, Bethel, House Finance, Poverty, Rep. Bill Stoltze, school lunch, The Politics of Food, Tim Meyers
Posted by The Mudflats on March 13, 2012 · 16 Comments
Well, it’s Cheesy Grits Primary night in the deep south. So, what’s really important to the Republican primary voters in Alabama and Mississippi? What feature, above all others, is most critical in a president? Is it morality? Experience? True conservatism? Of course not. Better an immoral, un-experienced fake conservative than… President Obama. And if it’s not his lack of experience, as they once claimed; or his lack of conservative credentials… and if lack of morality is a non-issue for a candidate on either side, then what could it be? Rick Santorum has edged out Newt Gingrich to take Alabama. Next…
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Posted by Jeanne Devon on December 6, 2011 · 53 Comments
~Thick and fast they came at last, and more, and more, and more! This is Alaska… A 30-year old man escaped from jail during a bathroom break in the remote Western Alaska village of Alakanuk. It’s been nine years since Kevin Patrick has escaped from the Alakanuk jail during a bathroom break. This time his arrest was for drunk driving. The last time it was for assaulting a police officer with a shovel. After the first jail break, he was caught and arrested by trooper Eric Spitzer in a now infamous case where Patrick sued the state for the trooper’s…
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Category Anchorage Assembly, Baffle it, Election 2012, Mayor Dan Sullivan, Public Safety, Sarah Palin, Skulduggery, Strategery, Whackjobbery · Tags Alakanuk, Alaska ACLU, Alaska crime, Anchorage Assembly, Communist muppets, Dennis Wheeler, Dick Traini, Donald Trump, Newt Gingrich child labor
Posted by Jeanne Devon on December 5, 2011 · 34 Comments
Let’s play a little game. Imagine this scenario, and then tell me in what country this story takes place. You wake up and go to work. Maria, in the next cubicle over, isn’t there. And she isn’t there the next day. You and your coworkers come to find out that military officers knocked on her door in the middle of the night and took her away somewhere. She was suspected of being an enemy of the government – suspected of being a terrorist. No benchmark of proof was necessary. No presumption of innocence. The executive branch of the government gave…
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Category Bang it, Election 2010, Ethics, Joe Miller, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Mayor Dan Sullivan, Republicans, Skulduggery, Strategery, Teabaggery · Tags Defense Authorization bill 2011, Feinstein Amendment, Joe Miller, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Scott McAdams
Posted by Jeanne Devon on December 3, 2011 · 26 Comments
You might remember that in September, a coalition of organizations launched the One Anchorage Campaign: The One Anchorage campaign filed an application this morning with the Anchorage Municipal Clerk’s Office to place an initiative on the April 2012 ballot asking voters to include lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Alaskans in the same legal protections already provided to women and minorities in employment, housing, and public businesses. Arliss Sturgulewski, a former state senator and Republican gubernatorial candidate is the Initiative Sponsor and Co-Chair of the One Anchorage Campaign. Former Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles is the Alternate Sponsor and campaign Co-Chair….
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