Posted by Jeanne Devon on August 31, 2018 · 6 Comments
Alaska voters, we need to have a conversation. And I know this may hurt a little. It’s about Bill Walker and Mark Begich, the two “moderates” in the 3-way race for Alaska governor – the first, a former Republican and incumbent, the second, a Democrat and former US Senator. The third player in our little melodrama is Mike Dunleavy, a former Republican right-wing conservative state senator from Wasilla who quit in the middle of his term. In the end, your vote is your choice and yours alone, but I can’t let you step behind the red, white, and blue curtain…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Governors Race, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Bill Walker, Chuitna Coal, Election 2018, Elections, Environment, Headlines, LGBT, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Ohio Dan Sullivan, Oil & Gas, Pebble Mine, SB21, Sean Parnell, Strategery, Walker-Mallott Unity Ticket, Your Head · Tags Alaska Governors Race, Begich for Governor, Bill Walker, Bill Walker PFD, Bill Walker pro life, Bill Walker vouchers, Bob Shavelson, Chuitna Citizens Coalition, Chuitna coal, Cook Inletkeeper, Hollis French, Joe Miller, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Mike Dunleavy, SCOTUS, Walker Chuitna, Walker education, Walker fish first, Walker for Governor, Walker LGBT, Walker oil, Walker Pebble mine, Walker vs. Begich
Posted by Jeanne Devon on February 15, 2018 · 3 Comments
As Mike Dunleavy (R-Wasilla) steps down from the state senate to run for Governor, Gov. Bill Walker was tasked with choosing one of three possible replacements to fill out Dunleavy’s term. Walker opted to choose from outside the shallow pool of nominees from the Mat-Su Republican Party’s options, and appointed Mat-Su Borough Assemblyman Randall Kowalke. The fabulously-coiffed Kowalke was at least an already-elected official in some capacity. Walker took a risk by choosing from outside the list, and quickly felt the wrath. The arguments on the surface were difficult to discount. It’s the normal custom of the Party to…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Headlines, LGBT, Mat Su, Nation, Republicans · Tags Alaska senate, Gov. Bill Walker, Mat-Su Republicans, Mike Dunleavy, Randall Kowalke, Tom Braund
Posted by Jeanne Devon on February 9, 2018 · 4 Comments
You know that old song from the 70s, “If you can’t report on the governmental body you know, report on the governmental body you’re with.” Or something like that. Anyway, I’m here, so… DATELINE: DELTA JUNCTION, ALASKA – Somewhere south of the Granite Mountains, somewhere east of Fairbanks, west of the Canadian border, and squarely in the middle of what most Americans would call “nowhere.” The current temperature is about -20F with the wind chill factor. I don’t even know what it is without the wind chill factor because frankly, here, it doesn’t matter. Wind chill factor is everything. The…
Read More
Category Agriculture, Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Environment, Fish & Wildlife, Headlines, Native issues, Rural Issues · Tags Alaska Highway 1408, Clearwater remediation, Clearwater restoration, Clearwater River, Delta Junction Alaska
Posted by Shannyn Moore on February 21, 2016 · 2 Comments
State Sen. Pete Kelly, a Republican from Fairbanks, has introduced a bill to allow University of Alaska students to carry guns on campuses and into dorms. That’s public policy even more harebrained than putting pregnancy tests into bar bathrooms. Did Pete go to college? Did he live in a dorm? If so, he apparently didn’t notice that dorms aren’t exactly hothouses of good judgment. Adding firearms just increases the opportunity for adolescent bad judgment to become truly tragic. I sure wouldn’t send my kid to live in a dorm populated with gun-toting teenagers. I haven’t figured out what Kelly does…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Barack Obama, Education, Election 2016, Headlines, Lisa Murkowski, Nation, Public Safety, Republicans, Second Amendment, Whackjobbery · Tags Donald Trump, Guns on campus, Lisa Murkowski, Pete Kelly, Pope Francis, Pope v. Trump, SCOTUS, UAA, UAA guns
Posted by Jeanne Devon on September 2, 2015 · 6 Comments
As I drove, I imagined having to explain to a Secret Service agent that the reason my boots set off the sniffer dog is because the last two places I wore them were a pig farm and a gun show respectively. So, there was a perfectly good explanation why I smelled of gunpowder, and fertilizer. “No really! I swear! I still have the pictures on my phone!” I was glad I had allowed extra time. I had allowed so much extra time, it turns out, that I was the first member of the press at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson (JBER) and waited in…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Barack Obama, Environment, Headlines, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Military, Nation, Native issues, Ohio Dan Sullivan, Oil & Gas, Pebble Mine, Resource Development, Sarah Palin, Sean Parnell, Strategery · Tags Air Force One JBER, Barack Obama, Byron Mallott, climate change Alaska, Climate change arctic, GLACIER conference, Global leadership in the Arctic, Gov. Bill Walker, ice breakers, Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Obama Alaska, President's speech on climate change, Senator Dan Sullivan
Posted by Shannyn Moore on June 7, 2015 · 22 Comments
This has been a difficult week for many Alaskans. So much uncertainty as 10,000 pink slips go to our friends and neighbors working for the state. Fairbanks Sen. Pete Kelly argues they aren’t pink slips, because there’s an “if” in them, as in “You’re not laid off if a handful of senators get their poop together.” Of course, we know there’s no chance Pete and his collaborators will get their poop together. Instead of pink slips, people online are calling them “Pete slips.” Our current legislative crisis is the handiwork of a small cabal of senators who refuse to compromise their misguided ideology. The…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Bang it, Ethics, Headlines, Oil & Gas, Oil Tax, Republicans, SB21, Skulduggery, Vitamin Democracy · Tags Alaska budget, Alaska Legislature, alaska permanent fund, Alaska republicans, Alaska Senate Majority, Anna McKinnon, Cathy Giessel, Charlie Huggins, Fumbling five, Johnny Ellis, Lemming caucus, Lyda Green, Mike Dunleavy, Pete Kelly
Posted by Jeanne Devon on March 5, 2015 · 20 Comments
Sarah Palin, whom shame and decency dictate should be hiding out somewhere in the back of a dark deep cave with a bag over her head this week, is instead standing on the tippy top of Mt. Hypocrisy with a giant bullhorn yelling, “Look at me!” Should any of us be surprised? No. Was I still a little surprised? A little. Apparently the thought of raking Hillary Clinton (whom Palin thanked in 2008 for putting “16 million cracks in the glass ceiling”) over the political coals was just too tempting, just too enticing to put in check her own conscience, or…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Politicos, Baffle it, Bang it, Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin - the book, Election 2008, Ethics, Headlines, Nation, Roll your eyes into it, Sarah Palin, Skulduggery, Your Head · Tags Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin, Bristol Palin, Bristol Palin emails, Bristol Palin Hillary Clinton, Clinton email scandal, Frank Bailey, Jeanne Devon, Ken Morris, Palin Clinton, Palin Clinton emails, Palin email scandal, Palin emails, Sarah Palin
Posted by Jeanne Devon on November 3, 2014 · 9 Comments
Fueled by Jitters coffee and a sugar cookie the size of a frisbee, I was as ready as I was ever going to be. I and two companions were on a political road trip north to the Valley. As we arrived in Wasilla, a small plane flew laps over the AT&T sports center, towing a sign that read “Sullivan for Senate.” In a media market filled to capacity with political ads, this apparently was the only air time left. Inside, Toby Keith, Neil Diamond, Eminem, Corey Hart, and an unlikely play list of songs presumably chosen for themes of freedom, America,…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska Legislature, Alaska Politicos, Alaska Senate Race, Bang it, Barack Obama, Election 2014, Elections, Headlines, Health, Mark Begich, Mat Su, Nation, Ohio Dan Sullivan, Rallies and Events, Republicans · Tags Begich for Senate, Dan Sullivan Alaska, Sullivan for Senate, Ted Cruz Alaska, Ted Cruz Dan Sullivan
Posted by Shannyn Moore on October 28, 2014 · 13 Comments
I was about 10 when I heard a sermon I will never forget. The speaker that day drew a few gasps from the congregation of the Homer Christian Church when he disagreed with a passage from the Bible. He quoted from 1 Corinthians, Ch. 13, the passage you often hear at weddings: “Faith, Hope and Love, the greatest of these is love.” “That’s not true,” he said. “The greatest of these is hope.” He explained that his father had committed suicide. There was no shortage of love in their family. His father had simply lost hope that the pain of…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska House Race, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Don Young, Election 2014, Elections, Headlines, LGBT, Make it explode, Nation, Native issues, Republicans, Rural Issues, Whackjobbery, Your Head · Tags Don Young, Don Young for Congress, Don Young suicide, Forrest Dunbar for Congress
Posted by Jeanne Devon on October 22, 2014 · 15 Comments
Alaska’s lone congressman sure dug himself into a hole yesterday, didn’t he? And you know what they say. Since you’re in there anyway, you may as well just keep digging. At first it appeared as though Young may have been repentant about telling grieving high school students who had just lost a friend and classmate to suicide that the problem was the lack of support from family and friends. Matt Shuckerow responded to a request from the Alaska Dispatch News in an email stating: “Congressman Young was very serious and forthright when discussing the issue of suicide, in part because of the…
Read More
Category Alaska, Alaska House Race, Alaska Politicos, Bang it, Don Young, Election 2014, Elections, Headlines, Nation, Rallies and Events, Rural Issues, Veterans, Whackjobbery · Tags Don Young, Don Young for Congress, Don Young Mat-Su Senior Center, Don Young suicide, Forrest Dunbar, Forrest Dunbar for Congress