So let us look at the record and see who deserves a raise:
Palin runs a commercial fishing business, was a councilman and a mayor. As a councilman she helped to found her city police department and as mayor Palin oversaw tremendous growth in Wasilla as it became the cross roads of what is likely the two busyest highways in Alaska. So important did Wasilla become as the virtual crossroads of Alaska that a referendum to make Wasilla the capital of Alaska was only narrowly defeated. Palin easily won re-election as mayor. Palin presided over the Alaska Conference of Mayors.
After her terms as mayor Palin served on government commissions, brought down billion dollar corruption rings, ended the political careers of many who put self over service. Palin beat an incumbent GOP governor in a primary and a popular former two term Democratic governor in the general election. Palin, while fighting both parties and their machines, got ethics reforms passed, overhauled the tax system so energy companies could no longer game the system, returned money to the taxpayers and achieved the largest state infrastructure improvement in American history, a 40 billion dollar pipeline that was languishing in state government for decades. Palin cut the Alaska budget by 10% and cut her own Governor’s expenses by 80% compared to the previous governor. Palin chaired the National Governor’s Association (NGA) Natural Resources Committee. Palin’s approval rating varies between 65-80%.
Palin held elective office for 5 years before Obama ran for anything and as mayor and governor was not afforded the option to vote “present” 130 times.
Anchorage Daily News (not a friend of Gov. Palin by the way):
Palin won’t accept raise
20 PERCENT: Spokesman says governor feels increase in middle of her term isn’t appropriate.
By KYLE HOPKINS
khopkins@adn.com
Published: December 17th, 2008 11:05 PM
Gov. Sarah Palin didn’t ask for a pay raise and won’t accept one during her current term, a spokesman said Wednesday. “Her view is, it’s just not appropriate to accept a pay raise in the middle of the term.”
http://www.adn.com/palin/story/626781.html
Now lets look at Congress:
Congress enjoys an 11% approval rating and has been controlled by Democrats since the last election. Congress has spent exponentially, some of the bailout funds are already being mis-spent. Democrats in Congress blocked repeated attempts to fix the mortgage industry by Republicans and ignored warnings from the Federal Reserve and ignored Bush Administration warnings to pass reforms 20 times. In the meantime Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac spent $200 Million of your money on partisan activities with the vast majority going to Democrats. Democrats in Congress for years blocked repeated attempts to reform energy policy and have blocked attempts to expand domestic sources of energy keeping us at the mercy foreign energy producers who hate us.
Most of the perpetrators of this mess were just re-elected. Corruption and paybacks in Congress seem to be at an all time high.
The Hill Magazine:
With economy in shambles, Congress gets a raise
By Jordy Yager
Posted: 12/17/08 05:41 PM [ET]
A crumbling economy, more than 2 million constituents who have lost their jobs this year, and congressional demands of CEOs to work for free did not convince lawmakers to freeze their own pay.
Instead, they will get a $4,700 pay increase, amounting to an additional $2.5 million that taxpayers will spend on congressional salaries, and watchdog groups are not happy about it.
“As lawmakers make a big show of forcing auto executives to accept just $1 a year in salary, they are quietly raiding the vault for their own personal gain,” said Daniel O’Connell, chairman of The Senior Citizens League (TSCL), a non-partisan group.
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/with-economy-in-shambles-congress-gets-a-raise-2008-12-17.html
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