The View Interview

Speaking on “The View,” an ABC show popular with women, Sen. John McCain told a feisty pair of female interviewers that his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, had not asked the Alaska congressional delegation for special appropriations for her state.

“Not as governor she didn’t,” McCain said.

In fact, Gov. Palin had asked for about $200 million in “earmarks,” or about $300 for every man, woman and child in Alaska. Her request was the highest per capita request in the nation.

Now, asking for federal money for special projects is one of the things governors, representatives and senators do routinely — unless their name is John McCain. He doesn’t ask for earmarks for Arizona because he has long crusaded against the practice. He has carried the crusade into his presidential campaign and has promised, if elected, to veto any bill containing earmarks.

(Earmarks are targeted by reformers because they are appropriations that are tacked onto legislation just as it is to be voted on and thus are not subjected to consideration in committee and often become law without any floor debate, as well.)

Because he rarely makes a political speech without repeating that pledge, it is astounding that he was unaware that Palin not only was the first mayor of Wasilla to hire a lobbyist in Washington to get federal handouts for her hometown, but also jumped right on the earmark express when she was elected governor a couple of years ago.

What this probably means is that McCain didn’t do his homework on Palin. He had only spent 15 minutes with her before he called her to his Arizona ranch a few weeks ago and asked her to be his running mate. Apparently the subject of earmarks didn’t come up.

The other, less charitable explanation is that McCain knew Palin had her hand out for federal money but forgot when he got before the camera: short-term memory loss.

Palin, herself, has been having problems explaining her attitude toward federal grants for Alaska. Over and over again she has said that she turned down $395 million for the infamous bridge to nowhere, with a “thanks, but no thanks.”

The facts are that she campaigned for the bridge when she ran for governor in 2006, rejecting it only after Congress had killed the project because it had been so roundly ridiculed — and then took the money and used it for other projects. Her reversal on the bridge didn’t save the federal government a nickle.

In both of these cases, getting federal money for Alaska isn’t the issue. Every state gets federal dollars every year. Many states get earmarks. Those states with senior senators and representatives who have risen to powerful positions in Congress get the most. When the Kansas delegation in Washington included Senate President Bob Dole and Nancy Kassebaum, along with veteran congressmen like Pat Roberts who chaired the powerful Agricultural Committee, it did very well.

We’re not talking federal dollars; honesty is the subject at hand.

As much as Palin now wants to embrace McCain’s anti-earmark plank, she shouldn’t falsify her record. As much as McCain wants his running mate to be just like he is, he shouldn’t ignore what actually happened.

When these false statements were brought to the attention of a member of McCain’s staff, he said that the public would focus on “larger truths,” such as the fact that Palin is a woman, is a fresh, pretty face and a reformer. When those “larger truths” are taken into consideration, he said, those smaller untruths fade into insignificance.

Translation: forget the issues, forget the truth; pay attention to those sparkling personalities on the platform (and behind the curtain). They’re all that really matters — until after the inauguration.

From the Iola Register