Homer Alaska - News -

Her victories and mishaps during a year and a half as the state's chief executive are being picked apart, as well as her actions while serving as a member of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, and as mayor and assembly member in Wasilla.

In Alaska, Palin demonstrated strengths and weaknesses as governor. She scored stunning legislative achievements in 2007 and 2008, but failed to follow up on promises to cut spending and change the way the Legislature writes the state capital budget, a spending program stuffed with big construction projects with the state flush with oil money.

Based on Palin's track record so far in Juneau, her national campaign's claims of being tough on Big Oil have credibility, but big increases in two state budgets under her administration would challenge any claims of being a fiscal conservative.

Palin did champion ethics reform, and a strong ethics bill passed the Legislature during her first year. Legislators did the heavy lifting on the complex bill, but Palin strongly supported it.

While Palin lacks the kind of political experience that would have her negotiate compromises on complex issues, with state legislators for instance, her 80 percent-plus approval ratings with the Alaska public was so great that few legislators dared to challenge her.

Alaska's politicians credit Palin for an uncanny ability to connect with people and a superb sense of using media and timing. Palin understands how to use the public pulpit in pushing her initiatives, and the effects generally have cowed legislative critics.

Luck has played a big part in Palin's success as governor so far.

Since oil revenues pay for more than 80 percent of Alaska's budget, Palin came into office inheriting a budget surplus, as oil prices soared.

Her predecessor, Gov. Frank Murkowski, had the bad luck of coming into office facing low oil prices and a $1 billion state deficit. Murkowski's budget cuts set him on a trail of unpopularity that made him a pushover for the charismatic Palin to defeat.

Her legislative accomplishments were principally in the oil and gas arena. In 2007, just after taking office, Palin acted on advice from a close circle of advisers and trashed a complex agreement Murkowski had negotiated with major oil producers for a $30 billion-plus, natural-gas pipeline.

Palin's alternative was a solicitation to bring in an independent pipeline company to do the project, arguing the state shouldn't let the major oil companies own most of Alaska's energy infrastructure. That process was played out in 2008, with the Legislature's approval of Calgary-based TransCanada Corp. to receive a state license entitling the Canadian company to a $500 million state subsidy in return for agreeing to meet certain requirements for a pipeline.

While the TransCanada strategy was in play, two major companies, BP and ConocoPhillips, announced their own pipeline initiative in competition with TransCanada. Palin took credit for causing the big companies to move on the big pipeline. So now, no matter who builds the huge project, she can take some credit.

Palin also went after the petroleum industry for new taxes. Murkowski had increased state taxes on oil producers, but Palin came in with a proposal to tweak and increase the tax law. Palin's own tax proposal was relatively modest, but state legislators added changes that boosted its effects substantially. Now Alaska boasts some of the highest taxes on oil production in the world.

Bashing Big Oil is good politics in Alaska as elsewhere, and so far there has been no apparent downside to Palin's initiatives.

Likewise her oil tax increase. While it was the Legislature that ramped up the tax, Palin didn't oppose it. The tax is now so high that some industry development projects on the North Slope are being delayed and canceled.

If Palin has weaknesses it is in the day-to-day chores of dealing with complex decisions. Inexperienced elected officials usually recruit experienced advisers, and Palin has done this to some extent.

She also demonstrated a willingness to take advice and back away from a populist-type position on oil taxes she initially supported, instead taking the recommendation of her revenue commissioner and tax professionals in the Department of Revenue to support a net-profits tax on the industry that had been criticized.

One area where Palin initially showed good instincts but failed on the follow-through was when she made large cuts in 2007 to a bloated capital budget passed by legislators. Lawmakers howled, but Palin stood firm, arguing that the backroom deal was poor policy.

But in 2008, when legislators asked her for guidelines for the capital budget to avoid a second round of vetoes, Palin did not provide any. The capital budget was even bigger in 2008 than 2007, but she made few vetoes.

One area where Palin may be embarrassed on the national level is her administration's challenge and lawsuit against the U.S. Department of the Interior for listing polar bears as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Basically the state challenged the basic science in the global-warming debate and the models that showed shrinkage of the polar icecap, the prime polar bear habitat.

In making the decision to oppose the polar bear listing, Palin acted against the advice of scientists in the state Department of Fish and Game who were working with federal marine mammal scientists in drafting the proposed listing of the polar bears.

What could also embarrass Palin is that her position on polar bears puts Alaska at odds with the majority of scientists and governments around the world on global warming and at a time when Alaska is also seeking federal funds to offset problems of coastal erosion in rural villages, which is largely blamed on climate change.

Tim Bradner is a reporter for the Alaska Journal of Commerce.