|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
Though Leery of Washington, Alaska Feasts on Its Dollars
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Container
|
| Contributor | ArmyDem |
| Last Edited | ArmyDem Aug 18, 2010 12:10pm |
| Logged |
0
|
| Category | News |
| Media | Newspaper - New York Times |
| News Date | Wednesday, August 18, 2010 06:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | By MICHAEL POWELL
Published: August 18, 2010
PALMER, Alaska — Backed by a blue row of saw-toothed mountain peaks, the Republican state lawmaker Carl Gatto finds himself on a fine roll.
Roll it back, he says, roll back this entire socialistic experiment in federal hegemony. Give us control of our land, let us drill and mine, and please don’t let a few belugas get in the way of a perfectly good bridge.
“I’ve introduced legislation to roll back the federal government,” he says. “They don’t have solutions; they just have taxes.”
And what of the federal stimulus, from which Alaska receives the most money per capita in the nation? Would he reject it?
Mr. Gatto, 72 and wiry, smiles and shakes his head: “I’ll give the federal government credit: they sure give us a ton of money. For every $1 we give them in taxes for highways, they give us back $5.76.”
He points to a newly graded and federally financed highway, stretching toward distant fir trees. “Man, beautiful, right?”
Alaskans tend to live with their contradictions in these recessionary times. No place benefits more from federal largess than this state, where the Republican governor decries “intrusive” Obama administration policies, officials sue to overturn the health care legislation and Senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican, voted against the stimulus bill.
 |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
