Akidis: Lock Him Up

It is a great day for Alaska politics. According to this ADN article, former Rep. Tom Anderson was convicted of all 7 charges brought against him. I, for one, will be celebrating when they take him away. Anderson said,

"The prosecution has criminalized being a legislator over this
past year. And I think I fell victim to that," he said.

Lock up the bastard. As a mother, I can't help but think about his wife, Sen. McGuire, and their kid. My advice to Anderson is don't say anything that you wouldn't want your kid to read when a teenager. You know it will happen eventually.

Happy Alaska Flag Day

According to the Gavel to Gavel website, today is Alaska Flag Day. This comes from 50states.com:

Alaska adopted the flag for official state use in 1959. The blue field represents the sky, the sea, and mountain lakes, as well as Alaska's wildflowers. Emblazoned on the flag are eight gold stars: seven from the constellation Ursa Major, or the Big Dipper. The eighth being the North Star, representing the northern most state. Alaska's flag was designed in 1926 by a 13-year-old Native American boy, Bennie Benson, from the village of Chignik. Bennie received a 1,000-dollar scholarship and a watch for his winning entry in the flag design contest.

From ASP

Happy Independence Day! What better time to display Old Glory (or at least this early version of it) than today? The webpage from which it is found, has several different early flags of the American Revolution with brief explanations of them below. Read it, and remember. Memory may be the most important part of politics. It's a shame we don't use it properly.

Gara Criticizes House Leadership and, uh, half of the Senate Bipolar Leadership

In this ADN article, with regard to Governor Palin's budget spending, Representative Gara spins it thus:

Some Democrats, who had urged the governor to veto
some of the projects, hailed Palin’s broad cuts. “The Republican
leadership went on a spending spree,” said Rep. Les Gara, a Democrat from
Anchorage. “The state can’t afford a $1.8 billion pet-project budget.”
Gara said he agreed with Palin’s calls for more public involvement in the
budget-writing process. “Instead of writing the budget in someone’s
office, there should be public testimony to defend what projects are being
requested,” Gara said.

Somebody screwed up. Either Rep. Gara got his talking points mixed up, or Sabra Ayres, the reporter, didn't get the memo. Rep. Gara fails to mention that the number two man in the Senate is a man from his own party, Sen. Hoffman (yes, Hoffman alone is number two. Sen. Stedman, unfortunately, is an empty three-piece suit).

Frankly, I expected more from Rep. Gara. He is usually more on top of things. After all, he was routinely seen meeting last session with fellow Democrats from the House and Senate in the Juneau restaurant The Zephyr, on Seward Street, and no, I don't think it was an open caucus.

It's all a show anyway. Does anyone really think Les Gara is concerned with keeping a Conservative budget? If you do, I have a bridge to sell to you.