Unlikely Liberal by Matthew Zencey

Author:Matthew Zencey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Potomac Books Inc.
Published: 2012-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

TEA PARTY, TAKE NOTE

Some of McLeod’s complaints raised interesting questions—the kind that might resonate with antigovernment Tea Party critics who don’t like a system that’s tilted in favor of incumbents and helps them stay in office.

Was it OK for the governor to collect her state salary when she was campaigning full time in the Lower 48? An independent legal analysis of McLeod’s complaint on this score said yes. It ruled that state law explicitly allows Alaska’s governor to run for a different office and still collect a state salary. Complaint dismissed. Tea Party, take note: on Palin’s home turf, taxpayers have to subsidize the ambitious politician aspiring to higher office.

Was it OK for a key Palin aide, Kris Perry, to travel on state time, at state expense, with Palin to partisan functions in the Lower 48? Perry had taken personal leave to accompany Governor Palin to the Republican National Convention. But later, Perry stayed on the state payroll when she went with Palin on the national campaign trail and to other Republican events after the election. A review by the attorney general’s office found Perry did not violate the ethics law. Alaska governors traveling outside the state, even to partisan events, typically take along staff to help conduct official state business. That, the investigator found, is what Perry was doing. Perry had formally asked for ethics guidance and received clearance to take the travel assignment.

In the Kris Perry case, an elected official’s partisan ambitions caused additional expense for Alaska taxpayers. Both cases involving Palin’s political travels out of state show the advantages that incumbents enjoy once they get into office—a common subject of complaint from the antigovernment conservatives who so enthusiastically support Palin.

Another situation that was legal ended up causing Palin considerably more embarrassment—and financial pain. During her vice-presidential campaign, the Washington Post reported that Palin collected state travel payments—per diem for meals—while living at her Wasilla home and commuting to the governor’s office in Anchorage. She collected almost $17,000 covering 312 nights.4

A month before she left office, a critic filed an ethics complaint about that, seeking reimbursement of the money. Palin contended the meal charges were legal, because her official duty station was Juneau, so when she was at home she was officially on “travel” status. It was another instance in which Palin looked like a politician taking full advantage of the perks of office. She eventually had to pay back taxes on the income from the meal money, which the state payroll office had never included on her W-2.5 Palin had a similar back-tax problem from using a car the state provided to her as part of her job. The IRS considered it a taxable benefit, but the income never appeared on her state-issued W-2.6

Her unreported, untaxed free-ride income was the same tax problem that cost former U.S. Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle the chance to work in the Obama administration. Daschle hadn’t paid taxes on the value of his employer-sponsored ride. (His ride, in a limo complete with chauffeur, was much better than Palin’s.

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