Alaska, where the only thing wilder than our Grizzly Bears, is our politics.

While I have been distracted by a dabbler in witchcraft in Delaware, a Palin booty shaker in LA, and my favorite comedy duo's rally sized smack down of the Beckerheads, apparently there have been some earth shattering developments in our local politics. (And no I am NOT talking about that earthquake yesterday.)

Sarah Palin's "butt boy" gets Teabagged by farm subsidies.

So last week Alaska blogger extraordinaire AkMuckraker discovered that Joe "Federal dollars are destroying Alaska" Miller might just have taken a little taste from the federal teat himself in the form of farm subsidies. 

"What?"  You are undoubtedly saying. "A politician endorsed by Sarah Palin might be a hypocrite?  How can such a thing be possible?"  I know, right?

But don't worry because Joe "the antler collector" Miller's people TOTALLY said "nuh-uh" and claimed that it was a smear by a liberal doody-head who runs a communist, socialist style blog that makes stuff up. Here is the exact quote:

"This is a manufactured story from a Democratic blog. Joe has owned land near Delta Junction since 1999, but the land is not under production, and he's received no federal farm subsidies for it." (Obviously as you can see the "doody head" part was IMPLIED.)

But wait! Butt boy did not receive "federal farm subsidies for IT." Does "IT" mean there might be other parcels of land for which he MIGHT have received some of that sweet, sweet federal money? 

Alaska Dispatch wondered that too.

After Alaska Dispatch received Miller's farm subsidy records under the Freedom of Information Act and told the Miller campaign about them on Monday, Miller's staff confirmed he received federal payments for 140 acres of cropland he owned in Kansas between 1990 and 1998.

"Like the vast majority of farmers in that region, Joe received payment from the USDA in exchange for managing his crops according to government standards," said campaign spokesman Randy DeSoto in an e-mail Monday night.

Aha! Well that just about destroys my faith in anti-government wingnuts who want to give back federal dollars and tax Alaska residents into the poor house to make up for their loss to our economy. (That really IS the only way this works you know.)  The only thing that could disappoint me more about the Teabaggers was if they campaigned for Miller while traveling around Alaska in a luxury yacht.

Seriously?  I supposed next you will tell me that Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny aren't real either!

Shit!  Okay what's next?

Lisa Murkwski's Write-In campaign may spell disaster for the candidate. 

As you probably know Lisa Murkowski's entire hope of winning this three way Senate race hangs on the ability of Alaskan's (many from rural villages with a less than stellar success rate for educating their inhabitants) to spell her name correctly. 

But Lisa is confident that people have seen her name around long enough that they should be able to spell it with no trouble.

Sadly the same cannot be said for her own campaign staff. 

Personally I do not believe all is lost.  All that Lisa has to do is change her name to "None of the above" before November and she should be a shoo in.

Tanks, but NO tanks.

Yesterday there was a gubernatorial debate between Ethan "I am going to keep running for something until I win" Berkowitz, Sean "Sarah Palin quit and all I got was this stupid job" Parnell, and some other guy whose name I don't even care enough about to type out.

(I was totally going to watch this debate, but then I got distracted by watching some paint drying on my living room wall.)

However the joke is on me because apparently Berkowitz did what until now nobody thought was possible.  He got Sean "listening to my speeches even puts ME to sleep" Parnell to show an emotion. No really!  An actual, human like emotion.  Here read it for yourself.

Now it was Berkowitz' turn to ask Parnell a question. He pulled a white propane tank from behind his chair, barbecue grill size, with an "Ethan Berkowitz for Governor" campaign sticker plastered on the front, and hefted it onto the speakers' table. "This is the only natural gas that's been brought down from the North Slope, and we had to do it ourselves," he said (watch for the new TV spot coming tomorrow), calling the governor out on what little has been done to to bring Alaska gas to market.


A somewhat red-faced Parnell angrily stood up and lugged the tank off the table, dumping it on the floor behind him before touting his efforts toward a gas line and helping encourage more Cook Inlet natural gas production.

Did you read that? "A somewhat red faced Parnell."  That could be actual anger.  Or embarrassment. Or I guess that tank might have been really heavy.  But anyhow it completely dispels the rumor that Parnell is in actuality a barely animated clothing store mannequin.

However I must caution Ethan on attempting any more antics designed to get under Parnell's skin.  After all Alaska IS still a predominantly red state, and if voters begin to believe that Parnell actually has a pulse he might just win this thing.