Posted on 10/06/2010 10:05:49 PM PDT by freespirited
Once insurgent conservative Joe Miller knocked off moderate Sen. Lisa Murkowski in Alaska's Senate primary, almost all Beltway Republicans lined up behind Miller. But thanks to Alaska's unique political culture, there is a small cadre -- mostly former staffers for Murkowski and other Alaska lawmakers -- supporting her quixotic write-in race for re-election.
Murkowski's bid has brought attention to a quiet but significant clique on K Street composed of former aides to Murkowksi, her father, Frank, former Sen. Ted Stevens, and Rep. Don Young, who specialize in lobbying for energy interests, Alaskan natives, and Alaska's towns and cities. The phrase "Alaska mafia" slips off the tongue of many Republican staffers, activists, and lobbyists who have dealt with this clique.
[Click here for a partial diagram of the "Alaska mafia."
"They've done a very good job of looking out for each other," one Republican lobbyist told me. Stevens, Young and the Murkowskis have shared plenty of staff, and sent dozens of aides to lobby on K Street. These aides served as invisible middlemen in the earmark machine run by the venerable Alaska Republicans.
Stevens was a champion porker who once bragged, "I am guilty of asking the Senate for pork and proud of the Senate for giving it to me." Young was chairman of the House Transportation Committee. Lisa Murkowski was put on the Appropriations Committee in her first full term, and her father chaired the Energy and Natural Resources Committee before becoming governor.
Their aides grease the skids, cash in on K Street, and then donate to Murkowski and Young. Cordova, Alaska, population 2,500, boasts a former Lisa Murkowski staffer as a lobbyist. Another lobbyist, Jon DeVore, who worked for Ted Stevens, Frank Murkowski and Lisa Murkowski in the Senate, now represents a handful of Alaska Native Corporations -- government-created, for-profit entities owned by indigenous Alaskans. DeVore -- a Murkowski donor -- works at the lobbying firm Birch, Horton, a hub of the Alaska Mafia.
Besides representing cities and native corporations, K Street's Alaska contingent is heavy on the oil and pipeline clients, for obvious reasons
-- it's the state's leading industry.
But the Murkowski-Murkowski-Stevens-Young crowd isn't just lobbying for laissez-faire, unbridled drilling and mining everywhere. Consider Andrew Lundquist, another Lisa Murkowski donor who worked on energy policy for Stevens and the elder Murkowski before co-piloting former Vice President Cheney's infamous energy task force.
In 2003, Lundquist left the White House and started his own lobbying firm specializing in "green energy" and clients backing climate regulation right out of Al Gore's playbook. Lundquist's clients include cap-and-trade backers BP, Exelon, Duke Energy and ConocoPhillips as well as the Solar Energy Industries Association, Hudson Clean Energy Partners and the American Coalition for Ethanol.
This flexibility shows in Lisa's legislative record, too. Her 2009 energy bill included renewable energy subsidies, and she has voted for renewable energy mandates.
Earmarks, federal aid, energy subsidies and renewable mandates are hardly what one would expect on the agenda of a supposedly conservative state that styles itself as ruggedly individualistic pioneer country. Washington conservatives often express frustration that such a conservative state should produce moderates and big spenders -- especially Stevens and Lisa Murkowski.
But this pork culture, and the streak of moderation, is the natural product of Alaska's status as nearly a federal colony.
The federal government owns almost all of the land in Alaska, rendering moot a leave-us-alone attitude. Also, environmental groups see so much public relations value in "protecting" Alaska that they've fought tirelessly -- and successfully -- to block logging, drilling and mining.
And then there's the Alaska Permanent Fund, a government-run redistribution of oil revenues to all residents.
Alaskans may own lots of guns and care little for the Lower 48, but in effect they're living in a socialist microcosm. And
Ted Stevens and Lisa Murkowski are what Republicans look like in such a world.
With her connections, seniority, powerful committee posts and bipartisan alliances, Murkowski is a better fit for Alaska's political class -- especially the lobbyists -- than the staunch conservative Joe Miller, who is a transplant to Alaska, after all.
Just as ideology takes a back seat for the "Alaska Mafia," so does party. Most Alaska voters aren't registered in any party. When Murkowski's chief of staff -- former lobbyist Karen Knutson -- solicited K Street support for Murkowski's write-in campaign, she reached out to Democratic lobbyist Heather Podesta.
Please! Shut it down and put us out of our misery already.
bump
Indeed. As a 25 year resident voting Republican was almost always “The lesser of two Evils”.
The Dem’s could have won but they were like all Dem’s nationally, focused on socializing our nation through enviromentalism.
Democratic lobbyist Heather Podesta——
Daughter of the OTHER Soros tool, John?
No, wife of John’s brother (Tony, who is also a very well known lobbyist).
Not that it wouldn't be nice for them, of course, and I support giving help where needed, but I'd rather keep my own tax dollars here in Ohio, and out of federal hands (and state/county/city hands, for that matter) as much as possible...
Charity begins at home, as they say...but with the government takings, I have very little personally left for "home"...why can't Ohio get some of this money from Washington?!? Maybe we should build a "pipeline"? lol
My only concern is that there will be an effort by the dems to influence the election by voting for Murkowski. They already know the dem candidate can never win but might really fear Miller.
“You know, this Mafia money makes me wonder about Pelosi. I have no proof of any of what I’m about to say, but it makes sense. Pelosi is in hip-deep with organized crime, from union organizers at her canning factories in the Pacific to local crime figures in CA. I’ve heard that she used their files on politicians to blackmail her way to the Speaker of the House. Think about it. WTF did she do to warrant that position? “
You know, that’s a very interesting observation. I was telling a Democrat friend of mine a couple months back that I couldn’t understand why the Dems continued to tolerate Pelosi as speaker-as toxic as she is to their chances of reelection.
I argued that it would be better for Dems to throw her overboard now and replace her, since she would likely be replaced after the November elections anyway, so they’d have nothing to lose.
But not seeing any Dems really come out and condemn her and her tactics made me wonder what she has on these people. This may answer that question.
Lisa is something, the same voters, who wouldn’t place a check by her name, she now expects to write her name in.
(BECOME A MONTHLY DONNER LIKE ME.)
If it’s like this for Alaska and Murkowski then it is like this for most other states too. They have revolving door mafias of Congressional staffers and lobbyists that bring home the pork and get rich in the process
Bringing home the pork and earmarking is somewhat justified because that’s just the return of tax money that was shipped off to Washington
Alaska is the biggest welfare state in the country.
What an octopus! This is the corrupt machine Sarah Palin has been fighting since 2006 in AK.
- JP
If she’s replaced by an ideological fiscal conservative like Miller, the other Alaska pipeline — the one carrying federal dollars north — could shut down
Do you reckon AK will now reject the dollars coming their way just because they have a new Senator? My guess is they’ll accept them and asked for as much as they can get. They may not have the same influence as before and receive less dollars because the players have changed thus others will get an increase.
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