Alaska Ping!
Posted on 07/03/2016 7:53:40 AM PDT by Kaslin
Cell phone companies have a similar sweetheart deal.
Sounds smart
They’re called Obamaphones.
Alaska Ping!
The hard part is acting surprised.
There’s a 50yr plus history of cable companies bribing politicians to secure exclusive territories, starting in the big metro areas in the 1960s.
Lemme guess: free internet for everyone including people in the remotest areas. That’s a lot of cable wire strung all over Alaska.
The whole state is already on welfare.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund#Permanent_Fund_Dividend
Our capacity to produce things exceeds our ability to even consume them, so more and more industries are relying on government mandates to: (1) give money to people so they can buy more products from those industries, and (2) compel customers to do business with them.
This is exactly what ObamaCare was all about.
This is also why every major U.S. grocery retail chain lobbies heavily to increase eligibility for food stamps.
And still, after all the gubment spending programs, I can’t get DSL or even line of sight broad band a mere five miles from town in Sequoyah County, Oklahoma.
You would think the Cherokee Naiton of Oklahoma might spend a little casino money to encourage some connectivity.
Yeah my SIL lives in SW Missouri (just north of WalMart country).
All they can get is satellite internet, which is expensive and slow relative to most DSL or cable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund#Permanent_Fund_Dividend
Or the oil resources of Alaska are seen as belonging to the citizens of the state and the dividends are distributed to them rather than being retained by the government.
“Trans-Alaskan Pipeline System now is filled to only one-quarter capacity, “
Thank the feds for that.
Is it fed policy or are the wells aging out?
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MANFPAK2&f=M
Would be interesting to hear former Governor Palin’s take on their current financial issues.
Amazing isn’t it? Walmart world is like a transplant of the NE to the hills of NW Arkansas. That corridor is a disaster and getting worse. A cancer on what was once charming countryside. The freeway to Ginger Blue is like rape of the land.
I hate it.
In Alaska, all the (Visible) taxes we pay are local. All tax dollars stay in your own community and state revenue flows downward to the boroughs, cities, towns and villages. Individual Alaska residents receive an annual dividend check from the Permanent Fund. Last year it was $2000. Since oil revenue has tanked the politicians are desperate to maintain their Cadillac government but have no money. They want to raid the permanent fund and The governor has capped the dividend payments at $1000, the balance to go to the state. They want all of it, of course, but that would be political suicide.
Just like the wild hogs in the story, the government has come to depend on the lavish oil revenues and low income people in Alaska have come to depend on the annual dividend checks. For some of them it amounts to 20% or more of their income. For others it pays their federal taxes. Many of us donate all or part of the dividend to charity through the Pick-Click-Give program.
The charity donations are important because they support many local services and amenities like local public radio, the Humane Association, school sports, Little League and churches (There are twelve active churches in this little Alaska island town of 2500 souls)
The state cannot implement a state sales tax because local communities have long financed local government with sales taxes. The additional burden of a state tax would destroy local businesses. Severe cutbacks in state government, a raid on the permanent fund and a state income tax are all being considered. The politicians are beside themselves.
We are being bombarded with “We’ve got to DO something!” ads aimed at softening up the voters and mitigating the backlash that will come when the politicians eliminate the dividend and implement state taxes to avoid cutting spending.
And, of course, everyone wants to protect their state subsidies. Public broadcasting, for example. Our local radio station gets a third of their funding from the Feds, conditional upon certain criteria being met. They are able to meet these criteria because they get a third of their funding from the state and a third from private donations. State funding must be cut. Private donations will suffer due to the loss of the Permanent Fund Dividend checks. They are facing the loss of virtually all of their funding. No more public radio which, incidentally, is the ONLY radio and the ONLY form of broadcast communication available in many rural communities, including this one. That isn’t just the ability to listen to classic rock and Prairie Home Companion. Weather alerts, tsunami warnings, news and personal messages are all important information transmitted over FM radio that can reach areas with no cell or cable service. Loss of this important resource would be a disaster for small Alaska towns and villages.
That is just one example. Life in the last frontier is about to change drastically. It is not just about the loss of one cable/broadband service.
I wasn’t familiar with the area before she moved there 6 yrs ago but I can see the change happening.
What is really weird is the small town demographic. She said the illegal Mexicans who replaced the Americans who worked in the chicken slaughter plants have now been replaced by Somalian muslims.
You drive through these tiny towns and see the store signs in Spanish and Arabic...
Not enough voters to justify it, is my guess.
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