By CRAIG CAMPBELL
The speed at which politics has been spinning these past eight months is enough to make one dizzy to the point of vomiting.
Now, I don’t want to beat the dead horse that Ethan Berkowitz lied to us when he denied any involvement with Maria Athens, or that his leadership of our city these past five years has crippled our economy, denied us liberties under the law, caused crime to increase, and let vagrancy run rampant and more than double in population.
Nope, that’s not what this column is about. I’m just glad Berkowitz will finally be gone.
The problem is, the problem hasn’t been fixed. In fact, it just got worse. Last Friday the Assembly cabal did a bait-and-switch and replaced Felix Rivera with Austin Quinn-Davison as chair.
By law, that means on Oct. 23 at 6 pm, Quinn-Davidson will become Anchorage’s acting mayor. That’s just what we need — another California-educated liberal lawyer as mayor.
Quinn-Davidson has been a staunch supporter of the Assembly’s leftist agenda since joining the cabal just two years ago. She fit in nicely with the other seven liberals who were pushing the transformation of Anchorage into a Leftist autocracy. So why would the cabal elect her chair after Berkowitz resigned in disgrace?
Let me explain. Felix Rivera was elected to fill the Seat G position in Midtown in 2017. Early on, Felix proved to be a liberal extremist. He sponsored or supported numerous progressive ordinances and resolutions. He made political allies of the other cabal lefties and was elected chair last year.
However, Felix is not a good leader.
Under his chairmanship, the Assembly meetings became a circus. There has been no control of the public process. Who can forget his allowing clowns to lie down in front of the dais and do push-ups, sip drinks, and generally disrupt public testimony? This was an unbelievable lack of control by a totally unqualified chair.
How about his posting on the Young Democrats Facebook, job offers for Assembly work and specifically posting “please don’t share this publicly.” That’s not a person who supports government transparency.
His fear of the public resulted in unilaterally closing Assembly meetings to the public under the guise of the “Berkowitz Emergency Order,” in direct violation of the Alaska Open Meetings Act.
So Felix didn’t want to be acting mayor. His inability to lead is an embarrassment he wanted to avoid. But as vice chair, he is now back as cabal chair. That was not a bad move for an incompetent politician.
Then why not appoint Forrest Dunbar as cabal chair? He previously served as chair for eight months in 2018. He is currently running for the Anchorage mayor’s seat and by appointing him chair, he would have become our acting mayor. Why not Forrest?
That’s an easy one to figure out. Forrest is a wacko liberal with a terrible track record. So to protect Forrest from having the spotlight shine on what will be his leadership priorities as mayor, they want to mask his record. Protect him from being judged on his actions while serving as acting mayor, to make sure the voters do not see the real lefty he will be if elected mayor in April.
Forrest Dunbar would be a disaster as acting mayor, basically killing his chances of getting elected to that position next April.
He supported improperly using CARES Act funds to acquire property for the homeless, regardless that the public voiced fierce opposition.
He tried to enact legislation to mandate hiring practices on the private sector hotel industry.
He publically threated to move homeless shelters to Eagle River in a personal rant against Eagle River Assembly member Jamie Allard.
He supports political activism to micromanage local law enforcement.
He supports extreme COVID restrictive mandates responsible for crippling our local economy.
But his biggest problem, and the shining example of his being a political whore (sorry if I’m offending any prostitutes) is when he swore under oath, to “support and defend” the United States Constitution, a document the he now publicly claims is fundamentally racist to its core.
Here’s his quote: “What becomes inescapable when you read it (the Constitution) is how shot through every portion of our constitutional law is with race when it comes to the three-fifths compromise, the way the Senate was apportioned in Congress, the Electoral College.” He concludes by stating “All of it. All of it was tied to race.”
As a former Alaska National Guard Adjutant General, I’ve got real problems with an actively serving Alaska Guardsman, who is one fo the staff judge advocates who wrote the state Uniform Code of Military Justice, failing to grasp the basic precepts of the United States Constitution by claiming it’s all about race.
Really? What race-baiting. If he believes that, then he is directly complicit with enforcing a racists government’s actions under oaths he took as a member of the military, while trying to have us believe he is against racism. What a hypocritical, two-faced, dishonest lefty.
For the record, the United States Constitution was not written from a racist’s perspective. Rather it provided the foundation that allowed our nation to grow and change to free blacks from slavery and provide equality to everyone regardless of gender, color, religious believes, or wealth.
It is the finest government document every written that establishes the foundation for a true democratic republic. But that’s what freaks out socialists like Forrest Dunbar.
So to protect Forrest from being unmasked as the despot he really is and protect the left’s plan to win the mayor’s seat next April, he was not an option. He can’t let the voters see who he really is. He hopes he’ll become mayor if we only believe his campaign propaganda.
That’s why they elected Austin Quinn-Davison as chair to become the puppet mayor to the cabal and protect their liberal alliance. With little experience, she would play the perfect part.
Good luck. Acting Mayor Quinn-Davison. But you will need more than luck to fix the crippled Anchorage economy, stop the rampant growth of unsheltered vagrants, reopen closed businesses, defend the public’s right to assemble, reduce the rising crime of the past five years, rebuild trust between local government and the public, and honestly represent all the residents of Anchorage.
These are problems all created or exacerbated by your predecessor, Ethan Berkowitz.
Craig E. Campbell served on the Anchorage Assembly between 1986 and 1995 and later as Alaska’s Tenth Lieutenant Governor. He was the previous Chief Executive Officer and President for Alaska Aerospace Corporation. He retired from the Alaska National Guard as Lieutenant General (AKNG) and holds the concurrent retired Federal rank of Major General (USAF).
