AMERICA THE STRONG: Conservative Ideas to Spark the Next Generation, by William J. Bennett and John T.E. Cribb.
Back to school season is here and we thought we’d take a remedial course in conservative political thought. Just in case we got sloppy.
Former Secretary of Education William J. Bennett and co-author John Cribb unpack the basics of conservative ideology and come up with some easily understood foundational principles: Free enterprise, limited government, individual liberty, national defense, and traditional values. They spell FLINT.
Those who hold conservative values dear have become accustomed to being ridiculed by the mainstream media, and have come to accept that they’ll be misunderstood. They worry that young people are embracing a socialist dream, and indeed that’s what’s being taught in schools across the country.
But America was founded on conservative principles, and they are as relevant today as they were when we threw off the shackles of tyranny during the writing of our founding fules of law, the US Constitution and Bill of Rights.
This book is an easy read because it’s aimed at a younger reader, perhaps someone in high school or college who has never been exposed to a conservative answer to questions posed in civics classes: Why do terrorists want to kill Americans? Why can’t the rich just pay all the taxes? Why don’t we just have an open border? What is a conservative?
America the Strong is largely question-and-answer format, which makes it not only a fast read, but easy to flip pages for quick topical items. It’s the kind of book that might spark a conversation around the dinner table or in the classroom. It’s a book that a reasonably well-read 10th grade reader will have no trouble with. Perfect gift for back-to-school?
While many Alaskans have concentrated on national politics and party conventions, this is the time of year when we should shift our focus for a period of time to our local municipal elections. Arguably, municipal races across the state will determine the make-up of our local Assemblies and have far more impact on us personally than who will be our country’s next president.
Assembly District 2
It’s been 10 years since all three Juneau Assembly seats have been seriously contested. This year will be no different as Beth Weldon will be running unopposed for the District 2 Assembly seat.
This is in stark contrast to elections in the ‘80s when it wasn’t unusual for four or five candidates to run for one Assembly seat. The reasons for this can be debated, but it’s easy to surmise the cost of campaigns and intense scrutiny have discouraged many people from running.
Nevertheless, our community can be happy someone as qualified as Beth Weldon decided to run. A lifelong resident of Juneau, she retired four years ago after a 22-year career as one of the few female firefighters in the Capital City Fire/Rescue department.
Weldon and her husband now own and operate a small business, Glacier Auto Parts. She has been very active in a variety of community organizations and with her business background and other experience, she’ll be a valuable addition to the Assembly.
Assembly Area-Wide
Voters will find some interesting match-ups in the other two Assembly races, making this election noteworthy. This is because the controversy surrounding the senior sales tax exemption and the special election are still fresh in voters’ minds from the mayoral election in March.
The senior community was particularly incensed by the scaled-back senior tax exemption because, while no one should be held harmless from potential cuts, seniors felt other cuts were a higher priority than ones impacting seniors. Furthermore, the action taken didn’t grandfather existing seniors or include a “phase-in” period allowing the senior community to adjust to these changes. In short, they felt the issue was handled poorly and not given proper consideration.
This galled many Juneauites because five of the Assembly members (Karen Crane, Kate Troll, Jesse Kiehl, Loren Jones, and Maria Gladziszewski) who voted to gut the senior sales tax exemption also voted for an expensive and needless special election just a few months later.
Both issues contributed to the defeat of mayoral candidate Karen Crane in the special election.
These issues come to the forefront again as incumbent Kate Troll runs for re-election against challenger Norton Gregory for the area-wide Assembly seat. Troll’s re-election effort has attracted support from former mayor Bruce Botelho who is chairing her campaign assisted by campaign manager Greg Smith, both of whom worked on Karen Crane’s campaign.
This will be a competitive race as Gregory previously ran against Maria Gladziszewski in 2014, only losing after splitting the votes in a 3-way contest. In that race, Gregory campaigned hard to maintain the senior sales tax exemption and he earned the Empire’s endorsement that stated in part that he “… would be a young Native voice on the Assembly” and “has the best background of the three areawide candidates … as housing services manager for the Tlingit-Haida Regional Housing Authority (and a member of the Affordable Housing Commission), he has seen and continues to see the problems with Juneau’s existing housing situation.”
Assembly District 1
Mary Becker is running for re-election to the downtown District 1 Assembly seat against two challengers, Arnold Liebelt and William Quayle Jr. Becker has been diligent and effective as an Assembly member and has run unopposed in her last two elections in 2013 and 2010.
Prior to her Assembly tenure, Becker was a Juneau school teacher for 30 years and later served for nine years on the Juneau School Board, four years as its president. She has also served as deputy mayor during her two previous Assembly terms and was acting Mayor after the untimely death of Mayor Greg Fisk last year. She voted against the special election and against ending the senior sales tax exemption.
In an interview announcing his decision to run against Becker, Liebelt, a former state budget policy analyst, stated, “With city finances, we’ve got to keep our revenues equaling expenditures.” That’s an unfortunate phrasing of his financial philosophy because if Liebelt hopes to attract area-wide support, he’ll need to convince voters he isn’t willing to raise taxes first before considering cuts to balance the budget.
Too often local elections are considered hum-drum affairs with little at stake. Nothing could be further from the truth. Supporting your candidate by volunteering and contributing financially makes a difference. More importantly, your vote on Oct. 4 will decide who makes decisions affecting you and your community for the next three years.
Win Gruening retired as the senior vice president in charge of business banking for Key Bank in 2012. He was born and raised in Juneau and graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1970. He is active in community affairs as a 30-plus year member of Juneau Downtown Rotary Club and has been involved in various local and statewide organizations.
That Sarah Palin. She has a wicked sense of humor. After Donald Trump canned his campaign chair because of his squishy ties to Russia, Palin tweeted this:
Note the Russian flag emoji. Palin was referring to Paul Manafort’s work for former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, and possible work on behalf of the Russian annexation of Crimea. That was Putin the pink slip on Manafort (insert your own smirk emoji).
Trump issued a statement from Louisiana on Friday, accepting Manafort’s resignation: “This morning, Paul Manafort offered, and I accepted, his resignation from the campaign,” Trump said.
TRUMP CAMPAIGN MATERIALS
Alaska’s Trump/Pence headquarters is located at 11610 Old Seward Hwy, near Klatt Road, and is open normal business hours. It has 5,000 rally signs, (card stock — not yard signs), 10,000 bumper stickers, and yard signs will arrive soon. Contact Jerry Ward at jward at donaldtrump dot com. Ward, a former state senator, is the Trump campaign director for Alaska.
You can also get Trump shirts, mugs, and whatnots at Dooley’s Athletics in Anchorage, 230 Center Court. 907-272-5660.
Coulter, a prolific New York Times bestselling author, will appear Sept. 17 at the Egan Center. The book release date is this Tuesday.
Tickets are going fast, says Mike Robbins, who is the event organizer. While Coulter is in Alaska, she’ll likely do at least one book signing and Robbins is organizing a reception. There also may be an event in the Mat-Su, we hear.
Coulter is the author of 12 New York Times bestsellers, including her most recent, Adios America. She writes a nationally syndicated column and has more than a million fans on Twitter and Facebook. This
WASSERMAN SCHULTZ HAS BEEN SERVED
More than 100 Bernie Sanders supporters have sued the Democratic National Committee and its former chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz for fraud.
The suit, which has been served on Wasserman Schultz and the DNC, says the Florida congresswoman made “knowingly made false statements and omissions” that undermined the 2016 Democratic primary process, while serving as the DNC chairwoman.
Anyone who donated to the Democratic National Committee after Bernie Sanders announced his candidacy for president as a Democrat, can be part of the class action lawsuit, even if they donated through third-party payment platforms like ActBlue, or if they donated directly to the Bernie campaign. More background from the attorneys leading the charge is here.
To see a video of the lawsuit being served, go here. The young lawyer who is featured serving the suit is said to have died mysteriously a few weeks later.
Lieutenant Governor Byron Mallott / James Brooks photo from Wikipedia
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR FAILS HIS FIRST ELECTION
In all of Alaska, when voters go into the polling place, they are given just one ballot.
They get to vote a Republican ballot or an ADL ballot, which is an “everything else” ballot – Alaskan Independence Party, Democrats, Libertarians, etc.
Alaskans on Tuesday had to pick, as they do. If they are registered Republican, they could pick either ballot, but if they were Democrat, they could not vote the Republican ballot.
That is because Alaska Republicans have a closed ballot system, which simply means if you are registered with another party, you cannot vote that ballot.
You can, however, vote the Republican ballot if you are undeclared or nonpartisan or not saying what you are. Democrats have an open ballot; anyone can ask for it.
In District 18, for instance, Republican voters did not get to choose the Republican ballot and then also be allowed to vote the ADL ballot for Rep. Harriet Drummond, who is a Democrat running against Republican challenger Mike Gordon.
Voters on Tuesday could decide they wanted to vote for the top of the ticket for Republican incumbents Rep. Don Young and Lisa Murkowski (or their Republican challengers), or they could ask for the ADL ballot and see what was available there (Steve Lindbeck for Congress, Edgar Blatchford and Ray Metcalfe for Senate or Libertarian Cean Stevens for Senate). Their decision had strong down-ballot consequences.
Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott has badly mangled his first election. His Division of Elections is looking the other way while local officials stuff the ballot box, allowing at least one community, and perhaps others, to vote two ballots.
LT. GOV. BYRON MALLOTT ALLOWING BALLOT BOX STUFFING IN SHUNGNAK
When the Division of Elections Director Josie Bahnke told the Alaska Dispatch News that it really didn’t matter that people in Shungnak voted both ballots, she was wrong.
If people had only chosen the Republican ballot, they would not have been able to vote in the House race between Dean Westlake and Ben Nageak. That race is now five votes apart districtwide. The election has effectively been rigged by the local government, and now the state government.
Bahnke and the clerk in charge in Shungnak knew — as data exists from the last election — that the village was safely Westlake country, and they’ve determined that everyone should vote that Democratic ballot, even if they asked for a Republican one.
In that village, 48 votes went to Westlake and 2 went to Nageak. The results of that precinct also were not reported for 22 hours, long after all the other votes in the district had been reported and were known.
Who is aggrieved by this? Not just Ben Nageak, but every voter in District 40 who did not get to vote two ballots. Indeed, every other voter in Alaska who had to choose one ballot or the other has a legal case that they were not treated equally at the ballot box.
The buck stops with the lieutenant governor. Will anyone hold him accountable?
Relevant section of Alaska law:
AS 15.25.060. Preparation and Distribution of Ballots; Appropriate Ballot.
(b) A voter may vote only one primary election ballot. A voter may vote a political party ballot only if the voter is registered as affiliated with that party, is allowed to participate in the party primary under the party’s bylaws, or is registered as nonpartisan or undeclared rather than as affiliated with a particular political party and the party’s bylaws do not restrict participation by nonpartisan or undeclared voters in the party’s primary. For the purpose of determining which primary election ballot a voter may use, a voter’s party affiliation is considered to be the affiliation registered with the director as of the 30th day before the primary election. If a voter changes party affiliation within the 30 days before the primary election, the voter’s previous party affiliation shall be used for the determination under this subsection.
FiveThirtyEight podcaster comes to Juneau. Gets stuck on mountain. Is rescued. Tweets about it: “It was quite an ordeal. We can’t say enough about how impressive the rescue operations folks were. Ever grateful.”
Jody Avirgan, who is a broadcasting host for the political pollster and prognosticator website of Nat Silver, was in Juneau this week for kayaking and other soft adventures that probably involved folks from KTOO, the local NPR station.
Avirgan was hiking with a companion from New York, who apparently left the trail on Mount Roberts, which is Juneau’s most accessible climb. The companion could not navigate the steep terrain, so Juneau Mountain Rescue and the SEADOGS were flown to the area by Temsco Helicopters. The two New Yorkers were escorted to safety.
Argivan has that NPR voice on his podcasts; we know this because we stuck with one of the tapings for a full four minutes before it became too intellectually steep and we had to be rescued by our dogs.
JOBLESS IN ALASKA
Alaska’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 6.7 percent in July, unchanged from June. The national unemployment rate was 4.9 percent, same as the previous month, and Alaska has the highest unemployment rate of the 50 states.
The highest area of unemployment in the state is in the Kusilvak Census Area, formerly known as the Wade Hampton Census Area, where more than 23 percent of the employable population is jobless.
Alaska employment dropped 1.3 percent in July compared to 2015. Oil, gas, construction and professional services took the biggest hit. Health care jobs grew substantially. State jobs are reported to be down, but Juneau’s joblessness actually decreased from 4.2 percent in July, 2015, to 4 percent in July, 2016.
Alaska has highest unemployment in nation.
NO VOTES TURNED IN YET FOR MEKORYUK PRECINCT
Nearly three days after the polls closed, the small village of Mekoryuk has yet to turn in its vote totals to the Division of Elections. Of the 31 precincts in House District 38, 30 of them have reported and have given Zach Fansler a huge lead over incumbent Bob Herron, 1099 to 839 votes. Both are Democrats.
The Alaska Democratic Party targeted Herron for removal because he was part of the bipartisan majority, which is mainly Republicans.
Mekoryuk has 147 registered voters. No results are listed on the Division of Elections web site as of 3 pm Friday.
Supreme Court Justice Sandra Sotomayor, right, walks through the Ted Stevens International Airport this morning on her way to her flight leaving Alaska. Steve Strait photo
POWERFUL, PROTECTED PUBLIC SERVANTS
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor arrived in Alaska earlier last week. She gave some speeches, met with some attorneys, had some rainy vacation time, and then left early this morning on a flight out of Anchorage.
Citizen journalist Steve Strait of Strait Media spotted her at the Ted Stevens International Airport, where she was being watched over by three federal agents. Strait snapped the photo above before being told by one of her agents, (the one directly behind her), “No more pictures.”
Strait had remained at a distance and had not approached the Supreme Court justice, but took the warning to heart and put away his camera phone.
Being told by a federal employee that a person cannot take a photo of a federal employee who is on public property (an airport) is not just odd — it’s illegal.
The agent gave no rationale for why a citizen could not take a photo of a judge who happened to be traveling through an open airport.
While Sotomayor visited Alaska as part of her “bucket list” of traveling to all of the states, she had an entourage of several Secret Service agents with her most of the time. They were seen scanning the crowd at the Dena’ina Center, where she spoke to the Alaska Bar Association and others. She also spoke at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Social media has very few photos of her trip to Alaska, indicting that audiences may have been instructed the same way: “No photos.”
Sotomayor was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2009. During her remarks this week, she noted that although the Supreme Court is accused of being more politicized, it is simply a function of being asked to judge increasingly complicated questions in a rapidly changing society.
One of those complicated questions might be: When is it illegal to take a photo on taxpayer-funded property that is used by tens of thousands of people every day?
Read about one of Sotomayor’s most recent dissenting opinions here.
Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott on a site visit to Manakotok on Election Day. Turnout was 33 percent.
BUSY WITH YUP’IK BALLOTS; NOT SO MUCH WITH BALLOT INTEGRITY
Lieutenant Gov. Byron Mallott visited three villages on primary election day, and he reported witnessing no real problems. The U.S. Department of Justice also had people on the ground to observe the election, after last year’s settlement of a lawsuit over the lack of Yup’ik language ballots. They were also satisfied.
Yet while Mallott was visiting three villages and Dillingham in Western Alaska, in District 40 things were going haywire.
In one village, Shungnak, it appears that all who voted were given both the Republican Party ballot, where Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Don Young were listed, and the Democratic Party ballot, where the state House race of Dean Westlake and Rep. Ben Nageak were available.
PROBLEM MAY BE MORE WIDESPREAD: 105% TURNOUT?
Normally in an election in America, it’s one ballot per voter. Shungnak ended up with a 63 percent voter turnout. 50 ballots went Republican and 50 went Democrat. More troubling was that the results were not turned in until all the other precincts were counted and announced.
The irregularities have now put into question the results from all outlier results, such as Newtok, where registered voters total 215, but the Division of Elections shows there were 227 ballots cast, for a 105% turnout. Newtok uses digital voting machines.
Education reporter Mareesa Nicosia shot this photo of voters in Newtok casting their ballots.
In Shaktoolik, the turnout was 81 percent. 125 of 154 registered voters cast ballots there, even though their legislator, Rep. Neal Foster, had no competition.
But the areas where Mallott visited had more expected results.
Lt. Gov. Mallott observed voting in Togiak. Turnout was 11.86 percent
“There was nothing substantive that either the DOJ or our own folks saw,” Mallott said of his observation visits to New Stuyahok, Manakotok, and Togiak. “And so it’s just continuing the process, making it work, being responsive to those issues that are raised,” Mallott said, as reported by the Associated Press’ Juneau reporter Becky Bohrer.
A five vote difference between Nageak and Westlake in District 40 brings up the importance of adequate training and oversight for elections. If the election process has failed under Lt. Gov. Mallott’s watch, he must be held accountable, particularly since ballot access has been one of the areas about which he has been most outspoken.
WESTLAKE OUTRAISED, OUTSPENT NAGEAK
Westlake, a Democrat, is the candidate backed by the Alaska Democratic Party, which decided that Democrat Rep. Nageak’s participation in the bipartisan majority that holds the power was detrimental to their goals of taking control of the House.
The Alaska Democratic Party gave nearly $10,000 to the Westlake campaign. The Democrats raised a total of $40,000 for Westlake, much of it through a major fundraising event at the home of Governor Walker’s surrogate, lawyer Robin Brena. There were also major checks from public employee unions.
In contrast, the Nageak campaign raised about $15,000 and he had no help from his party. Most of his funds came from individual checks.
Westlake spent at least $6,000 with the Ship Creek Group, a new political consultancy whose principal, newcomer John Henry Heckendorn, is also listed as an employee of Lottsfeldt Strategies, which runs an organized labor-funded political blog MidnightSunAK. Ship Creek Group and Lottsfeldt work for Democratic candidates and left-leaning causes.
SHUNGNAK TURNOUT PATTERN HAS BEEN HIGH, BUT THIS IS RIDICULOUS
Looking at primaries for 2010, 2012, and 2014, Shungnak outperformed the rest of the district by 11, 13, and 8 percent.
However, this primary result shows this year the community outperformed the entire district by 41 percent.
Lieutenant Governor Mallott, a Democrat, has run a sloppy election with multiple integrity problems. In the case of District 40, it could be that his operational neglect has led to a result that is entirely unbelievable.
Questioned ballots have yet to be counted in this district, and they number close to 100.
(This story has been updated at the end to reflect a working theory on how the numbers in Shungnak might be explained.)
On election night, all results in Alaska were slow to be posted. But the results from District 40 were the slowest to arrive. In fact, they never did arrive that night after the polls closed at 8 pm. This was the first time since pre-internet days that election observers can remember such delays.
Election watchers monitoring the postings by the Division of Elections were scanning the website for updates, to no avail.
There were precincts missing and it was too close to call. At one point Ben Nageak was up by 30 votes, and then he was down by just 5.
The three villages missing were Shungnak, Kaktovik, and Point Hope.
Because it’s the North Slope, one can expect things to be a bit slower. But 22 hours late in reporting results from a village? That’s dog-sled speed. And this was a summer day.
SHUNGNAK DID NOT REPORT UNTIL ALL OTHER VOTES WERE IN
Dean Westlake / Division of Elections file photo
What is unusual about the Shungnak reporting is that it came in well after all the other results were posted, and the votes went 48 for Dean Westlake, and 2 for Ben Nageak.
Westlake has been heavily favored by the Alaska Democratic Party over their incumbent Nageak, also a Democrat. Vast sums of money, including a big fundraiser by the Alaska Governor Bill Walker’s surrogate Robin Brena, have poured into the Westlake race.
The governor wants to get rid of Nageak, because he caucuses with the bipartisan majority that the governor does not control.
SHUNGNAK TURNOUT: 62.9 PERCENT
Even more unusual is that the voter turnout in Shungnak was nearly 63 percent, with the turnout for Democrats nearly 30 percent, making it either the most civic-minded community in Alaska…or perhaps there’s another explanation.
Shungnak has 159 registered voters, with 46 of them registered Democrats, 17 registered Republicans, and the rest fall into the “variety pack” categories. Fully 100 Shungnak voters actually cast a ballot.
Rep. Ben Nageak
It took 22 hours for the Shungnak results to be reported, leading observers to wonder if someone had withheld the ballots until all the others were reported.
As of this writing, Rep. Ben Nageak is trailing behind challenger Dean Westlake, with just five votes separating them. Districtwide, Westlake has 765 votes to Nageak’s 760 for the District 40 House seat.
We’re not ready to call this race, but if there was ever an example of how every vote counts, this is it. It also may be an example of voter fraud.
REPUBLICAN VOTERS WERE DISCOURAGED BY ELECTION WORKERS
Yesterday, Must Read Alaska received reports that for registered Republicans in District 40, voting was not a civic breeze. They tell us that election workers told them that if they wanted to vote the Democrats’ ballot, where Westlake and Nageak faced off, their ballot would be put into the “questioned ballot” stack.
Our sources are reporting that there are at least 40 of these questioned ballots in Barrow.
All of this raises questions about ballot custody, ballot security, and a possibly rigged election.
As for the other two villages that reported late, they are:
Kaktovik, where of the 33 votes, 4 went to Dean Westlake and 29 went to Benjamin Nageak. (The result is not surprising because this is Nageak’s hometown.)
Point Hope, where of the 19 votes, 6 went to Westlake and 13 went to Nageak.
Here’s a snapshot of the District 40 results:
Final results for District 40.
HISTORIC RESULTS: LOTS OF VOTING IN SHUNGNAK
An analysis of voter history in Shungnak shows that they know how to turn out the vote.
ONE THEORY: BOTH BALLOTS
If 100 actually people voted, we see that 50 voters in Shungnak picked the Republican ballot, and 50 picked the Democratic ballot, according to the precinct results. In every other village in that region, the breakdown was much more weighted toward the Democratic ballot.
With a total of 100 cards cast, it appears that the election officials allowed 50 voters to vote two ballots — both the Democratic and Republican ballots.
For example, they could vote for Lisa Murkowski for Senate on one ballot, and Cean Stevens on the other. But only one of those ballots had the Westlake-Nageak matchup on it, which is why there are only 50 votes recorded for that race.
Not only does Shungnak have an extraordinarily high turnout, but the numbers simply don’t add up.
Barrow’s Rep. Ben Nageak is behind challenger Dean Westlake, with just five votes separating them. Westlake has 765 votes to Nageak’s 760.
We’re not ready to call this race, but if there was ever an example of how every vote counts, this is it.
Our understanding from the field is there are three villages that have not been counted and there is a looming question about many questioned ballots. Reports have come in to Must Read Alaska that in District 40, election workers made voters who requested a Democratic ballot vote a questioned ballot if they were registered as Republicans; the questioned ballots could make a difference for Rep. Nageak.
Stephen Bannon / YouTube
TRUMP CAMPAIGN PICKS A STREET FIGHTER FOR CEO
Stephen Bannon, the executive chairman of Breitbart News, is the new CEO for the Donald Trump campaign, while Kellyanne Conway, a senior adviser and pollster for Trump, is the campaign manager.
ASRC Energy Services CEO Jeff Kinneeveauk has resigned effective this Thursday. Doug Smith will become the new president and CEO. Smith is president and CEO of Little Red Services and ASRC Construction Holding Co. Kinneeveauk, born in Point Hope, became CEO in 2011.
SHIP OF FOOLS?
The Celebrity Serenity left Seward and is motoring west and north with 1,000 passengers and 600 crew members to cross over the Northwest Passage. The trip cost passengers between $21,000 and $120,000, depending on your stateroom and amenities, and is billed as the adventure of a lifetime as the itinerary stops in 14 places before reaching New York City….
…Or as Slate magazine puts it: “It is also an abomination—a massive, diesel-burning, waste-dumping, ice-destroying, golf-ball-smacking middle finger to what remains of the planet, courtesy of precisely 1,089 of its richest and most destructive inhabitants. And it’s all made possible by runaway climate change, the existential global crisis that these same people and their ilk have disproportionately helped to create.”
Kill joy.
The Celebrity Serenity will arrive in Nome on Aug. 21, and will be the largest ship of its kind to ever stop there, and just in time for the Nome Berry Festival.
MARGARET STOCK GOES UNION
There was a big fundraiser at the IBEW building tonight and it was for self-described nonpartisan candidate Margaret Stock, running for U.S. Senate. We missed getting the invite, but it looked like a union made in heaven.
RACE FOR SITKA MAYOR
Then there were three: Former Sitka city administrator Gary Paxton, has withdrawn from the race for mayor of Sitka, which leaves Deputy Mayor Matthew Hunter, Assembly member Ben Miyasato, and local civic leader Mary Magnuson vying for the job.
Magnuson is ready for the heat of politics because last year she got into politically incorrect trouble as she defended the honor of the Alaska Day charity “slave” auction, whereby you can bid on two hours of household chores from willing volunteers.
The 30-year-old traditional event ran into the buzzsaw of the Anchorage chapter of NAACP, which called it “inflammatory and insensitive” and ordered a name change. Politically thin-skinned Sitkans (can we still say that?) complied.
In an interview with the Alaska Dispatch last year, Magnuson said the slave auction had raised $3,000 for the local fire department, and those who wanted the name changed were just blowing it up. “There were no shackles, no oppression, just raising money for the first responders we all love. I’m offended that this political correctness is trying to be pushed on us and making us look like jerks.”
This year and forever more it will be known as the “Alaska Day Auction,” but locals will probably cluck at being bullied by Anchorage pc police. What is the world coming to? They already had to ditch the wet T-shirt contest.
The Municipal Election will be held on Oct 4. No big controversies are planned.
Alaska Day in Sitka is October 10-18, with the Alaska Day Ball on Oct. 17. The people of Sitka will endeavor to not offend non-Sitkans by having any non-politically correct fun.
Coming soon to Anchorage, 
