In the closing months of the Biden Administration, bureaucrats pushed through a staggering 1,500 new regulations, costing American taxpayers and businesses an estimated $1.3 trillion.
Congressman Nick Begich III said today that House Resolution 77, the “Midnight Rules Relief Act,” is critical legislation in that it streamlines the congressional review process and ensures Congress can roll back these 11th-hour rules, thereby preventing outgoing administrations like President Joe Biden’s from burdening the American people with job-killing regulations.
“This bill is about accountability. The Biden Administration knew its radical agenda wouldn’t pass through Congress, so they rammed through a mountain of regulations in their final days. These midnight rules hurt Alaska’s industries—our fishermen, miners, energy producers, and small businesses—all of whom are now forced to navigate costly, unnecessary red tape. Congress shouldn’t have to waste time unraveling a flood of last-minute overreach when we should be focused on securing America’s future,” said Congressman Begich, upon voting for the resolution.
By streamlining the Congressional Review Act process, HR77 allows Congress to repeal harmful midnight rules in one legislative package rather than individually.
Many of these 1,500 last-minute regulations rolled out under Biden directly impact Alaska, stifling resource development, raising energy costs, and making it harder for businesses to grow and thrive, he said.
From NPR-A to federal land withdrawals and excessive permitting requirements, the regulations threaten jobs and economic opportunities across the state, Begich said.
Congressman Andy Biggs of Arizona was the prime sponsor of the measure, and encouraged the Senate to move quickly to pass his resolution.
“Today’s passage of Midnight Rules Relief Act will make it easier for Congress to check the unelected bureaucrats who feverishly wrote new federal rules before the end of the Biden Administration. In 2024 alone, the Biden Administration imposed more than 1,400 new rules at $1.34 trillion in regulatory costs. Many of these rules are out of step with the mandate the American people gave us in November, and the tools provided under this Act will allow them to be swiftly addressed., he said.
The Midnight Rules Relief Act will allow Congress and President Trump’s Administration to follow through on our promises to rein in the out-of-control bureaucracy and return power to the American people and those they elect, Biggs said.
“I urge the Senate to quickly take up this legislation so it can be signed into law by President Trump. I look forward to working with my colleagues—in both the legislative and executive branches—to break down the massive administrative state that was propped up by Joe Biden and his cronies,” Biggs said.
President Donald Trump has nominated Kathleen Sgamma, a prominent advocate for the oil and gas industry, to be the new director the Bureau of Land Management. The agency under the Department of Interior is responsible for overseeing approximately 245 million acres of federal land in the United States, including 70 million acres in Alaska.
Sgamma has been the president of the Denver-based Western Energy Alliance since 2006, where she has been a vocal proponent of increased domestic energy production and has consistently pushed for policies favoring oil and gas development on public lands.
Sgamma was a staunch critic of harsh regulatory and shutdown measures promulgated by the Biden Administration. In 2024, the Alliance, along with petroleum associations from New Mexico, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Utah, filed a lawsuit challenging the Bureau of Land Management’s new leasing rules. These rules increased royalty rates, minimum bids, rental rates, and bonding requirements for companies drilling on federal lands. The industry groups argued that the updated regulations would close eligible lands for leasing and disproportionately harm smaller companies.
A graduate of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she has never worked for the Bureau of Land Management.
“Her confirmation by the Senate into the position would represent a seismic change in direction for the bureau after the last four years under the Biden administration, during which BLM prioritized developing green energy to combat climate warming,” wrote POLITICO.
Sgamma’s nomination aligns with President Trump’s agenda to bolster U.S. fossil fuel production and achieve “energy dominance.”
If confirmed by the Senate, Sgamma would work under the direction of Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to implement policies aimed at expanding oil and gas drilling on public lands.
Her nomination will be strongly opposed by the environmental non-governmental industry. But she will likely have the support of many leaders in the western states. She would replace Tracy Stone-Manning, a radical environmentalist who served President Joe Biden’s anti-oil and gas agenda and had previously worked for EarthFirst!, where she was tied to a tree-spiking incident.
Newly minted Sen. Rob Yundt of Wasilla surprised his fellow Republicans when he submitted his first bill, and it was a tax increase.
The Yundt tax, Senate Bill 92, is designed to enact a specific 9.2% tax on Hilcorp, the company that runs Prudhoe Bay, having taken over for BP Alaska when it exited the state.
Hilcorp is an S corporation, and currently those are not taxed in Alaska. But the bill opens up the door to taxing all S corporations, large and small, and business owners will want to pay heed.
Yundt’s bill threatens to destabilize the oil industry in Alaska. Many conservatives are “livid,” according to Must Read Alaska sources, that Yundt effectively sandbagged his Republican colleagues by not having a conversation with them first. But Democrat Sen. Bill Wielechowski was pleased, saying that good ideas can come from all sides. Wielechowski has been trying to increase taxes on oil companies his entire career. He’s known in circles as “Bill Will Tax.”
SB 92 is similar to a bill offered in 2023, SB 114, which was act “establishing an income tax on certain entities producing or transporting oil or gas in the state; relating to the oil and gas production tax.”
Yundt’s bill has nearly the same language as Wielechowski’s : “An Act establishing an income tax on certain entities producing or transporting oil or gas in the state.”
The tax is supposed to close what some say is a loophole. The S-Corp tax category bypasses income taxes on the company, enabling tax liability to “pass through” and apply to earnings of the company’s shareholders.
In 1980 Alaska repealed its personal income tax, so the shareholders in Alaska do not pay an income tax on their gains.
The statement from the Senate Republican Caucus said the Republican minority was measured, but pointed: They said they are “a non-binding caucus, meaning our members are free to pursue policy proposals that align with their constituent goals and personal values. While Senator Yundt is a valued and respected member of our team, the entirety of the caucus does not align with the proposed legislation SB 92.”
In the House, the Republicans were equally surprised as the Republican minority in the Senate. No one was brought into the discussion before Yundt introduced the bill on Monday.
Although the House and Senate are controlled by pro-tax Democrats, Yundt will still have to appear in front of the respective Resource committees and testify, and he may not be able to answer detailed questions about his own legislation. Oil and gas tax is an extremely specialized and complicated subject that takes years to master.
Some in Juneau have suggested that Yundt is being used by Democrats to find a way to fund their big-spending items, such as returning massive pensions to state and city employees in Alaska through the defined benefits package, and enacting a major spending increase for Alaska’s woefully mismanaged schools. If the tax increase is tied to either of these spending programs, it may improve its chance of passing.
In the past, Gov. Mike Dunleavy has threatened to veto similar legislation.
Who put Yundt up to it as a freshman legislator who has only been in office for less than a month and who never mentioned oil taxes during his campaign against Sen. David Wilson? That’s the burning question among Republicans in the Capitol this week.
There are many solutions to the disastrous performance of Alaska public education. Most of them involve moving control of the money spent per student as close to the student as possible. On the other hand, the political left and their cheerleaders generally try to move control of that money as far from the student as possible, insulating the public schools from oversight and accountability.
Maybe we are fighting the wrong fight.
One of the strengths of President Trump is the ability to shake the box on an intractable problem, allowing solutions after the dust settles. His suggestion to move all the brainwashed Gazans out of Gaza into neighboring Jordan or Egypt is one such example.
How do we shake the box with public education here in Alaska? One solution would be vouchers, paid directly into the hands of parents.
The legislature shall by general law establish and maintain a system of public schools open to all children of the State, and may provide for other public educational institutions. Schools and institutions so established shall be free from sectarian control.
No money shall be paid from public funds for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution.
That seems pretty straightforward. A constitutional amendment would work. Such an amendment is impossible under the current state of affairs in the legislature where Republican majorities end up losing a few members who caucus with democrats, handing control of one or both houses to democrats. Expecting democrats to pass something the Alaska Education unions (NEA Alaska) opposes is a fool’s errand.
Given that, what other options do we have?
As it turns out, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) in its Jun 30, 2020 Espinoza v Montana Department of Revenue opinion solved that problem for us.
In Espinoza, Montana set up a program that granted tax credits to those that donate to organizations that award scholarships for private school tuitions. The Montana Department of Revenue published a rule prohibiting families from using the scholarships for private religious schools, essentially the same provision in the Montana state constitution that Alaska has.
In their Espinoza opinion, SCOTUS found that:
The application of the no-aid provision discriminated against religious schools and the families whose children attend or hope to attend them in violation of the Free Exercise Clause of the Federal Constitution.
In other words, this provision in the Montana constitution was unconstitutional religious discrimination. So too is the similar provision in the Alaska constitution.
Haven been given this tool, how to use it?
This is where it gets tricky and will take some political fortitude. The legislature needs to pass legislation in support of vouchers for the public schools. The governor may be able to do the same thing administratively.
Expect that legislation, once signed to immediately be litigated. The Alaska courts will likely do their level best to kill it by finding it unconstitutional. When they do, take it into federal court. Cite the provision in the Alaska Constitution as unconstitutional religious discrimination and see what the judge says. Appeals are likely. Sooner or later, the federal courts or the SCOTUS itself will have to agree that SCOTUS actually meant what they said in Espinoza, and Alaska will have vouchers, moving control of public education money closer to the students than ever before.
The only drawback to this would be election of a Democrat governor who will reprise Gov. Tony Knowles in Katie John, dropping the case with prejudice.
Too convoluted? Perhaps. But it is another approach using a new tool, breaking the current impasse. The public discussion, as what we have been having for years, hasn’t been working, despite the great work by many on Our Side of the argument.
Alex Gimarc lives in Anchorage since retiring from the military in 1997. His interests include science and technology, environment, energy, economics, military affairs, fishing and disabilities policies. His weekly column “Interesting Items” is a summary of news stories with substantive Alaska-themed topics. He was a small business owner and Information Technology professional.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, after voting in favor of the confirmation of former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Security, announced on Wednesday that she will vote in favor of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human Services.
On X, Murkowski wrote what, for her, is a lengthy explanation that laid out her concerns, but also her acknowledgement that many Alaskans had shared their support for RFK Jr., whose confirmation vote is expected to be taken on Thursday in the US Senate.
“I intend to support Robert Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation as Secretary of Health and Human Services. While there is no dispute that the U.S. spends more per capita on healthcare than any other country, our health outcomes do not reflect this investment. Instead of focusing on who covers our exorbitant healthcare costs, we need to reduce these costs by directing our attention to prevention and keeping people healthy. This is the appeal of RFK, and many Alaskans have shared that view with me. Chronic conditions are a significant source of illness and major drivers of public debt; he recognizes this and is committed to addressing it,” Murkowski wrote.
“I continue to have concerns about Mr. Kennedy’s views on vaccines and his selective interpretation of scientific studies, which initially caused my misgivings about his nomination. Vaccines have saved millions of lives, and I sought assurance that, as HHS Secretary, he would do nothing to make it difficult for people to take vaccines or discourage vaccination efforts. He has made numerous commitments to me and my colleagues, promising to work with Congress to ensure public access to information and to base vaccine recommendations on data-driven, evidence-based, and medically sound research. These commitments are important to me and, on balance, provide assurance for my vote,” she wrote.
“I am encouraged by the time he has spent among indigenous peoples, his commitment to tribal sovereignty, and his promised attention to the Indian Health Service. He has spent time in rural Alaska and understands some of the unique public health challenges we face that require complex solutions. There is much shared work ahead to achieve better public health outcomes, and I will push Mr. Kennedy to realize these goals,” Murkowski concluded.
Sen. Dan Sullivan said several weeks ago that he would support RFK Jr.’s nomination by President Donald Trump.
To date, Murkowski has supported most of Trump’s nominees, with the exception of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has started strongly in the Department of Defense, returning it to a fighting mission, rather than a social club that it was becoming under former Sec. Lloyd Austin.
The Democrats who are attempting to make the House Natural Resources Committee their battleground did not come prepared for the likes of Congressman Nick Begich, newly elected from Alaska.
As a Harvard-educated former oil executive who represents a nonprofit dedicated to stopping drilling in the Atlantic Ocean took the microphone to testify against offshore oil drilling in the Atlantic outer continental shelf, she came up against the buzzsaw logic of Begich, who eventually accused her of using a “duplicitous level of doublespeak.”
Margaret Howell has testified before on behalf of Stop Offshore Drilling in The Atlantic, a group she founded several years ago. Here’s her testimony from 2017, essentially bringing the same arguments that she presented on Tuesday.
Begich asked Howell if she supported oil drilling anywhere in the world. She said she supports it in the Gulf of Mexico (now known as the Gulf of America), and she supports it overseas, off the shore of the African continent and China. She said those areas are drilled by American companies, her former colleagues, in fact, and that “it’s important for the workforce that those jobs are available, and they’re happy, my best friend has traveled all over the world drilling for other countries, and our oil companies benefit.”
Then Begich asked her if the Atlantic coastline of the United States has some special ecological significance that the other places do not have.
Watch what Howell has to say, and how Congressman Begich traps her in a net of her own duplicitousness:
Begich has been assigned to the House Natural Resources Committee, one of three committees and eight subcommittees he has added to his workload for Alaska.
President Donald Trump issued a sweeping executive order to reduce the size of the federal workforce, citing the need to increase efficiency, eliminate waste, and restore accountability in government operations.
The order, titled Reforming the Federal Workforce to Maximize Efficiency and Productivity, mandates that federal agencies significantly cut down on hiring, implement large-scale reductions in force, and streamline operations. Under Tuesday’s directive, agencies are limited to hiring one new employee for every four who depart. However, exceptions have been made for positions related to public safety, immigration enforcement, and law enforcement.
“To restore accountability to the American public, this order commences a critical transformation of the Federal bureaucracy,” the order states. “By eliminating waste, bloat, and insularity, my Administration will empower American families, workers, taxpayers, and our system of Government itself.”
There are an estimated two million federal workers, and about 6% of them work full time in the office. About 200,000 are expected to take buyouts by the Trump Administration already, per an earlier order to reduce the size of the workforce through buyouts.
This is the same one-to-four ratio that the first Trump Administration ordered to reduce regulations — only one new regulation could be approved for every four eliminated.
The new executive order enforces a strict hiring ratio across federal agencies. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is required to submit a workforce reduction plan, ensuring agencies adhere to the new hiring constraints. The hiring freeze currently in place for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) remains unaffected.
Each agency will be required to consult with a Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Team Lead to assess and approve hiring decisions. Agencies must also submit monthly hiring reports to the United States DOGE Service (USDS) Administrator.
The order directs agencies to prepare for major layoffs, targeting temporary employees and reemployed annuitants. Programs not mandated by law—such as diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives—are prioritized for elimination.
Agency heads must also submit reports within 30 days identifying statutory requirements for their operations and assessing whether departments or subcomponents should be consolidated or eliminated.
The Office of Personnel Management has been tasked with revising suitability criteria for federal employment. New standards include disqualifications for failure to comply with tax obligations, citizenship requirements, nondisclosure agreements, and government resource misuse.
Although the order mandates aggressive workforce reductions, military personnel are explicitly excluded. Agency heads retain discretion to exempt positions deemed necessary for national security, homeland security, or public safety. The OPM Director may also grant exemptions where necessary.
A group of Alaskans, inspired by Elon Musk and his team of analysts are the Department of Government Efficiency, has started DOGE Alaska.
The initiative was conceptualized in November by Jamie Allard, who has since recruited Alaska citizens dedicated to the same lean-government principles as the Department of Government Efficiency that is exposing government waste and fraud on behalf of President Donald Trump.
In her capacity as a citizen, and not in her job as a representative for Eagle River, Allard has brought on several people as the founding members of the group, including:
Cathy Tilton, Wasilla civic leader
Bob Griffin, former member of Alaska Board of Education
Craig Campbell, former lieutenant governor
Loren Leman, former lieutenant governor
Dan Sullivan, former Anchorage mayor
Jordan Harary, IT and AI
Suzanne Downing, Somewhere in Alaska
Portia Erickson, former community engagement director for Municipality of Anchorage
Sami Graham, educator and former chief of staff, Anchorage mayor
Jordan Schuster, Fairbanks businessman
Jamie Allard, Eagle River
The group will be researching and encouraging others to research waste, fraud, and misuse of public funds in Alaska, and findings will be reported to the public. The group has no role in the administration of Gov. Mike Dunleavy, the Alaska Legislature, or the Trump Administration.
“Of course, it’s our sincerest hope that we don’t find waste, fraud, or abuse in our state budget, but considering that our state has the highest level of federal funding per capita, it’s likely that some federal and state funds are being directed to places where they have marginal benefit. We welcome people to research and send us what they find because this is going to be a group project for Alaska,” said Jamie Allard.
“We are all volunteers, and would love to work ourselves out of the job of tracking down misuse of public money,” she said. “There are so many people in Alaska who have stepped forward to help, and more will step forward, of that I am confident.”
A website with contact information has been established. Alaskans who know of specific instances of misuse of funds can forward the information through the website.
Historically, the United States has provided foreign aid to other countries since 1812; but on a large scale only during and after World War II.
The history of the U.S. foreign assistance is marked by several key events, including Lend-Lease during World War II (1941-1945); the Marshall Plan (1948-1951); the Mutual Security Act/Plan (1951-1961); and the creation of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) from 1961 to present.
The Lend-Lease program was a system of transfer to participating countries of military and other materials necessary for conducting the war. Countries receiving aid through the Lend-Lease program signed a bilateral agreement with the US, stipulating those materials destroyed, lost, or used during the war would not be subject to any repayment whatsoever after the end of the war. Materials left over after the war that were deemed suitable to the needs of the population would be subject to repayment in full or in part by means of long-term credit. Military materials left after the war could be reclaimed by the US government (although the US government repeatedly declared that it would not make use of that right). Equipment and materials ordered but not delivered by the end of the war could be acquired by the ordering country with long-term American credits.
In their turn, countries entering the Lend-Lease contract took upon themselves the obligation to render help to the United States with materials at their disposal.
All in all, during the years of the war, the United States made Lend-Lease deliveries to 42 countries, amounting to a worth of nearly $50 billion dollars. In return, the U.S. received goods and services―and, ultimately, repayments totaling $7.4 billion dollars.
Of the overall sum of Lend-Lease help, Great Britain received nearly $31 billion, France about $1.5 billion, and the Nationalist-controlled regions of China about $600 million.
The entire sum of Lend-Lease deliveries to the USSR from 1941 to 1945, according to Soviet sources, amounted to about $10 billion in war materials and other supplies, approaching the $13 billion distributed to Western Europe under the post-war Marshall Plan.
After the end of World War II, problems arose around the terms of payment for remaining Lend-Lease materials. The US discontinued Lend-Lease deliveries to the USSR in September of 1945. A little over a year later, in December of 1946, the United States annulled the original agreement’s stipulation allowing the USSR long-term credit for materials and equipment ordered under the Lend- Lease Agreement, but not yet shipped. This unilateral annulment, claimed the Soviets, constituted a discriminatory attitude with respect to the USSR in settling the payments under the Lend-Lease Agreement. The U.S. was also accused of delaying negotiations on the issue.
In negotiations with the United States in 1947 and 1948, 1951 and 1952, and at the beginning of 1960, the Soviet government asserted that the Soviet Union had had the greatest effect in securing an Allied victory in World War II; therefore, Soviet diplomats argued, it could not and would not accept discriminatory measures that would leave it in a position inferior to other Lend-Lease recipient nations. The Soviet representatives based their arguments on clauses in the Soviet–American agreement of June 11, 1942, stating that the conditions of the final settlement should be of such a nature as to conform to the common interests of the United States of America and the Soviet Union and to advance the creation and maintenance of peace in the world.
The language of the pact also indicated its intention that Lend-Lease debt settlement conditions do not hinder commerce but, rather, encourage mutually beneficial economic relations between the two nations.
Accordingly, in negotiations that took place in Washington, D.C., in January of 1960, the Soviets insisted that the agreement settling Lend-Lease matters should be reached contemporaneously with the normalization of commercial and economic agreements between the USSR and the US.
However, at that time, America expressed little desire to resolve the question, and the exchange of opinions between the representatives of the USSR and the US was suspended.
Although settlements were made within 15 years of the termination of the Lend-Lease programs with most of the countries that had received aid from the United States, a settlement with the USSR would not be reached until the early 1970s when, on Oct. 18, 1972, an “Agreement on the Disposition of Lend-Lease Supplies in Inventory or Procurement in the United States Between the United States and the USSR” was signed.
In the end, the United States accepted the Soviet Union’s offer to pay $722 million in installments through 2001 to settle its debt. During Russian President Boris Yeltsin’s visit to the United States in 1991, the parties revisited the agreement, with the Russian government agreeing to settle the balance with a payment of $674 million to the U.S. Treasury. This sum was finally paid to the US by the Russian Federation in 2006.
The Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, was a program that provided economic assistance to Europe after World War II. It was proposed by Secretary of State George Marshall in 1947 and signed into law by President Harry Truman in 1948.
The goals of the Marshall Plan were to help West European countries become stable partners to the United States; rebuild their private industry and public infrastructure; create markets for American goods; create reliable trading partners for the United States; restore consumption to acceptable levels; and support democratic governments in Western Europe.
The recipient countries involved in the Plan were England, West Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, and Netherlands. The Soviet Union, despite its vocal protests, was excluded from this program due to the emergence of the Cold War between the West and East (1946 to 1986/1991).
The United States spent $13.3 billion on the Marshall Plan between 1948 and 1951. This is equivalent to about $200 billion in today’s U.S. dollars.
Mutual Security Act/Plan. The Marshall Plan addressed each of the obstacles to postwar recovery and, eventually, was replaced by the Mutual Security Act/Plan at the end of 1951; that new plan gave away about $7.5 billion annually until 1961, when it was replaced again by another program— Three-Pronged Program.
Three-Pronged Program. Instead of the Marshall Plan, we now have a Three-Pronged Program combining economic aid, now called “defense support,” administered by the Mutual Security Agency as successor to the Economic Cooperation Administration (ECA); military aid under the Department of Defense; and the Point Four Program and External Certification Authority under Technical Cooperation Administration.
U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 established USAID as the federal agency responsible for coordinating foreign aid until present. The Act also aimed to improve the administration of foreign aid and refocus it on the needs of developing countries.
The USAID was created by President John F. Kennedy to coordinate foreign aid, with the main goal to be responsible for disbursing capital and technical assistance to developing countries.
According to the Congressional Research Service, USAID employs about 10,000 people, mostly in Washington D.C., and controls an annual budget of about $50-55 billion. In 2023, USAID poured $10.5 billion into humanitarian aid and $10.5 billion into health programs in countries around the world.
Over the years, despite USAID essential humanitarian work around the world, the agency was subjected to numerous criticisms for its misuse of funds, questionable appropriations and logistical authorities. My good and long-time friend, via private correspondence, shared with me his experience with the USAID agency:
“USAID has always been a covert manipulative agency within the intelligence’ world of the federal government, funneling money to people and causes in other countries that the CIA, mainly, has directed, usually as a means of fomenting political unrest and dissatisfaction. It’s all done under the guise of ‘foreign aid.’ And it seems from these stories coming out now, that the corruption has become closely aligned with the Democratic Party or at least mostly used by influential Democrats for self-enriching corruption purposes (Clinton style). USAID was the agency that funded my ecological work in Poland in the 1980s. I just thought of them as some federal agency that had tons of money available for scientific collaboration in communist and other problematic regions of the world. I learned of them from another ecologist at Colorado State University who had been receiving funding from them for work he was doing in Pakistan. So, I submitted a proposal and found it accepted/funded with minimal review. The guy responsible for interacting with me was delighted to be able to fund something he thought was scientifically interesting for ecology (or so he said with enthusiasm — I pictured him as some poor sap in an office in Washington DC bored out of his mind). Other than the money, which lasted 3 years, I received only one (or maybe 2) phone calls from someone in Washington asking me a few really dumb ‘spy questions’ (like did you see any military bases while you were there? What were your general impressions of how happy the people are?) More recently, while reading several books about ‘state crime’ and corruption, I read how USAID is the classic federal agency of corruption and malfeasance in the CIA’s meddling in foreign affairs. Very interesting to see Musk and Trump focus on it and try to shut it down. Not surprised at all that political judges will try to prevent that from happening. Trump is taking on the CIA directly and forcefully; it’s a very risky business. The Kennedy family learned that the hard way.”
Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, and Clipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.
