A new SurveyUSA poll of North Carolina puts McCain up 20 points, compared to 4 points a month ago.
Sometimes when you’ve got a liar as big as Sarah Palin on the line only a timeline will really do justice to her fibbing ways.
So a lot of you have written in to ask: Okay, she says she said ‘Thanks. But no thanks’ to the Bridge to Nowhere. But how exactly did it all come out? What’s the order of events? Well, briefly, it went like this.
Actually, Congress put the kibosh on the Bridge to Nowhere back in November 2005. Since Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) was then head of the Senate Appropriations Committee he was able to force a compromise in which the earmark for the bridge was killed but Alaska got to hold on to the money — some $442 million of federal tax dollars.
Fast forward to November 2006. That’s when Sarah Palin was running as a staunch supporter of the Bridge to Nowhere — that is, after the feds had themselves already said ‘No Thanks.’
In 2006, the Democrats took over both houses of Congress. So by the time Palin got into office it was clear that not only was the first Bridge earmark killed but that Congress was not going to be ponying up any more money. That meant that Alaska was going to have to pick up the tab all on its own. So since she couldn’t pay for it with the federal pork barrel, in September 2007, Palin officially halted the project which was then a state project since Congress had said ‘Thanks. But no thanks’ two years earlier.
She couldn’t say ‘No Thanks’ because Congress had already said ‘Forget It’.
Still with me?
So the money Palin sent back to Washington? Well, she didn’t. She kept the money for other bridges and roads in Alaska.
So, to boil it all down, Congress pulled the plug on the Bridge to Nowhere in 2005. Palin was still for it in 2006. And when she finally ended the project because Congress had cut off funding, instead of saying ‘No Thanks’ she actually said ‘Thanks!’ because instead of sending the money back to Washington she kept it all in Juneau.
Next question?
Late Update: From TPM Reader JF …
Good summary of the Bridge to Nowhere fiasco but it’s even worse:
From the Anchorage Daily News:
Alaska “is continuing to build a road on Gravina Island to an empty beach where the bridge would have gone — because federal money for the access road, unlike the bridge money, would have otherwise been returned to the federal government.”
The state is building a road to a bridge that doesn’t even exist for $24M. Who’s paying for it? You and me.
We are beyond the ridiculous here. It’s utterly surreal.
The local news in Alaska is willing to play it more straight about Palin’s Bridge lie than the prestige networks in the lower 48 …
New McCain ad: Obama wants to teach children about sex before they can read.
McCain tries to whip up outrage about Obama using a common phrase McCain used last year.
I mean, can’t he at least be happy that now he has someone who can go toe to toe with Obama for him?
At first it seemed like they didn’t want to let Palin out on her own for fear she’d stumble into some kind of trouble. But now it’s pretty clear McCain’s afraid to let go of her or go out alone without her.
Late Update: That’s interesting. It seems like more than a few people are just telling it like it is that McCain is lying as bad as Palin now. Now Ben Smith, like Ambinder, is giving the buzzer to McCain on his new lie about what Obama said.
Latter Update: Now Jake’s calling McCain out.
Still Latter Update: Melber on Lying McCain’s ploy. “McCain Camp Plays Gender Card with Pig Ploy”
TPM Reader JM not happy with McCain’s sleazy campaign …
The sex ed ad is literally worse than the Willie Horton ad, because at least the Horton story was true. But the bill Obama supported actually did the reverse of what McCain claims – it didn’t mandate more sex ed for anybody, it tried to toughen up existing classes by teaching the risks of STDs. The bill didn’t glorify sex, it highlighted the dangers of sex. It’s the most old fashioned sex ed there is: scaring kids straight. So now even THAT is anti-family?
Calling this “perverse” is a good first step, but the lie here deserves much, much more. It’s the disgusting act of a candidate who cares more about scaring people with lies than warning kids about the dangers of early sexual activity. Anyone who would oppose such
warnings is an objective supporter of unprotected, unsafe underage sex.So throw back the slime with a truthful attack: It’s McCain who wants more unsafe teenage sex, McCain who wants more kids to get STDs, McCain who wants more young people to get HIV. McCain would rather win a political campaign than protect children from sexual diseases.
That’s worse than shameful, worse than unpatriotic. That’s evil.
TPM Reader WS has some more to add …
Is everyone looking close enough at the McCain ad?
I just watched the ad again. There is one picture of children, all of them white (I think – can you tell?) And the next image is of Obama, looking down and over his shoulder, with a smile on his face.
But since when do campaign ads show your opponent smiling? It’s always a frown or a grimace, right? Not this time. What’s he smiling about?
It’s not subtle. And it’s not an ad about sex education.
A black man, sex, and children. I think this ad is more odious than is being acknowledged.
Take another look at it!
Couldn’t agree more. But let’s not be surprised. McCain is pure sleaze. Sound harsh? Sure. But any other interpretation of the man at this point amounts to willful obliviousness or an embrace of the fantasy that he somehow doesn’t know what his campaign is doing in his name. This is the race he’s decided to run. Now what do you do about it?
From TPM Reader NH …
What alien invaded Mark Halperin’s body? On AC360, he trashed McCain/Palin for being phony and dishonest. Then he went after the press for talking about lipstick on the pig, for not calling Palin out on the Bridge to Nowhere, and for letting her get away with such tight press restrictions.
Hardball also went hard on the bridge to nowhere.
And TPM Reader BS too …
Shocked, absolutely shocked.
Watching AC360 on CNN, the last segment ~10 minutes in, Mark Halperin actually made intelligent points regarding the coverage of Palin. In essence, the other 3 candidates have been on the scene for months if not years. Sarah Palin is new to the scene and instead of wasting time on silly stories (putting lipstick on a pig), the real record of Palin has to be discussed.
The latest out of Trooper-gate.
Remember that Palin’s Trooper-Gate scandal revolves around her apparent efforts to use her power as governor to have her ex-brother-in-law, an Alaska state trooper, fired from his job. The trooper, Michael Wooten, was in a long-lasting and bitter divorce and custody battle with Palin’s sister. (Once the state Commissioner of Public Safety, Wooten’s ultimate boss, wouldn’t do the deed, she fired him.)
Now it comes out that before she even became governor — and was in a position to abuse her power of office — Palin had to be warned by the judge in the divorce case that her harassment of Wooten amounted to “a form of child abuse.”
If her behavior was so abusive and over-the-line before she became governor (this was in 2005), can there really be much doubt she would have used all her power of office to get him fired?