Palin's Project List Totals $453 Million

Last week, the Republican presidential candidate, Senator John McCain said that his running mate, Alaska, Gov. Sarah Palin, did not seek or affect special interest spending of Congress, serving as a fiscal conservative. But the administration of the State Gov. Palin has the American taxpayer to finance $ 453 million in projects from Alaska in the past two years.

These projects include more than $ 130 million in federal funds that could benefit from the Alaska fishing industry and another $ 9 million to help oil companies in Alaska. It has also requested $ 4.5 million to improve an airport on an island in the Bering Sea with a year-round population of less than 100.
[Gov. Sarah Palin has more than 130 million dollars in federal funds for the fishing industry in Alaska.]
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Gov. Sarah Palin has more than 130 million dollars in federal funds for the fishing industry in Alaska.

Senator McCain, the fight against wasteful spending and provides a central point of his campaign. He has never tried to withdraw his state of Arizona and vows to veto pork-barrel spending bills to his office as president, says these projects to go through the normal budget review. And he decided the argument that states that they are often the financing of major projects.

"If they are good projects, they can be admitted and opened in a New York minute, he says on his campaign bus earlier this year, before Gov. Palin to the ticket." If they are worthy projects that I know they are financed. "

During an appearance Friday on ABC, The View, "said Senator McCain Gov. Palin's vision, and has not asked Congress allocates." Not as governor, she did not, "he said.

In fact, in the current fiscal year, is seeking $ 197 million for 31 projects, records show. In the previous year, the first year in office, she requested 256 million dollars for dozens of other projects ranging from research on redfish and port attached genetics and sanitation in rural areas of obesity prevention. In comparison, his predecessor, Governor Frank Murkowski, asked more than 350 million dollars in its last years of his mandate.

The McCain campaign said Sunday that the governor Palin is generally one of the budget discipline. "His case is to reduce the number of applications for the allocation of the previous administration sizably," said McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds, the state has a veto unnecessary spending.

What Senator McCain comments on television on Friday, Mr. Bounds said: "If he gave viewers a wrong impression, certainly not the intention."

In an interview with ABC News on Friday, Governor Palin itself suggested that it is no longer to his condition. "The abuse of the reserves, American United Nations, it is undemocratic and it will not be accepted in a McCain-Palin administration. Book abuse stops."

If you press the record as governor, she said: "We have drastically reduced our request to reserve since my arrival in power. That's what I said residents of Alaska for those years that I was in power, is more".

The success of Alaska with the reserves is partly due to the power of Senator Ted Stevens, the top Republican in the Senate Appropriations Committee. The state of the attention in part because the state government is one of the richest in the United States Flush with oil and gas royalties, it is not to impose income tax or sales. In fact, the flow of money in the other direction: every man, woman and child this year, a check for $ 3200.

The McCain campaign is also under fire for his remarks on the stump and in television ads Gov. Palin killed the controversial "Bridge to Nowhere", $ 223 million reserve linking the mainland to an island with a low population density. In fact, they project initially and killed after he was widely criticized and Congress allowed the state to use the funds for other projects.

On the campaign, Governor Palin has repeatedly attacked Senator Obama on the reservation. "Our opponent has invited nearly one billion dollars in the reserve of three years. This is about one million euros for each working day," she said during a rally in Albuquerque, NM

Senator Barack Obama called for a total of $ 860 million in reserve in his Senate years to taxpayers based on common sense. This does not apply to $ 78 million for projects that are national in scope and was asked by many legislators. Senator Obama stop put all affect applications in fiscal 2009.

It is difficult to compare Senator Obama affect register with Governor Palin - States differ in size, for example, and both candidates have different roles in the process. But using the same calculation that the campaign of McCain, the total amount of dollars, divided by the number of working days so that each held office (assuming a five day working week for both), asked the governor Palin $ 980000 per day, compared with about $ 893000 for Senator Obama.

M. Bounds, spokesman for the McCain campaign, said this "apples and oranges, because Senator Obama has asked Governor Palin, and because it has the ear applications.