Palin has a point

I forgot to add in my last post that I do agree with Sarah Palin on one issue.

In her interview with conservative radio talk-show host and filmmaker John Ziegler, Palin complained about reports suggesting that Trig Palin was not her son and said she was “frustrated” by rampant rumors about her and her family.

While mainstream media stayed away from such rumors, they were fueled by bloggers and others online and the supermarket tabloids.

“I wasn’t believed that Trig was really my son,” she said. She called it a “sad state of affairs.”

“What is the double-standard here?” she asked. “Why would people choose to believe lies? What is it that drives people to believe the worst, perpetuate the worst?”

“When did we start accepting as hard news sources bloggers, anonymous bloggers especially?” she asked.

I couldn’t agree more. It’s a shame that so much of what thrives on the Internet are outright, vicious lies.

The mainstream media stayed away from such rumors because there was nothing to them. That’s the way it used to be when facts mattered, but now anyone can say anything and all kinds of people believe it. Conservatives and liberals are equally guilty of it. Never let the facts get in the way of a good yard is what they believe.

Let’s hope that one day we get back to where people base their decisions on the truth not just what they want to believe.

Palin at it again

Sarah Palin apparently just can’t help herself.

According to Associated Press, the governor of Alaska was in Miami last week for the Republican Governors Association meeting and at first she displayed her sense of humor telling her fellow governors, that she wanted to catch them up on the developments in her life since they last met.

“I had a baby, I did some traveling, I very briefly expanded my wardrobe, I made a few speeches, I met a few VIPs including those who really impact society like Tina Fey,” she said to loud laughter.

Palin then got serious, noting Congress is led by the likes of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Rep. Barney Frank, and said it was incumbent upon GOP governors to ensure that the federal government doesn’t take over the health care system. She said if Obama and the new Congress “err on the side of excess taxes, we have to show them the way.”

Before briefly taking questions from reporters Thursday morning, Palin said, “I, like all of our governors, we’re focused on the future. The future for us is not the 2012 presidential race. It’s next year and our next budget, and the next reforms in our states and in 2010 we’re going to have 36 governors’ positions open across the U.S. That’s what we’re focused on.”

“We are the minority party,” Palin added at a session on “Looking Towards the Future: The GOP in Transition.” “Let us resolve not to be the negative party.”

Palin even said she’d be willing to try and help Obama.

“Let’s reach out to Barack Obama,” Palin said. “Show him how lower taxes provide opportunity for the private sector to grow.”

But then Palin went back into her attack dog-mode.

She said with governors, “the buck stops on our desk. … We are not the many voting yea or nay or present.” While an Illinois state lawmaker, Obama often voted “present,” a practice the GOP criticized during the campaign.

Why would Palin take such a cheap shot at Obama? Doesn’t she realize the American people are sick and tired of these negative attacks. Even John McCain has agreed to bury the hatchet. He’s meeting with Obama on Monday to try and see what they can to work together for America.

Remember when Obama was asked about Palin during his final debate with McCain. He could have said a lot, especially with Palin bashing him everyday at campaign stops around the country.

But Obama refused to take the bait and said it was up to the American people not him to judge Palin.

Palin would be well advised to study the exit polls from the election. Six in 10 Americans said Palin is not qualified to become president, according to exit polls of voters in last week’s election. That included nine in 10 Democrats, nearly two-thirds of independents and a quarter of Republicans. The exit polls were conducted for The Associated Press and the television networks.

If indeed she’s going to be a force in American politics in the coming years, she’ll have to turn those numbers around. And one way would be to ditch the snide and negative comments. They may help her with the Republican base but they certainly don’t win over any Democrats or Independents, whose votes she’ll need to win a national election.

McCain burying hatchet with Obama

Isn’t it amazing that some folks on the right seem determined to continue insulting and defaming President-elect Barack Obama even though their hero John McCain has agreed to bury the hatchet with him.

According to Associated Press, Obama will meet Monday with John McCain in talks that will focus on ways they can cooperate on an array of troublesome issues facing the country.

“It’s well known that they share an important belief that Americans want and deserve a more effective and efficient government, and will discuss ways to work together to make that a reality,” Obama spokesman Stephanie Cutter said in announcing the meeting.

Shouldn’t this be what Republicans and Democrats do across the country?

The Associated Press said  the two will be joined at Obama’s Chicago transition office by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a McCain confidant, and Rep. Rahm Emanuel, the Illinois Democrat whom Obama has chosen to be his White House chief of staff.

According to Associated Press, Obama has struck a bipartisan tone, pairing pairing a Republican and a Democrat to meet with foreign leaders this weekend on his behalf in Washington, for example. His aides emphasized the bringing together of both sides in announcing the meeting with McCain.

Republican and Democratic officials say Emanuel and Graham arranged in a postelection conversation to have Obama and McCain meet at the earliest possible time and Monday was it. Emanuel and Graham have worked together before on issues on Capitol Hill, and Graham jumped to Emanuel’s defense when Republicans criticized his appointment as Obama’s chief of staff.

Meanwhile, on another interesting note, the Associated Press is reporting that a Democratic official speaking on grounds of anonymity said that Obama met in Chicago with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is under consideration for secretary of state.

The two met on Thursday afternoon, said the official, who asked not to be publicly identified because the official was not authorized to release the information.

Maybe that will satisfy all those people out there who were so upset that Obama didn’t pick Hillary for VP that they voted for McCain.

Bill Ayers comes clean

I know this won’t be near enough to satisfy all the Obama Bin Laden haters out there but Bill Ayers has finally spoken and guess what. He denies the two were ever close contrary to claims by John McCain and Sarah Palin that they were “paling around,” presumably trying to overthrow the U.S. government.

“I think my relationship with Obama was probably like thousands of others in Chicago. And, like millions and millions of others, I wish I knew him better,” Ayers said in a recent Washington Post interview.

Then, according to the Associated Press in the afterward of his new paperback release of his 2001 memoir, “Fugitive Days.” Ayers wrote, “In 2008 there was a lot of chatter on the blogosphere about my relationship with Barack Obama: we had served together on the board of a foundation, knew one another as neighbors and family friends, held an initial fundraiser at my house, where I’d made a small donation to his earliest political campaign.”

He writes that Obama’s enemies saw their connections as a chance to “deepen a dishonest narrative about him.”

“That he is somehow un-American, alien, linked to radical ideas, a closet terrorist, a sympathizer with extremism,” Ayers writes.

Ayers said it was “more than guilt by association,” something he called “a deep and ugly tradition in our political life.”

For the record, Ayers lives just a few blocks from Obama on Chicago’s South Side with his wife, former fellow radical Bernardine Dohrn. Now a law professor at Northwestern University, Dohrn was a fugitive for years with her husband until they surrendered in 1980. Now an education professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago, Ayers helped found the Vietnam-era radical group the Weathermen, which carried out bombings at the Pentagon and the Capitol. Charges against him were dropped because of government misconduct, which included FBI break-ins, wiretaps and opening of mail.

Also for the record, Obama has denounced Ayers’ violent past and said Ayers was never involved in his White House campaign.

And finally, the board they both served on was the Chicago Annenburg Challenge, which was founded by Walter Annenburg a big-time Republican supporter. Annenburg was appointed to serve as ambassador to the United Kingdom by Richard Nixon and he was a close friend of Ronald Reagan.  So, it wasn’t like this was a left-wing board they served on. It was a community education-reform board with all types of people on it.  You have to wonder how many other people served on the board and why weren’t they made to answer for their ties to Ayers?

Endoresment furor puzzles editor

OK, I’ll admit it. I’m more than a little puzzled and confused.

I’ve been a member of the Herald-Standard Editorial Board since it was formed in 1982, and I’ve never seen such vitriol and viciousness over an endorsement as our backing this year of Barack Obama for president.

For some reason, this past presidential campaign brought out rather extreme viewpoints about the candidates, especially Obama. In the past there had always been a certain civility in presidential politics. Even if you disagreed with a candidate there was a basic level of respect that was paid to those running for the highest office in the land.

But that was not the case this year. That line of civility was crossed and then some. We received numerous calls questioning our sanity in endorsing Obama with several threatening to actually stop their subscription to the Herald-Standard.

One woman I talked with said she was upset with our endorsement because  Obama was “evil, un-American and unChristian.’’ Pressed for details she also called him a “Muslim terrorist.’’ Some people right here in Fayette County took to calling him the Anti-Christ.

So, to these people, I guess, our endorsement was seen as a sign that we were somehow backing Satan.

Realizing that people sometimes get a little fired up for presidential campaigns, we thought things would calm down after the election, but we were wrong as the calls and comments have kept coming.

Apparently upset at the results of Tuesday’s election, they’re now blaming us for Obama’s victory. It’d be nice to be so powerful, but I think they give us far more credit than we deserve. After all, local politicians don’t call our endorsement the kiss of death for nothing. Just look at how Obama lost to John McCain in Fayette, Greene and Washington counties for proof of that theory.

Maybe if we wanted McCain to lose so much, we should have endorsed him.

But that goes against the main reason why we endorse candidates. Our biggest concern is not who wins or loses.  Our top reason for endorsing candidates is to get people to think.  Period. If you agree with us, fine. But if you disagree, that’s OK too. We’re just hoping that our editorials can spur some critical thinking on the various issues of the day. That’s why we have an editorial page in the first place.

To us, politics is no different. If we’re going to take certain viewpoints then it stands to reason that we should back candidates who are going to support those viewpoints.

Trust me, we don’t have some grand “liberal’’ agenda that we want to impose on our readers. If we did, how could we have endorsed George W. Bush for president back in 2000? In fact our editorial board’s endorsement meetings are often spirited affairs with strong arguments waged on both sides. That certainly was the case this year as the board was almost equally divided between Obama and McCain.

The vote came out in Obama’s favor, but we tried to make it clear in the endorsement editorial that the board was divided, and there was much to like about McCain.

Overall, the vast amount of issues we editorialize about are local ones because they’re the ones we know best. It’s not like we editorialize to a great extent on national or international issues like the New York Times or the Washington Post do.

Our biggest concerns in the past have been making sure that the government’s business is done in the open and those making decisions concerning the public trust are held accountable for them. Are those concerns liberal or conservative? We sincerely hope they’re  supported by those on the left, on the right and in the middle too.

We’ve also tried to make the editorial board more representative of the community in general. It now includes four editors, our publisher and controller, a reporter and two members from the community.

That’s all the more reason why I’m so puzzled over all the hoopla about the endorsement editorial. It’s just a very small part of our overall job. Given that, you have to wonder if endorsement editorials are worth all the problems they cause. Certainly at some point if people are so divided and take them so much to heart then maybe we’ll have to stop them. The last thing we want to do is insult or offend our readers in any way.

But if we stop the endorsements, I think we’ll all suffer. Our democracy was built around a free press and giving everyone the right to express their opinion.

If our voice is silenced, then who’s next?

 

Mark O’Keefe is the executive editor of the Herald-Standard. O’Keefe can be reached by e-mail at mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com., regular mail at 8-18 Church St., Uniontown, Pa., 15401 or by phone at 724-439-7569.

Obama the uniter?

Well I guess i should be jumping up and down since Barack Obama defeated John McCain for the presidency. But I’m hardly euphoric. Consider all the problems that Obama will face when he comes into office, the worst economy in 75 years, Afghanistan, Iraq, terrorism, health care etc. I worry that some people will expect too much of Obama. It’s going to be impossible for him to do everything and do it all at once. There certainly will be many problems along the way that will be very difficult to solve.

Also, I worry about the people who have called Obama the Anti-Christ, a terrorist or just plain evil. Will these people support Obama now that he’s president? That’s the way we’ve done it here in America since the nation was founded. But what will these people think? Will they be there to support Obama as the country did George W. Bush on 9-11? Only they know the answer to that question. It’s my hope that they at least give him a chance.  It’s still so hard to figure out why so many people hate Obama. You have to wonder if they ever listen to his speeches. He’s not a rabble-rouser. His speeches are about one country and making sacrifices for the good of everyone. What’s not to like about that? I guess we’ll see what happens.

The truth about Obama’s record on coal

McCain campaigns last minute distortion of Obamas coal record an act of desperation

United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) International President Cecil E. Roberts issued the following statement today:

“Sen. John McCain and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, have once again demonstrated that they are willing to say anything and do anything to win this election. Their latest twisting of the truth is about coal and some comments Sen. Obama made last January about the future use of coal in America.

“Here what the McCain campaign left out of Sen. Obamas actual words: But this notion of no coal, I think, is an illusion. Because the fact of the matter is, is that right now we are getting a lot of our energy from coal. And China is building a coal-powered plant once a week. So what we have to do then is figure out how can we use coal without emitting greenhouse gases and carbon. And how can we sequester that carbon and capture it.

“Sen. Obama has been consistent with that message not just in the coalfields, but everywhere else he goes as well. Despite what the McCain campaign and some far right-wing blogs would have Americans believe, Sen. Obama has been and remains a tremendous supporter of coal and the future of coal.

“I noted that Sen. McCain even went so far yesterday as to say he has always been a supporter of coal. I wonder, then, how he can justify his statement at a Senate hearing in 2000 that, In a perfect world we would like to transition away from coal entirely, and his leading role in sponsoring legislation in 2003 that would have wiped out 78 percent of all coal production in America?

“Fortunately, UMWA members, their families and their friends and neighbors in the coalfields know all too well what is going on here. Theyre not going to fall for it, and we urge others throughout America who care about coal to review what the candidates records on coal actually are. We are confident that once they do, and once they see the many other benefits to working families of voting for Sen. Obama, they will make the right choice for themselves and their families.”

It ain’t over til it’s over

Republicans can put away their cyanide capsules and Democrats can hold off on popping that champagne…for now anyway.

Despite claims that Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama has a commanding lead over his counterpart Republican John McCain and is guaranteed of victory Tuesday, nothing will be official until the results of the election are counted.

And there’s certainly evidence that McCain could pull off the upset of the century if he can get your vote and that of your fellow Pennsylvanians. But more on that later.

Consider that after all the soaring speeches, scurrilous attacks, charges, countercharges, rallies, robocalls, debates, protests and mudslinging, the election comes down to a matter of math. But it won’t be which candidate gets the most votes at the polls. We found that out back in 2000 when Democrat Al Gore won the popular vote but lost in the Electoral College to Republican George Bush.

No, it all comes down to the Electoral College and the magic number 270. That’s the number of Electoral College votes, Obama and  McCain need to become our next president.

So, here’s the deal on those votes. Obama has pretty much of a lock on 264 votes. According to a consensus of the pollsters, Obama looks like a pretty safe winner in Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, Callifornia, New Mexico, Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Maine, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hamphsire, Connecticut, New Jersey, Deleware, Maryland and the District of Columbia.

McCain, on the other hand, has 157 safe votes. Everyone concedes he’s pretty much of a lock to win Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, South Carolina, West Virginia  and Alaska.

There’s another eight so-called “battleground’’ states where Obama and McCain are pretty much tied. They are Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, North Dakota, Montana and Nevada. The plus for McCain is that Bush carried all of them back in 2000 and 2004, and it wouldn’t be a big surprise if McCain wins them all.

 Should McCain take all eight he would have 252 votes, 18 short of the magic 270.

In that scenario, the race would come down to Virginia’s 13 votes and Colorado’s nine tallies. Right now Obama leads McCain in both states, and he only has to win one of them. But McCain could still win the presidency by taking both of them. And Bush won both of them in 2000 and 2004. In fact, Virginia hasn’t voted for a Democrat since Lyndon Johnson took the state back in 1964.

So, no matter what you read or hear, Tuesday’s election is far from decided.

And there’s one other state, which could throw the whole race into turmoil. Yes, that’s Pennsylvania. While the pollsters have it firmly in Obama’s corner,  it’s still within McCain’s reach. That’s the reason why McCain and his vice presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, have spent so much time in the Keystone state with the Alaska governor making a  last-minute campaign stop in Westmoreland County on Friday.

If McCain could win Pennsylvania, then in all likelihood Obama would have to win either Florida or Ohio, places where the Democrats have already had their hearts broken in the last two presidential elections.

That’s why Pennsylvania is so crucial to both Obama and McCain.

You have to figure that Obama will pile up some big margins in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, but  McCain will probably do well in other parts of Pennsylvania, including central, northeast and northwest.

So, the race could come down to how well McCain does in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Back in 2004, Bush won both Westmoreland and Greene counties while losing narrowly in Washington County.

In Fayette County, Bush won 46 percent of the vote in 2004, the best showing by a Republican presidential candidate since Richard Nixon beat George McGovern back in 1972.

So, it’s certainly possible that McCain could take Fayette and Washington counties. Win them by convincing margins, and he could be our next president.

Sure there’s backing for Obama here, but  it’s more on the order of Democrats just voting for Democrats than a real outpouring of support for the Illinois senator and his policies.

It’s been somewhat surprising that the Obama campaign hasn’t done more to win the hearts and minds of voters in Fayette, Washington and Greene counties.

Apart from a visit by Gov. Ed Rendell last week, they’ve done virtually no campaigning here.

On the other hand, there’s a definite passion for whatever reason on the part of those opposed to Obama. Our endorsement of Obama last Sunday has drawn more harsh criticism than any in the 25 years since I’ve been here.

Obama has also been subjected to more vicious rumors and vile attacks than any presidential candidate in history. Despite questions about their veracity, some of them will stick and hurt Obama come Tuesday.

In the end, there’s no doubt that Herald-Standard readers will play a key role in deciding whether Obama or McCain is elected as our next president.

It’s all the more reason why everyone needs to get out and cast their ballots Tuesday.

It’s shaping up as one of the most crucial elections in our history with the fate of the nation hanging in the balance.

Just remember if you don’t vote and your candidate loses Tuesday, you’ll only have yourself to blame.

 

Mark O’Keefe is the executive editor of the Herald-Standard. He can be reached at mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com by regular mail at 8-18 Church St., Uniontown, Pa., 15401 or by phone at 724-439-7569.

 

Conservatives lying about Obama and gun control

Lies, lies, lies. That’s all the Republicans and conservatives are doing these days in regards to Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. They’re desperate, and they’re doing anything they can to scare the American people into voting against him. It’s terrible. The Democrats have never resorted to such despicable tactics when it looked like they were losing in 2000 and 2004. And the Republicans never did it when they losing to Clinton back in 1992 and 1996. So, you have to ask yourself why are they spreading so much dirt and vile filth around in the final days of the campaign. Could it be because Obama is black? You really have to wonder if they would be saying this stuff if Obama was white? I talked to a woman yesterday who said that Obama was evil, anti-Christian and anti-American. She said she only watches Fox and listens only to talk-radio. So, we know were she’s getting this stuff. It’s just wrong to be spewing such hatred. The America I know and love tolerates people with different views on things. But not these guys. There’s certainly nothing wrong with being opposed to Obama’s policies but how can you call him evil? Is there no end to the craziness?

A good example is this e-mail I received yesterday. This guys says that “Obama is not only opposed to right-to-carry permits for law-abiding gun owners, but has also endorsed a complete ban on handgun ownership. Now come on. This guy has to know better. Read the e-mail, then read a story below from the Chicago Tribune. Nowhere does it say that Obama has endorsed a complete ban on handguns. It’s just a big, boldfaced lie. And to think that these people call themselves Christians when they’re launching the biggest hate campaign in the history of American politics. Well, they will have to face their Maker some day and answer for these awful attacks. Read both the e-mail and the story and come to your own conclusion. And may God help us all no matter who’s elected because we’re going to need it after this offensive, un-American campaign being waged by the Republicans and conservatives.

Democrats Should Fear the ‘Brady Effect’ As seen to day on AmericanThinker.com:

While many politicians and pundits of varying political persuasions have come to learn that the power of gun owners, hunters, sportsmen and freedom advocates cannot be ignored on Election Day – hardcore Liberals have a more difficult time facing reality. It is much easier for them to cry “racism” than swallow the truth.

The truth for them this time around is that Barack Obama is the most rabid anti-Second Amendment candidate to ever run for the U.S. presidency. Obama is not only opposed to right-to-carry permits for law-abiding gun owners, but has also endorsed a complete ban on handgun ownership.

The inconvenient truth facing Obama supporters is that gun ownership is strong in the U.S. Roughly half of all American households own at least one gun, and according to an ATI-News/Zogby poll of likely voters, gun owners favor McCain over Obama by a more than 2 – 1 margin – 62 to 29 percent.

Posted September 5, 2008 1:49 PM/news/politics/blog//news/politics/blog/

by James Oliphant

DURYEA, Pa.–At a campaign event here Friday, Barack Obama ran headlong into the one of the issues that dogs him in this battleground state.

“There are rumors going around that . . . you’re going to take away our guns,” said Joan O’Neil, a resident of tiny Susquehanna in northeastern Pennsylvania, a big-time area for hunting.

This gun issue that Obama has tried to deftly navigate throughout this long campaign and one that damaged

him here in his primary fight with Hillary Clinton. And it’s one that could do even him even further harm in the general election, as he is matched against a pro-gun ticket that includes a vice-presidential nominee who has been photographed firing an assault rifle.And indeed, several of the dozens of plant workers invited to Obama’s economic “town hall” here in this town outside of Scranton, Pa. nodded as the question was asked. Pennsylvania has the highest per capita rate of National Rifle Association members in the nation.

“I believe in the Second Amendment, and if you are a law-abiding gun owner you have nothing to fear from an Obama administration,” Obama said. “This has been peddled again and again. Here’s what I believe: The Second Amendment is an indvidual right. . . people have the right to bear arms. But I also believe there is nothing wrong with some common-sense gun safety measures.”

As examples, Obama listed background checks and providing cities with federal gun trace data that would allow them to go after dealers that sell guns illegally.

“That kind of thing is common sense and has nothing to do with the guy who has got his rifle and wants to go hunting,” Obama said. “Now the NRA — I’ll be honest and I’m sure there are NRA members here — their general attitude is that we don’t want anything, and if you even breathe the words ‘gun control’ or ‘gun safety’ then you must want to take away everybody’s guns. Well, that’s just not true.”

At the campaign event Friday, Obama said that there are “two realities about guns” in the United States, one including lawful gun owners, hunters, and sportsmen and a second that involves the flow of illegal handguns and automatic weapons into cities such as Philadelphia, where they are used by “teenage gang-bangers.”

“Surely, we can come up with a system that protects lawful gun-owners, but at the same time tries to do something about kids getting shot,” he said. “That is, I think, the job of the president is to reconcile this tradition of gun ownership in this country, with some basic public safety concerns.

“The bottom line is this: You got a rifle, you got a shotgun, you got a gun in your house, I’m not taking it away,” Obama said. “They can keep on talking about it, but it’s just not true.”

In the end, Obama told the group, that if voters believe he can help them on economic issues such as health care, energy and education, “this can’t be the reason not to vote for me. This can’t be the reason not to vote. Your guns, we’re not going to mess with them.”

O’Neil said afterward that being able to keep their guns for hunting was the biggest concern residents in her town have about Obama. “The important thing is that people understand that they can keep their guns and they can use their guns,” she said.

Bids for Palin’s pipeline questioned

More bad news for Republican President candidate John McCain in his bid to become the nation’s next chief executive.

Turns out that Gov. Sarah Palin’s signature accomplishment _ a contract to build a 1,715-mile pipeline to bring natural gas from Alaska to the Lower 48 _ emerged from a flawed bidding process that narrowed the field to a company with ties to her administration, according to a story by Associated Press.

It’s received little play in the national media but this should be something that all Americans look into. Beginning at the Republican National Convention in August, the McCain-Palin ticket has touted the pipeline as an example of how it would help America achieve energy independence.

Despite Palin’s boast of a smart and fair bidding process, the AP found that her team crafted terms that favored only a few independent pipeline companies and ultimately benefited the winner, TransCanada Corp.

And contrary to the ballyhoo, there’s no guarantee the pipeline will ever be built; at a minimum, any project is years away, as TransCanada must first overcome major financial and regulatory hurdles.

In interviews and a review of records, the AP found:

_Instead of creating a process that would attract many potential builders, Palin slanted the terms away from an important group _ the global energy giants that own the rights to the gas.

_Despite promises and legal guidance not to talk directly with potential bidders, Palin had meetings or phone calls with nearly every major candidate, including TransCanada.

_The leader of Palin’s pipeline team had been a partner at a lobbying firm where she worked on behalf of a TransCanada subsidiary. Also, that woman’s former business partner at the lobbying firm was TransCanada’s lead private lobbyist on the pipeline deal. Plus, a former TransCanada executive served as an outside consultant to Palin’s pipeline team.

_Under a different set of rules four years earlier, TransCanada had offered to build the pipeline without a state subsidy; under Palin, the company could receive a maximum $500 million.

“Governor Palin held firmly to her fundamental belief that Alaska could best serve Alaskans and the nation’s interests by pursuing a competitive approach to building a natural gas pipeline,” said McCain-Palin spokesman Taylor Griffin. “There was an open and transparent process that subjected the decision to extensive public scrutiny and due diligence.”

There were never more than a few players that could execute such a complex undertaking _ at least a million tons of steel stretching across some of Earth’s most hostile and remote terrain.

TransCanada estimates it will cost $26 billion; Palin’s consultants estimate nearly $40 billion.

The pipeline would run from Alaska’s North Slope to Alberta in Canada; secondary lines would take the gas to various points in the United States and Canada.

Building such a pipeline had been a dream for decades. The rising cost and demand for energy injected new urgency into the proposal.

When Palin was elected governor two years ago, she vowed to take on Exxon Mobil Corp., ConocoPhillips and BP, the multinational energy companies that long dominated the state’s biggest industry.

Palin ousted fellow Republican Gov. Frank Murkowski, who negotiated a secret pipeline deal with the “Big Three” energy companies. That deal went nowhere.

The new governor tackled the pipeline issue with gusto, meeting with representatives from all sides and assembling her own team of experts to draw up terms.

Palin invited bidders to submit applications and offered the multimillion-dollar subsidy. Members of her team say that without the incentive, it might not have received any bids for the risky undertaking.

Palin’s team was led by Marty Rutherford, a widely respected energy specialist and veteran of state government. Rutherford solidified her status when, in 2005, she joined an exodus of Department of Natural Resources staff who felt former Alaska Gov. Frank Murkowski was selling out to the oil giants.

What the Palin administration neglected to mention in its announcement of Rutherford’s appointment was that in 2003, Rutherford left public service and worked for 10 months at the Anchorage-based Jade North lobbying firm. There she did $40,200 worth of work for Foothills Pipe Lines Alaska, Inc., a subsidiary of TransCanada.

Foothills Pipe Lines Alaska Inc. paid Rutherford for expertise on topics including state legislation and funding related to gas commercialization, according to her 2003 lobbyist registration statement.

Palin has said she wasn’t bothered by that past work because it had occurred several years before. But Rutherford wouldn’t have passed her new boss’ own standards: Under ethics reforms the governor pushed through, Rutherford would have had to wait a year to jump from government service to a lobbying firm.

Rutherford also has downplayed her work for Foothills.

“I did a couple of projects for them, small projects,” she told a state Senate committee examining the TransCanada bid earlier this year. While a partner, Rutherford said, she “realized that my heart was not in the private sector, it was in the public sector.”

At one point, Palin’s pipeline team debated Rutherford’s role, but concluded there was no problem, said Revenue Department Commissioner Pat Galvin, another team member.

Patricia Bielawski, Rutherford’s former partner at Jade North, spent last summer in Juneau, the state capital, serving as TransCanada’s lead private lobbyist. While the Legislature debated _ and ultimately approved _ the TransCanada deal, Bielawski met with lawmakers and sat in on the public proceedings, several legislators said.

Bielawski told AP that Rutherford never directly lobbied the Legislature for Foothills, and that Rutherford broke no rules.

But others say it’s a legitimate question.

“I’m not saying someone’s getting paid off for a sweetheart contract, but it’s very hard to ignore that this is your former partner and your former client standing there before you,” said Republican Sen. Lyda Green, a Palin critic who in August voted against awarding TransCanada the license.

Tony Palmer, the TransCanada vice president who leads the company’s Alaska gas pipeline effort, rejects the suggestion that his company benefited.

“We have gained clearly no advantage from anything that Ms. Rutherford did for Foothills some five years ago on a very much unrelated topic,” he said.

Rutherford did not respond to interview requests. But McCain-Palin spokesman Griffin said Rutherford “had no decision-making role or authority,” and contended that such matters were handled by others on the Palin pipeline team.

TransCanada also had a connection to the team hired by the Palin administration to analyze the bid. Patrick Anderson, a former TransCanada executive, served as an outside consultant.

In January 2007, Palin spoke the first of at least two times to Vice President Dick Cheney, the Bush administration’s point person on energy issues, according to calendars obtained by the AP. Cheney’s staff pressed the Palin administration to draw in the energy companies, said current and former state officials involved in those discussions.

As the governor’s approach unfolded in the spring of 2007, Palin said she saw problems if the firms that own the gas also owned the pipeline. They could manipulate the market or charge prohibitive fees to smaller exploration firms, discouraging competition.

Several important requirements in the legislation were unpalatable to the big oil companies. In the talks under Murkowski, the firms asked that the rates for the gas production tax and royalties be fixed for 45 years; Palin refused to consider setting rates for that long.

Under her process, pipeline firms had an advantage because they simply pass along taxes paid by oil and gas producers.

Oil company officials warned lawmakers they wouldn’t participate under those terms. Still, in a near unanimous vote, the Legislature passed the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act in May 2007, as generally written by Palin’s pipeline team.

Once the state issued its request for proposals on July 2, 2007, the level of communication between the government and potential bidders was supposed to decrease drastically. State lawyers advised public officials to keep their distance, and bidders were told to submit questions on a public Web site.

But Palin had conversations with executives at most of the major potential bidders during that period, according to her calendars, which indicate that the pipeline was the subject of the discussions, or that the conversations occurred immediately after a briefing with Palin’s pipeline team.

TransCanada’s Palmer described communication with state officials as nonexistent.

According to the governor’s official schedule, however, Palin called TransCanada President and CEO Hal Kvisle on Aug. 8, 2007. Palmer said the call was to clarify the bidding process.

Griffin said that in keeping with legal guidance, Palin never spoke in any of the meetings about the competitive bidding process.

By the Nov. 30 submission deadline, there were five applications. But the state disqualified four for failing to satisfy the bill’s requirements.

That left TransCanada.

The Canadian giant had been pursuing an Alaska pipeline since at least 2004, when the company negotiated a deal with Rutherford that the state ended up shelving. While the details remain confidential, six people familiar with the terms told the AP that TransCanada was willing to do the work then without the large state subsidy.

In testimony this July before the state Senate, Rutherford described the 2004 deal as presenting different trade-offs.

Others who reviewed the deal think much of the $500 million will be wasted money.

“Most definitely TransCanada got a sweetheart deal this time,” said Republican Sen. Bert Stedman, who voted against the TransCanada license. “Where else could you get a $500 million reimbursement when you don’t even have the financing to build the pipeline?”