Word: palin
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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True to her campaign pledge, Palin had her gas team draft a pipeline plan that set tough conditions on whoever would build the line. One of the "must-haves," as they were called, required the builder to allow other producers to use the pipe, even if that meant expanding it at the builder's expense. That was a nonstarter with the big producers, who didn't even put in bids. In the end, the only acceptable offer came from TransCanada, an independent Canadian pipeline builder...
Neither the plan nor its proponents were universally loved. Critics pointed out that gas-team member Rutherford had briefly been a lobbyist for a TransCanada subsidiary. And stiffer resistance came from economic conservatives. Representative Mike Hawker says that by cutting Big Oil out of the pipeline, Palin's team "endangered the state's economic future. It's a classic case of biting the hand that feeds...
...Palin administration has also had a tendency to vilify its opponents. Hawker, whose wife works in the oil industry, says that this year after opposing the governor's tax plan on conservative economic grounds, he faced a GOP primary opponent for the first time in his career. Palin's political allies--Palinistas, as Hawker terms them--"called me 'corrupt' every...
Even some who worked for the Palin administration say the gas team went overboard. "They had a tendency to be preachy," says Larry Persily, who worked in Palin's Washington office. "They are true believers, zealots even." Irwin defends the hard line: "People in Alaska are tired of being pushed around by oil and gas companies." Palin's approach, Galvin says, "represented a fundamental shift in the entire relationship between the state and companies...
...Palin's pressure tactics prevailed. The Republican legislature passed a measure giving TransCanada up to $500 million in seed money. Alaskans had been talking about a gas pipeline for three decades, and in less than two years in office, Palin had made almost unbelievable headway. "I fought to bring about the largest private-sector infrastructure project in North American history," she told the convention audience in September. "And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly $40 billion natural-gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence...