Stupid is

I lived in Alaska and interviewed governors, senators, representatives and other elected and non-elected people and the one thing I often walked away with was this, those people are dolts.

Seriously. I can say this now because it's 20 years out and the vast majority of those in power then are not now.

I could tell countless stories of the idiots and morons and low lifes I would end up talking to, all of them serving the public good, in some form. There are many things about Alaska that amaze me and remind of a better place that we should all live in. Such as, leaving the keys in the car, windows down and being gone for an extended period of time. Try doing that almost anywhere else in America and at the very least you lose your car. In Alaska I got in the habit of never removing the keys to the car, it made life a lot easier and in all the time I lived there, nothing was ever taken from the car.

I was once on the phone interviewing a prominent state senator, who just happened to be far right leaning, but that was not my issue. What I found astounding is, and what is typical of these right leaners, was his utter love of all things military, without ever having served a moment himself. So, there we were, chatting away about some sort of military action in some far off country, and he says, I still remember when I returned home from Vietnam and there was no one at the airport and I felt my entire country had turned its back on me. Knowing that the good right wing senator had never been in the military, I was left a little speechless. As the gap in time began to grow I asked the only question that came to mind, "I did not know you served in the military during the Vietnam War" I said, both as a statement and a question. His answer? After a deep breath, "oh, I never served in Vietnam, but I do recall a trip there and feeling the weight of rejection when I returned." Again, I was still not sure what he was talking about. In the course of the rest of the conversation, I finally got it down to a trip he had taken to Vietnam in the 80's, about 20 years after the end of the war, and yet no one bothered to apparently pick him up at the airport when he flew home.

Yikes.

So last summer when Sarah Palin came stumbling out of the wilderness as the completely idiotic and unqualified vice presidential candidate, I kept thinking about all the politicians who I spoke with in Alaska and how often they would make my head spin with falsehoods, lies, misstatements and somewhat retarded propaganda.

How does this happen? Because the state is so small population wise, and yet so huge geographically. Small pockets of almost inbred populations send representatives to the state house with little or no education, little understanding of how elected branches of government work and often times a severe hatred of how government might work.

Yet I did speak with some politicians in Alaska who inspired me. An older woman was running for governor, I believe her name was Arlis Sterguleuski. We were talking via phone, a formal interview, as she was flying around the state campaigning. We talked about a variety of topics, some harder for her to dance around, some just regular political back and forth that journalists do with people running for office. At the end of a long interview, as we were saying goodbye to one another, before she hung up, she said, "may the sun find time to shine on you today."

I have loved the comment ever since, it comes up often, I say it to people and it was one of those moments in Alaska politics that I really thought that some wonderful and eccentric people run for office and have a chance of winning in this great big beautiful state.