Are They Sending Us Their Best People?

"Alaska population grew by 3.3% in past decade, far below national rate, Census Bureau reports."

-Anchorage Daily News, via Associated Press, April 26, 2021

According to the United States Census Bureau, Alaska has seen 23,160 new people arrive in its icy Arctic Entry over the last decade, which still makes us the third least populous state in the country after Vermont and Wyoming. I guess maple syrup and cowboys still don’t beat tanzanite and bear claw salad tongs.

So, who are these folks? Is the rest of the country/world really sending Alaska its best people? Let's take a closer look behind the numbers:

FLORIDA MEN/WOMEN/NB (4,999): Alaska is sometimes called "Cold Florida" due to the prevalence of dentists who are convicted for practicing dentistry on a Hoverboard, mayors who sext themselves out of a job, and senators who get banned from the state's largest commercial airline for performative anti-masking shenanigans. Approximately 4,999 of the State's increased population is obviously from Florida (if not in letter, then at least in spirit), including one prior resident, MAGA Stan blogger Suzanne Downing, who pretends to live in Alaska but secretly shit-posts from a pool noodle in Hot Florida, thus keeping this number south of 5,000.

PUBLIC RADIO REPORTERS, TEACHERS, & AMERICORPS VOLUNTEERS: (2,000): At least 2,000 of Alaska's population increase can be attributed to plucky young public radio reporters, Americorps/JVC volunteers, and teachers looking for that career-making experience and also a good deal on lightly used AT-bindings, if anyone hears of one. Please don’t leave us! We love to see it!

CLIMATE APOCALYPSE REFUGEES: (7,000): It's probably too soon to tell, but the climate crisis could be fueling Alaska’s horrendously bullish housing market. There appears to be a burgeoning cottage industry in climate apocalypse escapism by bourgeois Lower 48’ers seeking a bugout spot for when the shit goes beyond hurricanes and wildfires and really hits the fan with actual zombies.

PLAIN VANILLA FUGITIVES (3,000): *narrator voice on cold case true crime show* “He was subsequently apprehended by a joint task force of state and federal authorities in a remote cabin 200 miles north of Fairbanks, Alaska.” We’ve all heard this one before, amirite? (NOTE: there might be some overlap between this data point and Florida Person).

YOUR GIRLFRIEND/BOYFRIEND/PERSON (4,160): They followed you here, and there’s a better than 50% chance that you’re no longer a thing. Show me the lie.

PFD HUNTERS (2,000): You can blame reality TV and the Simpsons movie for letting the rest of the country know that the State government pays us to live here while going broker than a clock radio in the process. In short, you can have your ATV, but it’s gonna hit a few million potholes. Sorry!

QUILL THE HEDGEHOG (1): While not officially a person, and thus ineligible for the PFD, my 10 year-old son has convinced me to get a hedgehog that he plans to call “Quill,” a name his teen sister has scornfully dismissed as “so basic.”

Scylla and Charybdis

In the Greek myth of Scylla and Charybdis, two deadly hazards loomed before sailors navigating the Strait of Messina between Sicily and Calabria. 

On the Calabrian side towered Scylla, a rocky shoal mythologized as a six-headed monster. On the Sicilian side churned Charybdis, a broiling whirlpool said to swallow unfortunate boats whole and drag them to the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea. 

According to Homer, Odysseus was advised to pass closer to Scylla and sacrifice a few sailors, rather than tempt the yawning maw of Charybdis with his entire ship.

This myth was a childhood favorite of mine: I had a book with beautiful illustrations that depicted an old wooden boat being tossed about on white-capped seas, in a narrow passageway between a black-tentacled monster and a huge, frothy whirlpool. 

I thought of this myth tonight as I watched Dr. Anne Zink sail what I believe was a similar strait during her press briefing, which she has been giving with her bosses, Governor Dunleavy and State Health and Social Services Commissioner Adam Crum, nearly every day since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

During these conferences, Dr. Zink has been holding a master class in crisis management, thereby earning well-deserved praise for her leadership. 

She is calm. She is empathic. She is deeply knowledgeable. She is a numbers person. She studies data as well as health care infrastructure and the availability of personal protective equipment (PPE) in a state with limited quantities of both. She is an assiduous student of this disease. She gives meaning to her direction. She bases her recommendations on science and data. She takes seriously her Hippocratic Oath that all physicians swear to "do no harm." She works tirelessly night and day to mitigate and contain the impact of this disease on the public. She sounds--and probably is--ten times smarter than anyone in the room.

Yet she faced legitimate criticism--and questions--from both reporters and legislators yesterday as to why one particular procedure was singled out in the latest State Department of Health COVID guidance. 

Naturally, that procedure was abortion. As Rasha McChesney at KTOO reported:

Alaska joined at least five other states in banning elective abortions during the coronavirus outbreak. That procedure, along with dozens of others, is listed as an elective surgery — state officials suspended those in mid-March. But on Tuesday, Dunleavy issued clarification about exactly which surgeries to stop. Health and Social Services Commissioner Adam Crum said the state followed guidance from the American College of Surgeons about which procedures should be delayed. However, the guidance the state refers to doesn’t recommend delaying pregnancy terminations at all — either for medical reasons or if a patient requests it. According to the guidance, pregnancy termination is a procedure that “if significantly delayed, could cause significant harm.”

Here's another report on this, describing how certain states--Ohio, Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, and Louisiana--have chosen to specifically call out abortion as a procedure that should be avoided if possible during the COVID pandemic in order to conserve PPE. Both Dunleavy and Zink tonight dodged questions from reporters as to WHY the state guidance--otherwise verbatim to the federal guidance--differed in this conspicuous regard.

The answer is politics, notwithstanding Dunleavy's forceful denials to the contrary. 

His disgraced former Chief of Staff, Tuckerman Babcock, posted on his public Facebook page last month that closing Planned Parenthood for two weeks would save more lives than the virus would ever take. 

This administration vindictively and unconstitutionally vetoed $350,000 from the court system for interpreting Alaskans' reproductive rights in a way that did not sit well with Dunleavy and his base. 

And just months ago, before the pandemic, the governor fired and replaced the entire abortion-issue-plagued State Medical Board.

Some anti-choice folks are asking why abortions should get "special treatment" when every other clinic is being "asked to sacrifice" PPE, but that is not the question. 

No one is arguing against universal preservation of PPE or asking some providers to sacrifice PPE while others won’t have to do the same. What reporters, legislators, and the public want to know is WHY Alaska has joined a minority of (not coincidentally, very red) states in issuing guidance specific to abortion that is at odds with its national counterpart.

There is no answer to this question, or at least none that can be said aloud.

For over a decade, I worked for and defended five administrations of Republican governors. My goal was always to uphold my oath to support and defend the constitution of the United States and the State of Alaska. Before being unconstitutionally fired (along with two doctors and two other lawyers) for speaking out against the misdeeds of the Trump administration and other illegal and unconstitutional activity, none of these prior governors had ever put me in a position of having to sign my name to something I thought violated my professional oath.

I expect Dr. Zink is in a similar position. She just doesn't have time to fight with her bosses about this. She's simply counting on doctors—including abortion providers—to do what's best for their patients in adhering to their own oaths. 

Her focus, as she has said, is to save as many lives in Alaska as possible by emphasizing social distancing and conserving as many resources as we can. I imagine that her calculus is to pick her battles: to focus on understanding the disease every day, increase the supply chain of PPE, and flatten the curve of the virus, rather than try to convince her bosses to quit throwing red meat at their base. 

Like Odysseus, she is choosing Scylla.

I agree with the Governor that Dr. Zink is a treasure and asset to the state, and that she is performing beautifully and unflappably under unspeakable pressure. That her boss has put her in the awkward position of having to defend his political peccadilloes in the midst of a global pandemic says a lot about him and nothing about her.

Understand that mediocre hacks like Dunleavy don't run for office because they care about the public health and welfare. They run on blind ambition and to redistribute wealth to their corporate and religious backers. They simply do not view their duty to the public the way people like Dr. Zink do.

So when Governor Dunleavy claims he isn't playing politics with a pandemic, you can bet he is lying, and that Dr. Zink is doing everything in her power to ignore him and save lives. 

In other words, she is choosing the Scylla of her superiors' petty political side-projects over the Charybdis of a disease scientists do not yet fully understand, and that left unchecked, will surely bring what the doctor has described as a "significant loss of life."

Alaska needs her, and she is making the right choice.

Really, My Dude?

Governor Dunleavy just doesn't get it, or maybe he just doesn't care. I don't know which, but it's probably both. Here he is on the 8:30 p.m. flight from Anchorage to Juneau last night, asking someone to move their bag out of the way so that he and his third floor minions (whom the state pays six figures for doing more or less nothing) can sit in first class on Alaska Airlines.

This is a big no-no, and every Alaskan politician knows that. Ever since Frank Murkowski traveled the state in a publicly-funded private jet--which Sarah Palin immediately sold in a stunt-queen gesture of solidarity with the commoners--gifting yourself special perks on air travel has just been a bad look.

Every Alaskan has seen senators, legislators, and governors sitting in coach, because, DUH, optics. Look, I get that Governor Dunleavy is 6'9. His entire horseshit brand is built on his height. But Fascist Giraffe™ can easily sit in an exit or bulkhead row and have just as much legroom without exposing himself for the asshole he is, and not have to do that thing where he watches his constituents shuffle past him and his lackeys like zombies into coach class.

That averted-eye look of shame most first class passengers give to the coach plebes as they walk on by to seat 26E is apparently not in Dunleavy's repertoire. I don't care if you're a gold-level million miler who gets free upgrades and it costs the state nothing. I can count on one hand the number of times that I, in my 12+ years as a lowly AAG state employee, took even a free upgrade offered to me while traveling for work. 

Because, again, optics.

For high-profile politicians especially, it's simply a really bad look to lounge around in first class; especially while you are out here in these Alaskan streets telling elders they have to pay 140% more to live in the Pioneers' Home, cutting ferry service to the point that rural Southeast needs to beg for diapers on Facebook, and slashing Medicaid funding because Donna Arudin.

The hypocrisy is stunning, and the flagrant flaunting of privilege is even worse. Mike Dunleavy or Micheal J. or Big Mike or Tall Mike or Mike J. or whatever TF he's calling himself these days is the living incarnation of mediocrity ascending to the heights of power based on nothing but privilege and family wealth. It's certainly not his charisma or intellect or hard work that got him where he is, since, I think it's safe to say, he's proven himself fairly deficient in all of those areas.

The legislature gavels in today, and if "The People's Governor" is starting out with free drinks for rows 1-4 at 30,000 feet, it's going to be a looooooooooong session, my dudes.

Ten Times Alaska Man Kicked Florida Man's Ass

"Florida Man." 

You've probably heard of him. He's the guy who gets arrested at Wal-Mart for punching someone who took too long at the checkout. He's the fella who wears a "fuck the police" shirt to court. And he's the bro who was attacked during a selfie with a squirrel. There are a lot more example of Florida Man doing what Florida Man does, but I won't waste your time with those here because this is an ALAKSA blog--not a FLORIDA blog.

Have you heard of Alaska Man (or woman)? I didn't think so. I'm here to tell you that Alaska Man kicks Florida Man's AAAASSSS. One of my readers called Alaska "Cold Florida," and never has there been a more apt descriptions to describe the shenanigans that transpire up here. Here are at least ten times Alaska Man kicked Florida Man's ass.

1. THE GOAT INTESTINE DRUG MULE: From USA Today: "An Alaska man was arrested last week after allegedly smuggling drugs hidden inside spoiled goat intestines stored in his checked luggage, authorities said. ... He said he packed the goat himself after buying it from a California rancher for $140."

2. THE DENTAL SELF DEFENSE/NOSE BITER: From KFQD News: "An Alaska man used his teeth to defend himself and his property. Anchorage police say the man bit off part of the nose of a suspect who attempted to steal the man’s bicycle . . . Police say he removed a 'large chunk' of the suspects nose."

3. THE HOVERBOARD DENTIST: From Fox News: An Alaska dentist charged with fraud and unnecessarily sedating patients performed a procedure while riding on a hoverboard, authorities said. A former patient testified Wednesday at the trial of Seth Lookhart that an investigator showed her a 2016 video of the dentist riding the motorized, wheeled vehicle while extracting one of her teeth when she was sedated."

4. THE IN-COURT EVIDENCE STEALER: From U.S. News: "An Alaska woman charged with the courthouse theft of a gun that was being used as evidence against her has accepted a plea deal on her original charges . . . Authorities say that during a break in her trial Tuesday she removed the unloaded gun from an evidence box and hid it outside."

5. THE BEAR ASSAULT DEFENSE: From KDOQ News: "A 50-year-old Alaska man suspected of assaulting his mother [because she wanted him to move out of her house] told investigating officers that she had been attacked by a bear . . . Police found no evidence of a bear."

6. THE BB GUN BANDIT: From Fairbanks Daily News Miner: "A 41-year-old Anchorage man faces five felony assault charges for reportedly brandishing a realistic-looking BB gun pistol Wednesday near a west Fairbanks shopping area."

7. EYEBALL TATTOO GUY: From the National Post: "Alaska man with eyeball tattoo pleads guilty to attempted murder, says 'beautiful face' led to crime." Alaska Man's "most striking tattoo is the whites of his right eyeball that have been tattooed black. Eyeball tattooing is a relatively new practice that is done by inserting ink under the surface of the eye. The pigment is then trapped in the sclera, the white of the eye, and the ink then begins to slowly move around to cover the entire eyeball."

8. THE 70K PFD THIEF FROM ALABAMA WITH 149 CHARGES: From Fox News: "A woman suspected of fraudulently applying for $70,000 in Alaska Permanent Fund dividends pleaded not guilty at arraignment. Anchorage television station KTVA reports 44-year-old Sheila McMahon entered the plea Thursday in Anchorage Superior Court. She faces one count of scheming to defraud and 148 counts of unsworn falsification."

9. THE KNOCKOFF ITALIAN FURNITURE SALESMAN: From USDOJ: Alaska Man from Wasilla was sentenced to a year in the federal pen after he "participated in a scheme based on his importation of furniture manufactured in China and then falsely advertising the furniture for sale as having been manufactured in Italy. Specifically, [Alaska Man] purchased hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of wholesale furniture from a manufacturer in China and then re-sold the furniture as “Italian leather furniture” to retail purchasers in Alaska at a significant markup using the Craigslist.com internet marketplace. He fraudulently sold hundreds of these sofa sets to individuals in Alaska, including an undercover Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) investigator."

10. STOLEN "TEDDY'S TASTY MEATS" TRUCK CRASHES INTO "CHURCH OF LOVE": From KTVA News: "A man is in custody after allegedly stealing a delivery truck, [from TEDDY'S TASTY MEATS!?] ramming it through a patrol car and then crashed the truck into the side of the Church of Love building in the 3500 block of Spenard Road and fled on foot."

The Attorney General’s Assault on Alaska Supreme Court Caselaw Imperils Alaskans

As Anchorage Daily News reporter James Brooks reported last week, a string of defeats suffered by Governor Dunleavy in prominent court cases this year has exposed the limits of his administration's ability to push their agenda through the court system--the last bulwark and a major check and balance against government overreach.

The PFD and oil taxes are kitchen table talk for most Alaskans, but more than anything else, the judiciary--and its interpretation of the Alaska Constitution--is at the heart of the ongoing battle to save American constitutional democracy, both here and at the national level. It's a form of constitutional democracy that, for the most part and ideally, protects and prioritizes individual rights and liberties above corporate interests. 

To understand what is happening, you have to start with Alaska's judicial selection process. The Alaska Court System's website explains:

Alaska’s judges are selected by what is called the Judicial Merit Selection System. The authors of Alaska’s Constitution believed that it was important to have judges who were honest, fair, impartial, intelligent, experienced in applying the law, committed to following the rule of law and serving the interests of justice. Likewise, the authors believed that traditional partisan politics, with its influence of money, political patronage, deal-making and favoritism, posed too great a threat and impediment to achieving the desired goal of having a judiciary composed of such fair and impartial judges. That’s why the authors of the constitution decided that Alaska’s judges should be chosen by the Judicial Merit Selection System.

This system works through a rigorous vetting process. Attorneys who apply to be judges are rated by their colleagues and interviewed by the Alaska Judicial Council. The Council then sends two or more names to the Governor for appointment to the bench, and the Governor chooses from those names. Judges then stand for retention at general elections according to a set schedule.

Governor Dunleavy ran into trouble this year when he hijacked this process by illegally insisting that the Council provide him with different names. This unconstitutional "negotiation" delayed the appointment of a Palmer Superior Court judge and is now a stated legal ground for recalling the governor--one that Dunleavy's appointed Attorney General, Kevin Clarkson, has deemed legally insufficient.

We'll see about that. 

As Attorney General Clarkson himself said, the Alaska Supreme Court will have the final say about this and other positions he has taken, and that is the point.

The Alaska Supreme Court interprets the Alaska Constitution and those opinions become law; law that trial courts are required to follow, and that future justices of the Alaska Supreme Court must generally follow as well. Every government lawyer is accustomed to making arguments for the State that are perhaps losing arguments, or that they disagree with personally. But Attorney General Clarkson has gone a step further by forcing career attorneys at the Department of Law to—at a minimum—embarrass themselves in court by taking positions clearly at odds with judicial precedent.

Why would he do this? 

The answer is bigger than Alaska, although we are a rich laboratory for these constitutional experiments. This is part of a national trend and tactic on the far right to discredit the judicial branch by forcing clearly losing cases to the courts. That way, when they lose, proponents of these positions can blame an "activist judiciary" for following precedent on a document that, for his part, Governor Dunleavy wants to amend to favor corporations over individuals. (Fortunately, amending the constitution is very hard to do).

In short, decades of Alaska Supreme Court precedent have given Alaskans liberty, privacy, education, resource, and property interests unmatched elsewhere in the nation and stronger than those afforded at the federal level. This precedent has helped cement Alaska's reputation as a bastion of rugged individualism, which helps individuals, but arguably harms corporations. Neutering the constitution and hobbling and stacking the judiciary is the Holy Grail of this mode of governing.

It remains to be seen which of Attorney General Clarkson's positions will be overturned or upheld by the Alaska Supreme Court, but if he loses, look for this administration to blame the referees, and loudly. 

That reaction is a key performative move in a long game, the ultimate goal of which is a showdown at the ballot box to unseat judges for doing their jobs and/or open the door to a constitutional convention designed to unravel civil liberties.

It is an axiom of creeping autocracy that "your institutions will not save you." Unfortunately, the Dunleavy administration has put Alaskans in the perilous position of waiting for our judiciary to do exactly that.

My Public Comment on Proposed Department of Law Ethics Act Regulations

I have submitted a version of the following comment to the State in accordance with the notice and comment provisions of the Alaska Administrative Procedure Act.

To Whom it May Concern:

I am submitting the following public comment in response to the regulations project initiated by the Department of Law and noticed on Alaska's Online Public Notice System on October 1, 2019, by Deputy Attorney General Treg Taylor. 

According to the public notice, the comment period is open until November 4, 2019. Also according to the notice, the proposed regulation changes are as follows:

9 AAC 52.140 is proposed to be changed to expressly clarify that the attorney general, through the Department of Law, may defend against complaints alleging a violation by the governor, lieutenant governor, or attorney general upon a public interest determination. 

9 AAC 52.160 is proposed to be changed to add a new subsection addressing confidentiality.

The statutory basis for these regulations is cited as the Executive Branch Ethics Act (AS 39.52.010-960). I have reviewed the full regulations, which are available online in PDF here. However, for your convenience, the full changes are as follows:

9 AAC 52.140 is amended by adding new subsections to read: 

      (f) If a person brings a complaint alleging a violation under AS 39.52.110 - 39.52.190 or this chapter by the governor or the lieutenant governor, the Department of Law may provide legal representation to the governor or lieutenant governor to defend against the complaint if the attorney general makes a written determination, in the attorney general’s sole discretion, that the representation is in the public interest. (Emphasis added).

      (g) If a person brings a complaint alleging a violation under AS 39.52.110 - 39.52.190 or this chapter by the attorney general, the Department of Law may provide legal representation to the attorney general to defend against the complaint if the governor makes a written determination, in the governor’s sole discretion, that the representation is in the public interest.(Emphasis added).

9 AAC 52.160 is amended by adding a new subsection to read:
    (h) Notwithstanding (a) - (g) of this section, information received by the Department of Law and the attorney general related to the defense of a complaint alleged under 9 AAC 52.140(f) and (g) is confidential. 

I am concerned that the adoption of these regulations will encourage corruption, malfeasance, lack of transparency, and an erosion of public trust in the Office of the Attorney General, the Department of Law, and the Governor's Office.

In enacting the Executive Branch Ethics Act, the Legislature declared that "high moral and ethical standards among public officers in the executive branch are essential to assure the trust, respect, and confidence of the people of this state" and that the purpose of the Act is to "discourage those officers from acting upon personal or financial interests in the performance of their public responsibilities." 

Furthermore, "a fair and open government requires that executive branch public officers conduct the public’s business in a manner that preserves the integrity of the governmental process and avoids conflicts of interest." See AS 39.52.010(a).

The foregoing regulations are, at best, inconsistent with these statutory goals. 

They permit both the Governor and his appointed Attorney General to unilaterally decide "in their sole discretion" when to expend the time and resources of public attorneys (i.e. Assistant Attorneys General) to defend themselves against any and all Ethics Act complaints. The targets of the complaints need only make written statements certifying to each other that doing so is "in the public interest." Worse yet, they can then keep all the information related to these complaints hidden from public view.

The conflict of interest and lack of transparency here should be obvious. These regulations allow the target of an Ethics Act complaint to use their own public employees to shield them from such complaints at their say-so.

The effect of these changes is that when a member of the public makes an Ethics Act complaint against the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, or the Attorney General, these individuals can decide by executive fiat to expend public resources to defend what may be their own misconduct. 

This is not a proper use of Department of Law labor.

While the Attorney General is "the legal advisor for the governor and other state officers," the enumerated statutory duties for that office make clear that this role is not intended to include using Department of Law attorneys as the personal defense team of the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and/or the Attorney General in these individuals’ "sole discretion" and based on their subjective determination of what constitutes "the public interest," if and when faced with an Ethics Act complaint.

The Attorney General's duties include the defense of the state and federal constitutions; representing the state in civil actions; bringing and prosecuting all cases involving violation of state law; drafting legal instruments for the state; and providing legal opinions to the governor, legislature, and other state offices. See AS 44.23.020. 

Nothing in these statutes suggests that Department of Law resources should be deployed to defend three specific high-level state appointees against their own potential violations of the Ethics Act with the stroke of a pen, under some meaningless and subjective rubber-stamp standard. 

The Legislature, not the Attorney General or the Governor, should decide when and under what circumstances these particular high-level state employees receive Department of Law services.

While in some cases it may be appropriate for the Department of Law to defend these individuals from an Ethics Act complaint, allowing the Attorney General and the Governor to unilaterally determine in their "sole discretion" when that can occur, and when doing so is in "the public interest"—is rife with conflict. 

That is because under the regulations, the same people who would make "written determinations" to gift themselves the personal legal services of state attorneys are also the targets of the complaints. The fact that the Governor and Attorney General may "cross-certify" for each other does little to resolve this obvious conflict.

The regulations also place Department of Law attorneys in the awkward position of being forced, at risk of dismissal from their jobs, to engage in representation that is potentially inconsistent with state law and/or the Alaska Bar Rules of Professional Conduct.

These regulations violate the spirit if not the letter of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. I encourage the Department of Law not to adopt them.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth M. Bakalar
Juneau, Alaska
October 1, 2019

Organized Labor is Under Attack in Alaska and Corporate Money is the Reason Why

This week, the People's Governor™, through his Attorney General Kevin Clarkson, filed a lawsuit against state employees--specifically the ASEA--which is the main state employee union. Its members perform invaluable tasks like plowing your roads in the winter, extinguishing wildfires in the summer, fixing potholes in the spring, and processing your PFD checks in the fall. 

James Brooks at the Anchorage Daily News has a good summary of the whole story here, which I won't reiterate. But I do want to add some context as someone who worked at the Department of Law for over 12 years and whose grandfather gave seven years of his life to federal prison for union organizing.

It is very rare for the Attorney General to initiate litigation against anyone, much less the state's own union. With the exception of consumer protection cases and amicus briefs, the state typically defends--not prosecutes--civil cases. 

And the AG is not using his own perfectly competent employees to litigate the case, either. Many of them didn't even know the suit was coming at all. Instead, he's hired an Outside DC law firm, Consovoy McCarthy, to do the job at a "discounted" rate of $600 per hour on a $50,000 contract. This is a bargain from their usual rate of $900 or so. Last I checked, Assistant Attorneys General (i.e. line attorneys in the Department of Law) charge their clients less than $200 per hour. Most private practice attorneys in Alaska charge between $200 and $300 per hour. To be fair, the state has hired this firm to work as amicus counsel on controversial issues before, but never to mount a direct assault on its own employees.

Dermot Cole addresses the whole debacle here. Suffice it to say that hiring a white shoe east coast law firm to bust the biggest employee union in Alaska for eye-popping fees at a time when elders face bankruptcy and the sick face death thanks to the Governor's drastic budget cuts is not a good look. This firm also represents President Trump as his personal lawyers in Trump's financial shenanigans, and apparently has filed, or is filing, similar cases around the country against unions in other union-hostile states. One look at the complaint tells you it's a cut and paste job.

The Attorney General is pretending this ASEA case is all about state employees' First Amendment Rights. That's disingenuous AF. 

As readers of this blog know, AAG Ruth Botstein and I were fired for exercising our First Amendment rights in speaking out against President Trump. My firing is the subject of separate litigation brought on my behalf by the ACLU, which also sued separately on behalf of two state psychiatrists who refused to sign the now-"retired" Chief of Staff Tuckerman Babcock's "loyalty pledge." 

But, I digress. 

The point is, Kevin Clarkson doesn't care about state employees' First Amendment rights. Or at least, he wants to selectively apply the First Amendment. In Clarkson's world, the First Amendment is convenient when you're a religious zealot crusading against LGBTQ rights, or a corporate shill trying to bust unions. But freedom of speech can go straight to hell the minute anyone dares to criticize government officials out loud.

You might wonder why the AG is throwing so much money at neutering unions, and surprise surprise, the answer is more money. 

Unions are bad for the corporate bottom line, corporations are all about the bottom line, they have bought themselves at least two branches of government, and they are hard at work on the third. 

The greatest trick the corporate right ever pulled was convincing the working class right that unions were bad for them. But left or right, working class folks are never going to be millionaires courtesy of the American Dream or the largesse of those above them in the pecking order. People like Clarkson and those he works for and hires are making damn sure of that. The whole game is rigged, and absent some seismic shift in business as usual, the best we can do as a society is put some sideboards on greed by creating a fair labor market in which workers have basic rights like unemployment insurance, workers' compensation, overtime pay, and the weekend.

Tuckerman Babcock is gone, Donna Arudin is gone, and Clarkson and Dunleavy both seem to be gunning for jobs in DC. I'll bet you your union dues that the Governor resigns before he can face a recall. So if you're looking for people in high places and positions of power who have real Alaskans' interests at heart, you definitely won't find them in Alaska.

Let Judicial 'Font-Gate' Commence!

A fellow attorney here in Alaska alerted me to this critical proposed rule change to the Appellate Rules regarding approved fonts for filing legal pleadings in the appellate courts of the state. 

The proposal "would eliminate certain fonts, add a tiered system of approved fonts, and require certification of font used and availability . . . Courier should be the font of last resort."

COURIER IS THE "FONT OF LAST RESORT," Y'ALL!

This made us both literally LOL, simply because of the cognitive dissonance between the grave tone of the rule change and its subject, the latter of which is undisputedly petty AF.

Certainly there are lofty issues facing our judiciary, today and every day. Our Attorney General and his boss, Individual 2, are openly attacking the court system and the separation of powers. These Amateur Hour Shitgoblins™ slashed the court system's budget just because they did their job upholding the constitution. Every day, the courts are deciding weighty issues of liberty and property for the citizens of the state at a time in our nation's history when the third branch of government serves as the only bulwark against encroaching authoritarianism.

But frankly, I think judges should be evaluating these issues in exclusively the following three fonts:

COMIC SANS

HERCULANUM

APPLE CHANCERY

While Herculanum and Apple Chancery are valuable for their ridiculous names alone, Comic Sans, in my view, should be the font of FIRST resort. 

In fact, I think I will type the rest of this post in Comic Sans to show you how serious a font it truly is, its name notwithstanding. Comic Sans is not just for Karens sending group emails to the office that the theme for this year's Christmas party is "tropical paradise" and everyone should wear Hawaiian shirts next Tuesday. 

Indeed not, your honor. 

In this canonical McSweenys piece, "I'm Comic Sans, Asshole," Comic Sans itself, through its counsel of record Mike Lacher, defends its own gravity as a font to be reckoned with. I am entering the above monologue into the record of public comment on this rule, and would draw the Court's attention to the following statement from Comic Sans itself: 

I am on every major operating system since Microsoft fucking Bob. I'm in your signs. I'm in your browsers. I'm in your instant messengers. I'm not just a font. I am a force of motherfucking nature and I will not rest until every uptight armchair typographer cock-hat like you is surrounded by my lovable, comic-book inspired, sans-serif badassery.

Surely Alaska's appellate courts would be wise to adopt Comic Sans as the operative default font for all pleadings. Far be it for me to imply that anyone on the rules-making committee is an "uptight armchair typographer cock-hat" but there is certainly circumstantial evidence of same, and I don't think the possibility can be excluded as a matter of law. Moreover, there is direct evidence that reading boring sentences like "this is an easement appurtenant to a dominant tenement" would be much more fun in Comic Sans.

Whether the person or persons who wrote: "Courier should be the font of last resort" are, as Comic Sans stated, "uptight armchair typographer cock-hats" is really a question for the trier of fact, and, at least with respect to admissibility, a matter for the trial judge to consider in evidence as a potential exception to the hearsay rule.

COMIC SANS IS THE FONT OF FIRST RESORT IN ALASKA. IT IS SO ORDERED.