Have you noticed the avalanche of “Vote No/Defend Our Constitution” commercials? Who’s paying for them? Who’s promoting them?
In watching these ads, you see scripted “typical citizens” wearing hard hats. This is a classic visual ploy to reach the conservative working class. You certainly won’t see any pro-abortion, rainbow draped liberals in the “Vote No” commercials.
But the truth is that the Green Lobby, Democrats, socialists, RINOs and myriad other Leftists will all be voting “No” on calling a statewide constitutional convention. They already have everything they want. Why would they feel compelled to change anything? But to successfully avoid a convention they must convince the very people who would actually benefit from it, to vote against their own interests.
Our supposedly “model” constitution, the recipient of much overblown high praise, came right out the socialist think-tank of the Rockefeller-funded University of Chicago. The Public Administration Service (PAS) was a great place for loyal FDR New Dealers to spend their dotage in the late 40s and early 50s. They crafted model templates for municipalities and states, that they hoped would hopefully come to them for impressive and scholarly-looking models in which to craft their local governments.
None other than conservative Bob Atwood, the editor of the influential Anchorage Times, is the man who was somehow suckered into signing off on an Alaska template from the PAS. If today’s “Vote No” lobby – now flooded with millions in “dark money” – is warning frightened conservatives that the outcome of a constitutional convention might lead to a socialist constitution, they certainly don’t want to change the current one.
We already have a socialist constitution, crafted by socialists and for socialists. The hideous problems Alaskans face today are a result of all this.
I submit the following:
— Unlike the lower 48, Alaskans do not have sub-surface mineral rights. Who does? The state! This is the very definition of socialism.
— We cannot control the courts because of the tyrannical judicial council system. Socialism.
— We were forced to accept Article 12, Section 12, which gave the federal government control of unconstitutional properties. And how much? Fully 65 % of the state is owned by the federal government. Socialism.
— Another 25% belongs to the state. Socialism.
— Another 10 % by natives, under the watchful eye of corporations which receive billions of dollars in federal contracts. Socialism.
— Only about 1 % of Alaska is in private hands. Socialism.
— Even Walter Hickel identified Alaska as “The owner State.” Socialism.
— They raid our PFD to feed an already overblown bureaucracy. Socialism.
“The question is not, will a con-con make things worse. It is whether do you believe it can get better – without one?”
— We were not allowed four options during the statehood vote, which was guaranteed to all non-self-governing territories under the UN Treaty of 1945. Puerto Rico and Guam still have these four options. Alaska and Hawaii do not. Ignoring treaties obligations is a federal art. Socialism.
— We do not have counties, but boroughs. Why this is the case is a matter of conjecture, but counties do have sheriffs who are the ultimate authority in their area because they are elected by the people. They can order out the FBI and the IRS if they are wielding their power in an unjust manner, which they are doing all over America and Alaska, right now. Socialism.
— We cannot build a 12-mile gravel road from King Cove to Cold Bay for the sake of humanitarian health care. Why? The federal Congress fears the propaganda of the Green Lobby. Socialism.
— Despite guarantees that the current constitution “is dedicated to the principles that all persons have a natural right to life,” we have been unable to allow the definition of “personhood” to be submitted to a vote by the people, but instead is defined by unelected federal and state judges. Socialism.
— The power of the purse has been seized from the people’s elected representatives. Socialism.
ALASKA WATCHMAN DIRECT TO YOUR INBOX
And now, let’s go to this “dark money” thing. The propaganda machine of the Vote No consortium tells us that should a convention be called, it might – might – come under “dark money” control. What hypocrisy!
In reality, they fear that economic independence will lead to a political one. They insert straws into our guts and take what vital resources they can use, but never so much as to allow us freedom to control our own destiny. By depriving the people of subsurface mineral rights, the lobby that controls us is Big Business, not what would naturally arise from a free economy – the people. We have seen this with fish, oil, timber, mining. It gives us a boom, followed by a bust.
Over $2 million dollars has come into the “Defend Our (socialist) Constitution” lobby from outside of Alaska. They have been at it for nearly a year. The “Vote Yes” works out of its own pocket or from contributions received by Alaskan residents, and amounts to a miniscule budget.
Yet the governor has just endorsed the “Vote Yes.” Despite a stacked deck, “Vote No” fears something.
They fear Alaskans, who know that we cannot keep the status quo, which feeds socialism.
As Rep. Ben Carpenter recently said, “The question is not, will a con-con make things worse. It is whether do you believe it can get better – without one?”
12 Comments
Thank you for this article. I’ve been trying to spread this word to everyone I speak to/with. This spells it out very well. The democrats are SCARED to death if we have a Cin. Con. the Republicans will win some independents and they won’t be able to control us. We’ll long ago I figured it all out and YES we need a Con. Con. Yes we need to make things better. If you look back 10 years or longer now when the Mat Valley people had no say about a gas well being placed in their back yard. This is a perfect example of what is being said here in this article. We the Alaskan people have no rights. We can buy and sell land but can’t legally do anything other to build a house on tge surface. In closing I’ll say VOTE YES on proposition #1. We need a Constitutional Conversation. It’s past time to straighten some things out.
Very well said! And Precise! And TRUE, by the way! Wish there was more $ to get this voice out across the airwaves. Hope people will print this out and share it with friends and neighbors and family. Or is there a way to share it on social media? Vote FOR a Constitutional Convention everyone! Again… this is JUST a vote to HAVE one. There’s a lot more after that… so it’s 100% safe to vote just to HAVE one!
No way do we get a convention. Even if a majority vote for one, it’ll lose in the “counting.”
PAS is out of the university of indiana, not chicago!
Not back then. I spoke with the archivist personally by phone. But I had no idea that it existed elsewhere.
Bob Bird, thank you for this article and the link to the Oct. 11th youtube video for the Alaska governor candidate forum: October 11, 2022. Good to see that Dunleavy and Pierce publicly voted yes on a constitutional convention. Walker and what’s-his-name voted no on that and had a hard time having to show their votes on many questions. Losers that will flush us down the drain so quickly if one of them gets into office. My household will be voting yes for a constitutional convention. Praying that the elections will be fair and honest! If they are not fair and honest, I am pretty sure that there are a lot of eyes watching and there will be a lot of testimonials going on when the time comes!
YES!!!
This is an excellent article. I wonder if the ADN would publish it? Perhaps a flyer or pamphlet form would be helpful to get the word out.
YES ON 1
I wish this was published a few weeks ago before I sent in my absentee ballot.
David: Your self-critical comment is worthy of a comment. It demonstrates the NEED to withhold voting until election day. Consider that “final blitz” ads, information, etc are necessarily coming towards the end of a campaign season because conservatives are generally outspent by these scoundrels, who take their money from quadrillionaires outside of Alaska, and can propagandize the voters for months.
Thank you Bob Bird for an excellent article.
I admire you efforts on behalf of Liberty! As a Business Law Professor for 30+ years and General Counsel of the Justice Foundation (a national non-profit public interest law firm which fights for private property rights, free enterprise, limited government, parental rights and life)
I heartily agree with your assessments.
The essence of COMMUNISM is a system where the state owns or controls all of the property and the people all work for the state under a totalitarian dictatorship. (Example China)
SOCIALISM is a system whereby the people have the right to own property, but the state controls how the property is used. People have a modicum of freedom but are “managed” by bureaucracy. (Examples Finland, United States today)
FREE MARKET CAPITALISM is a system where private parties own the property and control the product of that property. (Example United States from founding until the New Deal)
Because the STATE owns the means of production (subsurface oil property) in Alaska, Alaska is by definition a COMMUNIST state as far as the oil and gas industry is concerned, a SOCIALIST state in most education and public services, and FREE MARKET CAPITALIST in only the 1% of the property not controlled by the State. (Bob is still right to call that Socialist for when only a tiny amount of property is in private hands that is actually a tenant of socialism,
WE inherited a Socialist/Communist system from the Socialist New Deal thinkers of the FDR era. Either we rise up and change the system, or our bondage will only grow greater and our chains heavier!
“Now stop your mocking, or your chains will become heavier;” ISA 28:22
And politicians will continue to play fast and loose with our PFD “Dividends” (It really is supposed to be a dividend on our property (sub surface rights) transferred to the State to manage for us – it is not welfare)
We the People did a good job with the U S Constitution, though today largely ignored by the Washington Bureaucracy.
We the People can do it again.
VOTE YES for a Constitutional Convention!*
It is time for a change, a change – back to Liberty!
*Note the No campaign against the Constitutional Convention is being financed by the NEA and a left wing “dark money fund” called the “1630 fund” out of Washington DC for more information see https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/sixteen-thirty-fund/