Going Rogue: An American Life (22 page)

Going Rogue

mayor’s race, wh.ich was just around the corner. In one report, a
candidate claimed gleefully that I had recruited her to run for my joh.

Todd turned and stared at me, and his ice-blue eyes got icier.

“Is that true’” he asked.

I was busted.

With my mayoral term in its twilight, candidates had been throwing their hats into the ring to replace me. One of them was Todd’s stepmom, Faye Palin, a sharp, very ptofessionalleader in the city’s business community. r d always said our parents were too smart and too nice to get into politics, yet now Faye was offering to serve Wasilla in a new capacity But the rumor was that John Stein was thinking about running yet again, and r d be darned if he was going to get hack in and wipe out the progress we’d made in Wasilla with his liberal agenda. So I had approached a couple of well-known council members who shared my conservative freemarket views and asked them if they’d consider running. To beat Stein, I thought we needed a safer bet than Faye, whom I feared wasn’t as well known as the council members. Plus my political detractors would rake it out on her because of our relationship. This did not go over well with my husband. “That’s two-faced,” he said.

Instead of instant remorse, I jumped on defense. “That’s not
entirely
true,” I said and quickly tried to spin my way out of trouble. I loved Faye and knew she’d be a great mayor, but I didn’t know if she’d defeat a former multiterm mayor. It was a lame excuse for a lame deed, and deep inside I realized it.

Todd stood his ground and pierced me with those eyes. “No. That’s two-faced.”

“Well, if I backed my own motherin-law for mayor, people would scream, ‘Nepotism!’” I said self-righteously. “I can’t afford to be accused of that!”

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SARAH

PALIN

“My family has
always
supported you. Why wouldn’t you support her?”

“Hey, it’s
my
family stuffing all the envelopes and stuck with all the babysitting!”

”Are you kidding me? I’m with these kids-and
your sister’s
kids-so
much that I don’t even get to go do my own stuff!”

“Your
own
stuff! What about the Iron Dog? What abour all those hours you spend tinkering in the garage?” It didn’t go exactly like that, but if you’ve ever been married, you know the kind of stupid bunny-trail argument that normal couples have. It was a nasty brew, mixing local politics, which is notoriously contentious, with family politics, which can be just as bad. The ttuth was, I had let the heat of politics get in the way of family. Faye would never have done that to me. In fact, even though we disagree on Some issues, when I later ran for VP, she worked incredibly hard for John McCain and me, traveling around the nation to campaign for us. She and Jim helped lead successful efforts in some of the western states. But that’s what politics can do to you if you don’t catch yourself: the heat of battle causes a little core of self-centeredness to harden in your heart, so subtly that you’re not even aware of it.

As it turned out, we both lost our races that year. I came in
a close second, coming up short by only about 2 percent of the vote despite being outspent five to one. I had managed not to ingratiate myself with anyone just to fill my campaign coffers, though, so that was some consolation. Deep-pocketed lobbyists don’t always write fat checks out of the goodness of their hearts. It was encouraging to know I would not be beholden to special interests going forward-if there was a political “forward.” The way things unfolded for the victor, I realize now that it was a blessing not to have won. It would have been very tough to serve in that office. As the years spun out, communication ,

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broke down so completely between the governor’s and lieutenanr governor’s offices rhar rhey lirerally closed the doors berween them.

Looking back, my lack of passion in even contemplaring gunning for the job should have been a sign. My basketball coaches used ro say, “Practice how you play.” If I was going ro run rhis kind of halfhearred campaign, was thar some indicarion of how I would have performed in the job? Reading my jdurnal enrries from rhose days, I detecr the nore of apathy that I absolurely loarhe in roday’s political culture. I’d made a mistake, but that’s the way we learn life’s most important lessons. I would not make the same mistake again.

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After I lost the lieutenant governor’s race, I hit the campaign trail and srumped for Murkowski’s general election bid, at one point whistle-sropping across the state with Senaror Ted Stevens for two weeks. Alaskans still

our senior senaror as the World

War II vereran who had volunteered on Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidential campaign, served as a U.S. Attorney, and spearheaded Alaska’s efforts ro be admitted into the Union. He had served in Congress since I was a kid. He was the author of rhe MagnusonStevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, the primary law governing matine fisheties management in U.S. federal waters; and, of course, he helped usher in Title IX legislarion ro ensure gender equality.

Those were glorious, pressure-free travels and so much more fun than the trips I’d taken alone during my own lieutenant governor campaign. We sropped amidst the fjords of Kodiak, where emerald green mountains plunge straight down into brilliant blue waters surrounded by picruresque fishing villages. We crisscrossed Southcentral Alaska, Fairbanks, and the Kenai Peninsula, where • 89

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glacier-covered mountains form a spine that juts down the coast. We stopped in the small communities along Prince William Sound, ringed by green islands rising out of waters that house whales and copious sea life, tidewater glaciers, and the towering trees of the Chugach National Forest.

It was refreshing and comfortable to stump for someone else, to speak highly of someone else’s record and vision, and to know I wasn’t the aim of the spotlight-the other guy was. I agreed with Murkowski’s vision of resource development, rhough not wholesale and in every particular. I also supported his talk of fiscal conservatism. In srump speeches, I noted that if Mutkowski’s opponent, a Democrat, got in there, we’d be paying sky-high taxes to fund all the government growth that ticket promised.

On election day, Murkowski won with neatly 56 percent of the vote. He then had to resign from Congtess. The national press was buzzing about who he would appoint to take over his Senate seat. He released a short list of potential candidates. My name was on it, along with sevetal current and former state lawmakers, and prominent businessmen in the srare.

I had mixed feelings about being on the U.S. Senate shorr lisr. As before, I wasn’t sure I’d fir in to a group that required loyalty
to a party machine.

There were a few U.S. senators whom I’d admired from afar, especially those in whom I saw an independent streak as they bucked party politics whenever they felt it was good for the people as a whole. I didn’t know if there’d be room for one more maverick on Capitol Hill. Still, the idea of serving in the Senate where I could contribute on a national level was definitely appealing. As the days ticked down for Murkowski to announce his pick, there was a dramatic crescendo in the state and local press. Newspapers ran detailed profiles of all the candidates, pegging their
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sttengths and weaknesses and even placing odds as though we were horses in a race. After the governor whittled his list down-to just a handful of candidates, I was called in for an interview. Todd drove me into Anchorage in our Ford Extended Bronco on a sunny but frigid November day. We were supposed to meet with the governor and his newly chosen attorney general in the Anchorage governor’s transition office.

Todd drove laps in the parking lot to keep the truck warm while I rode up in the elevator. Walking into a large office, I found the governor, silver-haired and reminiscent of a large, gruff, but relatively friendly insurance salesman, along with the new AG, a lobbyist from D.C. who had come up to run Murkowski’s campaign. His appointment as AG was the first big controversy Murkowski had generated. Transplanting a D.C. lobbyist who had to join the Alaska bar quickly to practice law legally in our state raised eyebrows and questions about the new governor’s political judgment. Later, this AG would leave office under a cloud of alleged selfdealing involving some stock he owned, and Murkowski would appoint yet another lobbyist, this time from the oil industry, as the state’s next attorney general.

The interview began, but instead of the anticipated litany of questions on my policy positions and goals for the state, Murkowski barely touched on those.

“Whar’s your key issue?” Murkowski said.

“Energy,” I answered instantly. “Resource development so we
can grow more jobs in Alaska.”

That wasn’t the last word I said, but it was pretty close. Murkowski immediately launched into a soliloquy on how tough it was on a family to serve in the Senate. Although it was a bit of a weird segue, it felt like a fatherly talk, and I remember thinking that he must be a caring parent who had the welfare of his family uppermost in his mind.

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