Not-So-Working-Class-IWRC* Palin

By GottaLaff

Heck! For a hockeymommin', moose-shootin', Joe-Six-Packer, IWRC* sure has a big mouth to nowhere. Here's what she said (re: the economy) at a campaign event:

“Todd and I, heck, we’re going through that right now even as we speak — which may put me again kind of on the outs of those Washington elite who don’t like the idea of just an everyday, working-class American running for such an office.”

Oh really?

But her income, assets and access to health care place her higher up the economic ladder. While she describes herself as a member of the working class, when faced with policy choices on issues important to blue-collar voters, Palin, over the course of her political career, rarely breaks in their favor.

A close examination of Palin’s record on such issues as health care, the minimum wage, taxes and retirement funds shows that she has remained silent on proposals that would channel public money to programs beneficial to working-class Alaskans. In other instances, Palin supported programs that favored wealthy Alaskans over low-income families.

Financially, Palin and her husband, Todd, are far from being members of the working class. [...] The Palin’s assets total $1.2 million, including a lakefront house valued at about half a million dollars, a snowmobile and a float plane.

Todd, a union worker on the North Slope, and Sarah Palin both have jobs that include comprehensive health benefits for their family. And, unlike most Americans, Todd Palin and the Palin children are entitled to federally funded comprehensive health care because of Todd’s Native Alaskan ancestry. [...]

Many working-class advocates in Alaska say that Palin’s affinity for the working class has not resulted in increased funding for programs that benefit working families.

Instead, as her supporters say, Palin has established her fiscal conservative bona-fides in resisting spending on social programs — even when the state’s budget surplus is expected to reach between $5 billion and $9 billion next year in a state of about 650,0000 people.

Palin has been specifically criticized for allowing Alaska to remain one of the least generous states in a federally backed health-care program for the children of working-class families; for remaining silent on a proposal to raise the state’s minimum wage; for tacitly supporting the privatization of public employee pensions; and for implementing a regressive tax in her hometown of Wasilla while mayor.

Maybe if she downs enough six-packs, she can continue to fool herself into believing she's "just an everyday, working-class American". Or maybe it's all her devotees who have been drinking. That might explain a lot.

*"In What Respect, Charlie?"