Alaska statesmanship is dead for all practical purposes — the victim of gerrymandering, big money and where conflicts of interest are rarely an impediment. The Legislature's repeated failure to even debate our fiscal crisis is the epitome of this death. Now, many citizens see that our second best solution is term limits. I fully agree.
Our solvable but intractable political problem is not rocket science. Simply, we are facing a $4 billion contraction in our economy so spending billions per year from our one-time savings account is not a smart and wise solution. Moreover, the math to solve the crisis is feasible: oil tax reforms, broadening the use of the Permanent Fund, additional budget cuts and new broad based taxes. Yet, this has been totally rejected by an entrenched and extremely arrogant Legislature. Their plain spoken message (to us mere commoners) is to "party hearty because we do not care if your jobs and homes could be worth next to nothing in the near future."
Given that depressing situation, any "fix" must first address three underlying fatal flaws.
The worst fatal flaw is the ideologues that see the fiscal crisis as an opportunity to make government small enough to drown in a bathtub. They are blind to the fact that 76 cents of every state and federal dollar spent in Alaska goes to a resident or a business owned by Alaskans. Like it or not, government spending is our current economic engine and simply cutting government to the bone is economic suicide. Simply, getting off the public milk wagon must be carefully phased out.
A second fatal flaw is anonymous Big Money from any source and our weak conflict of interest rules. No surprise here. How many half-hearted recusals have you heard from legislators that have clear conflicts of interest? Such conflicts are summarily dismissed without debate.
Anonymous Big Money institutionalizes nontransparent deal making by installing their guys with long, self-serving agendas. Our greatest risk is we don't know when predetermined agendas make the public hearings a pro forma exercise.
While term limits are only an indirect fix to Big Money, it can indeed shorten "their guy's" career. A two-term limit has been proposed and I further suggest that the first term for all sitting legislators be their current term.
It is a sad reality that both ideologues and the career guys are well-insulated by the third fatal flaw of gerrymandering. Gerrymandering has created fiefdoms where legislators can unabashedly prevent honest debate — and easily preempt any bipartisan efforts. The vitriolic response of many legislators toward Governor Bill Walker after the last special session exemplifies this fatal flaw.
The solution to gerrymandering, like term limits, may be in citizen initiatives where a more formal role is provided for citizen-based alternatives. At least voters would have a fighting chance to restore a political environment that promotes the greater public good.
So, how do we move forward? Borrowing a lyric from an old Harry Chapin song may help: "How do you expect the world to get better when you only leave it alone?" If we want a restore the environment where politicians must work for both constituents and the greater public good, then we must look into the mirror first. The solution starts with us, and more importantly, the difficult but necessary citizen referendums.
We will never prevent wrong-headed politicians from getting in office or getting big money out of politics or eliminating the incentives for gerrymandering. But we can better regulate these ill effects through term limits and more citizen involvement in redistricting. More importantly, the time may be now or never.
Joe Mehrkens lives in Auke Bay and Petersburg. He is a retired economist and 41-year resident of Alaska who has worked as a private consultant and for federal and state agencies.