Sarah Palin and Alaska, a few things you should probably know

OK, obviously as an Alaskan I've been reading everything I can access regarding our state governor's nomination as John McCain's running mate.

I've pursed the media, large and small, read endless blogs, and listened to every pundit, Congressman, Senator, Judge, fudge maker, reporter, exporter, expert, ex-admiral, monk, lunk, and lunatic.

And I'll tell you what I've discovered: You people (and by 'you people' I mean everybody who doesn't live in Alaska) know exactly dick about The Great Land.

What?

Oh, The Great Land, see that's what I'm talking about. The word, Alaska, is an Anglicization of a Russianification of a Native Inupiat word, Alyeska - meaning the great land. You didn't know that, did you? That's my point, right there. You don't know beans about Alaska. And it's rather obvious that you know even less about our governor Govnacudda (remember, you saw that term coined here at Stonekettle Station first).

That hasn't stopped you people from going on and on about it though, has it?

In recent days, Stonekettle Station has become a hot spot for Google searches regarding Alaska, right now I'm pushing over a metric gazillion hits on this subject alone. And so, as a public service, let me fill those of you in the media and the blogosphere in on a few things regarding Alaska -where the men are hockey moms and so is the vice presidential candidate.

1. Let's start with geography: Alaska is not the largest state in the union. That's a big fat lie. Hey, it started out as a joke, we were just having one over on a couple of Texan oil workers and things got out of hand. Alaska is really about the size of Connecticut. Sorry about the maps and such.

2. Our state capital is Juneau, which is another native word meaning "No Jews!" The TV show Northern Exposure was actually an accurate depiction of Alaskan life, there are no Jewish people in Alaska other than the morose doctors we've kidnapped from other states and forced to work in small villages. Here in Alaska we are all Born Again Christian White People who go to church four times a week. When we're not in church damning the homos to the fires of perdition, we're burning biology text books and condoms.

3. Yes, we have 24 hours of daylight here, except when we have 24 hours of darkness, which we mostly don't notice as we are all too busy shooting wolves from airplanes with bazookas.

4. Alaskans live in either igloos or log cabins. We have neither electricity or in-door plumbing here in Alaska. For many modern people this would be a problem, especially since we have 24 hours of darkness - except when we don't - but the lack of electric lights doesn't bother Alaskans as the Northern Lights provide sufficient illumination to hunt by. We heat our homes, such as they are, with special furnaces which burn the rendered fat of baby harp seals or free oil that we get from our employers, Exxon, Shell, and BP. Since it's always thirty below here, and we have to snowshoe to the outhouse to do our business - and when you eat nothing but raw salmon and moose meat you have to do a lot of business, just saying - all Alaskans are hirsute and have beards, even the woman.

5. Yes, there is always snow here. Always. Ten feet deep. Even in summer - that's what we build the igloos out of. In fact, snow is one of Alaska's largest exports - every snow cone vender in the world has a vested interest in Alaska. Traditionally snow is carried via bulk tanker down to the real United States, but our Governor, Sarah Ice Water Palin, just signed a deal with the international giant, Tasty Freeze, to build a Mr. Slushy pipeline across Saskatchewan in order to convey the frozen treat directly into every 7/11 and Quik-E Mart in the country. This action will go a long, long way towards reducing America's dependence on foreign shaved ice and break the stranglehold monopoly of the Greenland Dictators.

6. Alaskans drive either dog sleds or snow machines, as such in Alaska, the roads and parking lots are a bit different than they are down there in the real United States. Additionally, since we live in the ass-end of nowhere, and have neither real cities or towns, all of the bridges here are actually bridges to nowhere.

7. Everybody in Alaska works for Exxon. Everybody.

8. It is true that Alaskans get free money from the Oil industry. Lot's of it. We're all millionaires here. We also get gobs of free pork from the Federal Government, food stamps, and an unlimited supply of tasty WIC cheese spread. Unfortunately, other than snow there's nothing to spend our bushels of free money on. And we damned sure aren't putting it into schools, infrastructure, cruise ship docks, or silly stuff like that. So, we use the money to buy Rolls Royces from Amazon, which we then pull through the snow with sled dogs down to the piers where we keep our gold plated fishing boats.

9. The movie Mystery, Alaska is absolutely true. Everybody ice skates here, we skate everywhere, in the bank, in the grocery store, in bed and out to the crapper. That's why Sarah Palin has such shapely ankles. And, we are crazy mad about hockey. Everybody plays hockey in Alaska. We used to play football, but the ball got dropped in a snowdrift and we haven't been able to find it since about 1996.

10. All Alaskan woman begin having babies at twelve years of age. It's cold here and we don't have a lot of intramural sports - knocking up underage girls is almost as good and you don't have to have any special equipment. Frankly we were a bit concerned about Bristol Old Maid Palin's fertility, our population is small and every Christian baby counts, as such we like to pound out as many as possible. So far, abstinence is working just fine for us.

11. Alaskans have no imagination and we don't have any good, old traditions like the rest of the country. So, we really appreciate it when real Americans come here and rename stuff, like Mount Princess Cruise Lines (formerly Mount McKinley named after a dead politician from Ohio, which truthfully was much better than that ten thousand year old name, Denali, that we used to call it. Ten thousand years, jeez, you would have thought we could have come up with something better, but again, that's exactly my point.

12. Screw ANWR, all Alaskans hate the environment. Global warming is a myth, there's absolutely no biblically scientific evidence for it here in Alaska at all. None. Nope. No retreating glaciers, no melting polar ice, no thawing muskeg. Nothing. But damned if we don't wish it were true. It's cold here, Baby, and we wouldn't mind seeing some of that heat.

When it comes to Sarah Drill Baby Drill Palin herself, the Wikipedia entry is an absolutely true and correct source of factual information, compiled by actual and authentic researchers with detailed knowledge of Alaska and Sarah herself. However, there are a few things it doesn't cover. First we all know her, personally. As I said above, Alaska is a tiny little place, with a small population (we're not actually sure how many Alaskans there are, since we don't teach math in our religious schools. We know there's more than sixteen - which most Alaskans can count to, since that's the average number of toes Alaskan babies are born with and the average number of dogs in a sled team - but exactly how many more, we couldn't say precisely, but it's a lot - at least a hundred). Additionally, any tourist who has ever visited Alaska, even if they've only had a one hour layover in the Ted Stevens Pork Barrel Anchorage International Airport and Exxon Headquarters, is an expert on Sarah Fish Camp Palin. Please, feel free to interview anybody in an "Alaska" sweatshirt.

As you know Sarah Hottie Palin comes from a small village, Wasilla. And it is true that she was a beauty queen, but what you may not know is that beauty contests here are a little different than in civilized parts of the world. The year Sarah won the Miss Wasilla pageant, her competition consisted of two moose, a genuine Alaskan penguin, Willie the Singing Sourdough, and an Arctic Cat snow machine. And I've got to tell you, if Willie had combed his beard or the Arctic Cat had been a 700cc model, Sarah would have been runner up. It was that close. There just isn't a lot to choose from in Wasilla, it's a small place, really small. The population is actually about eight people, pretty much the Palin family, Willie, and Lipstick the Pit Bull - a stray abandoned by a tourist family from Utah. Sarah Fahrenheit-451 Palin was elected Mayor of Wasilla mostly because LipStick the Pit Bull didn't want the job, and after burning down the library and squeezing out five grandchildren, Sarah set her sights (literally her sights, as in gun sights, since she carries a good old fashion American made Colt .44 Magnum in a custom Right-to-Life Holster strapped to her shapely muscular thigh everywhere) on the governorship. Now Governor of Alaskan is kind of a goof, there's really no responsibility at all since we don't have any industry except the aforementioned snow cone deal and a corner on the Moose Nugget Jewelry market, so it's more like Governor Lite here. Be that as it may, Alaskans demand that our executive be as fully qualified as any Texas Governor and frankly we were all concerned about Sarah No Experience Palin - until she swapped out her contacts for a pair of sexy librarian glasses. As you know, glasses immediately make you smarterer and more intellectualated, and we're pretty sure that was the deciding factor when John McCain was running down the short list of potential Veeps.

So, there you have it. The truth about Alaska and Sarah One Pulmonary Infarction Away From the Presidency Palin. I hope this clears up a few things for you. Feel free to repost as necessary for the good of the nation.

On the other hand, you could just keep talking out your excretory orifices, either way, I'm good.

Now if you, excuse me, I have to go shovel snow and fight off a pack of atheist gay marriage wolves.