Former Anchorage Boy Blogs in NY About Vanity Fair's Palin Story

Marty Beckerman grew up in Anchorage and now lives and works in New York.  Among other things he blogs.  His short piece on The Awl  begins with comments on the Michael Joseph Gross piece in the new VF, then goes on to talk about what it's like to be from Alaska.  [Disclosure:  I knew Marty when he was a kid here in Anchorage, but haven't seen him for a long while. He had a bizarre sense of humor back then and even wrote a book in college and seems to have found someone to pay him to keep writing. The bio says he's written two more books and he's the online features editor at Esquire.]

The new Vanity Fair Sarah Palin profile is enthralling: rage-fueled breakdowns, domestic violence (is there a battered spouse center for First Dudes?) and Madoff-worthy financial manipulation. Equally fascinating is the climate of fear and confusion that Michael Joseph Gross discovered in Wasilla, where townspeople are terrified of discussing their former mayor/governor, and deeply uncomfortable with the world-famous media creation that she has become. "To appreciate how alien Palin has become in Wasilla, how inscrutable to her own people, you have to wrap your mind around the fact that Sarah Palin is more famous than any other Alaskan, ever," Gross writes. "It still does not quite seem real to most Alaskans that there are all these thousands of people in the Lower 48 turning out for … Sarah."

Echoing the fear theme, someone mentioned that Joe McGuiness said that he was surprised at the level of Palinphobia in Wasilla.  Fear seems to be a characteristic of the Republican party in Alaska.  Someone else mentioned good friends who wouldn't contribute to non-partisan candidates because the party would punish them for straying from the fold. 

Below is a paragraph from the actual Vanity Fair article about Palin's tipping habits. 

Palin does not always treat those ordinary people well, however—it depends on who is watching. Of the many famous people who have stayed at the Hyatt in Wichita (Cher, Reba McEntire, Neil Young), Sarah Palin ranks as the all-time worst tipper: $5 for seven bags. But the bellhops had it good in Kansas, compared with the bellman at another midwestern hotel who waited up until past midnight for Palin and her entourage to check in—and then got no tip at all for 10 bags. He was stiffed again at checkout time. The same went for the maids who cleaned Palin’s rooms in both places—no tip whatsoever. The only time I heard of Palin giving a generous tip was in St. Joseph, Michigan, after the owner of Kilwin’s chocolate shop, on State Street, sent a CARE package to Palin’s suite, and Palin walked to the store to say thank you. She also wanted to buy more boxes of candy to take home. When the owner would not accept her money, Palin, encircled by the crowd that had jammed the store to get a glimpse of her, pressed a hundred-dollar bill into the woman’s hand, saying, “This is for the staff.” That Ben Franklin was the talk of State Street the whole rest of the day. 

The whole VF article is here.

How Exit Glacier Connected Me to El Limpiador de Tejados

I got a comment about a week ago on a post last year about Exit Glacier.  Tomás Serrano left a comment, "I was there today. It´s a wonderful place, but ask your knees... It worths!!!!"  (I don't look at old posts for comments, they come to me by email.)  I linked on his profile and checked out his blogs.  He's from Spain and wrote a children's book called Salfón:  El limpiador de tejados.  His blog also mentioned that he was leaving copies of the book for Alaskans to find.  So I emailed him about clues where we might find the book.  (If you're in Valdez, he left one in the library there.)  He seemed like an interesting guy. 








 



It turned out he would be in Anchorage on Saturday and Sunday so I invited him over for breakfast.  Sunday he came over with his wife and two children and we had a great time together - including a trip to the botanical garden and Glen Alps.  










We had a great time Sunday, thanks to the blog and Exit Glacier.  They should all be back in Spain now.  They stopped in Chicago for six or seven hours and I just got an email from our friends there who picked them up and showed them around on their stopover.  


There are so many interesting people in the world and it's fun to have this sort of opportunity to show Anchorage off to people who so enjoyed seeing it. 


Oh yes, he left an autographed copy of Salfón with us.  And if you want to know what

El limpiador de tejados

means, you can copy it here, then paste it into the window at translate.reference.com (make sure it is set to Spanish to English) and you can find out. 

I should add a note about another blogger friend, Ropi, who studied Spanish as well as English.  He's been accepted to study applied economics at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics.  He did mention that he is going to drop Spanish and study Russian.  But wait Ropi, and first read Tomás' book. 

Minimum Daily Requirement of Truth and Acceptable Daily Levels of Lies

I first remember being aware of blatant false advertisement as a kid - maybe I was ten, but I'm really not sure - when I ordered the 'fresh strawberries' for dessert in a restaurant.

They brought me very recently thawed frozen strawberries.  I was indignant. "These aren't fresh!" I said to the waitress.  Without blinking an eye, she replied, "Yes, they're fresh frozen."  I couldn't believe it then, and I still can't believe that people can so blatantly twist the truth.

This all comes up as today I looked at this cereal package and  thought, "What does this have to do with Grapes or Nuts?"




So I checked out the ingredients:

Do you see anything related to grapes or nuts?





That reminded me of a photo I'd taken earlier this summer thinking there'd be a time it would fit into a blog post.

"good food for the fun of it"

We see this sort of thing so often that we forget to react, "Why is this 'good' food?"   "Good" for what?  Frito-Lay company?  (Owned by Pepsi, another healthy food company) Good for diabetes?   Hey, I like crispy food and potato chips are among the crispiest.  

But most of us know that more than a couple really aren't that healthy.  

Actually, when I went to the FritoLay website, I realized that things aren't quite as bad as they used to be when chips were made with trans fats.   The ingredients (from their website) are to the left.   This doesn't look all that bad.

This is for a two ounce container of chips, a serving size is one ounce.  15 chips = one ounce = 150 calories, 90 from fat.

Ingredients:  Potatoes,  Sunflower or Corn oil, and salt.  

It is clear that they are VERY conscious of consumer interest in health. They have a number of webpages dedicated to answering questions about nutrition and health.  There's no more trans fats.

But let's remember that these are ultimately written by marketing folks, not doctors.  And they are not all that easy to deconstruct.  Let's just look at a couple of their FAQ's on their "Straight Talk on Snacking" page.

"Q:  Aren’t all fried foods unhealthy?

A:  Actually, no. Frying itself isn’t unhealthy—it’s the type of oil in which the frying is done that  matters. Certain oils, such as tropical and partially hydrogenated oils have saturated fats or trans fats, which are considered “bad fats.” But Frito-Lay chips are fried in healthier oils like corn and sunflower oils, which contain 80% or more of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fat—the “good fats.”"

• "Frying itself isn't unhealthy" - when I looked up "Is frying unhealthy?"  just about all the links on the first three pages said yes.  Here's one from a doctor's website explaining why.  I'm not saying it is, but I'm pointing out that a lot of people would disagree with Fritolay's statement. 

• OK, they talk about the trans fats - partially hydrogenated oils and saturated fats - as the bad fats.  (Large food companies only changed from trans fats when they feared they would be banned, now they don't even mention they used those fats and didn't so voluntarily drop them.) 

In their next FAQ - "But aren't your chips high in fat?" their answer contains this explanation:

. . . The good news about all our chips is that we make them with “good fats”—polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, which have heart health benefits because they can actually lower bad cholesterol, so long as the total calories consumed do not increase.

"Good fats' is relative.  Webmd says,

when eaten in moderation and used to replace saturated or trans fats, can help lower cholesterol levels and reduce your risk of heart disease. (emphasis added)

OK, this suggests eating 'good fats' doesn't by itself lower your risk. The risk is lowered because you substitute them for the 'bad fats' and thus you have less harm than if you had the 'bad fats' instead.  The bad fats they used to use until the government leaned on them to stop.  But that's not all.  Webmd continues:

Polyunsaturated fats, found mostly in vegetable oils, help lower both blood cholesterol levels and triglyceride levels -- especially when you substitute them for saturated fats. One type of polyunsaturated fat is omega-3 fatty acids, whose potential heart-health benefits have gotten a lot of attention.

But it turns out the 'good fats' that really do the work of lowering risk of heart disease are the fats with Omega 3 that are found in some fish and SOME oils.

Omega-3s are found in fatty fish (salmon, trout, catfish, mackerel), as well as flaxseed and walnuts. And it's fish that contains the most effective, "long-chain" type of omega-3s. The American Heart Association recommends eating 2 servings of fatty fish each week.

"Plant sources are a good substitute for saturated or trans fats, but they are not as effective as fatty fish in decreasing cardiovascular disease," notes Lichtenstein. Do keep in mind that your twice-weekly fish should not be deep-fat fried!

We can also get some lowering of heart disease risk from monounsaturated fats, but when they list the best sources, Fritolays'  corn and sunflower oils are not among those listed.  

The other "good guy" unsaturated fats are monounsaturated fats, thought to reduce the risk of heart disease. Mediterranean countries consume lots of these -- primarily in the form of olive oil -- and this dietary component is credited with the low levels of heart disease in those countries.

Monounsaturated fats are typically liquid at room temperature but solidify if refrigerated. These heart-healthy fats are typically a good source of the antioxidant vitamin E, a nutrient often lacking in American diets. They can be found in olives; avocados; hazelnuts; almonds; Brazil nuts; cashews; sesame seeds; pumpkin seeds; and olive, canola, and peanut oils.

So, while corn and sunflower oils are among the group of oils that can lower heart disease risk, they aren't among the oils that really do the most.  So their answer that their potato chips help lower the risk of heart disease, is, at best, misleading.  At worst, dishonest.  

Let's look carefully at one more of their FAQs about health.  

Q:  Won’t eating chips make me fat?A:  Weight and weight gain always goes back to calories in, calories out. Frito Lay chips (and any food, in fact) can be a part of a healthy lifestyle but moderation is important. Frito-Lay offers a number of options to help with portion control, including our multipacks and variety packs, which are an easy way to ensure the right portion, and fresh-tasting chips every time. And our 100 Calorie Mini Bites offer 100 calorie portions of some of our most popular brands including DORITOS® and CHEETOS®. 

So, what they are saying is that if you just eat a few potato chips as a snack, you won't get fat.  They are suggesting here that if you buy their one ounce bag, you will have a reasonable amount and then stop.  

Before I go on, let me remind you that this is the company that had one of the most successful advertising slogans of all times:  "Betcha can't eat just one..."   Now they are saying, "Sure they are healthy.  If you only eat 15 chips a day."

I'd also note that if you  go to thefind.com you can compare prices of buying Fritolay products in different packaging options.   You can buy 104 one ounce packages for $42 and you can buy one 12 ounce package for $3.99.  That comes out to:

one  ounce package = $.40 per ounce

12 ounce package   =  $.25 per ounce

Healthy packages are a lot more expensive.  And these appear to be wholesale prices.  I'm sure that the retail markup on a single one ounce bag is a lot more than the markup on a single 12 ounce bag.

I guess the most telling part here is the where they say, "Fritolays (and any food, in fact) can be part of a healthy life style, but moderation is important."  ANY food, no matter how unhealthy, as long as you just take a bite or two, can be part of a healthy diet.  I don't disagree with that. 

This has turned out to be a much longer post than I ever anticipated when I took the picture of the Fritolay truck. 

Back to Truth and Lies

But let's close by reminding you that the point was not so much how healthy potato chips are, but how our sensitivity to TRUTH has been eroded by the marketing of products that is a fundamental part of a capitalist society.  (I realize that some people will start calling me a communist because I've used "capitalist" in a way that is not completely positive.  But the key is whether my comment is accurate or not.  And marketing is a fundamental part of capitalism.)  Marketing has become a high science, and truth and ethics are not a major part of  marketing curricula.  

That same science today is applied to political candidates and political movements.  All parties use it, some more skillfully and less ethically than others.  So we need to awaken our thinking skills.  One in particularly, that Brain Power author Karl Albrecht called "crap detection" is critically important in this effort.  It involves seeing through the bullshit to get closer to, if not that elusive entity 'truth,' then at least to reasonable accuracy. 

The Private Sector, Without Government Oversight, Isn't Going to Tell Us

Now I also need to point out, that if it weren't for government regulation, we would have absolutely no idea what ingredients are in the foods we eat.  We'd have no way of getting even partial honesty from these companies.  Without government agencies monitoring health, we'd have no reliable data on the impacts of food and the food industry on health. (And even government data is often shaky given the influence of business on government.) The private sector wouldn't take up the cause because their reason for being is to make a profit and thus to make whatever food  people will buy as cheap as possible.  And, in our ignorance of what is in the food we buy, we would have no way of evaluating whether the food was healthy or not.  Our basic choices would be based solely on how it tastes, how it is marketed, how much it costs.  

Even with all the information we do have available, many, many people either do not read the labels or choose to make decisions about what they eat emotionally rather than rationally.  Obviously, emotion - in the form of "I really want some chocolate" - is always going to be an important and legitimate factor in choosing food.  But that needs to be balanced by understanding how much salt, how much fat, etc. is in a product. 

From Food to Politics

And  so when we move to other areas of our lives, besides food, we are so used to 'truthiness' that we easily fall into believing those things that support what we want to believe.  We discount the problems with foods we really love.  We discount the problems with politicians who says things we approve.

What if political ads had to come with percent of daily  requirements of Truth and acceptable daily levels of Lies? 

EXTRA:  Some other snack options

Remember, 15 potato chips have 150 calories, or about 10 calories per chip.

From the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute:

Fruits contain 15 grams of carbohydrate and 60 calories. One serving equals:

1 small	Apple, banana, orange, nectarine
1 med.	Fresh peach
1	Kiwi
½	Grapefruit
½	Mango
1 C	Fresh berries (strawberries, raspberries, or blueberries)
1 C	Fresh melon cubes
1⁄8th	Honeydew melon

Vegetables contain 25 calories and 5 grams of carbohydrate. One serving equals:

½ C	Cooked vegetables (carrots, broccoli, zucchini, cabbage, etc.)
1 C	Raw vegetables or salad greens
½ C	Vegetable juice
If you’re hungry, eat more fresh or steamed vegetables.

So when it comes to calories:

One apple + one banana + 1/2 cup of fresh berries   =   15 potato chips

or

Six cups of salad with raw vegetables (you could put on some lemon oil) = 15 potato chips


Betcha can't eat just 15 though.

Flowery Distractions So You Won't Notice My Unwritten Posts

I have a small pile of unwritten posts - the Democratic Unity Dinner last Tuesday, How Exit Glacier introduced me to Salfón, el limpiador de tejados, something on the uniting possibilities of funerals, the Charter College Graduation, and others that will probably slip away as time passes and more current events take priority.

So I was going to post these photos from the botanical garden yesterday just because I thought they were pretty neat.  In one case, I was smart and took a picture of name of the flower so I'd remember. This red one is a masterwort - Astrantia "Ruby Wedding" Apiaceae.

But I got so caught up shooting these two that I forgot to the the name.

I was even going to ride back to the gardens and find out.  A good excuse to get some exercise.  But I had some things to take care of and then it started to rain really hard. 

Hard enough that the drops were actually splashing on our deck table.  And I decided you're going to have to just appreciate the flowers and their insect friends as anonymous visitors to the blog.  But I'm now on the lookout for a good insect field guide, one that allows me to distinguish between different types of flies like the two in the pictures above.





Even though the rain is down to a light drizzle now, my back fender somehow disappeared Saturday when we were out in pretty substantial rain.  You can get a sense from this picture of water in Chester Creek gushing out from under New Seward Highway.

Vote Here To Know God

This is what I saw when I voted last week.  I have no problem visiting a church for someone's wedding.  I visited churches voluntarily when we were in England this summer.  I even went to the Anchorage Baptist Temple for Sen. Ted Stevens' memorial.

But when my right to vote at my local polling place requires me to enter a church, it doesn't feel right to me.

What's your problem Steve?  What's the big deal?  It's just a building.  No one is asking you to pray before you vote.  (Would that help get my candidates elected?) 

As I wrote last year when I voted at the Municipal election, "Would anyone be troubled if they had to vote in a mosque?"  Given the debate over a proposed mosque in Lower Manhattan, I'm guessing there are a few people who might not feel comfortable voting in a mosque.  Then why, in a nation that constitutionally protects freedom of religion for all, should anyone be required, in order to vote, to attend a house of worship?

I think it's about power and equality.  When the vast majority of people actively support the idea that every religion should be treated  with equal esteem and respect before the law, when some religions aren't favored over others, when a significant and politically active segment of the population does not believe its their job to convert everyone to their belief - then we can start talking about being less concerned about celebrating religious holidays in public schools and voting in houses of worship.

It seems to me that as the people who have been traditionally privileged before the law - whites and males (is there anyone who doesn't believe that whites and males have been historically privileged in the US?) - are feeling uncomfortable in the US as the laws are being changed to balance things a bit, starting with abolishing slavery, voting rights for women,  rights for women over property and in marriages, equal access to public accommodation, housing,  education, jobs,  and voting.   Isn't this what moving back to basic American values is all about?  Taking back America?  That discomfort they feel, that's how it feels to vote in a church.


[Note:  I set this up to post Monday morning early but accidentally posted Sunday morning.  Before I could correct this, there was already a comment, so I'm posting the comment in this reposting at the correct time.


Dean has left a new comment on your post "Vote Here To Know God":

Where your polling place is has an enormous psychological impact. Great article on this very topic in this month's Miller-McCune Magazine]

[Update Sept. 3:  A Pakistani friend emailed that in Pakistan they do NOT vote in mosques, only in public schools.]

Arctic Streakers Agility Club

Last Sunday, while on a bike ride we ran into a bunch of tents in the Waldron Park off Tudor Road east of Seward Highway.  We discovered the Arctic Streakers Agility Club.  

Wikipedia seems to have the best description of agility

Dog agility is a dog sport in which a handler directs a dog through an obstacle course in a race for both time and accuracy. Dogs run off-leash with no food or toys as incentives, and the handler can touch neither dog nor obstacles.

Consequently the handler's controls are limited to voice, movement, and various body signals, requiring exceptional training of the animal and coordination of the handler.
In its simplest form, an agility course consists of a set of standard obstacles, laid out by an agility judge in a design of his or her own choosing on a roughly 100 by 100-foot (30 by 30 m) area, with numbers indicating the order in which the dog must complete the obstacles.

Courses are complicated enough that a dog could not complete them correctly without human direction. In competition, the handler must assess the course, decide on handling strategies, and direct the dog through the course, with precision and speed equally important. Many strategies exist to compensate for the inherent difference in human and dog speeds and the strengths and weaknesses of the various dogs and handlers.

The North American Dog Agility Council website tells us:

The North American Dog Agility Council (NADAC) was formed in 1993 to provide North American dogs and their handlers with a fast, safe and enjoyable form of the sport of dog agility. NADAC sanctions agility trials sponsored by affiliated clubs.

The purpose of a NADAC agility trial is to demonstrate the ability of a dog and its handler to work as a smoothly functioning team. With separate class divisions for Veterans and Junior Handlers and a variety of games, NADAC dog agility offers something for everyone!

Looking a little further, I found the United States Association of Dog Agility Clubs.  I wonder what the story is about these two organizations.

As evidence of the pioneering spirit and leadership role of USDAA and its supporters, we count among our accomplishments -

Introduction of the sport to North America in its international form (1986)

• First organization in the world to separate competition into four jumping height divisions, fostering participation among competitors with virtually all sizes of dogs
• First officially sanctioned event in the United States and North America (1986)
• Introduction of the first competitive tournament series in North America - the "Grand Prix of Dog Agility^®" (1988)
• Introduction of the first certification tests in the world in five distinctive classes of competition (1990)
• First U.S. canine sports authority to field teams in "world" competition (FCI World Dog Show, Germany, 1991)
• First championship tournament series on a major national television network when the USDAA Grand Prix of Dog Agility^® Championships was telecast on Animal Planet (1999)

Alaska to be Buried in Virginia

Speaker after speaker told us at Ted Stevens' memorial in Anchorage that, in Lisa Murkowski's words, "Ted was Alaska."


The Anchorage Daily News reports today that Ted is to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.

Blogger Blocks Spam Comments!

When people leave a comment on a post, I get an email notice with the comment.  Yesterday and today I got such emails.  The comments were spam and I was going to delete them, but they weren't posted.  "Did Blogger block them?" I wondered.

Today I checked Blogger settings and there's a new comment category and there's a Spam tab.  And that's where those two messages ended up.  This is a real improvement.

I'm sure there will be some legitimate comments that end up in the spam basket, but we'll be able to let them be posted.  But will I know from the email that it wasn't posted if it isn't spam and I don't go to the post to see the comments there?  I'm not sure.


Here's what blogger says when click the link "more about Blogger's spam filter."

Spam Inbox

Blogger now filters comments that are likely spam comments to a Spam Inbox, much like the spam folder in your email. When someone leaves a comment on your blog, it will be reviewed against our spam detector, and comments that are identified as possible spam will be sent to your blog’s Spam Inbox, found at Comments | Spam.
You can help improve our ability to automatically detect spam comments by checking your Spam Inbox and deleting spam comments and marking real comments that may have been flagged as spam as Not Spam.
We are always seeking feedback on how to improve this feature, so please share your feedback with us by clicking on the Report Spam Filtering Issues.
If you have questions about what constitutes spam on Blogger, please review our Content Policies.

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Papilio canadensis - Time for a Break from Politics

Our neighbor called us to see this strange bug he'd found. 

The closest thing I could think of was a tomato worm, but this was much smaller and didn't have the horns.

The fake eyes, with eye brows even, give it a really strange appearance and makes that section look like the head. 

I suspect the head is really that little fuzzy thing in front.




I checked with the Cooperative Extension and they suggested it was

Papilio canadensis -the caterpillar of the Canadian Tiger Swallow Tail.   With a name, I could check on line.  This appears to be what it is, though the ones I saw online were bright green and this is more brown.  Perhaps it's at a different stage of its life.  The 'eyes' are right and the ones online also have dots along the back of the 'neck.'  And they live in Alaska and they eat birch and aspen among other leaves.

Alaska Election Context 3 - How Vulnerable Was Lisa Murkowski?

In Part 1 I looked at looked at Alaska's registered voter rate (apparently 96%).
In Part 2 I looked at the US Senate race and how the primaries work in Alaska.
In this post I'll look at Sen. Lisa Murkowski's background.

[UPDATE Aug 28:  A reader sent me this link to Anchorage attorney Don Mitchell's Huffington Post piece on the same topic, which has the same gist, but gives much richer detail than do I.]

These are thoughts aimed more at non-Alaskans.  Alaskans know all this and will, no doubt, correct me if I misreported anywhere.

Lisa Murkowski was a Republican state legislators with whom Democrats could live and  Republicans had some problems.  She was for women's rights, if not completely pro-choice, friendly, smart, articulate, and not of her father, Senator Frank Murkowski's, generation.  'Environmental' wasn't an epithet to her. 

She won her 2002 reelection to the State House by only 52 votes in the Republican primary  and then faced no opposition in the general election. 

That same year, her father had deciding to leave the Senate and run for Governor of Alaska.  In a January 2008 post speculating why Murkowski might have decided to leave to the Senate to run for governor I wrote:

The oil controlled state legislature passed a bill that said, in case a US Senate seat becomes vacant, the newly elected governor, not the currently sitting governor, makes the appointment. Everyone knew the purpose was to give Murkowski the power to appoint his successor. If this hadn’t passed, retiring governor Tony Knowles would have appointed the next US Senator. But it did pass assuring that, if Murkowki won, he could appoint his daughter. If he lost, he was still in the Senate.

This was settled before he ran for Governor.  Republicans didn't like the idea of a Democrat appointing Murkowski's successor and, given the reaction when he did appoint his daughter to the position, most people hadn't  anticipated that Frank would appoint Lisa. 

Appointing Lisa to the US Senate was the first seriously unpopular act of the new Governor.  Most people thought it was tacky at best, unethical or even illegal at worst.  Rival Republicans for the position were pissed.  The more conservative Republicans were particularly dismayed, while the moderate Republicans were less upset.  Democrats were ambivalent.  They thought it reeked of nepotism, but of all the Republican contenders, Lisa was probably the best in their eyes.

Gov. Murkowski went on to do a lot of things that got everyone mad from cutting benefits to seniors to buying a private jet - with administrative funds when the legislature said no.  (One of Palin's first acts as governor was to announce she was putting the jet on e-bay.)

Since Palin's run for governor knocked off Frank Murkowski in the Republican primary in 2006, there has been no love lost between the Murkowskis and Palin.  As an Alaskan, if I had to pick between  Sarah Palin and Lisa Murkowski to represent my state to the world, it would be Murkowski hands down.

But, when Lisa Murkowski got to the US Senate, she got into a much less flexible Republican majority where she forgot the words 'global climate change' and probably left the room entirely when abortion came up.  She quickly moved into the party leadership by moving way right.  There had always seemed to be a real ideological difference between Murkowski the elder and Murkowski the younger, but that seems to have mostly evaporated.

There was some question about whether Lisa could get elected on her own, but she had no real primary competition in 2004 when she had to run.  In the general election Republicans saw her as the lesser to two evils and united behind her against former Democratic  Gov. Tony Knowles.  At that point, I think, people thought she'd established herself, even if the Republicans didn't love her.

But Palin knew that Murkowski's Republican support was pretty shallow. And there is still a lot of resentment toward her dad and her original appointment.  There was even talk that Palin might run against her.  But then she'd have to take a pay cut and lose some of her spotlight.   But she probably saw this current race as a good opportunity to settle old scores.  Even if Miller hadn't gotten this close, she would be telling Murkowski to watch her back.

Add to that a primary with 25% turnout and a ballot measure on abortion and she was vulnerable. All Miller needed to do was get about 9% of Alaskan voters to vote for him. 

So while this seems to come as a huge surprise, the conditions were ripe for it to happen if the right factors came into play.  And they did.