VP candidate’s family profited by and illegally rode off-road motor vehicles
I’ll admit there’s more interesting and controversial stuff coming out about John McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate than the fact she and her husband once owned a snowmobile and ATV dealership. Even Todd Palin’s 1986 DWI is making more headlines than his pleading no contest to illegally operating an off-road vehicle in a game refuge in 2002. Nevertheless, these “lesser” tidbits caught my attention.
The Alaska governor’s public record, thin as it is, raises larger questions about her commitment to the environment and natural resource protection. It has been widely reported that Palin favors drilling the Arctic Refuge and does not believe global warming is man-made. But if we didn’t know that and knew only that the Palin family harbored a love of motorsports for fun as well as profit – public land be damned, apparently – that would tell us more than enough about her values.
– Joel Patenaude