WHY I LOVE TO PICK BERRIES

Thanks to our celebrity governor, it might seem Alaskans are all about bagging moose and shooting wolves from planes. Truth is, most of us revel in simpler and less controversial pursuits like picking berries.

This hasn't been an especially good year for berries. They arrived late and are hanging on late. But I spent two glorious days surrounded by mountains, gathering blueberries from leaf-swept bushes and plucking clusters of cranberries hanging low to the ground, marveling at the bounty undeserved and the seemingly limitless supply. Kneeling in lichen and prickly crowberry leaves and spongy moss and minty labrador tea, you see layers of goodness that mostly just get stepped on.

Picking berries requires little. You decide whether this berry is big enough or that berry is ripe enough. You swoop on size and quantity, and you toss aside obsessions with picking them all. There's a satisfaction to filling your pail, but mostly you love the smell of smoke wafting from the chimney, the rattle of leaves fluttering to the ground, the explosion of colors on the fall tundra, the flutter of little white moths indifferent to the brevity of their lives.

Things you've felt in your gut gather in ways that make sense. Picking berries on the wide-sweeping tundra, I realized something bigger than me was in charge of the world, and that was very good. Picking berries in the shadow of mountains, I finally figured out that when who you are and what you want are overshadowed by what someone else wants you to be and what someone else wants you to want, that really is an irreconcilable difference.

When you pick berries, there's always hope. Antioxidants are a nice plus, but I love berries because I love to pick them.

ALASKAN AUTHORS WEEKLY ROUND-UP

The Alaska Sisters in Crime have much to celebrate. On Monday, October 13, the group will receive the 2007 Alaska Contributions to Literacy Award for the outstanding work they've done promoting literacy in our state. Also on hand will be Scottish author Donna Moore, AKSinC's 2008 Author to the Bush, who'll do a short presentation on her work with students in Aniak. AKSinC invites you to join them for refreshments, door prizes, live music, and special guests, starting at 6 p.m. at the BP Energy Center. Be sure to RSVP by Friday, October 10, to info@aksinc.org.

Another Palin book is crashing to market. Assembled in a week by the folks at Collins (don't we all wish we could produce a book that fast?), Terminatrix: The Sarah Palin Chronicles will feature satire and digitally altered photographs ostensibly gathered by the Wasilla Iron Dog Gazette. They say even negative publicity is good publicity, but is anyone else doubting the rhetoric that the Palin candidacy is good for Alaska?

Google Previews, coming soon to your favorite websites, will allow readers to preview up to 20 percent of a book. I've been reading Andrew Keen's Cult of the Amateur, a timely analysis of the effect of the internet on our culture, and will have more to say on that next week.

Seems we may have to clone Mr. Whitekeys. No sooner had my friend invited me to his political show built around next Thursday's VP debates, and we learn the Whitekeys event is sold out. Stay tuned. After McCain proposed canceling his debate with Obama tonight and conveniently bumping the VP debate to reschedule it, anything could happen. Joe Biden could be left standing on an empty stage like Obama almost was, and we'd have to send Mr. Whitekeys as a Sarah stand-in.

Given our governor's stellar performance with Katie Couric this week (answer to why Alaska's proximity to Russia counts as foreign policy experience: "it's funny that a comment like that was kinda made to...charac...you know...reporters"), McCain must want to cancel her debate out of fear she'll upstage him. I'm sure glad I heard the Couric interview, because I discovered I've been asleep at the wheel these last 29 years. Turns out - according to Sarah - Russia has been buzzing all over our airspace and none of us knew it. Dang Russkies. But rest easy - "we've" been keeping a watchful eye on them.

TRUE VOICES

I need to get out in the mountains. How's that for a follow-up to yesterday's post on the non-open, non-agreeable, introverted but at least non-neurotic Alaskan personality?

Something happens when I get couped up for too long. We've been painting and doing chores and getting ready for winter around here. I've been tinkering with stories and writing reviews and thinking deep thoughts about the state of our nation. I've gotten out, but not for long. Not in a meaningful way.

I listen better in the mountains and the woods. Out there I rediscover the fundamental connection between voice and truth, the one that comes by way of deep grounding with the earth, the one that for me happens best in wild and rugged places.

Author Jennifer Hubbard has a great post on voice. It got me thinking about the truest Alaskan voices, especially now as we're bombarded from the political arena with noises that are neither pleasing nor authentic.

Thanks be for writers like Dan O'Neill and Seth Kantner and Velma Wallace and a host of others whose voices ring true. And thanks be to my friend who invited me out to the mountains this weekend, where we can listen together and reflect on what's true.

THE ALASKAN STATE OF MIND

Are Alaskans neurotic? Open? Agreeable? Conscientious? Extroverted?

Using a 44-question test to evaluate these five personality traits in 600,000 Americans, researchers have profiled all 50 states, with results reported in the Wall Street Journal's "The United States of Mind," .

Some states fit existing stereotypes; some didn't. As one might expect, our state's profile was, ahem, extreme. We scored as not at all agreeable, correlating with our already documented high rates of crime. The survey also showed us to be not at all open, translating as very conservative and, unfortunately for us writer-types, not very creative.

In keeping with our stereotype as a place that attracts rugged isolationists, Alaskans bumped bottom on extroversion. We also scored low on conscientiousness, a result that surprised me. The bright spot: Alaskans aren't overly neurotic, which should mean we're healthy, at least.

How does that stack up with what you guessed? This jumble of traits makes for interesting fictional characters. Politicians? Well, that's another story.

WHY NOT TO WRITE

As if the writer's path weren't challenging enough, career specialist Penelope Trunk offers Five Reasons Not to Write a Book.

If you're looking for a platform for self-promotion or a surefire way to pad your bank account, book writing is hardly the way. I recently learned a new legal term for what I do: "voluntarily underemployed."

Offsetting Trunk's five reasons not to write books are at least five hundred reasons why we do. Ironically, most are imprecise, visceral, and hard to put into words. Like raising children, writing is hard work. It's an uncertain walk into foggy places. And if you can't revel in the sheer joy of something you can't fully explain, you probably shouldn't be doing it.

ALASKA'S BUSH DOCTRINE

Just when I've decided I can't read one more sentence about Sarah Palin, another Alaskan author pens an essay that gives me pause. Today it's Scott Woodham's "Why Sarah Didn't Blink," in The Alaska Dispatch.

Pundits have been dissecting Sarah's non-answer to Charlie Gibson's question about the Bush doctrine. Ironically, what caused the non-answer is Alaska's own Bush doctrine, otherwise known as "can-do" spirit. As Woodham points out, it's the reason why Sarah didn't blink when offered a shot at the VP slot.

When you live in the Alaskan Bush, you have to be resourceful. You rely on your own talents and skills, no matter how minimal, because the experts aren't around. You take your chances with things like home improvement and small engine repair, even if you know little about them. You muddle through. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Blue tarp roofs, Tyvek "siding," snowmachine carcasses, and personal junkyards of pieces and parts happen when the Alaskan Bush doctrine fails. "Can't do" trash litters yards throughout the Alaskan Bush.

You have to admire the guts, the self-reliance, the ingenuity. But our country's discard pile of failed policies and bad faith is already overflowing. Neither Bush doctrine is good for the long-term health of our nation, or our world.

ALASKAN AUTHORS WEEKLY ROUND-UP

The talk of the publishing world this week: Boris Kachka's article "The End," in New York magazine. It's a lengthy tome, but well worth the read. Kachka's hardly the first to declare the end of publishing as we know it, but the fact that the business is dying a slow death can't stop the funeral march. Books and readers will prevail. Despite what I wrote earlier about vetting in publishing, Kachka affirms that celebrity-making is as alive - though perhaps not as well - in book-selling as it is in politics.

Speaking of politics - you didn't really think I could breeze by that opening - a new Sarah book is in the works, and this one's not through a Christian publisher. 101 Things You—and John McCain—Didn’t Know About Sarah Palin should hit bookstores in a couple of weeks.

I'm working on a review of Willie Hensley's Fifty Miles from Tomorrow for Bookforum, so I'm thrilled to see that Barry Scott Zellen will be speaking Monday from 5-7 p.m. at the UAA Campus Bookstore on "Breaking the Ice: From Land Claims to Tribal Sovereignty in the Arctic." Important and timely issues all.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN HERE?

"I've lived in Alaska for ____ years." Fill in the blank, the bigger the better. We've heard it often of late, especially as our rank and file have weighed in on the Palin candidacy.

I invoke it myself, because in Alaska, years-in-state offer street cred. Where else do residents talk about everyplace else as "Outside" and draw dubious lines of distinction between cheechakos and sourdoughs?

Dating back to 18th century Russians and going right up to present-day oil field workers who get the hell out of here at the end of their shifts, we've had more than our share of those who take and run. So sheer staying power means something. But how much?

We can make a good case that Alaska is more than just a state or even a place - it's an experience. We've got more than our share of quirky independent types. Heck, we even have a political party that wants a re-do on the statehood vote. And most of us would agree that Outsiders who wheel in, muck things up and leave (are you listening, Truth Squad?) - they can go home anytime.

It's all well and good to feel special, but at some point that crosses into arrogance. Denying Alaskan arrogance is a lot like denying that shrinking sea ice affects polar bears.

Starting with Jack London, transplanted authors have written deeply and well about the Alaska experience. Like London, not all of them did long shifts in the North, but they managed to pen eloquent, thought-provoking reflections anyhow.

Seat time doesn't count much when it comes to real learning, and we should take care in assuming how much it counts in our state. What matters is that Alaskans think and care and act in ways that promote the good of all that's genuine and worthwhile in this thing we call the "Alaska experience."

THE TRUTH SQUAD

Still pondering that pesky distinction between fact and fiction? Never fear, the Truth Squad is here.

Yes, according to KTUU and confirmed in the Alaska Dispatch, John McCain has sent his self-proclaimed Palin Truth Squad to set you straight on the ever-complicated details of Troopergate.

You thought a bipartisan committee voted 12-0 back in July to investigate whether Palin abused executive powers in firing Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan? You thought Palin agreed to cooperate fully with the investigation, saying she had nothing to hide?

Boy, did you get that wrong. Check out the Truth Squad's poster (suitable for recycling in your high school student's current events report). All roads lead to...you guessed it, Barack Obama. Yup, all that stuff you thought happened back in July - lies. Apparently back then even Sarah Palin was drinking the Democratic Koolaid the neo-cons keep talking about.

Thankfully, the McCain campaign rescued her, and they've come to rescue Alaska, too. Although Palin never mentioned it in the past two months, turns out Monegan was "insubordinate." Independent investigation? That's actually "McCarthyism." A three-person personnel board, appointed by the governor herself, with a legendary record of firing all those who cross her, is all the independence we need.

Subpoenas? Former no-name lawyer-turned-Attorney General Talis Colberg says the Palin folk don't have to answer to those. (Note to criminals: consider donating to the McCain-Palin campaign, and maybe you, too, can dodge subpoenas.) Palin's commitment to be open and transparent? Not when it comes to explaining her role in this mess - she won't testify. Oh, and Republicans supporting McPalin have filed two separate lawsuits to stall the investigation, which they say is tainted by partisanship.

All these details are so complicated, aren't they? Our friends in the Lower 48 can't be bothered. Thank heavens for the Truth Squad, which makes everything simple and crystal clear: this whole mess is the fault of the Democrats.

By the way, all questions on the investigations are now to be funneled through the TS. No fair asking the gov's attorney or, heaven forbid, the governor herself.

Time to dust off your copies of Brave New World.

A BIG SMALL TOWN?

Is Alaska really a big small town, as claimed by our governor and her party as they stump for a four-year stint in Washington?

Who can argue the appeal of a small town, with its good and honest and hard-working people? Quintessential America. John McCain invoked it yesterday, as Wall Street was collapsing around its ankles, in an attempt to convince us that the economy is fundamentally sound because America has the same good, hard workers it has always had. Funny, but I think we had that same small-town work ethic when the market crashed in 1929.

True, Alaskans run into friends from far-flung parts of the state all the time - usually in Anchorage, derided as "Los Anchorage." But beyond that, I'm having a hard time plastering the small town sticker on the largest state in the Union. We're caretakers of vast chunks of real estate most of us will never see. Most Alaskans haven't a clue how folks live on the other side of the tracks, in Chefornak or Shishmaref. We entertain millions of visitors every year. We've got oil and gas and gold and sticky issues associated with development. We've got wildlife to manage and oceans to protect and species to ponder (or plunder) in the face of global warming.

Alaska has some fascinating small towns. Heather Lende writes beautifully about Haines in If You Lived Here, I'd Know Your Name. Amanda Coyne has a nice piece in Newsweek about Wasilla. But to characterize the whole state as a big small town is wrong.

The more we learn about how our state has been run like one - from our legislators pandering to oil companies to our governor appointing high school classmates to head state divisions on flimsy qualifications such as "I've always liked cows" - the more we should reject the notion that we're just one big small town.

FACT OR FICTION?

Alaskans are the first to complain when people Outside don't "get it right" about our state. But there's a lot more than geography at stake as the line between fact and fiction blurs.

We used to think we knew. Books from reputable publishers, newspapers (other than tabloids), and stuff filed as non-fiction in the library - that was Truth, vetted and substantiated. But in the Information Age, entertainment and political purposes trump facts. We're inundated with information from blogs and tabloids and 24/7 cable channels owned by entertainment giants. You don't have to look far for evidence that the current occupants of the White House have taken every advantage of avenues for creating and promoting their own versions of Truth.

With Sarah Palin thrust in the national limelight, distortions fly hard in Alaskan faces. Our governor still claims she told Congress "thanks but no thanks" to that Bridge to Nowhere. She told almost 40 million people we've got a natural gas pipeline under construction. Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell and former New York City mayor Rudy Guiliani, among others, chide Obama campaign for the Troopergate mess, even though every non-comatose Alaskan knows it began more than a month before McCain made his VP pick, with a Republican majority overseeing the investigation.

As people turn selectively to news sources they agree with, and as these distortions (dare we call them lies?) are repeated, they become accepted as "truth." In the midst of this perfect storm, along comes J. Frank Prewitt's self-pubbed Bridge to Nowhere, subtitled an "FBI confidential source account of Alaska's political corruption scandal."

Not having read the book yet, I can't comment on its quality or value. What's of interest is that Prewitt, according to Sunday's ADN, categorizes his book as "creative nonfiction," going on to say he replicates scenes "in a way that enables people's mind [sic] to step into the picture and have a good time."

Authors, what's your take on this definition of creative non-fiction? Readers, what sort of Truth do you expect when taking up a book like Prewitt's? How about Prewitt's decision to self-publish, admitting to typos and all, because he wanted to get it out in time for the election?

And finally, from teachers, I'd love to hear if media literacy is taught in any substantial way. Given the narrow onus of No Child Left Behind, my guess is it's not. Which means, information-wise, we've got lots more to worry about than whether some folks still think we live in igloos.

ALASKAN AUTHORS WEEKLY ROUND-UP

Plenty again to round up this week. First, go to 49 Writers, No Moose, where blooger Andromeda Romano-Lax is launching the Equinox Book Club. John Straley's The Big Both Ways is the club's first pick. No long-term commitment, and you've got till November to read the first book.

Mark your calendars for Kaylene Johnson, signing copies of Sarah: How a Hockey Mom Turned Alaska's Political Establishment Upside Down, on Saturday, Sept. 20 from 1-3 at Title Wave Books. You may want to get in line early. Tyndale, now distributing the books, reports 350,000 copies going into print.

On the same day and time, you can catch a book signing for Captain Cook in Alaska and the North Pacific at Pandemonium Booksellers in Wasilla. (Wow - did they have some sort of premonition in naming that store or what?) The print run's not nearly as large, but I've got it queued up on my shelf.

Speaking of Sarah (is anyone not?), the ADN reports on several Alaskan writers who are getting lots of hits - as in one million, per Andrew Halcro - on their political blogs. Check out the story for a list of the featured blogs.

I've only read excerpts of Sarah's first interview since she turned V.P. pick; plan to watch the whole thing tonight. I did get the impression that she's not going to second guess what Israel will do - possibly because she repeated it three times. Expect the rhetorical line between fiction and nonfiction to blur even more as the campaign heats up. Several Bush (as in W., not Alaskan) campaign vets have jumped on to manage and prep Sarah. Enough said.

The Constitutional free speech doctrine has come up with Palin's questions about removing books from the Wasilla library. Now it's coming up again as a group calling itself Alaska Women Against Palin plan a rally for tomorrow, Sept. 13, and local radio host "butt-whooping" Eddie Burke called the organizers "maggots" and gave out their personal phone numbers over the air. According to the organizers, threats of violence ensued. And Representative Jay Ramras is worried that we'll be airing our dirty laundry with Troopergate? Come on, people. Let's show the rest of the world that the freedoms we enjoy in our country can do better than name-calling and threats of harm to people who have the audacity to express opinions that differ from ours.

Speaking of the Constitution, Alaskans will have an opportunity to hear from an influential author of legal opinions, Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. He'll by speaking on another Palin-timely topic, "The Curious Case of Free Exercise: Religion and the First Amendment," at the Loussac Library's Marston Theater at 3 p.m. on Saturday, September 27.

And finally, on an infinitely lighter note, sometimes author and always funny Mr. Whitekeys is appearing tonight at 8 p.m. at the Palmer Depot. Subject of his $30 show: "Mr. Whitekeys Does the Valley."

GATEWAY DRUGS

At 49 Writers, No Moose, Andromeda Romano-Lax is sponsoring a contest for readers who post on Alaskan books that hold special meaning for them. Borrowing a phrase from blogger Patrick Brown, reported in Paper Cuts, which book got you hooked on Alaska and the North?

For me, it was Mrs. Mike, which I recently learned is also one of my Alaskan-born daughter's favorite Northern reads. No matter that it's technically set in the Canadian North - it opened up the subarctic for me. On its heels I read Tisha and later, after I'd accepted a job in Alaska, John McPhee's Coming into the Country.

Special meaning or gateway drug - post your thoughts at 49 Writers, No Moose.

PITBULLS AND PIGS

With no end in sight for the Sarah-frenzy, it's fascinating how much of the dialogue swirls around issues of language and literacy. This campaign offers so many teachable moments on audience and rhetoric that it almost makes me wish I was back in the classroom.

Depending on whom you ask, it's okay to talk lipstick with pitbulls but not pigs. Then there's the issue of book banning and censorship. Are questions posed by the mayor to the town librarian about whether she would remove questionable books from the library - followed by a termination letter when the librarian says banning is not a-okay - reflective of a book-banning stance or merely, as the mayor-cum-Veep says, "rhetorical"? You'll find lively discussions on both sides of that topic on the blog Librarians Against Palin .

Also of interest is the fact that a new Palin bio comes out in a few weeks from Christian publisher Zondervan. Another Christian publisher, Tyndale, is taking over distribution of the current bio from Epicenter, which has been overwhelmed with orders.

For a fascinating look at rhetoric and image building in the modern American political arena, check out Frank Rich's The Greatest Story Ever Sold. It's a captivating treatise on the misuse of language and what passes for truth - a timely read with 55 days and counting until we elect a new President.

Calling All Science Writers

Alaska has spawned some fine science and nature writers. I hope we'll be reading new essays by some of them in response to a joint call for manuscripts by Penguin Classics and the Union of Concerned Scientists.

The online collection, Thoreau's Legacy: American Stories about Global Warming, is slated for publication in 2009. From all appearances, it will be a high-visibility effort. Ned Rozell, Bill Sherwonit, Debbie Miller, Susan Quinlan - and many more of you out there - let's have an Alaskan or two in the mix.

Bringing Out the Best

Despite all the criticisms hurled at the oxymoronic "publishing industry," it does - with some notable exceptions - keep the Peter Principle at bay, at least in terms of authors and their published work. As anyone who's tried will attest, it's darned hard to get published. Which is why I make a distinction between the Peter Principle at work in Alaskan politics and the markedly non-Peterish showing of Alaskan authors.

Outside a few notably literary enclaves like New York, it would be tough to find a collection of really fine writers like we enjoy among the 600,000 folks who call Alaska home. Sure, we've got our literary yahoos and embarrassments, but for those who rise beyond self-publishing, the Alaska card plays only so far. Call me a romantic, but I believe Alaska attracts insightful writers for whom relative isolation offers an opportunity to hone their craft, with results that are vetted by the quirky, skittish publishing markets Outside.

Not so with politics. I'm no sociologist, but the inverse may well be true. Look no farther than Joe Vogler and the AIP, with whom the nation's Darling Sarah Palin flirted as she made her rise to the top.

The interplay between our fair Governor and the press continues to fascinate. A Peter Principle corrolary is that once you rise beyond your level of competence, you must shield yourself from anyone and anything that could send you crashing. No surprise, then, that Sarah's new bio will be penned by a Christian novelist and pubbed by Zondervan.

No surprise, either, that McCain campaign manager Rick Davis has said, by all reports with a straight face, that Sarah's not going to make herself available to the media until they agree to treat her with deference. Or as one letter-writer to the ADN admonished the press, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

Goodbye, Press. Hello, Brave New World. Fortunately, Alaskan authors continue to speak articulately on the current Alaska-spawned national obsession. Check out, for instance, Nicole Stellon O'Donnell's articulate essay "The Sarah Myth" in Literary Mama. Whether you agree with her or not, Nicole speaks brilliantly of how Sarah's thrust into the limelight has left her tarnished in the eyes of some who used to be proud to call her their own.

It's too bad that great opportunities don't bring out the best in politicians the way they seem to in writers. Maybe that's because writers have to fight so hard to get where they are. It pains me to say it, but thanks, publishing industry. McCain could learn a few lessons in vetting from you.

ALASKAN AUTHORS WEEKLY ROUND-UP

Quite a week here in Alaska. A lot of us still feel as my daughter did when I woke her at 8 a.m. last Friday to tell her Alaska was making history. As we watched McCain introduce his new running mate, my daughter said, "I have this feeling that in a little while I'm going to wake up saying, 'Wow, I just had the weirdest dream.'"

We've heard a lot of misinformation about Alaska. Anyone with a 907 area code apparently breezed through call screeners on national talk radio. I tuned in as one woman was bragging about how Sarah's very own lieutenant governor had just beat out that bad old boy Ted Stevens in the state's primary election. News flash: Sarah's LG ran against Don Young in a race that was too close to call; we'll see where it stands after absentee and questioned ballots are counted today. All the ensuing radio blather about how anyone who could take on that corrupt SOB Ted Stevens had to be great was a teeny bit misplaced.

Then there was Karl Rove lauding Sarah's accomplishments as mayor of the second largest city in Alaska. Move over, Fairbanks. I could go on and on with the misrepresentations of fact, all too common in politics as well as in Alaska.

But the flurry has also generated spirited dialogue. The Anchorage Daily News has done a marvelous job of providing coverage. Among the author-related news reported by ADN as well as national media: Sarah's attempt to fire the Wasilla librarian after she refused to agree to ban books.

Also worth a read is Dena Fox's fine piece, pubbed in the Alaska Dispatch, "Reflections of Palin from a Christian in Wasilla." I spent a good deal of my adult life in evangelical churches, and while I worship elsewhere now, I'm always interested in intelligent discourse from a subculture where it takes some guts to step out of the box. Bravo, Dena - I hope we hear more from this Alaskan author.

Non-Sarah, author-friendly upcoming events include Garrison Keillor's visit next Wednesday, Sept. 10. I hope you were swifter than I was and bought tickets before the show sold out. Bill Sherwonit is signing his new collection of essays, Living with Wilderness, on Thursday, Sept. 11 at Title Wave. And Lance Mackey, two-time consecutive winner of both the Iditarod and the Yukon Quest, who may not be an author but who has a great story to tell, is speaking at 7 p.m. this Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Eagle River VFW.

AUTHOR OF THE DAY

Republican speechwriter Matthew Scully is the Alaskan author of the day. I doubt he's ever set foot in our state, but the text he prepared for Alaska governor Sarah Palin's debut at the Party's convention caught the attention of more Americans than perhaps the last decade of books written in and about Alaska.

Never mind that the speech was littered with errors, omissions, and sleight-of-hand. Alaska has not "begun a nearly forty billion dollar natural gas pipeline." The legislature authorized the governor's controversial AGIA plan, giving a Canadian company a license to explore the permitting process for a pipeline, with no obligation to actually build one. But facts, Schmacts. Loaded pickups are already gunning north to get rich on our state's next boom.

Forget the $27 million in earmarks Sarah sought as mayor of Wasilla. Last night's Sarah "ended the abuses of earmark spending by Congress." Cut taxes in Alaska? Not much to cut when you consider that we have no state income or sales taxes to start with. And you'd think maybe they could have dropped the Bridge to Nowhere line after it came out that Sarah campaigned in favor of it.

But hey, when you're on a roll, why bother with truth? Just criticize your opponent for rhetoric-charged speeches plying different lines with different audiences (the folks in Bridge-to-Nowhere Ketchikan have a lot to say about that). Irony, after all, is just one of those words liberals like to toss around. When they do, simply berate the press by charging that the only reason for their scrutiny is that you're not "a member in good standing of the Washington elite."

Most Alaskans interviewed by the press lauded the speech, saying that this was the Sarah they know and love. I agree - on the delivery. But Sarah hasn't accomplished what she has in Alaska with the kind of divisive fear-mongering Scully wrote for her last night.

The best line, an apparently scripted aside addressed to conveniently placed hockey-mom banner wavers, was that the difference between hockey moms and pitbulls is lipstick.

We'll have to get used to this new Sarah. Because even pitbulls know better than to bite the hand that feeds them.

What's Cooking, Alaska?

No, I'm not going to discuss how Sarah dumped the state cook or leak the mooseburger recipe of our State Super Mom (aka the "perfect woman," according to one Republican delegate). Frankly, I'm not sure how much more I can take of people like Wasilla's current mayor gushing about how running her town and running the country require exactly the same skill set.

SOOOO...let's talk about food. Alaskan cookbooks, to be specific. Apolitical, unless you're going to get into Sarah's aversion to Prop 2, which would have put limits on aerial wolf and grizzly kills, or her aversion to Prop 4, the Clean Water Initiative, to protect Alaska's salmon-spawning waterways.

OOOOPS. Let's just assume we've got fish and wild game is taken by - ahem - legal measures. (Rumor is that some of those Palinburgers were made with moose taken illegally by Troopergate star Mike Wooten).

Okay, then. Look no farther than What's Cooking, Alaska?, a collection of 100 recipes from Chef Al Levinsohn, billed as Alaska's Favorite Chef. Chef Al does cooking spots on one of the local stations here in Anchorage, and he runs a couple of great restaurants - the Kincaid Grill and the City Diner.

Levinsohn's book features approachable recipes, some more Alaskan than others. I suspect it's a nice balance for readers who don't have easy access to wild game or berries, but I would have liked the collection to be more uniquely Alaskan, not just in terms of ingredients but aloso in the chapter and recipe introductions. Still, I've found several dishes I want to try.

Poached Alaskan Salmon Salad, anyone? Make it now, before Pebble Mine takes its toll on those salmon streams.

Blogging Alaska-Style

If Alaskans have complained in the past that we're overlooked by the rest of the nation - the old "Can you use American currency there?" and "Do you need a passport?" routines - we've got no business complaining now. Palin as VP pick; Palin as soon-to-be grandma (mom yet unwed); Palin target of legislative investigation; Stevens on trial this month on seven federal charges; Don Young and Sean Parnell still duking it out almost a week after the primary.

No shortage of attention here. And new on the scene among Alaskan writers is the Alaska Dispatch, brainchild of well-published freelancers Amanda Coyne and Tony Hopfinger. They feature a nice variety of opinions and original reporting.

Any other mention-worthy Alaskan blogs out there?