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EXCLUSIVE Interview With Sarah Palin
by Human Events

“Thank you, sir. It is an honor to be named your ‘Conservative of the Year.’”

That’s how Sarah Palin began her third interview this year with HUMAN EVENTS Political Editor John Gizzi. She spoke to Gizzi last April as the first of 16 Republicans he interviewed for HE’s “Veepstakes” election-year feature and then she sat down with him during the National Governors Association meeting in Philadelphia in July. The Alaska governor last week again spoke to Gizzi, this time about her historic candidacy as the Republican vice presidential nominee as well as about current issues and her future.

Veteran Republican political consultant Holly Robichaud, who had arranged the first “Veepstakes” interview between Palin and Gizzi, set up their latest exchange December 12.

Speaking from her office in Juneau, Gov Palin set the scene “It’s five below, not too cold to snow, which is nice, absolutely beautiful and white and crisp,” and then Gizzi began the interview with her:

GIZZI: Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss singled you out for praise after you campaigned for him and he won re-election in the run-off in Georgia earlier this month. What did you do that was so helpful to Sen. Chambliss, who won by a relatively large margin?

PALIN: Georgia was a blast. People were fired up to re-elect him. It certainly wasn’t me. It was him. When he was on stage, people were cheering. I think the rest of the country, those who were concerned about checks and balances in Washington, D.C., were very excited about the opportunity for me to help out a little bit there. And we made sure we did have those checks and balances that came with his re-election. I was very thankful he was re-elected, and very thankful for my state of Alaska. Saxby is pro-development and wants to make sure that our nation becomes energy independent. Alaska can help. As opposed to the positions his opponent had been taking, he can help us progress toward that end. His opponent [Democrat Jim Martin], I believe, would have worked to lock up more of Alaska.

GIZZI: In campaigning for Sen. Chambliss, you brought back a lot of conservatives who had been critical of him for voting for the Wall Street bailout [of financial institutions]. Would you have favored the Wall Street bailout and voted as Sen. Chambliss did?

PALIN: I would have done what the GOP [senators] did yesterday and said ‘no’ to additional bailout efforts of one industry [the automobile industry, whose proposed federal bailout was stopped in the Senate December 11]. Picking winners and losers in Washington, D.C., is a dangerous thing to do when you’re talking about a system that supposed to be based on free enterprise. When you talk about rewarding for work ethic and good management decisions and then consequences are the results of the opposite of that, and those decisions lead to some mistakes that are made in some industries, taxpayer bailouts should not be looked to as the be-all, end-all solutions.

But back then, weeks ago, when that initial bailout [of financial institutions] was proposed, remember, it was considered at the time a rescue and not necessarily a bailout. Without having as much information as everyone has now, I did support that initial effort that was going to come from Congress. Of course, we saw [Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben] Bernanke and others appear to change the rules right away, it seemed like, after that initial rescue plan or bailout was given the green light, then everybody in the public, including me, started hearing that the rules were changing on where those dollars would go and what the criterion would be. Unfortunately, that leads to distrust of decisions our politicians make on our behalf and bureaucrats make on our behalf.

Now the situation has changed and I think the GOP did the right thing yesterday in saying, “Look, we still want more information before one industry -- in this case, the auto industry -- gets more taxpayer assistance until everybody knows what those dollars would be used for and how it will lead to success in this industry.”

GIZZI: So you stand with Sen. [Bob] Corker [Tenn.] and other Republicans who stopped the auto industry bailout in the Senate?

PALIN: I do. Once bitten, twice shy. We learned a lesson, at least being amenable -- if not enthused -- to the idea all those weeks ago to the first rescue plan. But then the rules changed quickly, and more information was revealed that perhaps Congress and the bureaucrats in the Treasury Department not having a good grasp on what the problem was and how taxpayer funds would solve any of the problems. That’s caused a lot of concern and caution on my part and the part of the Republican Party.

GIZZI: Indiana Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels has spoken out against the bailout of states that [California] Gov. [Arnold] Schwarzenegger and other governors have called for. As a governor yourself and an active member of the National Governors Association, where do you stand on the bailout of states?

PALIN: Every state, like every community in the United States, comes to Congress with its list of infrastructure needs. Alaska is going to join every other state with a governor’s list. In fact, I’ve looked at every other governor’s list of infrastructure needs that’s presented to Congress. It’s up to Congress, because Congress holds the purse strings, to decide how some of those projects are going to be funded. Alaska’s projects are going to be in the nation’s best interests. They will be infrastructure that will build gas lines and build that infrastructure up that will lead to energy production to allow us to become energy independent. We aren’t asking for things like “Bridges to Nowhere.”

But, in speaking with Gov. Schwarzenegger about this, he has said it’s not his intention to ask for a bailout that is based on his state’s management decisions that have led to some problems in that state. In Alaska, we’re fortunate. We have a surplus. We have money put aside for the last few years, waiting for a ‘rainy day’ when the economy wasn’t as strong. We are in a good position, so we are not asking for, nor should we ask for, a bailout from the ‘feds.’ But we will, along with every other state, have our list of infrastructure projects and roads and very basic tools that will lead to energy production.

GIZZI: For my birthday this year, friends gave me the new biography of Andrew Jackson [American Lion, by Jon Meacham]. One of the passages that reminded me of you is when the author is explaining how vilified Jackson was and says, ‘He was the first President to come from the common people, not from an educated elite, and he never ceased to see himself as their champion.’ Is that something you can identify with and do you think the fact you had a similar background to Jackson’s was a reason for some of the criticism you received from some of the punditocracy and the media in general?

PALIN: Maybe initially it is a hindrance for someone starting out. But once the electorate knows what that candidate’s convictions are and positions are, I don’t think that matters. You just prefaced your question with the fact that I didn’t come from that ‘stock’. I got my education from the University of Idaho because that’s what I could afford. It was the least-expensive school that offered the programs I knew would benefit me in my future. My Dad was a school teacher and had four kids in college at about the same time. It didn’t occur to me to ask my parents to pay for my college education. We all worked through school and paid for schools that we could afford. I still got a great education. No, I don’t come from the self-proclaimed ‘movers and shakers’ group and that’s fine with me. It’s caused me, or rather, allowed me, to work harder and pulled myself up by my bootstraps without anyone else helping me. I think it allows me to be in touch with the vast majority of Americans who are in the same position that I am. That is desiring government to be on our side and not against us. And that means, in a lot of ways, for government to get out of the way to allow our families and our businesses to keep more of what they produce, to meet our own priorities.

My own upbringing and what I am today -- with my husband, in a blue-collar job that he has -- allow me a great connection with the vast majority of Americans who live and work and are trying to raise our families.

GIZZI: What was the biggest mistake made in the ’08 campaign?

PALIN: The biggest mistake made was that I could have called more shots on this: the opportunities that were not seized to speak to more Americans via media. I was not allowed to do very many interviews, and the interviews that I did were not necessarily those I would have chosen. But I was so thankful to have the opportunity to run with John McCain that I was not going to argue with the strategy decisions that some of his people were making regarding the media contacts?

But if I would have been in charge, I would have wanted to speak to more reporters because that’s how you get your message out to the electorate.

GIZZI: And what was the most important lesson you learned from the campaign?

PALIN: The campaign was 99.9% amazing and invigorating and inspiring. But looking back, there were so many things that were outside of my control. I was in a campaign in which I did not know the people individually running the campaign. So I had to put my life, my career, my family, and my reputation in their hands. That’s kind of a scary thing to do when you don’t know the people you are working with.

Now I have all the faith in the world in Sen. McCain and his family. But some of the folks around him I did not know and so it was a kind of a risky thing for me to put my faith in the decisions they were making on my behalf.

As an administrator, as a chief executive of a state, I am not used to that. I am used to proving my abilities by calling the shots. Then I know the buck stops with me. I made the decisions, and I’m responsible. When others are making decisions for me, as they were in the campaign, and I am the one to live with the fallout from the decisions that were made on my behalf, that is something I am not very comfortable with.

GIZZI: Do you want to give me any names of people?

PALIN: No. But they’re folks who have done this before. Of course, I haven’t done this on a national level before.

But my reliance on seeking God’s direction in all that I do -- that is good enough for me. And others who have a different worldview and different strategy on messaging and such, I would like to have the opportunity to prove to them that my gut instincts were going to be quite adequate.

GIZZI: Are you getting a lot of requests to speak around the country for candidates, as you did for Sen. Chambliss?

PALIN: I’m getting a lot of requests to speak. But right now my focus is on Alaska and a lot of the energy projects we are working on.

GIZZI: Who is your role model?

PALIN: Susan B. Anthony. I have great respect there for the history. She was a pro-life feminist and those things that she stood for, and she was so far ahead of her time. It amazes me.

GIZZI: You made it clear in our interviews earlier this year that you were not close to fellow Republicans Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young from your state, both of whom you said had a different vision of Alaska’s dealings with the federal government than you did. Were you pleased with the election of Democrat Mark Begich who defeated Stevens and with the re-election of Rep. Young?

PALIN: I met yesterday with Sen.-elect Begich to see that we are on the same page as we move forward as he starts his new job representing Alaska.

I thought that Sen. Stevens was going to be re-elected, and it was so close, and that if he were to step aside because he was convicted [on corruption charges], then I would get to appoint a Republican. So I was kind of surprised at the outcome there.

It is what it is, and I wish Sen. Begich well. We’ll work well together. He’s going to be in the majority party and that’s all the more reason for Mark Begich and me to work closely together. We will.

GIZZI: Will you run for higher office, such as the U.S. Senate from Alaska in 2010 [when more moderate Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s seat is up]?

PALIN: That’s not in my sites. There’s so much to do as governor.

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Read Ann Coulter's EXCLUSIVE HUMAN EVENTS column, Sarah Palin: Conservative of the Year.

Palin blows a kiss to fans during a rally in Kissimmee, Fla., on October 26. (Burbank/Orlando Sentinel/MCT)

Sarah Palin: Conservative of the Year
by Ann Coulter

Sarah Palin wins HUMAN EVENTS’ prestigious “Conservative of the Year” Award for 2008 for her genius at annoying all the right people. The last woman to get liberals this hot under the collar would have been … let's see now … oh, yeah: Me!

The entire presidential election year was kind of a downer for conservatives. Once the “maverick” John McCain won the nomination, the rest of the year was like watching a slow motion car crash. Except at least a slow-motion car crash is occasionally entertaining. So it was going to be a long year.

Until Palin.

When McCain chose our beauteous Sarah as his running mate, the maverick was finally acting like a real maverick -- as opposed to the media’s definition of a “maverick” which is: “agreeing with the editorial positions of the New York Times.”

Pre-Palin it had been one race -- boring old “You kids get off my lawn!” John McCain versus the exciting, new politician Barack Obama, who threw caution to the wind and bravely ran as the Pro-Hope candidate. And then our heroic Sarah bounded out of the Alaska tundra and it became a completely different race. This left the press completely discombobulated and upset. They didn't know whether to attack Sarah for not having an abortion or go after her husband for not being a sissy.

I assume Palin was chosen because McCain had heard that she was a real conservative and he had always wanted to meet one -- no, actually because he needed a conservative on the ticket, but that he had no idea that picking her would send the left into a tailspin of wanton despair.

But if anyone on the McCain campaign chose Palin because she would drive liberals crazy, my hat is off to him!

True, Palin made some embarrassing gaffes.

She complained that we didn’t have enough “Arabic translators” in Afghanistan -- not realizing the natives don’t speak Arabic in Afghanistan, but rather a variety of regional dialects, the most common of which is Pashtun.

Speaking to military veterans one time, Palin said, “Our nation honors its unbroken line of fallen heroes -- and I see many of them in the audience here today.”

She bragged about passing a law regulating the nuclear industry that it turned out never became a law at all.

Some days Palin said Venezuela's dictator Hugo Chavez should suffer "regional isolation" -- but then on others she’d say she supported the president’s meeting with Chavez.

She told one audience about recent tornados in Kansas that had killed 10,000 people. In fact, a dozen people were killed in the tornados.

She referred to the “57 states” that make up the U.S.

Speaking of her eldest daughter’s pregnancy, she said Bristol was being “punished” with a baby.

As you probably know -- or guessed by now -- none of these gaffes were uttered by Palin. They are all Obama gaffes. Luckily, he made them to a star-struck press that managed not to ask him a difficult question for two years.

It seemed like the media would introduce an all-new double standard each day throughout the two glorious months of Palin’s candidacy.

I don’t remember, for example, zealous inquiries into the supposedly peculiar religious practices of any candidates in past elections. No one in the press touched on Sen. Joe Lieberman’s religious beliefs when he was Kerry’s running mate. (Nor, while we’re on the subject, was the media particularly interested in the beliefs of the religion that inspired the 9/11 attacks on America.)

But the press snapped right back into their anti-religious hysteria for a candidate who was a Pentecostal! The same media that couldn’t be bothered to investigate Obama’s ties to former Weathermen or Syrian Nationalist Tony Rezko was soon hot on the trail of a rumor that Palin’s church had a speaker 30 years ago who spoke in tongues!

Let me think now: Were there ever any unusual or otherwise noteworthy speeches or sermons given in churches where Obama worshipped? Hmmm … it's on the tip of my tongue.

Liberals also suddenly decided that a woman with children could not handle the stress of higher office. Until Palin reared her beautiful head, this is precisely the sort of thinking liberals would have denounced as the Neanderthal, backwards, good old boy network attitude that had created a “glass ceiling.”

Let’s consider the facts: Palin’s oldest son was about to be under the tender care of Gen. David Petraeus after being shipped off to Iraq. Her next oldest child was about to be married and probably would prefer that her parents butt out. That left three children under the age of 15, which was almost the same as Obama had.

So Palin had one more child -- and a lot more executive experience -- than the guy at the top of the Democrats’ ticket. (I suspect what liberals were really mad about was that if Palin became Vice President, she probably would have hired a nanny who was a U.S. citizen.)

Having indignantly rejected experience as a presidential qualification in the case of Obama, liberals had to raise questions about Palin’s experience gingerly. But, in short order, they threw caution to the wind and began energetically criticizing Palin for her lack of experience. I call that two … two … two standards in one!

Like most Democrats, both Obama and Biden boasted of their humble beginnings, while having fully adopted the attitudes, pomposity and style of the elites.

Meanwhile, Palin is the sort of genuine American that brings out the worst, most egregious pomposity of liberals. For weeks, Carl Bernstein was showing up on TV to announce: “We still don’t have the date of first issuance of her passport.” Members of the establishment would be astonished to learn that more Americans have guns than passports.

Liberals were angry at Palin because they thought she should look and act like Kay Bailey Hutchinson: Upper crust, prissy and stiff.

Palin had a husband in the Steelworkers Union, a sister and brother-in-law who owned a gas station, and five attractive children -- one headed for Iraq, one a Down’s syndrome baby and one the cutest little girl anyone had ever seen.

In a nutshell, Palin was everything Democrats are always pretending to be, but never are.

She didn’t have to conjure up implausible images of herself duck hunting as Hillary Clinton did. Nor was Palin the typical Democratic elected female official who went straight from college into politics, like Nita Lowey.

Despite their phony championing of “women’s issues” (i.e. abortion) there was not one Democrat woman who could win a head-to-head contest with Palin. Especially not if we got to see their faces. Democrats may have a fleet of women politicians, but they don’t have a deep bench of attractive ones. You don’t even think of most Democratic woman as women: Rosa Delauro, Nita Lowey, Patty Murray, Janet Napolitano -- and the list goes on. Oh, sure, there are the odd female Democrat sex kittens -- your Janet Renos, your Donna Shalalas -- but they're the exception to the rule.

After Palin gave her barnburner of a speech at the Republican National Convention, a friend of mine in a liberal industry told me his friends were aggressively confronting him demanding to know if Palin was raised by a secret cult of Christians that taught children nothing but Creationism and public speaking.

Oh, how I wish he had said “yes.” Imagine the aneurisms! I think what liberals were to say was: Gosh, she’s an exceptionally attractive mother of five!

The Obama campaign was so alarmed by Palin’s speech, it loudly dismissed the speech saying she didn’t write it. At least that’s what a press release written by an Obama campaign staffer said. Indeed, the first words out of every Palin critic's mouth were: "Good speech, but she didn't write it."

So I guess all liberals were reading the same talking points written for them by the Obama campaign. At least Palin pays her speechwriters. Neil Kinnock is still waiting for his check.

Speaking of Joe Biden, he said that Palin’s speech had a lot of style but little substance. Inasmuch as Biden was Obama's running mate, I think that meant he liked it!

A newspaper in Boston responded to Palin’s speech by interviewing hairdressers who criticized Sarah's hairstyle. (Where were these people after Joe Biden's speech?)

Trendy dinner party opinion soon demanded that all liberals take up the cry that Palin must let the press have a whack at her. Almost immediately after she was introduced to the nation, the cry went up: “When are we going to be allowed to ask Palin questions?”

Palin’s refusal to meet with the press for one week after being chosen as McCain’s running mate was evidently more maddening than Obama's refusal to appear on Fox News for almost the entirety of his campaign.

Everyone acted as if Obama’s feat of running for President for two years constituted a complete and thorough vetting.

It might have been, except that the entire media had apparently agreed: “OK, none of us will ask Obama about Tony Rezko, William Ayers, and Jeremiah Wright.”

Hillary was hissed by the audience for mentioning Rezko at a Democratic debate and George Stephanopoulos nearly lost his career for asking Obama one William Ayers question at another.

Osama bin Laden was more upset about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright than liberals were -- especially after "Jeremiah Wright videos" passed "al Qaeda videos" for most total viewings on Youtube. (He was kicking himself for not coming up with that “God Damn America” line first!)

Who cares if Palin was qualified to be President? She was running with John McCain! There was no chance that ticket was going to place her anywhere near the presidency. In fact, I can’t think of a better place to put someone you wanted to keep away from the White House than on a ticket with McCain.

Palin was a kick in the pants, she energized conservatives, and she made liberal heads explode. Other than his brave military service, introducing Sarah Palin to Americans is the greatest thing John McCain ever did for his country.

But unless Palin is going to be the perpetual running mate of “moderate” Republicans who need conservative bona fides, she will need to become wiser and better read. Even Reagan didn’t run for President in his 40s. (True Obama is in his 40s, but we are not Democrats.)

Perhaps Palin’s year is 2012, but I would recommend that she take a little more time to become older and wiser. She ought to spend the next decade being a good governor, tending to her children so none of them turn out like Ron Reagan Jr., and reading everything Phyllis Schlafly, Thomas Sowell, Ronald Reagan and “Publius” have ever written. (She also might keep in mind that HUMAN EVENTS was Ronald Reagan’s favorite newspaper!)

In time, HUMAN EVENTS’ 2008 Conservative of the Year will be ready to be our President and someday can sweep into office and dismantle all the heinous government programs Obama and the Democrats are about to foist on the nation. Who knows? She might even be able to run as the candidate of "hope" and "change."

Todd is one lucky (former) First Dude!

What WAS Feminism?
By Victor Davis Hanson
The Washington Times

The media went hysterical over Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska and Republican nominee for vice president. She may have appeared to the public as an independent, capable professional woman, but to a particular elite she couldn't possibly be a real feminist or even a serious candidate.

And that raises questions about what is — and what is not — feminism.

Feminism grew out of the 1960s to address sexual inequality. At an early age, I was mentored on most feminist arguments by my late mother. She graduated from Stanford Law School in the 1940s but then was offered only a single job as a legal secretary. Instead, she went back home to raise three children with my father, a teacher and farmer, and only returned to legal work in her 40s. She was eventually named a California superior court judge and, later, a state appellate court justice.

Hers was a common and compelling feminist argument of the times, and went something like this: Women should receive equal pay for equal work, and not be considered mere appendages of their husbands. Childrearing — if properly practiced as a joint enterprise — did not preclude women from pursuing careers. A woman's worth was not to be necessarily judged by having either too many or too few children, given the privacy of such decisions and the co-responsibility of male partners.

In such an ideal gender-blind workplace, women were not to be defined by their husband's or father's success or failure. The beauty of women's liberation was that it was not hierarchical but included the unmarried woman who drove a combine on her own farm, the corporate attorney and the homemaker who chose to home-school her children.

Women in the workplace did not look for special favors. And they surely did not wish to deny innately feminine differences. Instead, they asked only that men should not establish arbitrary rules of the game that favored their male gender.

Soon radical changes in American attitudes about birth control, abortion, dating, marriage and health care became, for some, part and parcel of women's liberation. But in its essence feminism still was about equality of opportunity, and so included women of all political and religious beliefs.

That old definition of feminism is now dead. It has been replaced by a new creed that is far more restrictive - as the controversy over Sarah Palin attests. Out of the recent media frenzy, four general truths emerged about the new feminism:

(1) There is a particular class and professional bent to the practitioners of feminism. Sarah Palin has as many kids as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, she has as much of a prior political record as the once-heralded Rep. Geraldine Ferraro, who was named to the Democratic ticket by Walter Mondale in 1984 - and arguably has as much as, or more executive experience than, Barack Obama. Somehow all that got lost in the endless sneering stories about her blue-collar conservatism, small Alaskan town, five children, snowmobiling husband and Idaho college degree.

(2) Feminism now often equates to a condescending liberalism. Emancipated women who, like Mrs. Palin, do not believe in abortion or are devout Christians are at best considered unsophisticated dupes. At worst, they are caricatured as conservative interlopers, piggybacking on the hard work of left-wing women whose progressive ideas alone have allowed the Palins of the world the choices they otherwise would not now enjoy.

Apparently these feminists believe that without the ideas of Gloria Steinem on abortion, a moose-hunting PTA mom would not have made governor. The Democrat's vice presidential candidate, Joe Biden, said Mrs. Palin's election, given her politics, would be "a backward step for women."

(3) Hypocrisy abounds. Many female critics of Mrs. Palin, in Washington and New York politics and media, found their careers enhanced through the political influence of their powerful fathers, their advantageous marriages to male power players and the inherited advantages of capital. The irony is that a Sarah Palin - like a Barbara Jordan, Golda Meir or Margaret Thatcher - made her own way without the help of money or influence.

(4) Most Americans still believe in the old feminism but not this new doctrinaire liberal brand. Apparently millions of Americans like Mrs. Palin's underdog feminist saga and her can-do pluckiness. Many are offended by haughty liberal media elites sneering at someone whom, politics aside, they should be praising - for her substantial achievements, her inspirational personal story and her charisma.

[During the 2008 campaign] we were supposed to learn about a liberated Gov. Sarah Palin. Instead the media taught us more than we ever wanted to know about what they now call feminism.
______________________________

Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the author of "A War Like No Other" (Random House).

Drill
Petroleum is a major part of America’s energy picture. Shall we get it here or abroad?
By Sarah Palin

Given that we’re spending billions of stimulus dollars to rebuild our highways, it makes sense to think about what we’ll be driving on them. For years to come, most of what we drive will be powered, at least in part, by diesel fuel or gasoline. To fuel that driving, we need access to oil. The less use we make of our own reserves, the more we will have to import, which leads to a number of harmful consequences. That means we need to drill here and drill now.

We rely on petroleum for much more than just powering our vehicles: It is essential in everything from jet fuel to petrochemicals, plastics to fertilizers, pesticides to pharmaceuticals. Ac­cord­ing to the Energy Information Ad­min­is­tra­tion, our total domestic petroleum consumption last year was 19.5 million barrels per day (bpd). Motor gasoline and diesel fuel accounted for less than 13 million bpd of that. Meanwhile, we produced only 4.95 million bpd of domestic crude. In other words, even if we ran all our vehicles on something else (which won’t happen anytime soon), we would still have to depend on imported oil. And we’ll continue that dependence until we develop our own oil resources to their fullest extent.

Those who oppose domestic drilling are motivated primarily by environmental considerations, but many of the countries we’re forced to import from have few if any environmental-protection laws, and those that do exist often go unenforced. In effect, American environmentalists are preventing responsible development here at home while supporting irresponsible development overseas.

My home state of Alaska shows how it’s possible to be both pro-environment and pro-resource-development. Alaskans would never support anything that endangered our pristine air, clean water, and abundant wildlife (which, among other things, provides many of us with our livelihood). The state’s government has made safeguarding resources a priority; when I was governor, for instance, we created a petroleum-systems-integrity office to monitor our oil and gas infrastructure for any potential environmental risks.

Alaska also shows how oil drilling is thoroughly compatible with energy conservation and renewable-energy development. Over 20 percent of Alas­ka’s electricity currently comes from renewable sources, and as governor I put forward a long-term plan to increase that figure to 50 percent by 2025. Alaska’s comprehensive plan identifies renewable options across the state that can help rural villages transition away from expensive diesel-generated electricity — allowing each community to choose the solution that best fits its needs. That’s important in any energy plan: Tempting as they may be to central planners, top-down, one-size-fits-all solutions are recipes for failure.

For the same reason, the federal government shouldn’t push a single, uni­versal approach to alternative-powered vehicles. Electric cars might work in Los Angeles, but they don’t work in Alaska, where you can drive hundreds of miles without seeing many people, let alone many electrical sockets. And while electric and hybrid cars have their advantages, producing the electricity to power them still requires an energy source. For the sake of the environment, that energy should be generated from the cleanest source available.

Natural gas is one promising clean alternative. It contains fewer pollutants than other fossil fuels, it’s easier to collect and process, and it is found throughout our country. In Alaska, we’re developing the largest private-sector energy project in history — a 3,000-mile, $40 billion pipeline to transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of natural gas to markets across the United States. Onshore and offshore na­tural gas from Alaska and the Lower 48 can satisfy a large part of our energy needs for decades, bringing us closer to energy independence. Whether we use it to power natural-gas cars or to run natural-gas power plants that charge electric cars — or ideally for both — natural gas can act as a clean “bridge fuel” to a future when more renewable sources are available.

In addition to drilling, we need to build new refineries. America currently has roughly 150 refineries, down from over 300 in the 1970s. Due mainly to environmental regulations, we haven’t built a major new refinery since 1976, though our oil consumption has increased significantly since then. That’s no way to secure our energy supply. The post-Katrina jump in gas prices proved that we can’t leave ourselves at the mercy of a hurricane that knocks a few refineries out of commission.

Building an energy-independent Amer­ica will mean a real economic stimulus. It will mean American jobs that can never be shipped overseas. Think about how much of our trade deficit is fueled by the oil we import — sometimes as much as half of the total. Through this massive transfer of wealth, we lose hundreds of billions of dollars a year that could be invested in our economy. Instead it goes to foreign countries, including some repressive regimes that use it to fund activities that threaten our security.

Reliance on foreign sources of energy weakens America. When a riot breaks out in an OPEC nation, or a developing country talks about nationalizing its oil industry, or a petro-dictator threatens to cut off exports, the probability is great that the price of oil will shoot up. Even in friendly nations, business and financial decisions made for local reasons can de­stabilize Amer­i­ca’s energy market, since the price we pay for foreign oil is subject to rising and falling exchange rates. Decreasing our dependence on foreign sources of energy will reduce the impact of world events on our economy.

In the end, energy independence is not just about the environment or the economy. It’s about freedom and confidence. It’s about building a more secure and peaceful America, an America in which our energy needs will not be subject to the whims of nature, currency speculators, or madmen in possession of vast oil reserves.

Alternative sources of energy are part of the answer, but only part. There’s no getting around the fact that we still need to “drill, baby, drill!” And if those in D.C. say otherwise, we need to tell them: “Yes, we can!”
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Sarah Palin was governor of Alaska from 2006 to 2009, and the Republican candidate for vice ­president in 2008. This article appears in the November 2, 2009, issue of National Review.