Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin (24 page)

Truth optional. Win at all costs.

16
 

Hello, Governor

F
rank,” Scott Heyworth had said, “in the final ten days of a campaign, there's nothing more you can do. The airwaves are bought up, the flyers are out, the signs are up, and the money is all spent. All you can do is wave signs.”

I thought about those words as I got out of bed before dawn on Election Day, Tuesday, November 7, 2006. There truly
was
almost nothing left to do except pray to Almighty God that Sarah would win. We'd done many regrettable things to get to this point, but all of us still believed in her mission to build a brighter future for our children. God willing, volunteers and voters were about to hand over the glass slipper that would complete this Cinderella story.

Around four thirty in the morning, with the temperature hovering around zero, I drove past The Intersection. Anyone who's ever worked on a campaign in Anchorage knows what I mean by The Intersection. This is where the New Seward Highway and Northern Lights Boulevard meet in a blizzard of frantic commuters. Seventy or eighty thousand cars drive by every day, passing our patch of sidewalk near the massive Sears Mall parking lot. During the campaign season, this innocent city block becomes a battleground of banner waving, horn-blowing, slogan-chanting partisans. A core of dedicated Palin volunteers had literally spent the night and camped out on the corner so we'd have the proverbial Boardwalk of campaign real estate, forcing
Knowles to lay claim to a lesser space. The sea of red triumphed again.

Parking along Northern Lights Boulevard, I marveled at the dozen or so hardy souls already standing under the cold blue of the street-lights. They surged toward me as I delivered donuts and bagels. Once others arrived, some with young children, we poured coffee and hot chocolate from a thermos. Bundled in layers of bulky winter gear and breath turning to steam, they bounced on toes to keep warm while waving signs overhead. If a truck driver pulled the cord on his horn in short bursts of Sarah-support, a unified voice would respond, “Go, Sarah!” A driver delivering a thumbs-up received dozens in return, along with a “Whoo! Whoo! Whoo!” chorus.

With this corner hyperkinetically alive and well, by half past five I moved on to the corner of Benson Boulevard and Minnesota Drive. With its own tens of thousands of daily travelers, this scene was playing equally well for us. Approaching the small crowd, I recognized my brother Stevie handing out signs. Jogging in place and looking splendidly puffy in his padded North Slope arctic gear, only a postage stamp's worth of his face showed through the drawn hood. The sea of smiles suggested that even a wind chill of minus-ten degrees could not ice the excitement of this day for any of the congregated supporters. If these efforts were indicative, Palinmania was sweeping the state. On this day, a once-unknown former mayor from Wasilla was challenging a former two-term governor who had every advantage imaginable except our enthusiasm and Sarah's charisma.

With ice crunching underfoot, I circled around the back of my pickup and retrieved several bulky four-by-eight signs from the truck bed. Working slowly through stiff joints, Steve and I mounted the larger posters as background billboards while volunteers held a hot beverage in one hand and a Palin placard in the other. Throughout the state, by six o'clock the morning commute had begun in earnest; street corners from Fairbanks, to the Mat-Su Valley, to Anchorage, Soldotna, Homer, and beyond were Palin red and vibrating with anticipation, mirroring our recent slogan for Sarah: “New Energy for Alaska.” Our hope was that we'd motivate drivers who might be procrastinating
to detour to their voting place and fill in the oval next to the name Palin.

With enthusiasm high, it became obvious there was no need for my cheerleading, so I left for the main campaign headquarters, noting on my smartphone a series of bullish, anecdotal reports from the valley. By all indications, we had the momentum. At our office, I entered to uncharacteristic silence. The piles of signs were gone and, except for strategists John Bitney and Mike Tibbles, who had their heads buried in folders, the rooms were empty. The two men stopped what was a whispered conversation once they saw me.

“What's going on?” I asked.

“Good things, my man, good things,” said Bitney. As if choreographed, they flipped their folders bottom side up, but not before I saw the heading, “Transition,” at the top of a cover page. Tibbles studied my face as if trying to read a reaction. The two men, referred somewhat pejoratively by long-term volunteers as “Tibbles 'n' Bits,” simultaneously bobbed their heads in a silent signal while folding their hands. Tibbles flashed a quivering half smile I'd come to associate with nerves. Bitney forced a grin that looked as if it hurt his face.

“Aren't you going to help with the sign waving?” I asked. “We can use all the bodies we can get.”

“Yeah, I guess I should probably do that, shouldn't I?” said Bitney. He didn't seem enthusiastic, and Tibbles remained silent. Both men, politically savvy and known for their ambition, clearly hadn't expected or welcomed my intrusion. With the polls showing us ahead, I understood that my two colleagues were already moving on. A win today meant that tomorrow would began what is known as transition, that two-month period during which the newly elected governor chose key personnel for jobs and cabinet positions in the upcoming administration.

I suddenly realized that these relative newcomers to our group—and political operatives to boot—were already plotting their own futures in the Palin administration. It dampened my spirits. What was to become of Sarah's Rag Tags after today? We weren't experienced in running government, but we'd been like family and through hard
work and learning on the job, we'd done something remarkable in overwhelming the state's political machinery. I understood that Sarah needed experienced help, but she needed close confidants more. John Bitney? Mike Tibbles? Men like these were competent enough, but when push came to shove, would they hold their own ambition and welfare above all others? Bitney had once said to me, “Frank, do you realize how much money Sarah will be in control of if she's elected governor? It's in the neighborhood of thirteen billion dollars. That's billion, with a
b
!” I thought about that comment and understood that for some, this election was as much about dollars as message. Would these two men fall on their swords to protect our governor or her husband? My gut said no.

As for my own motivations, I hadn't volunteered exactly one year before to land a plum assignment if or when Sarah Palin won. Now I was suddenly feeling forced to look to the future through anxious eyes. Did I want this road to end, here, today, after the election results were finalized? With a million thoughts buzzing around in those brief moments, I realized that I desperately needed to continue on in close contact with my future governor and her administration. There was no desire to become a bureaucrat, but if that's what it took to help Sarah make a difference, then I'd do whatever was necessary. The missteps we'd taken these last months were merely growing pains. My desire was to take new insights and use them to protect Sarah and be that commonsense voice to counteract individuals like these two sitting tight lipped across from me.

Sarah had promised that she would find jobs for most of us, but it seemed a generalized proposal that I took on faith. In my imagination, I'd be assigned tasks similar to those I'd assumed during the campaigns, including troubleshooting, locating and cutting waste, and being a supportive sounding board for Sarah in times of stress. What did I need to know about running government to take on these important duties?

“Listen,” I said, doing my best to pretend that I had no negative thoughts about interloping professionals, “I'm gonna take off, check on the other offices, and make sure we've got rides for everyone, coffee, hot chocolate—”

“Yeah, you do that, Frank. Mike and I have some numbers to crunch. You know.”

Yeah
, I thought,
I know, all right
. After grabbing a pile of phone messages from an in-box, I about-faced, hastened for the exit, and breathed in the refreshingly frigid air. It felt good to be away from that disheartening scene and back to what really mattered most: working with
real
Alaskans.

A quick stop at our other Anchorage campaign headquarters, was more positive. Our office manager, and semiretired engineer Mary Havens, had the place humming. Her small stature did not diminish the confidence she instilled in others. “This day has finally come, Frank,” she said in that hard to believe voice of a child on Christmas morning. “Just look at all those people, so happy. Twenty hour days, all for this moment.”

We shared upbeat reports that we'd heard filtering from word of mouth and discussed the need to paste our newly printed Thank You stickers across our larger signs. As for retrieving the other thirteen thousand signs of all shapes and sizes decorating the state? That would be a massive undertaking for another day. Suffice it to say, with the help of extraordinary talents like Mary Havens, we had an overwhelming victory in the statewide sign war, with advantages of two to one in Anchorage, five to one on the Kenai Peninsula, three to one in Kodiak, three to one in Fairbanks, and twenty to one in the Mat-Su Valley.

My number-one job on Election Day became the same as my number-one job for most of the past year. I'd convey to those volunteers how valuable their sacrifice was to both me and Sarah. And after all these months, it still amazed me how motivating these simple words became. This made my more than one hundred and fifty hours a month on the phone worthwhile.

Sean Parnell's people were down at the next corner, waving signs. Because Sarah had been less than impressed with Parnell's effort, this came as a pleasant surprise. Since Sarah was stuck with him these next four years, I hoped this marked a positive new beginning.

After lunchtime, Sarah arrived at the corner of New Seward and Northern Lights to greet the crowd and wave signs. As she pulled up in her black VW Jetta, she was being interviewing over the phone by Dan Fagan. With the victory appearing close at hand, the talk show host had gone from totally negative to a position of passive-aggressive support. He was saying something like, “I hate Sarah's stance on the oil companies, but we should vote for her because of her stance on social issues. Also, she'll select judges we can live with. Do we want Tony Knowles doing that?” Unbelievably, only days earlier he had suggested that listeners vote for Knowles, saying, “At least we know what we'll get. With Sarah, she'll lock out the oil companies, and business in Alaska will dry up.” From my truck, as I listened on the radio to the interview, I thought that Sarah sounded energized and handled herself well. I gave her a thumbs-up when she got off the call. Without missing a beat, we grabbed a couple of Palin signs and headed toward the excited crowd.

What I saw back at campaign headquarters was still gnawing at my gut, so I took the opportunity to nervously ask her thoughts on transition. I let her know that Mike Tibbles and John Bitney were going through the folder when I'd stopped in at headquarters. She placed her hand next to her mouth and leaned in, whispering, “I think transition needs to be you, me, and Tibbles, but only because he's done this before.” She was wary to discuss transition, she said, because she didn't want to jinx anything. Her brief explanation relaxed me completely. The job I most wanted, as confidant to Sarah, was secure. What a day this was turning out to be.

The events over the next hours felt like Mardi Gras, a whirl of partying, giddiness, anticipation, and hope. All my up-and-down concerns over the last eleven months vanished. We had only the present and the future, and those couldn't be looking better.