Photos from Anchorage's United Against the War on Women march and rally

[Blue_In_AK]

26. Alaska's Big Three oil companies are already under an obligation to produce

as part of their lease agreements, but they'd rather sit on the oil as they wait for prices to increase even more. If the state gave them more money in an effort to force them to put more oil in the pipeline, they'd just invest that money somewhere else. Luckily, our bipartisan senate shut Sean down on this one, at least for the time being.

Oil politics is quite complex here due to the fact that our Constitution states that the citizens of the state are the "owners" of the oil, so the oilies don't have to negotiate with private owners like they do in the Lower 48 oil fields. It's our governor's and legislature's responsibility to see that the citizens/state of Alaska get the maximum benefit from the development of the resources, but Sean Parnell (who was, after all, a Conoco-Phillips lobbyist before he became Sarah's lieutenant gov. and worked for the law firm that represented Exxon in the EXXON VALDEZ litigation) seems to be working for the benefit of the oil companies. He's a real piece of work, flying under the radar a bit nationally, but just as deranged as Scott Walker, Rick Scott, et al.