20,000 Plus Turned Out in Auburn, N.Y. To See Gov.Sarah Palin

Gov. Palin speaks at Seward House during Founder’s Day events in Auburn, NY on June 6, 2009. Part 1 of 5.

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Palin speaks at Seward House Part 2

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Palin speaks at Seward House Part 3

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Palin speaks in Auburn, NY – Part 4

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Palin speaks in Auburn, NY – Part 5

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The Washington Post
More than 20,000 people turned out to see Palin lead a parade through downtown Auburn and sign a proclamation honoring Seward, the 19th-century Secretary of State who negotiated the $7.2 million deal with Russia for Alaska, which is celebrating its 50th year of statehood.
Later, Palin spoke to several hundred people at a private fundraiser for the Seward House Museum, where she criticized the Obama administration for its policies on national security and energy and its handling of the economic crisis.

“It’s clear to many that some of our priorities as a nation are reversed,” Palin told the several hundred people who each paid $100 or more to attend a garden party on the museum grounds. “Alaskans get tired of hearing that Washington bureaucrats know what’s best for us so we push and fight and challenge decisions made inside the Beltway when they are not in the best interests of the country, and we know that decisions that are being made recently are not in the country’s best interests.”

Alaska became the nation’s 49th state on Jan. 3, 1959.
Palin and her entourage arrived in upstate New York on Friday. She toured the home of Harriet Tubman, the Civil War-era abolitionist who led dozens of slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad and is buried in Auburn. Later Friday, she traveled to Seneca Falls to visit the National Women’s Hall of Fame and Women’s Rights National Historic Park.
Palin’s trip was paid for by her political action committee, SarahPAC.
Her husband and daughter Willow, as well as Palin’s sister and her son, accompanied the governor to upstate New York.
From her speech:

“We never need to fear that though we’re not a perfect nation, that we must apologize for being proud of ourselves.”

Our resources are there, and the time is now, right now, and we’re ready to develop. And we already provide about 17% of the U.S. domestic supply of energy, but we could do more. And it’s time. But believe it or not, what prohibits our development, what stands in the way, is government in Washington D.C.

Alaska can actually quench America’s thirst for hydrocarbons for years, and reduce energy costs, and reduce the dependence on foreign sources of energy if given the opportunities that America was founded upon — remember that was the exploration, and the innovation, and the production, and the hard work.

But drilling seems to be such a sensitive issue right now. It’s a political one that many don’t want to take on because it’s not an easy issue even though the choice really is quite clear. You can provide jobs and energy independence and national security by drilling in your sister state. Or you send jobs and you send our money to foreign countries asking them to ramp up production of energy sources so that we can import it – some of these countries not necessarily liking America – that is the choice.

Now Alaskans get tired of hearing that Washington bureaucrats know what’s best for us. So we push and we fight and we challenge decisions made inside the Beltway when they’re not in the country’s best interest. And we know decisions being made lately, we believe are not in the nation’s best interest, not when they can’t lead us to energy independence. So though it seems that there are some attempts to try to make some from Alaska to sit down and shut up, we’re not going to sit down and shut up, we’re going to spread the message.

We persist because as Alaskans we are independent thinkers, who like Central New Yorkers, we seek to do what is right, not what is just easy. And it seems that when government moves out of the way, that’s when progress can happen.

I recently turned down, or vetoed, stimulus dollars that were tied to implementing…some mandates from the federal government trying to take away more control of our local governments, and our families, and our businesses. In this case, implementing universal energy building codes that some claimed after I vetoed the money “oh, she’s just trying to make a political statement.” And, no, I’m actually trying to use some common sense here, and some may be uncomfortable with that, but it is the right thing to do.

You know the response I got when I vetoed these dollars? “Girl, are you crazy, the federal government is handing out free money and if you don’t take it another state’s going to spend it.” Oh this borrowed, debt ridden, government growing money – it is not free money, and taking it takes away anything that is free.

So many in Congress warned the states about the ramifications of accepting the money, and most legislators went around governors who didn’t want to take all the money, and they resolved via resolutions to take the money anyway. But opportunity for development and local control, that is what’s taken away when all of these dollars are accepted without questioning them, because, believe it or not, there are fat strings attached to this borrowed money. See that attitude of free money is wrong.

Finally I have just conceded, I’ve said ok, I just won’t claim that there are strings attached. I won’t use that term anymore. Because the more we dig into these mandates, these connections that the money would have that we would spend coming from the federal government, including the string attached to these dizzying federal debts that we are handing to our kids and to their kids to pay off for us – I can’t say strings attached anymore, now I say they are ropes…They are debt building, binding, controlling ropes and it is bigger government that ultimately will take away our opportunities and our freedoms.

And now precedent says government will bail you out, depending on the decisions that you’ve made if you’re not prudent with your business dollars. Government will buy you out. Anyone need a car? And this is a problem because we cannot afford this government largess and control and unrestrained spending. I don’t think that’s what Seward had in mind. And I do not believe it’s the will of the people.

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Wild Thing’s comment……….
WOW 20,000 plus, fantastic! It’s so refreshing to see LEADERSHIP from an elected official.
I looked this place up where she spoke. Auburn only has a population of 28,000 and it’s heavily democrat. A Virginia couple that traveled 12 hours to see Sarah.
Out of an estimated 20,000 people screaming Sa-RAH, Sa-RAH, they found a rumpled protestor who tried to bring up the unfortunate stereotypes about her.
Sarah has the ability to lead and inspire. Reagan had it. Palin is younger and less experienced than Reagan when he ascended to the national scene, but she has it as well.

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…..Thank you Richard for sending this to me.