Murkowski Campaign Touts Her RINO’ness as a Positive

Lisa Murkowski’s write-in effort is putting her close to Joe Miller.  I wanted to understand what very Conservative Alaska voters saw in her over a truly Conservative Joe Miller.  First, her campaign website.  The entire web site talks about her career in Washington (emphasis mine):

With Lisa Murkowski, a known brand in the Senate with a demonstrated ability to work across the aisle

She’s actually bragging about being a RINO.  Is she?  Could some off her votes be questionable when measured against Conservative principles?  Well, at a glance, she didn’t vote with Republicans on one out-of-four votes.  Digging into the individual issues she voted on, here’s what I found:

Just since September 13th of this year she has failed to vote 13 times.  There were only 17 possible votes, so she failed to service Alaska as their Senator 75% of the time in the last two months!!  Some of those votes would have benefited from her participation.  In every case, she would have been one more vote for the Conservatives in Congress and stood against the fiscally irresponsible Democrats.  Instead she avoided the conflict and gave a silent nod to the progressive agenda.  Here’s a sampling from The Washington Post (emphasized notes are mine):

Vote 245: H R 3081: Thune Amdt. No. 4676; To reduce spending other than national security spending by 5 percent. – She didn’t vote – same as voting Democrat on this issue

Vote 238: On the Cloture Motion: Motion to Invoke Cloture on the Motion to Proceed to S. 3454; National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011 – She Didn’t Vote – same as voting Democrat on this issue

Vote 231: To repeal the expansion of information reporting requirements for payments of $600 or more – This clause in Obamacare is a small business and jobs killer.  Repealing it would relieve small businesses like the fisherman in Alaska, from having to report every purchase or sale over $600 as an individual item.  This is also a step towards repealing the whole of the government take over of health care – She Didn’t Vote – same as voting Democrat on this issue.

Vote 230: On the Nomination: Confirmation Jane Branstetter Stranch, of Tennessee, to be U.S. Circuit Judge for the Sixth Circuit.  While the sixth circuit does not include Alaska, we have all seen how important U.S. Court of Appeals judges can be (Arizona immigration law, defense of marriage, right to bear arms, etc).  Any Conservative should jump at the chance to ensure that good constitutional constructionist judges are put on benches whenever they can – She Didn’t Vote – same as voting Democrat on this nomination

This is just in the past six weeks.  Imagine the damage she’s done to the Country over her entire career in Congress as a true RINO.  She may well have voted “present” more times than Obama if the option were made available, instead, she just didn’t vote at all.  As if to put an exclamation point on her RINO-voting tendencies, the American Conservative Union gave her voting record a 68% in 2009 – far worse than even the accomplished RINO John McCain.  To prove the point, when asked who she would caucus with, Murkowski alarmingly responded that she would Caucus with just about everyone including “Greens” and “Democrats”. When pressed by CNN she told them this:

She skirted the issue when asked what party she would caucus with in the new Congress and said she would be returning to represent “Alaskans interest,” instead of the Republican Party’s.

So she won’t be caucusing with the Republicans?  Guess that’ll show those Republican Alaskans that voted her out in the primaries .. or something.

So what was Lisa Murkowski doing while being paid by U.S. taxpayers?

• Lost her re-election bid during the Republican primary – whined, cried, jumped up-and-down about it then started her attempt to steal the seat back with a write-in campaign
• Sent out dishonest and untruthful mailers
• Attacked Sarah Palin
• Used her Senate position to enrich herself at taxpayer’s expense

Lisa is asking Alaka’s voters to re-elect her based on her record.  Well, here’s her real record, hopefully Alaskans are paying attention.