Lisa Murkowski makes time for DC lobbyists, but is MIA while Republican colleagues continue the fight for lower taxes and against the Democrat agenda.

Anchorage, September 30, 2010 — Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski has missed 80% of the Senate’s votes since losing the Republican primary, including every Senate vote since proclaiming she was “continuing the fight for Alaskans” by launching her write-in campaign.

Lisa has missed critical Senate votes to: cut government spending; reign in some of the outrageous small business burdens in ‘health care reform’; and to provide ‘disapproval’ of National Mediation Board rules changes for airline and railway unions, among others. In some cases she was the only Republican missing. In fact, since the Republican primary, Murkowski has only been present for one day of Senate votes out of eight (September 16, 2010).

“Actions speak louder than words and this is just another example of Lisa saying one thing to Alaskan voters and actually doing another,” Miller spokesman Randy DeSoto said. “Murkowski spent months trying to convince the voters that she really was a conservative while voting for things like the Wall Street Bailouts and sponsoring Alaska job-killing cap and trade legislation.”

DeSoto continued, “Our self-described ‘conservative Republican’ senator is now surrounding herself with Democrats, tacking hard to the left and is back championing her old big spending ways. Is she really ‘fighting for Alaska?’ It’s hard to fight for the people of Alaska when you don’t bother to show up.”

As a ‘write-in candidate’ Lisa has managed to find time for DC lobbyists though. According to the September 17, 2010 Politico story “Murkowski hits up lobbyists,” her staff were quick to call on some of DC’s “most prominent lobbyists” for a call with the Senator just one day after her campaign announcement. It makes sense that she would solicit lobbyists before telling Alaskans of her campaign. According moneyline.cq.com, nearly 65% of the money she has raised in 2009 and 2010 has been raised from individuals and interests outside of Alaska.

DeSoto pointed out, “It is interesting to note that during the primary campaign she said she was too busy to debate Joe Miller (until days before the election) because she was “fighting for Alaska” in the U.S. Senate. Why has she abandoned the fight now?”

The critical votes:

Senate Vote 231 – HR 5297: Small-Business Tax and Lending – Cloture

September 14, 2010 – The Johanns amendment would repeal a tax information-reporting requirement from the 2010 health care overhaul law, offset by increasing the affordability exemption to the individual mandate in the health care law and funding allocated for prevention programs. The Nelson amendment would exempt businesses with fewer than 25 employees from the tax compliance provision in the health care law and would raise the reporting threshold for the remaining companies from $600 to $5,000. The substitute [Johann] would provide for a variety of small-business tax initiatives, including a revival of an expired bonus depreciation provision to allow companies to write off assets more quickly, and authorize a small-business lending fund.

Motion rejected 46-52: R 39-0; D 7-50; I 0-2.

Senate Vote 239 – S J Res 30: Union Elections – Motion to Proceed

September 23, 2010 – Isakson, R-Ga., motion to proceed to consideration of a joint resolution that would provide for congressional disapproval of a National Mediation Board rules change regarding airline and railway union elections under the Railway Labor Act.

Motion rejected 43-56: R 40-0; D 3-54; I 0-2.

Senate Vote 245 – HR 3081: Continuing Appropriations ‘Shell’ – Spending Reductions

September 29, 2010 – Thune, R-S.D., amendment no. 4676 to the Inouye, D-Hawaii, substitute amendment no. 4674. The Thune amendment would provide for a 5 percent reduction in spending, except for defense, homeland security, veterans programs and other matters adjusted by the substitute. The substitute would provide continuing appropriations through Dec. 3, 2010, for all federal departments and agencies whose fiscal 2010 appropriations bills have not been enacted.

Rejected 48-51: R 40-0; D 8-49; I 0-2.

Murkowski’s Missed Votes since the Primary:

9/13: 1 vote

9/14: 3 votes

She was present on 9/16: 4 votes

9/21: 1 vote

9/23: 2 votes

9/27: 1 vote

9/28: 2 votes

9/29: 5 votes

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Anchorage, Alaska. September 23, 2010 — Joe Miller, candidate for US Senate, picked up the endorsement of FreedomWorks. The group is dedicated to bringing lower taxes, less government and greater freedom to the American people. FreedomWorks PAC Chairman Dick Armey observed, “Joe Miller is the clear choice for true conservatives in this election. He has enough common sense to recognize that a nation cannot tax its way to growth, or spend its way to prosperity. We need to support candidates like Joe who will hold the line on spending and make job creation and fixing the economy the top priority.”

The endorsement adds, “Miller is also a signer of the Contract FROM America, an authentic grassroots document created by the people, for the people, expressing what a majority of Americans want for their future. After garnering nearly half a million votes in less than two months, the Contract was whittled down to ten core ideas which advocate fundamental tax reform, fiscal responsibility and limited government. Joe Miller opposes all encroachments on individual freedom, including ObamaCare, job-killing cap and trade energy regulation, and all unnecessary tax hikes.”

Miller responded, “I’m deeply appreciative of FreedomWorks’ endorsement and its willingness to work with our campaign towards victory this November. The mission of the organization is directly in line with our core message of the need to return to limited government. Dick Armey was a foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution and one of the top leaders that orchestrated the Republican Revolution of 1994. He has been a consistent voice calling for restoring American government to its proper bounds. My highest goal, if elected to the US Senate, is to be part of the solution of putting our nation back on a prosperous path and free from massive deficits.

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(CNN) – Joe Miller hit back at his on-again opponent Sen. Lisa Murkowski Monday, saying she broke her word to voters by announcing her plans to run as a write-in candidate in the Alaska Senate race.

“I won the Republican primary with the largest Republican voter turnout in the history of this state, and we’ve had an extraordinary number come behind this campaign in the days following that, and even more coming behind this campaign after [Murkowski] announced her write-in campaign, which of course contradicted the word she gave just a few days before the primary that she would support the victor of the Republican primary,” Miller told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King.

Read the rest of the story at CNN

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Anchorage, Alaska. September 17, 2010 — Two hundred and twenty-three years ago delegates from throughout the United States assembled in Philadelphia to sign a world-changing document. The Declaration of Independence was our nation’s founding charter, stating the purpose of the new nation and government—to secure our God-given rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness–and the Constitution was the means the Founders adopted to that end. We commemorate that important date each year on Constitution Day, September 17.

The Constitution established a federal system of government granting specific powers from “the People” to the federal government and retaining the rest for themselves and the states. The founding document recognized that power has a tendency to corrupt and whenever too much power is placed within any branch of government or level of government, lost liberty inevitably follows. As James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution,” wrote so eloquently in the Federalist Papers, “But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

In recent years, citizens all over the United States have recognized that our federal government needs to be brought back under control, and they’ve been making their voices heard in the public square and at the ballot box. The federal government has grown too big to the detriment of that power that should be reserved to the people and the states.

If given the honor of being your next United States Senator, I will pledge to support and defend the Constitution, as I did two decades ago as a newly commissioned officer when I took the oath at West Point. As a former judge at the state and federal level, I also understand the importance of maintaining the rule of law, under the Constitution, in order to preserve our free society. I will work with other members of Congress to bring the federal government back within its bounds, so we can preserve the American dream for ourselves and future generations. May we all look back on September 17, 1787, with gratitude for the incredible gift of the Constitution and the principles of freedom it established and a form of government that is the envy of the world.

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