I think this might be it. Her state is in worse debt shape than California. They carry a worse Debt-to-GDP ratio than any other state in the USA. And this is from when she left office - she can't blame the new guy. You can cite it was a state issue - but she doubled the Wasila city debt in her short term there too.
Aside from the fact she supported capping emissions, Amnety bill, and bailout bill - it now appears she is one of those big spenders she hates so much. Despite her state having so much oil - and others in that area beign debt free due to oil revenues - Alaska is in this terrible shape. Sounds to me like she is what someone called me today - a lib that loves her guns.
Please, repubs, run a RESPONSIBLE spender in 2012. please.
Post-Palin Alaska has largest debt burden in US
Sarah Palin has long sold herself as a fiscal conservative, arguing against the Democrats' health overhaul on the grounds that the nation simply can't afford it.
But when the former vice presidential candidate resigned as governor of Alaska in the summer of 2009, she left the state with a 70 percent debt-to-GDP ratio -- the highest state debt burden in the United States.
That's according to data compiled by the Washington Independent's Megan Carpentier, who notes that Alaska has a debt burden similar to "that of Jordan and Palin’s favorite health care resource, Canada, and a higher ratio than Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, India, the Philippines or Uruguay."
By comparison, crisis-stricken California has a debt ratio of less than 40 percent. All the more confounding about Alaska's debt is the fact that it is an oil-producing region with a small population to share in that wealth. Oil-rich Alberta, Canada, for example, collects no sales tax and still managed to retire its debt entirely in 2004.
While Alaska's massive debt burden can't be blamed entirely on Palin's two-and-a-half-year stint as governor, she did face similar debt problems while mayor of Wasilla, and those appear to be of her own making.
Wasilla's municipal debt went from around $1 million when she came in to office, to around $22 million when she left, mostly as a result of the construction of a sports arena and public works projects championed by Palin.
While Alaska's debt load is high by the standards of US states, it's worth noting some nations have considerably higher debt loads. Japan, for example, is carrying a debt load of more than 190 percent of GDP; Greece, recently hit by a debt crisis, has a 108 percent debt-to-GDP ratio.
The debt load for the US federal government clocked in at around 53 percent in 2009; the debt is expected to increase to 68.5 percent by 2014.
