City Weekly Writer's Perspective on His Former Mayor Sarah Palin

Yes, I realize that I seem to be on this real Sarah Palin meme this week. However, its like the only thing happening right now. Besides, she's just too disasterously good to pass up.

That being said, Salt Lake City Weekly's Jerre Wroble lived in tiny Wasilia Alaska when Sarah Palin was mayor.

His Take:

Upon learning she’d won the hotly contested race, Palin and her supporters huddled together and prayed to Jesus Christ in gratitude. I began to wonder what was up with our local politicos. I’d watched as Palin aligned herself—in a city mayor’s race—with our newly minted Republican state lawmakers, all tripping over themselves to claim conservative Christian cred. I noticed how positions on abortion and gun rights bubbled up in a municipal race. After her win, a local cable TV show proclaimed Palin as the town’s first “Christian” mayor, much to the surprise of the town’s previous mayors who hadn’t been told their faith was revoked.

Even with all that prayer behind her, Palin’s first years as mayor were bumpy. She had to clean house and eliminate John Stein supporters among her staff. The local media and organizations around town questioned her ability to run a city without experienced people. She rather famously proclaimed: "It's not rocket science. It's $6 million and 53 employees."

That gutsy attitude along with her love of the Alaskan outdoors and her beauty-contestant good looks made her instantly popular and easy to re-elect.

About that time, I up and split Alaska, disillusioned by the conservative political sweep of my community. The Republican Party was seemingly intent on hijacking just about every nonprofit board and political office in the valley, filling them with smug, holier-than-thou operatives (I should point out that this is now changing. One Wasilla lawmaker from that era, Rep. Vic Kohring, for example, is serving time for accepting oil-industry bribes, and more are getting their comeuppance every day).