Silliness

As Alaskans await Attorney General Kevin Clarkson’s decision about whether signature-gathering for a wrong-headed, politically motivated recall petition aimed at removing Gov. Michael Dunleavy from office can proceed, we wonder at the silliness of it all.

Clarkson is to decide whether there are adequate grounds for a recall and allow recall proponents to begin gathering the 71,252 signatures needed to force the matter into a special election. In Alaska, those grounds include misconduct, incompetence or failure to perform duties prescribed by law.

What has Dunleavy done to deserve recall? The Recall Dunleavy bunch – and make no mistake, the Left is hip deep in this fiasco – says he failed to appoint a Palmer District Court judge seat within the 45 days mandated by law. No matter that he did appoint one before the seat on the bench was vacated by the retiring judge.

The group also says the Dunleavy administration made a mistake in a budget decision. The mistake was corrected quickly, but, hey, the group says, that amounts to incompetence.

Lastly, Dunleavy’s office used state resources to push partisan ads on Facebook, the group claims. Those ads actually targeted legislators who were opposing the governor’s budget policies, Must Read Alaska points out, and whether they were partisan in nature will be up to the courts.

“His brief time as governor has brought us an atmosphere of fear and distress, as people worry about whether they will be able to care for special-needs children or whether they will lose their jobs, their homes, and their ability to live in Alaska,” Recall Dunleavy says.

Good grief, when we first heard the grounds alleged by the group, we thought it was a joke because, in reality, the group is saying: The governor did not do what we wanted, when we wanted and how we wanted it done. He did not let us further bankrupt the state and we want him gone.

Taking a page from the Left in Washington, D.C., Dunleavy’s political enemies simply are trying to undo the last election, despite claims to the contrary. If we cannot win, they say, neither will you.

We fervently hope Clarkson stops the recall effort in its tracks. Then the recall folks will be forced to prove their incredibly flimsy case in court, rather than waste more of Alaskans’ time and energy.