As the campaign to take a little over $500 from every Alaskan's dividend continues, the truth seems to be taking a beating. Even some legislators who went along with the ballot proposal under the pressure of adjournment and the exaggerated deficit must be flinching at the claims of those trying to get a "yes" vote.

The campaign spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on TV, radio, "push polling" and print is trying to scare every special interest to energize them in a low turnout special election. The scare marketed in the Governor's letter to Longevity Bonus recipients, union letters to membership, teacher unions literature to parents, industry letters and publications is that you will lose what is most important to you unless you join the effort to cut dividends over $500 and reverse the 20 year history of Permanent Fund growth.

Sadly, this attack on the greatest public sector economic success since statehood is all on an ADVISORY VOTE. A non-binding, confusing question with 8 times more spent to advocate one side than the other.

The question itself is obviously deceptive, or it wouldn't have been exempted by the legislature from the clarity standard of the state ballot language law.

It says "After paying annual dividends to residents and inflation proofing the Permanent Fund, should a portion of Permanent Fund investment earnings be used to help balance the state budget?", it means "After first cutting dividends over $500 and reducing inflation proofing so much that the principal will decline in value, should over $800 million dollars per year of Permanent Fund income be used to fund government spending?".

A deceptive advisory vote with over half a million dollars spent to manipulate you into giving them the advice they want mocks the democratic process.

The proposal and its timing are unnecessary. The legislature was railroaded by a collection of special interests at a time when oil prices and projections were at an all time low. There is not a billion dollar shortfall and oil production levels are projected to stay the same for at least the next six or seven years. According to the Legislative Finance Division, the real shortfall at current prices is less than half of the billion dollar number being used to justify the plan. State reserves and the income on those reserves make the shortfall clearly manageable in a reasoned, incremental way with real voter input.

Those who today try to rewrite history to say the primary purpose of the Permanent Fund was only to endow government spending are simply wrong. Some advocates wanted to endow government spending. Others wanted to individualize the collective resource wealth. Hammond's Alaska, Inc. plan predated the Permanent Fund and envisioned dividends. Probably the greatest agreement of purpose was to simply slow the spending, which had consumed the 1969 lease sale bonuses of $900 million.

Whatever the intent of the 70s, the history of the 80s and 90s has been that the Permanent Fund and the Dividend Program are recognized worldwide for their success at saving resource wealth and sharing its benefits fairly. After almost two decades, the revenue stream of the Permanent Fund Dividend going into the economy, through private choices, is a core part of the state's economic base. Numerous studies have shown that the Permanent Fund Dividend has more turnover and more downstream impact on people, businesses and the economy than almost any other form of state distribution or spending. A $500 reduction in dividends is exactly like a $500 head tax on Alaska residents. About half of the money comes from a combination of children, the poor and the elderly. There is room for healthy disagreement on what combination of cuts and revenues should be used to close the fiscal gap, but the last choice should be a head tax on Alaskans only.

To be permanent, the Permanent Fund must keep its purchasing power in real dollars, not diluted by inflation. Just as your estimated $1,740 dividend this year won't buy as much as the original $1,000 dividend did in 1982, unless the principal balance of the Permanent Fund goes up more than inflation, the principal value is really going down.

To get over $800 million for state spending, the plan not only cuts dividends over $500, but it also reduces the payments that protect the Permanent Fund principal from inflation, so that the real value of the fund goes down. And, it keeps the inflation payments in a separate account available for spending, not in the protected principal of the fund.

According to the Permanent Fund Corporation's publication on the advisory vote, "In real 1999 dollars, the Plan doesn't quite preserve the total Fund's purchasing power in the median expected case, and the principal of the Fund goes down in real value."

The proposal is deceptive, unnecessary and unwise, but the real question in this campaign is who do you trust with the future of the Permanent Fund?

If you place you trust in the multinational corporations who opposed the creation of the Permanent Fund and their allies funding the "yes" campaign, or the governors who tried to eliminate or cut the dividends or vetoed deposits to the Permanent Fund, or the politicians and special interest who want to spend your dividend on their interest, you'll vote yes.

If you trust the defenders of the Permanent Fund, led by former Governor Jay Hammond, Oral Freeman and those who have championed the deposits to the Permanent Fund, or the information provided by the Permanent Fund itself, then you will join Hammond in voting NO.

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