# So when is Palin giving back all the clothes? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 6, 2008, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457 "2008-11-06T15:45:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/161 "2008-11-09T05:46:40Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Really? She goes out and works on the fishing boats? > > 'Cause that would impress me, just as I expect it would have impressed a lot of us, had we heard that. I wonder why we didn’t? I don’t know why you didn’t. I heard it within the first week of her nomination. Maybe you didn’t hear it because you only had room for negative stereotypes. Fishing boats and working on oil rigs are tough jobs that have a high salary. Todd Palin likely makes a pretty good salary working on oil rigs. $ 1.2m is above the median certainly, but 92k is above the world median. It’s all relative. All Americans are wealthy but 1.2m isn’t ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/162 "2008-11-09T05:54:34Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > I don’t know why you didn’t. I heard it within the first week of her nomination. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/163 "2008-11-09T06:38:25Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Cite? I’ll second that request for a cite. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/164 "2008-11-09T06:40:01Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > $ 1.2m is above the median certainly, but 92k is above the world median. It’s all relative. All Americans are wealthy but 1.2m isn’t ridiculous. All Americans are not wealthy compared to all other Americans. And that is what counts, not how the average American’s net worth compares to a beggar in India, or some other ridiculous comparison. ---
**Author:** ![whorfin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6f9a4e/32.png) [@whorfin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whorfin)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/165 "2008-11-09T06:58:01Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > It’s not the tax. You can’t just give $150,000 to a politician, whether they pay tax on it or not. True. But even if it’s illegal for a politician to recieve, if he gets it and keeps it, it’s taxable. Illegal income is still income, and clothes you get because of your position and get to keep look awfully like income to a non-lawyer. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/166 "2008-11-09T07:12:44Z")
> [@whorfin](#): > > True. But even if it’s illegal for a politician to recieve, if he gets it and keeps it, it’s taxable. Illegal income is still income,… Yes, but it should be the least of our worries. Is this **Whorfin’s Law** , as a political thread grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Al Capone approaches one? ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/167 "2008-11-09T07:17:40Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Is this **Whorfin’s Law** , as a political thread grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Al Capone approaches one? 😃 Good one. ---
**Author:** ![whorfin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6f9a4e/32.png) [@whorfin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whorfin)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/168 "2008-11-09T07:35:01Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Yes, but it should be the least of our worries. > > Is this **Whorfin’s Law** , as a political thread grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Al Capone approaches one? I wasn’t trying to compare her to capone. Just responding to your point that it wasn’t the tax that she’ll have to worry about. Now, if she doesn’t pay the tax, then that’s different. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/169 "2008-11-09T07:39:40Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Cite? [http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary\_0286-30026101\_ITM](http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-30026101_ITM) There is one from April 1, 2007, I know it’s on April Fool’s Day so maybe you should watch out lest you be fooled. I can’t of course provide the cite of the first place that I read it, or prove that I’d read it when I claim to have, but it’s not like it was this deep esoteric knowledge hermetically sealed in a Mason Jar in the depths of Alaskan history. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/170 "2008-11-09T08:17:04Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > [http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary\_0286-30026101\_ITM](http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-30026101_ITM) > > There is one from April 1, 2007, I know it’s on April Fool’s Day so maybe you should watch out lest you be fooled. > > I can’t of course provide the cite of the first place that I read it, or prove that I’d read it when I claim to have, but it’s not like it was this deep esoteric knowledge hermetically sealed in a Mason Jar in the depths of Alaskan history. This is the sum total of your cite: > [@](#): > > No, she’ll be in rubber boots picking sockeye at the family’s Bristol Bay commercial setnet sites. Wow, what a vast and complete source of information _National Fisherman_ magazine is! And yet, this seems to contrast with my cite: > [@](#): > > Toad’s Fisheries sells salmon caught in Bristol Bay to a commercial buyer in Seattle. Last year, the business made $15,513 in profits, with a gross income of $49,893 offset by $32,979 in expenses, the couple’s joint tax return shows. The previous year was even leaner, raising $7,690 after expenses. Both returns name Todd Palin as proprietor and the couple’s Wasilla home as a main office. > > On her public financial disclosure form, Palin describes the business as a sole proprietorship owned by her husband, listing the type and amount of proceeds simply as “Fishing Income.” No disclosure of income for Sarah and no listing of her as a co-proprietor. [Palins’ 2007 tax forms](http://www.johnmccain.com/downloads/2007TaxForms_Palin.pdf) [Palins’ 2006 tax forms](http://www.johnmccain.com/downloads/2006_TaxForms_Palin.pdf) Even her [Form 278](http://www.johnmccain.com/downloads/Form278_Palin.pdf) lists Todd as the sole proprietor. Sarah Palin may fish for fun, but thus far I see nothing to indicate that she works as a commercial fisherman, other than assertions in **National Fisherman** magazine and by her supporters. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/171 "2008-11-09T09:55:38Z")
[Here’s video of her doing some commercial fishing.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX6ZKA6tlO4) From her father’s words, as reported by the Washington Post: > [@](#): > > But Chuck has seen his daughter handle herself in other perilous situations and come out all right. A few years ago, he watched her pilot husband Todd Palin’s commercial fishing boat in a storm. Todd was working at his oil-field job on the North Slope, and Palin and her father had been fishing on Bristol Bay. “It was the toughest work I’ve ever done, and it wasn’t only hard, it was dangerous,” Chuck says. At the end of the run, they had to get the boat on a trailer amid crashing surf. As cold, metallic-sheened waves tossed the trawler around, Chuck quailed. > > “I’m not doing that,” he said. > > “Get out of the way,” Palin said. “I’ll do it.” > > She did. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/172 "2008-11-09T11:05:48Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > [Here’s video of her doing some commercial fishing.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX6ZKA6tlO4) > > From her father’s words, as reported by the Washington Post: Oh, my God! Her daddy says she’s a good girl! Who can argue with that? You realize, the deeper you go into this, providing evidence that she has genuinely worked as a commercial fisher, the more it looks like she was working a second job while on the public tit? I don’t happen to believe that you can actually show such a thing (“Aww, Todd took wifey along on a few trips, and she got up off her ass now and again!” is more like what probably happened) but if you can, be very careful about giving away free ammo. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/173 "2008-11-09T11:33:32Z")
And your YouTube link is just too much. When you’ve got nothing, post a link and assume no one’s going to open it? Almost worked with me. To save you guys time, it’s literally a 30-second clip of SP in a boat touching a fishing line the first few seconds and then SP sitting down in the boat staring out at the water. I’ve done more fishing on the Staten Island Ferry. And I’m not sure what your timeline is here–but the scenarios I speculate about above, with SP double-dipping–only apply to any serious commercial fishing she did while Governor of Alaska, if any. If you’re trying to show that she did commerical fishing while Mayor of Wasilla, and assuming you’re able to, then what does that say about her executive experience for the post of VP? 'She had a job so tough she was able to work another job at same time"? All this fishing BS is just image-building crap, IMO, but the truer it is and the more substance you provide, the more you weaken her already-weak claims to have in-depth knowledge of how government works and her effectiveness in administering Wasilla and /or Alaska. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/174 "2008-11-09T13:55:37Z")
> [@Sam Stone's link](#): > > A few years ago, he watched her pilot husband Todd Palin’s commercial fishing boat in a storm. Todd was working at his oil-field job on the North Slope, and Palin and her father had been fishing on Bristol Bay. 😕 ISTM that the obvious interpretation of that statement is that Palin and her father were using her husband’s commercial fishing boat one day to do some **recreational** fishing while her husband was away at his rig-worker job. That’s not surprising at all. Is there any evidence to show that Palin participated in the day-to-day commercial fishing runs, as opposed to just taking the boat out for fun sometimes when Todd wasn’t using it? That **would** kind of surprise me: I thought she was busy being mayor. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/175 "2008-11-09T15:08:43Z")
> [@geniios](#): > > Oh but of course I do, I’ll cite Wikopedia ..but first give me a minute I have to go type it all in .. So, this is what happens around here when the Freeper boards are down… -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/176 "2008-11-09T15:08:49Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > That’s not surprising at all. Is there any evidence to show that Palin participated in the day-to-day commercial fishing runs, as opposed to just taking the boat out for fun sometimes when Todd wasn’t using it? That **would** kind of surprise me: I thought she was busy being mayor. Hey, that’s what [she hired a city manager](http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/09/17/palin_mayor/) for. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/177 "2008-11-09T18:02:06Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > That **would** kind of surprise me: I thought she was busy being mayor. Signin’ checks on Tuesdays and havin’ a meetin’ on Thursdays! ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/178 "2008-11-09T18:29:56Z")
**Sam Stone** , while I appreciate the effort, surely you realize that anecdotes are not evidence. See also the points that **prr** made. When faced with the cold hard reality of self-reported tax forms, offering up a story from her father isn’t going to have the same weight. I watched your video link( all :40 of it), and with the big logo splashed over it and the poor quality, I can only concede that it might be Sarah Palin. It also might be Britney Spears, Sarah Silverman, or any other woman between the ages of 20 and 60. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/179 "2008-11-09T18:32:39Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > It also might be Britney Spears, Sarah Silverman, or any other woman between the ages of 20 and 60. I can state with some authority that I didn’t do it. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457/180 "2008-11-09T19:16:28Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I can state with some authority that I didn’t do it. hmmmm I suppose that asking for corroboration for a statement from a goddess is going to get me in big trouble, so I guess we can take you at your word… your eminence. 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-when-is-palin-giving-back-all-the-clothes/471457.md?page=10)