Alaska Standard.  For 30 years Alaskans have also held onto the hope that a gas pipeline would be built, providing a new economic boom and a long-lasting tax base that could replace the inevitable decline of state tax revenues based on oil production. Today Alaska seems poised to realize this dream, but major unresolved obstacles could easily delay or end this project. …  With Sarah Palin’s (NGP Photo) resignation, it’s now up to Gov. Sean Parnell (NGP Photo) to develop a long-term fiscal plan for Alaska.  Another critical challenge Palin left to Parnell is the question of long-term fiscal certainty for producers of Alaska’s natural gas resources. Each of the major leaseholders in Prudhoe Bay and Pt. Thompson, the fields that are initially expected to provide gas to the pipeline, have made it crystal clear that a successful gas pipeline project is dependent on linking the period of fiscal certainty with the length of the commitments producers must make to their customers.     *  Montreal Gazette.  … the North has been Canada’s El Dorado …. Robert Service, James Houston, and many others have implanted the region so deeply into Canada’s consciousness that when Doug and Bob Mackenzie spoke of the "Great White North," Canadians laughed but also recognized a stereotype that resonates as part of our national identity. … Fifty years after John Diefenbaker’s "roads to resources" program, the North is more open and less mysterious…. Several countries, including the U.S. and Russia, are showing interest in what’s starting to look like a 21st-century approximation of the 19th-century scramble for Africa. …Stephen Harper has headed up North this week. He goes up every year, but only in the summer. This year he’s holding a cabinet meeting there, having seal meat for lunch, and providing lots of photo opportunities.  … The Russians say they’ll drop paratroops at the North Pole next spring, a publicity stunt surpassing anything Canada can manage.    *     Reuters.  Growing volumes of crude oil from Canada and the Gulf of Mexico should assure U.S. Gulf Coast refiners adequate supplies for years to come despite fast-declining imports from Mexico and Venezuela.