Dunleavy changes state letterhead again to 'Mike,' instead of 'Michael J.'

Gov. Michael J. Dunleavy is henceforth to be referred to as Gov. Mike Dunleavy on the state letterhead, according to an email sent to state officials Friday.

This seems to be part of the Dunleavy political rebranding, an effort to create a more appealing image for the post-Arduin era. Insignificant steps of this sort will not defuse the recall campaign, which remains a grave threat to the governor, by any name.

Perhaps the governor and his staff think that switching to the colloquial will make him seem more approachable than the formal Michael J,. though that appellation has never hurt the actor whose last name is Fox.

It would be nice to know the name of the person who decided this and how much it is going to cost. The old letterhead is to be discarded.

This is the third version of the letterhead in the last year.

When Dunleavy first took office, the state letterhead called him Mike, but within days someone decided that Michael J. would be the gubernatorial handle. Now he is going back to the future, so to speak.

A press release from the governor’s office Thursday about the annual Christmas open house in Juneau was the first I’ve seen recently in which he was addressed as Mike. (The state website switched to Mike on Dec. 10.)

This is a waste of time, effort and money. It reminds me the opening days of the second Hickel administration, when the attempt was made to rebrand Wally as Walter J.

As the Associated Press put it in 1990, “The AP's style on the new governor's name henceforth will be Walter J. Hickel, rather than Wally Hickel. We decided to change our style after Hickel stated that he prefers the more formal style in print.”

We were lucky that during his long state and local political career, the late Henry Aristide Boucher preferred to be called Red in print and in person, while the late Hoyt Palmer Moss was the only Alaska legislator who always answered to the name Pappy.

I still think it was Wally’s staff and not Wally who wanted Walter J. Some of his staff complained at the continued use of Wally during his term, perhaps thinking that this would be a way to get Anchorage columnists Mike Doogan and Sheila Toomey to shut up about “Wally World.”

The tradition of addressing governors by their first name in Alaska is an old one, the late Bill Tobin of the Anchorage Times once wrote.

“You said Ernest, everybody knew you were talking about Gov. Gruening back in territorial days. Bill was Egan, first and foremost -- although another Bill, as in Sheffield, came along later. And Wally, as everybody understands, is Walter J. Hickel. If you speak of Gov. Hammond, you just call him Jay. Did the same for Tony, as in Knowles. Not to mention Keith, as in Miller, and Steve, as in Cowper. Any other state do that? Doubt it.”