ANCHORAGE -- Here is an interesting twist on the McCain campaign's determined effort to shut down the investigation of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's abuses of power in what has come to be known as the "Troopergate" scandal.
Palin stands accused of dismissing the state's public safety commissioner because he would not fire her former brother-in-law, a state trooper with whom the governor was feuding after he and her sister divorced.
If Palin did so abuse her office, she could face any number of penalties, up to and including impeachment as governor. That would make it harder to pitch Palin as an "original maverick" reformer.
The McCain camp has tried a number of moves since Palin's selection to close down the bipartisan inquiry -- which was approved by the state's Legislative Council but is being conducted by a respected former prosecutor -- into the governor's alleged wrongdoing. If Alaska was a typical state, this partisan move might have worked. But Alaska is a very small state where top Democrats and Republicans have traditions of working together -- especially on ethics inquiries.
So, even though Republicans dominate the legislature, the McCain camp has been rebuffed.
Now, McCain's aides have gotten a handful of legislators who are tied to the campaign to file a suit in Alaska's Superior Court demanding that the investigation be halted. The clear goal is to prevent the completion of what is likely to be a damning report regarding Palin's misdeeds before election day -- as was evident when McCain aides suddenly began appearing on national news shows, fully briefed and ready to cheer on the suit, just moments after Alaskans learned it was being initiated.
What are the grounds for this suit? state Sen. Hollis French, who is managing the investigation at the behest of the legislature, is a Democrat who backs Barack Obama for president.
The five legislators name French and another Democratic legislator, Kim Elton, in the suit, as well as special investigator Stephen Branchflower and the Alaska Legislative Council. "The Partisan actions of Sen. French, Sen. Elton and the Legislative Council have tainted the investigation beyond the appearance of impartiality required under the Alaska Constitution," claims Kevin Clarkson, Esq., of the firm Brena, Bell & Clarkson, P.C., and counsel in the suit.
Here's the amusing part: The Alaska Legislative Council is a permanent interim committee of the Legislature and is responsible for conducting the business of the full Legislature when it is not in session.
The Council, which approved the Troopergate inquiry and is paying for it, and which has stood behind French despite the partisan attacks, is made up of 8 Republicans and 4 Democrats.
In other words, the McCain campaign's allies in Alaska are suing Republicans in order to protect Palin from a bipartisan inquiry.
Needless to say, the national McCain operatives who appeared on cable news shows to promote the suit failed to mention that detail.
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If she is so innocent, why are they trying so hard to stop this investigation?
Yep that is modern politics for you. Now why they are scared probably has to do with the fact that the results are scheduled to be released(and this was true before he selected her) pretty shortly before election day. Now if they know she is innocent, this being released would be a major boost at the right time. But what if they know she is as innocent as OJ? That becomes a major election liability at the worst possible time. As Bad Ace said - If she is so innocent, why are they trying so hard to stop this investigation?
You know in Alaska - which is a very reliable red state - they recently had what what perhaps the biggest rally in the states history and the theme of that rally IIRC (I'm not on my own computer so no bookmarks) was "Women Against Palin." It kinda looks like her "reformer image" was just the result of choosing the right message at the right time to appeal to voters.
Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in
America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the
country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along,
whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist
dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the
leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and
denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the
same in any country. - Hermann Goring
I found this after my last post -
Trooper-Gate: Palin's Shifting Stories Yes that is a somewhat partisan site but what I linked is well referenced enough.
Quote:
A court filing made yesterday by Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, asserts that Palin fired Monegan as the state's public safety commissioner because of a series of instances of Monegan's insubordination on budget issues, including Monegan working with an Alaska legislator to seek funding for a project Governor Palin had already vetoed. This alleged pattern of "outright insubordination" is said to have culminated in Monegan planning a trip to Washington to go after federal funds for an initiative to fight sexual assault crimes, which had not yet been approved by the governor.
In this interview from July, Palin said she fired Monegan because she was dissatisfied with his performance on filling vacant trooper positions and on bootlegging and alcohol abuse issues.
Around the same time, she told The New Yorker, for a story published this week, that she hadn't actually fired Monegan, but rather had wanted to reassign him to combat alcohol abuse, and that he quit instead.
Of course as first she pledged full cooperation but now she refused to testify and the McCain camp wants nothing to do with this investigation. Mavericks indeed... Just imagine if this was Barack or Biden under investigation and they tried to bury it - just what would the Republican establishment and or MSM be saying right now?
Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in
America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the
country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along,
whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist
dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the
leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and
denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the
same in any country. - Hermann Goring
If you want to investigate something a little more deeply I would start with the earmarks and shady dealings Obama had with Tony Resco. Go ahead and tells us all about the money that Obama helped him obtain in federal grants. Tell us all about how the money those Resco received for the projects did nothing to improve them and how most have been condemned. Continue on to tell us about all the money Resco poured into Obama's campaign. Oh yea let's not forget Resco is convicted now.
By the way if you people would get off your biased Palin bashing and take a good look at the non partisan my ass group you would see Palin has a good reason to say it is biased.
I want to hear what you guys know about the trooper involved. I really do. I think the more you know about him the more you will think the question should be why was this disgrace to LEO's not fired immediately.
FORGET GIRLS GONE WILD WE HAVE GOVERNMENT SPENDING GONE WILD!
Yeah, he was accused of brandishing a firearm at her parents or sister and making threats to the family or some such nonsense. He was put on leave while being investigated by internal affairs and not fired so he must not have been to out of line.
P.S. Resco and Obama have nothing to do with this topic.
And it is a non partisan your ass group, it has 8 Rep. and 4 Dem. so I would say it is weighted in her favor anyway. If you would get off your biased Palin mud flap swinging you would have read that.
KevinP (Stabby McShankyou) wrote:
and I'm NOT a pedo. everyone knows i've got a wheelchair fetish.
Harrington (Fiber Faber) wrote:Yeah, he was accused of brandishing a firearm at her parents or sister and making threats to the family or some such nonsense. He was put on leave while being investigated by internal affairs and not fired so he must not have been to out of line.
P.S. Resco and Obama have nothing to do with this topic.
And it is a non partisan your ass group, it has 8 Rep. and 4 Dem. so I would say it is weighted in her favor anyway. If you would get off your biased Palin mud flap swinging you would have read that.
Wow that is all you know off? Seriously out of all the things he has done that a LEO would normally be fired on the spot for that is all you know about.?
My point about Obama and resco was off topic. My point that was that maybe people should investigate their own canidate as fiercly as they do the other sides. Why do you care anyway? I could be wrong but I thought you were or are considering voting for a third party canidate?
I read that. Just because they are republicans does not mean they are going to side with her. In her state she has stepped on more than a few peoples toes by exposing the corupt previous governor.
Re read this part and tell me it is un biased.
What are the grounds for this suit? state Sen. Hollis French, who is managing the investigation at the behest of the legislature, is a Democrat who backs Barack Obama for president.
The Council, which approved the Troopergate inquiry and is paying for it, and which has stood behind French despite the partisan attacks.
So let me get this straight they are saying even though she is a Obama suporter there is no conflict of intrest. Not to mention the timing of the release.
Do you really believe that politicians can do anything that is not partisan especially in the midst of a presidential election? I don't
FORGET GIRLS GONE WILD WE HAVE GOVERNMENT SPENDING GONE WILD!
Wade Jarvis wrote:
Re read this part and tell me it is un biased.
What are the grounds for this suit? state Sen. Hollis French, who is managing the investigation at the behest of the legislature, is a Democrat who backs Barack Obama for president.
The Council, which approved the Troopergate inquiry and is paying for it, and which has stood behind French despite the partisan attacks.
So let me get this straight they are saying even though she is a Obama suporter there is no conflict of intrest. Not to mention the timing of the release.
Don't be so blind. The Council had to approve and fund the investigation, and while it may be headed by a Democrat, there are 8 Republicans to 4 Democrats. That means that REPUBLICANS approved it.
Not to mention, this investigation started well before she was in the nominated for veep.
So what all did he do, in your infinite wisdom please explain it to me. Make sure they are
facts and not your Republican spin. He must not have done anything very bad in the eyes of the review board they only gave him a 5 day IIRC suspension. Hell, Palin even wrote him a letter of recommendation to become a state trooper, oh sweet irony.
The investigation into Palin abusing her power in this case started before (July 28, 2008) she was even selected as McCain's running mate (August 29, 2008) so how would French being an Obama supporter have any bearing what so ever, after all she didn't know Palin would be selected as the VP candidate. If the McCain camp is so worried about the release date maybe they shouldn't have picked her to run as VP, especially with this hanging over her head.
This case is a fine example Palin's judgement, not to mention McCain's judgement for picking someone with this much baggage.
KevinP (Stabby McShankyou) wrote:
and I'm NOT a pedo. everyone knows i've got a wheelchair fetish.
The baggage you refer to is more spin than anything.
Think about this. As you say the case was started in July. Now tell me how they knew roughly 5 months from the start of the investigation exactly when the results were going to be announced unless they are slanting the investigation against her. Now why would they plan on anouncing it just days before the election unless the intent was to not give Palin enough time to counter it.
FORGET GIRLS GONE WILD WE HAVE GOVERNMENT SPENDING GONE WILD!
Wade Jarvis wrote:The baggage you refer to is more spin than anything.
Think about this. As you say the case was started in July. Now tell me how they knew roughly 5 months from the start of the investigation exactly when the results were going to be announced unless they are slanting the investigation against her. Now why would they plan on anouncing it just days before the election unless the intent was to not give Palin enough time to counter it.
AT THE TIME THEY DID NOT EVEN KNOW SHE WAS GOING TO BE SELECTED AS THE RUNNING MATE TO MCCAIN.
You should become a professional conspiracy theorist, I think you would be real good at it.
KevinP (Stabby McShankyou) wrote:
and I'm NOT a pedo. everyone knows i've got a wheelchair fetish.
Wade Jarvis wrote:The baggage you refer to is more spin than anything.
Think about this. As you say the case was started in July. Now tell me how they knew roughly 5 months from the start of the investigation exactly when the results were going to be announced unless they are slanting the investigation against her. Now why would they plan on anouncing it just days before the election unless the intent was to not give Palin enough time to counter it.
What in the hell are you talking about?
If she is so bloody innocent, why won't her and her cronies cooperate with the investigation.
Why are they all ignoring subpeonas?
Including her HUSBAND? He can't be bothered to profess her innocence?
Why are they delaying the investigation?
She is a @!#$ crook. A liar. A pathetic, horrible excuse for a person, even by politician standards. Despicable.
COME ON WADE!!! PROVE ME WRONG!!!
Oh wait...its a liberal lefty conspiracy, right?
Democratic state senator and staunch Barack Obama supporter Hollis French of Alaska boasted in early September that he would provide an "October Surprise" which would upset the McCain-Palin campaign. Indeed, he originally planned to time it for October 31, four days before the election, for maximum impact, until other legislators forced him to abandon that particular strategy.
Today, however, in an episode of political theater that would make Josef Stalin blush, French gave it his very best shot:
The investigator he hired and directed, Steve Branchflower, has labored mightily and given birth to a bloated and redundant 263-page report which boils down, for purposes of the ongoing presidential campaign, to two paragraphs that completely contradict one another. And the one of them that's unfavorable ignores the most important — indeed conclusive — evidence on point, but goes on to provide Branchflower's guess as to whether Gov. Palin has done anything improper.
Please understand this, if you take nothing else away from reading this post:
The Branchflower Report is a series of guess and insupportable conclusions drawn by exactly one guy, and it hasn't been approved or adopted or endorsed by so much as a single sub-committee of the Alaska Legislature, much less any kind of commission, court, jury, or other proper adjudicatory body. It contains no new bombshells in terms of factual revelations. Rather, it's just Steve Branchflower's opinion — after being hired and directed by one of Gov. Palin's most vocal opponents and one of Alaska's staunchest Obama supporters — that he thinks Gov. Palin had, at worst, mixed motives for an action that even Branchflower admits she unquestionably had both (a) the complete right to perform and (b) other very good reasons to perform.
Here are the two key "findings," however (from page 8 of the .pdf file; boldface mine):
Quote:
Finding Number One
For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) provides
The legislature reaffirms that each public officer holds office as a public trust, and any effort to benefit a personal or financial interest through official action is a violation of that trust."
Finding Number Two
I find that, although Walt Monegan's refusal to fire Trooper Michael Wooten was not the sole reason he was fired by Governor Sarah Palin, it was likely a contributing factor to his termination as Commissioner of Public Safety. In spite of that, Governor Palin's firing of Commissioner Monegan was a proper and lawful exercise of her constitutional and statutory authority to hire and fire executive branch department heads.
Here's a note to Mr. Branchflower, who clearly is verbose, but obviously none too keen a scholar of logic:
Gov. Palin's so-called "firing" of Monegan (it wasn't a firing, it was a re-assignment to other government duties that he resigned rather than accept) can't simultaneously be a violation of the Ethics Act and "a proper and lawful exercise of her constitutional and statutory authority." This, gentle readers, is a 263-page piece of political circus that actually explicitly refutes itself on its single most key page!
What's more incredible is that Branchflower utterly ignores the public admission made by Walt Monegan himself that ought to have ended this entire inquiry (boldface mine):
Quote:
"For the record, no one ever said fire Wooten. Not the governor. Not Todd. Not any of the other staff," Monegan said Friday from Portland. "What they said directly was more along the lines of 'This isn't a person that we would want to be representing our state troopers.'"
That explains, of course, why it took a couple of weeks for Monegan to be persuaded that he'd been improperly "fired" (for supposedly refusing to fire Wooten) by an Alaska blogger, Andrew Halcro — a bitter loser whom Gov. Palin crushed in the 2006 Alaska gubernatorial race (he got less than 10% of the vote, proving that most Alaskans have long since figured out he's an untrustworthy windbag).
Instead, Branchfire has piled a guess (that the Palins wanted Wooten fired, rather than, for example, counseled, disciplined, or reassigned) on top of an inference (that when the Palins expressed concern to Monegan about Wooten, they were really threatening to fire Monegan if he didn't fire Wooten) on top of an innuendo (that Gov. Palin "fired" Monegan at least in part because of his failure to fire Wooten) —
from which Branchflower then leaps to a legal conclusion:"abuse of authority." Branchflower reads the Ethics Act to prohibit any governmental action or decision made for justifiable reasons benefiting the State if that action or decision might also make a public official happy for any other reason. That would mean, of course, that governors must never act or decide in a way that makes them personally happy as a citizen, or as a wife or mother or daughter, and that they could only take actions or make decisions which left them feeling neutral or upset. This an incredibly shoddy tower of supposition, and a ridiculous misreading of the law.
Branchflower puts under a microscope every direct and indirect contact that can possibly be claimed to to come, directly or indirectly, from Gov. Palin or her husband, Todd. In none of them did either Sarah or Todd Palin demand or request that Wooten be fired. Some of them date back to before Gov. Palin was even a candidate for governor. All of them are equally well explained by legitimate concerns that Wooten was a potential threat to the Palin family (having already made death threats against Gov. Palin's father) and/or an embarrassment to the Alaska Department of Public Safety and the entire state law enforcement community. That the Palins also had strong — and entirely understandable! — negative feelings about Trooper Wooten does not make any of these communications remotely improper, much less illegal.
Nevertheless, Branchflower leaps to the personal conclusion (page 67 of the .pdf file) that "such claims of fear were not bona fide and were offered to provide cover for the Palins' real motivation: to get Trooper Wooten fired for personal family related reasons." Well, here's another memo to Mr. Branchflower:
When the family is question is the family of the Governor of Alaska, and when her security detail is charged with protecting her from threats, and in the process of that, the security detail actively seeks out information as to who may have previously made death threats against the family, that's no longer solely a "personal family related reason." And when someone like Trooper Wooten threatens to bring ridicule and shame to the entire state of Alaska, that's no longer solely a "personal family related reason" either.
Branchflower, I'm told, is an attorney and a former prosecutor. If he thinks this kind of nonsense could support a conviction beyond a reasonable doubt, or even a finding of proof by a preponderance of the evidence, then he may be the worst lawyer I've ever encountered — and I've met a lot of awful ones in almost three decades before the bar.
More likely, however, Branchflower knows that his imaginary case will never be tested before any judge or jury — and instead, Branchflower's audience, and the audience of his political patron Sen. French, is a purely political one. They do not want you to read the 263 pages of his report, but I invite you to do so: By the end of it, you'll be thoroughly convinced that both Wooten and Monegan ought to have been fired! And if you're a person, as I am, who admires husbands and fathers who stand up for their families, you'll definitely want to shake First Dude Todd Palin's hand, and maybe even give him a (manly) bear-hug.
No, indeed, Sen. French and Mr. Branchflower dearly hope most Americans won't look past the headlines generated by this ridiculous farce of a report. French and Branchflower hope that Americans will be misled into thinking this report is from someone whose judgment or opinions actually count for something — instead of being from a hitman hired to complete a political hatchet job, as it actually is.
This report changes absolutely nothing, except that it will be manipulated politically by Obama supporters and Palin haters in an attempt to drive more potential voters into taking sides with Trooper Mike Wooten — a proven child abuser (Tasered his own 10-year-old stepson on a lark) who's been conclusively determined by his own department to have also engaged in drinking and driving in his squad car, and to have used a deadly firearm to violate the very fish-and-game laws he himself was specifically assigned to enforce. "It is nearly certain," wrote Col. Julia Grimes, then then Director of the Alaska State Troopers Division of the Alaska Department of Public Safety, "that a civilian investigated under similar circumstances would have received criminal sanctions." The only real question in Tasergate remains why Trooper Mike Wooten is still not only uncharged for his confessed crimes, but carrying a badge and gun — to the continuing shame of the good and decent people of Alaska.
-----------------------------
UPDATE (Fri Oct 10 @ 11:25 p.m. CST): Gov. Palin's office and the McCain-Palin campaign have each put out press releases making some of the same points I've made in this post. And Gov. Palin's lawyer has issued a five-page response to the Branchflower report which notes, among other things, that "[e]very prior reported Ethics Act violation involved financial motives and financial 'potential gain, or the avoidance of a potential loss.' ... Here, there is no accusation, no finding and no facts that money or financial gain to the governor was involved in the decision to replace Monegan."
Even the Anchorage Daily News is misrepresenting the meaning of this report: I just received an email update from it in which it claims that "Today Alaska legislators found Palin did abuse her power in the 'Troopergate' controversy." That's absolutely false — the Alaska Legislature is not in session, and all that happened today was that the 12-member Legislative Council that received the Branchflower Report voted unanimously to release its first volume (the 263-page .pdf file linked above) to the public. Several more volumes and hundreds more pages prepared by Branchflower still remain confidential — suggesting that Branchflower's selective quotations in the report may well have been "cherry-picked" or taken out of context — but the governor's office has itself posted quite a few more documents pertaining to the investigation on the internet, confirming Gov. Palin's repeated statements that she has nothing to hide in this entire matter.
"The FACTS are always subject to CHANGE once the TRUTH is applied"
"In the entire history of man the only stupid questions are the ones that don't get asked"
