Rebranding Troopergate: A Seinfeld moment

Separate all the fluff from the substance and what you have is one man saying he thinks Sarah Palin should have told Todd Palin to back off a little sooner. That's it, that's the takeaway from this whole deal. Cue Peggy Lee.

Stop watching the glittery red shoes. Palin abused her power as the governor of Alaska. Sorry, that is a big deal. Does Dick Cheney ring a bell...I guess not.

If you are employed, would it be okay with your boss for your spouse to hang around, use the company equipment and disrupt other employees with personal matters on company time? No? I didn't think so. Taxpayers are the governor's boss, so it's a little disingenuous to suggest that only "one man" has an interest here. If you are okay with Sarah and Todd Palin using state offices for personal resources, despite the fact that it is illegal (and, incidentally, didn't Sarah make a big deal about "cleaning up the Energy Board" because someone was using state resources for personal campaigning?) you are the one who needs to explain why this was okay. If Sarah couldn't abide a political rival doing it because it was unethical and wrong, how was she so comfortable with her own husband doing it.

Like Sarah stating she did not do anything unethical, you're parsing. In other words, basing conclusion on some but not all fact, especially those facts that would lead to an opposing conclusion. There's more to it. Sarah actively tried to get a State employee fired. It wasn't just Todd needing to be controlled sooner. Also it had to do with Sarah knowing what was going on from the start. Which amounted to her INACTION for EACH of Todd's actions being in and of themselves unethical conduct. And of course there is more in the report. Aside from this, note that Sarah lied to Alaskans in many media interviews when she denied her knowledge of events, among many other things. These lies were not violations of the State ethics code, but they were unethical as per social norm. This sort of conduct inflames many who otherwise would support her.

Open your mind, Jim. There is so much more to take away from this whole deal. If only Gov. Palin had the good sense to be gracious in admitting that she abused her power to try to settle a personal family score right from the get go, this whole deal would have been over with months ago. Instead she chose to lie about it. A little apology and a few hits from the legislature, media and bloggers, and it's over. Way back then, people loved her; all would be forgiven. Unfortunately, Gov. Palin was not smart enough to understand that honesty is always the best policy; lies will always come back to bite you. I, for one, expect way more from my elected public officials. I expect smart and honest... This report shows that she is neither.

You are as bad as Palin to suggest the world should not know this. Another right wing, secrecy, hate thing. I'm disgusted with you not wanting the right of speech to impeach or air dirty laundry. Suggest you start by washing your hands.

Beautiful!

ROTFLMAO!!!!!

Most excellent stew you seemed to have brewed. If it weren't for those Who's, I'd have to settle for moose stew.

You can't find any evidence so you assume the partisan charge is a lie. I can't prove that robots aren't coming into your house and stealing socks out of your dryer so that must be the case. After all, I can't find any evidence. But let's start with a couple of facts that some of the electric visitors from the South may have missed: 1. Walt Monegan was chief of Anchorage Police Dept. While Walt was head of APD, Linda Branchflower, Stephan's wife was an investigator for him and worked in the cold case division. 2. While Walt was chief of APD, Stephan Branchflower was a prosecutor and worked very closely with APD bringing their cases to trial. 3. Hollis French is a liberal Democrat from West Anchorage with designs on higher office. He has made several public statements supporting Obama and has contributed to his campaign. 4. Read the McCain campaign's release on Troopergate; they have a transcript of an interview given by French in which he essentially had already convicted Palin before the investigation began. 5. Les Gara is a maxed-out Obama donor.

You prove my point by blathering, Palin-style, about everything but the question I raised. I said that I was assuming that what the McCain-Palin group have been saying - that Branchflower is a Democrat - was a lie. It's a simple question: Is it a lie or isn't it? Rather than answer it, you go on for dozens of lines about other things. Apparently, then, it *was* a lie, and you are just trying to change the subject. I said that French's affiliations were part of the public domain, so I don't know why you say that 3) and 4) are things that I would have missed. I didn't know about Gara's contributions (5) but it doesn't surprise me. Those are two of the fourteen members of the committee. Ten of the others are Republicans. Ten Republicans and four Democrats does not a "partisan" panel make, even if two of the Democrats have contributed to Obama and think he would be a good president. Or are you suggesting that an investigation can only be "fair" if *only* Republicans can be involved? A ten to four majority isn't tilted enough in your favor? You say that Branchflower and his wife worked with Monegan. I expect that they did. I grew up in a family of police officers in an area about the size of Anchorage. I can tell you that it is impossible for any two people working in law enforcement or the prosecutor's office to go for very long without working together for some stretch of time on something. So whatever independent prosecutor you chose - Branchflower or anyone else - would have some such connection to Monegan. Pointing out that they worked together is just a smokescreen. But all this is secondary: the basic fact is that the report is incredibly damning. It was prepared by a serious career prosecutor who is - you have not denied - a conservative Republican. If you keep raising a smokescreen of accusations of partisanship it can only be because you can't quarrel with the substance of the report.

Thanks for bringing this up. I've been a little confused about why the legislators and investigators don't squash this partisan nonsense, too, since it is pretty easily refuted based strictly on the facts of the case. Another interesting, and in some ways unfortunate, thing is that the independent investigator hired by the Alaska Personnel Board to run the "other" investigation--the one that Sarah agreed to cooperate with--is a Democrat, so the right wing will just denounce that report, as well. Have we really reached this point in our country where there is so little faith in the justice system that any and all illegal and unethical behavior can be justified by claiming that holding someone responsible for their actions is partisan? I know the gov CAN appoint (and fire) members of the personnel board, but it has not been stated whether she DID appoint the current members. Does anyone know? I'm thinking that the fact they immediately went out and hired a Democratic investigator indicates that (to their credit) they understand the appearance of favoritism since they are Palin appointees and they wanted to remove any question of pure partisanship. Unfortunately, they may have inadvertently played into the hands of her "truth squad."

No kidding. But Alaska will most likely never go "blue". Although in a twisted kind of way, Palin is somewhat "blue" as her economic policies in AK are anything BUT fiscally conservative (i.e. not what one considers Republican). She floats along with her popularity meter, and in her tenure that has meant tax and spend (e.g. oil taxes raised to highest on the globe, and a $500million incentive payment to TransCanada for a pipeline with no guarantees). Now that she's been exposed as a fluidly changing purple tinged with green (for the ethically challenged), I really don't know where she fits in the political arena!

Not in your lifetime. The only Democrat to ever carry Alaska was LBJ in 1964.

I hope the legislature finally takes charge this spring, and doesn't just take the governor's budget numbers at face value, but does a little digging to find out just which agencies might need a few more resources to do a proper job protecting and serving Alaskans' needs. THEN the legislature needs to back up their budget with veto overrides if the gov tries to shaft them for the third session in a row.

Agreed.

replace the "or" with "and" please.

JimAK asks: ***Why was Branchflower concerned about what Judge Suddock had to say given that his comments were made when Sarah Palin was a private citizen? *** It's part of the ungoing HISTORY of Sarah's obsessive stalking and persecution of Trooper Wooten, Jimmy. Get it now or do you still need help connecting the dots?

Because Sarah, Tallis, and the McCain campaign denied Branchflower the ability to receive their testimony by stonewalling. If they wanted their knowledge of the case recorded, they should not have excluded their testimony by obstructing justice.