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All the governor's men.....

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Like a scene from an old 1950's film portraying the shadowy side of government, the Attorney General's sudden and unexpected involvement in the Walt Monegan firing scandal has once again raised questions about the Palin administration.     

As you will recall, two weeks ago the legislature authorized the appointment of a special investigator to look into allegations that former Commissioner of Public Safety Walt Monegan was fired due to his refusal to fire the governor's ex-brother in law, Alaska State Trooper Mike Wooten.

Former Anchorage Assistant District Attorney Steve Branchflower was appointed shortly thereafter.

For her part the governor has strongly denied any and all involvement and she has repeatedly stated that she welcomes an investigation with open arms.

However yesterday, the Attorney General's office reportedly spent the day at the Department of Public Safety questioning DPS employees about their personal knowledge surrounding the case ahead of any questions before the special investigator.

It has been confirmed that Attorney Governor Talis Colberg has authorized a "fact finding" investigation into any relevant  communications between Palin administration employees and employees of the DPS regarding potential pressure brought to force Monegan to fire Wooten.

But why now? Why have the AG rush in just a day before the special investigator showed up? 

Why didn't they launch this investigation minutes after Walt Monegan went public with his allegations that he was pressured by Palin's husband and members of her administration to fire Palin's former brother in-law.

After weeks of making strident denials and calling her accusers "haters", the governor is finally realizing just how many people at DPS knew about the pressure her folks were exerting to get rid of Wooten. 

Obviously the AG's office has been dispatched to DPS to find out who knows what to assess the damage.

One thing that the Palin administration could be fearing is a reported twenty minute phone conversation between Frank Bailey and a DPS official regarding Wooten.

Apparently it was a little known fact that calls into the DPS are recorded.

However the AG's involvement raises serious questions of what is proper and to some degree what is even legal. One source told me today that DPS employees were told not to speak to special investigator Branchflower without permission from the governor's office.

And given the fact Governor Palin has said repeatedly that she did nothing wrong and has nothing to hide; why is her AG's office on the hunt for loose ends before the investigation begins? 

 

    

   

Andrew Halcro's blog

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If this is true - we got big problems

Submitted by Thor-Zone (not verified) on Thu, 2008-08-14 06:07.

"One source told me today that DPS employees were told not to speak to special investigator Branchflower without permission from the governor's office."

If this is true, we have huge problems. Will the legislature meet in special session to reverse ACES? After all, revisiting Murkowski's tax increase by the legislature was done primarily because of the "taint of corruption".

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Bailey

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 2008-08-13 21:42.

Does Branchflower have subpoena powers? If so, is it not true that an order by Governor Cupcake’s office not to speak to Branchflower be an illicit action? It is amusing that Frank Bailey has been caught on tape. According to KTUU.COM and KTVA.COM, Governor Cupcake did not ask Frank to make a phone call to the DPS. If Governor Cupcake did not ask him to call, then why would he? I fail to see how a call like this could be considered under the director of boards and commissions’ duties. If Frank made the call on his own behalf then why hasn’t Governor Cupcake sacked him? This appears to be another, “didn’t know anything about it” response. The Governor of Alaska does not know what is going on around her.

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Gov Lite Not Ready for Prime Time

Submitted by Thor-Zone (not verified) on Thu, 2008-08-14 06:13.

Gov Lite hasn't known what is going around her since she was elected. She has been focused solely on what makes her popular. Her popularity has been the primary source of her power over the legislature. I hope this episode provides a healthy dose of backbone to those in the legislature and a wake up for Alaskans across the state.

Enough is enough.

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Dear Sarah,

Submitted by Sam from DOS (not verified) on Tue, 2008-08-12 16:54.

Dear Sarah, Wasn’t sure how to get permission so I thought I’d leave the massage heer cuz I know Toddnyal read this site. I have an inturview with special investugator Branchflicker Munday. I have been rehearsing the script but I still am cunfoosed bout the third part. Is it “I wooten shootent progress if I tell the truth or confess? Or was it the wooten truth is a mess’n with your progress?” Pleeze let me know, cuz I may have misunderheardya with my shoot’n ear and I don’t want to be gett’n it wrong cuz this is a much better gig than the one I had in Waahsilla. Ohyah-- use my hotmail account to reply so ya don’t get a foiya request. Sam

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Ya Jumped the Gun

Submitted by Joe (not verified) on Tue, 2008-08-12 14:52.

Looks like your jumped the gun a little on this one Andrew. While you usually do a pretty good job of sniffing these things out, looks like the Palin administration pulled a fast one on you this time. Fagan just read a letter on the air from Branchflower to Palin requesting names of people with knowledge, as well as written and or recorded statements of summaries of statements from these people. Since the administration probably didn't already have said statements, they are just trying to get them all together now to comply with Branchflower's request. Fagan didn't give the date of the letter, but it did say that Branchflower would be in his office starting Monday, August 11, and that he would like to receive the information by August 13, which he indicated was one week from "today", "today" being the day the letter was written. Imagine that. They're just doing what Branchflower asked them to do.

Not so fast...I will post the letter later tonight.

It was a request for information that the Palin administration ALREADY had (i.e. emails, letters, phone logs, names and addresses from the governor or her staff) and in no way could reasonably be construed to have meant that Branchflower wanted the AG's office to wander over to DPS and question potential witnesses under oath.

Sorry, but this was totally out of bounds and was in no way what Branchflower requested.  AH 

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One word

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 2008-08-12 14:33.

One word: Scary.

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