"Today's report shows that the Governor acted within her proper and lawful authority in the reassignment of Walt Monegan.
TRUTH: This was never in doubt. The governor can fire the public safety commissioner for any reason at all, or for no reason at all. Pretending that this is the issue is just a typical GOP lie.
McCain-Palin:
The report also illustrates what we've known all along: this was a partisan led inquiry run by Obama supporters....
TRUTH: The Legislative Council voted 12-0 to release the report. Republicans control the council, 8-4. The report was authorized well before Palin became McCain's VP choice, and she publicly pledged to cooperate at least 13 times, including twice evan after being named as McCain's running mate, before abruptly changing her position. For example, McCain-Palin Press Release, August 30:
Governor Palin is an open book on this - she did nothing wrong and has nothing to hide. As a reformer and a leader on ethics reform, she has been happy to cooperate fully in the inquiry of this matter.
McCain-Palin:
...and the Palins were completely justified in their concern regarding Trooper Wooten given his violent and rogue behavior.
TRUTH: Not according to the Branchflower report (PDF, RTF ZIP):
UPDATED Below The Fold: Palin Attacks Report Because She Wasn't Interviewed!
Yesterday, Sarah Palin's self-investigation exonerated her of all wrongdoing in the Troopergate scandal, and placed the full blame squarely where it belonged: on the blogger who first wrote about it. TPM reports:
The campaign's report instead blames former campaign opponent, Andrew Halcro, who has a blog, of conspiring with Wooten to pin Monegan's dismissal on the family's dispute with Wooten....
"It is tragic that a false story hatched by a blogger after drinks with Trooper Wooten led the legislature to allocate over $100,000 of public money to be spent in what has become a politically driven investigation," the 21-page report concludes.
After months of hiding from the truth, I'll finally admit it; I was the blogger on the grassy knoll.
I am to blame for the entire Troopergate scandal and the ensuing investigation into if Governor Sarah Palin abused the power of her office by firing former Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan because he wouldn't fire her ex brother in law, State Trooper Mike Wooten.
Me, me, me. The blog stops with me.
I am responsible for Governor Palin's husband Todd's weird obsession with his former brother in law State Trooper Mike Wooten, where he admitted in a deposition this week that he has spent years trying to get Wooten fired.
I am responsible for the "over two dozen phone calls" Governor Palin admitted her staff made to the Department of Public Safety to inquire about the status of her former brother in law.
I am responsible for the recorded phone call where Palin's right hand man Frank Bailey is pressuring another State Trooper that Wooten needs to be fired, even though he hadn't been able to convince anyone else in authority....
Just as Woodward and Bernstein were responsible for Watergate, and Daniel Ellsberg and Tony Russo were responsible for the Vietname War, so, too, Andrew Halcro was the master fiend behind Troopergate.
Sarah Palin lost the debate. That much is devastatingly clear, not just from the insta-polling, but from the mistakes, contradictions and outright lies that emerged. For example, she lied about supporting divestiture from Sudan (h/t magster in Quick Hits). Unfortunately, the Darfur genocide is not that high up on most people's list of election concerns. But what about Iraq?
One point that Palin pounded on several times was her claim that Biden had supported McCain's position on the Iraq War until this campaign. As Eric Kleefeld demonstrates at TPM, this is utterly false. Back in 2004, Biden agreed with McCain's call for more troops on MTP, but that's the last time the two of them agreed. The truth vs. the reality is quite devastating--Biden opposed the surge in 2006 as too little, too late and criticized McCain for failing to fight for it earlier--but this Palin lie pales in comparison another one dealing with an even more salient issue for most voters right now: the economy, the bailout and Main Street vs. Wall Street.
McCain opposes bankruptcy protection for people's primary residences (his second through seventh homes are protected). In the debate, Palin denied this--in three words, before returning to talk about energy. As awkward007 diaries at DKos, it's become a story with some legs, thanks in part to some quick and deadly work by ACORN (who says community organizers can't have media smarts?)
By themselves, these and other contradictions weren't enough to stop the media narrative that Palin passed some low threashold for "success." (After all, she didn't burst into flames.) Even though it's widely acknowledged she could only surivive in a world without followup questions, that was deemed "acceptable." But the real world is not like that. And it's looking more and more like Palin is facing the mother of all followup questions about her character as the Troopergate investigation continues on, despite all GOP attempts to stop it, which have now gone all the way to the Alaska Supreme Court.
Yesterday, five Alaska lawmakers--all Republicans--sued to stop the legislatures official, bipartisan Troopergate investigation. Their lawyer, Anchorage attorney Kevin Clarkson, sent out an email overnight, accusing Democrats inovolved in the investigation of... being Democrats:
"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," said Kevin Clarkson, Esq., of the firm Brena, Bell & Clarkson, P.C., and counsel in the suit.
The investigation, which began after Monegan's dismissal in July 2008, is being led by outspoken supporters of Barack Obama and members of the Democratic Party. Sen. Elton, the Chair of the Legislative Council donated $2,000 to the Obama campaign but has failed to disclose this to the Legislative Council and he continues to preside over the Council with respect to the investigation, refusing to convene meetings of the Council at the request of a majority of the Council's membership.
In fact, the GOP-majority Senate Legislative Coucil met last Friday, and issued 13 subpeonas, with a Wasilla Republican casting the deciding vote in defiance of mounting party pressure to fall into line. Palin herself has been silenced, with GOP operatives talking to the press in place of her, and, apparently, the entire Alaska executive branch. Meanwhile, AP reports the involvement of the Texas-based Liberty Legal Institute, which TPM explains is connected to James Dobson. Alaska blogger/radio host and former GOP legislator Andrew Halcro has a list of 13 times--from July 18 to September 2--that Palin pledged full cooperation with "any investigation." (full list on flip).
In the immediate aftermath of the GOP convention, the Troopergate scandal has clearly emerged as VP candidate Sarah Palin's Achilles heel, with a ferocious, Nixonian combination of lies, stonewalling, and, of course, attacks on her "enemies" in the media.
The sheer intensity of Palin's turn from promised cooperation to Nixon/Bush total resistence only seems to makes sense if she's got something very serious to hide. So now, subtley, belatedly, but most definitely, the Republican state legislators are coming to her assistance, agreeing to subpoena the whole lot of Palin cronies she's convinced not to testify, but not Palin herself. The announcement comes along with an earlier completion date for the investigation--October 10--which could make it even easier for Palin to run out the clock.
This move will clearly allow Palin's stonewall to continue, without consequence, unless political heat is brought to bear. This will prove particularly challenging, as the Nancy Pelosi "See No Evil Policy" is having a deeply corrosive trickle-down affect on our political culture, as stonewalling legislative oversight has now become accepted public practice. Details on the flip.
ABC News has exclusively learned that Alaska Senator Hollis French will announce today that he is moving up the release date of his investigation into whether Gov. Sarah Palin abused her office to get the Alaska public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, fired. The results of the investigation were originally scheduled for release Oct. 31 but will now come almost three weeks earlier, according to sources.(...)
"It's likely to be damaging to the Governor's administration," said Senator Hollis French, a Democrat, appointed the project manager for a bi-partisan State Senate Legislative Counsel Committee investigation.
This is a good response to the new stall and avoid tactics of the McCain campaign. Palin had earlier refused to testify before the commission, in an obvious tactic to delay the release of the report until after Election Day. It is part and parcel with their strategy of not talking to the media, and while simultaneously attacking them at a partisan institution. Fortunately, Hollis French is not going to put up with it.
As noted in a comment, by Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle, TPM has a new, up-to-date overview of Sarah Palin's Troopergate scandal here. This is the scandal over the pressuring, and eventual firing of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, for his refusal to fire state trooper Mike Wooten, Palin's ex-brother-in-law who's involved in a bitter custody dispute with Palin's sister.
Josh explains his reasons for presenting the overview as a response to some particularly noxious spin:
STATE BLOGS
