Troopergate report: Palin abused power
David Edwards and Andrew McLemore
Published: Friday October 10, 2008
An investigation of Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin found she abused her power as an Alaska governor in the firing of the state public safety commissioner, the Associated Press reported.
The report concludes that Palin's desire for a state trooper to be dismissed following a family dispute was one of several factors leading to the firing of Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan.
Monegan claims his dismissal was an act of vengeance for resisting pressure to fire a state trooper involved in a bitter divorce with the governor's sister.
"I feel vindicated," Monegan said. "It sounds like they've validated my belief and opinions. And that tells me I'm not totally out in left field."
Palin and her supporters deny the accusations and have called the probe a politically-motivated attempt to tarnish her reputation as a reformer before the November election.
The Alaska governor said her action against Monegan was over a budget dispute.
Investigator Stephen Branchflower led the bipartisan panel that investigated the matter and found Palin in violation of a state ethics law, KTUU reported.
"I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch ethics act," Branchflower said in the 263-page report.
"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,'" Branchflower continued.
Alaska's Legislative Council reviewed the report for more than six hours Friday in a closed-door executive session before deciding unanimously to release it to the public.
CNN's Campbell Brown reported that Palin's wanted her former brother in-law Mike Wooten fired because the governor claimed he was harassing her family and threatened to "kill her father."
Wooten denies these claims.
The investigation did not find that Palin broke any laws and asserts that she was fully within her rights to hire and fire commissioner Monegan at her discretion.
Monegan said he was never directly asked to fire Wooten, but believes his unwillingness to do so was a factor in losing his job.
The investigation's 263-page report can be seen here.
This video is from MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show, broadcast October 10, 2008.
Download video via RawReplay.com
This video is from CNN's Election Center, broadcast October 10, 2008.
Download video via RawReplay.com
Abuse Of Power
by Andrew Sullivan
We have been given a clear warning about the vice-presidential nominee for the Republican party. We already know she is a pathological liar. We already know she refuses even basic transparency and accountability, refusing to hold a press conference as veep nominee for the first time in modern American political history and refusing to provide even minimal documentation of her fifth pregnancy. Barely into her first year as governor, as one might expect of such a person, she abused her power as governor of Alaska to persecute a former family member:
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
Investigation ties Palin to 'extreme right-wing fringe'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.
Finding Number Three
Harbor Adjustment Service of Anchorage, and its owner Ms. Murleen Wilkes, handled Trooper Michael Wooten's workers' compensation claim property and in the normal course of business like any other claim processed by Harbor Adjustment Service and Ms. Wilkes. Further, Trooper Wooten received all the workers' compensation benefits to which he was entitled.
Finding Number Four
The Attorney General's office has failed to substantially comply with my August 6, 2008 written request to Governor Sarah Palin for infomration about the case in the form of emails.
| David Edwards and Muriel Kane Published: Friday October 10, 2008 |
The McCain campaign has attempted to make an issue out of Barack Obama's limited connections with former Weather Underground member William Ayers. However, according to a new investigative report, vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin herself has had a far close and more extensive association with Alaska's own political extremists than she has ever acknowledged.
The story at Salon.com by Max Blumenthal and David Neiwart offers an in-depth examination of the crucial role played in Palin's political career by two members of the secessionist Alaska Independence Party (AIP).
When Blumenthal appeared on Thursday's Rachel Maddow Show, he began by explaining that AIP -- which has links to both neo-Confederate parties in the South and the theocratic Constitutional Party -- serves as "a haven for anti-government extremists, anti-government militia members, and conspiratorial figures who believe that the United States government plans to implement a New World Order."
AIP advocates secession from the United States, and its founder, Joe Vogler, is known for having proclaiming "I'm an Alaskan, not an American. I've got no use for America or her damned institutions."
The extent of Palin's connection to AIP has previously been uncertain. Her husband Todd was a member of the party until 2002, but although Palin attended some conventions and sent them a message earlier this year saying, "Keep up the good work," she herself never belonged to the group.
The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder suggested a week ago that Todd Palin's membership in AIP should not be an issue, writing that "Maybe Todd Palin didn't believe in all of the principles the AIP espoused... indeed, the AIP seems to be a bit of a cultural relic in Alaska, a quirky old friend. ... That [Sarah] didn't dump him because he associated with some dum-dum secessionists is probably a sign of good judgment."
However, Blumenthal told Maddow that when he and co-author David Neiwert, who has been investigating anti-government militias since the 1990's, interviewed people in Palin's home town of Wasilla, they found that "Sarah Palin is far more intimately associated with the extreme right-wing fringe of Alaska than the media has acknowledged or than she is willing to acknowledge."
Blumenthal said that Palin used former AIP chairman Mark Chryson and a local John Birch Society activist known as "Black Helicopter" Steve Stoll "to advance her political career on a local and state level -- and she sought to reward them with plum political appointments."
In 1996, Chryson and Stoll helped Palin with her campaign of negative, character-based attacks on the incumbent mayor, and after Palin was elected she attempted to appoint Stoll to the seat she had formerly held on the Wasilla city council.
That appointment was blocked by another council member, who considered Stoll a "violent influence," but Palin continued to work with Chryson and Stoll on various initiatives. Chryson now says, "Every time I showed up her door was open. And that policy continued when she became governor."
This video is from MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show, broadcast October 9, 2008.
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