Reading it now. Will update when I find something.
UPDATE:
Page 8:
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 Statue 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."
I wonder what Jack Kelly thinks of all this.
Jack, any thoughts??
UPDATE II (11:11pm): The McCain camp has a reaction:
"Today's report shows that the Governor acted within her proper and lawful authority in the reassignment of Walt Monegan," said Palin spokeswoman Meg Stapelton. "The report also illustrates what we've known all along: this was a partisan led inquiry run by Obama supporters and the Palins were completely justified in their concern regarding Trooper Wooten given his violent and rogue behavior. Lacking evidence to support the original Monegan allegation, the Legislative Council seriously overreached, making a tortured argument to find fault without basis in law or fact. The Governor is looking forward to cooperating with the Personnel Board and continuing her conversation with the American people regarding the important issues facing the country."Of course the "partisan board" was nothing but. The Anchorage Daily News reports:
The report by investigator Steve Branchflower was made public late this afternoon by a bipartisan 12-0 vote of the Legislative Council, which authorized the investigation. [emphasis added]Some analysis from TalkingPointsMemo about the McCain statement:
While the report also finds that the governor in Alaska has the inherent power to fire her department heads for any reason or for no reason, it concludes that Monegan's refusal to fire one of his state troopers at the insistence of the governor and her family was a contributing factor in his own firing.The ADN has more:
So rather than the firing of Monegan itself being the abuse of power, the wide-ranging effort to retaliate against her sister's ex-husband, of which Monegan's firing was merely a part, was the real abuse. Monegan's firing is evidence of the broader scheme, not the scheme itself. Cold comfort if you're a McCain-Palin supporter. [emphasis added]
The report says Palin failed to reign in her husband's inappropriate efforts to use the governor's office to contact trooper employees in his attempts to have Wooten fired.Yea, let's keep talking about William Ayers."Governor Palin knowingly permitted a situation to continue where impermissible pressure was placed on several subordinates in order to advance a personal agenda ... to get Trooper Michael Wooten fired," Branchflower's report says.
"Compliance with the code of ethics is not optional. It is an individual responsibility imposed by law, and any effort to benefit a personal interest through official action is a violation of that trust. ... The term 'benefit' is very broadly defined, and includes anything that is to the person's advantage or personal self-interest."
21 comments:
I can not resist. LOL. LOL. ROTFL.
So much for William Ayers. Question number one: Senator John McCain, what about your troubling association with Sarah Palin?
Did you see this article on Salon about the Alaska Independence Party:
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/10/10/palin_chryson/
These people make William Ayers look like Mr. Rogers.
We all know what the Republican response is going to be. I just listened to Jonah Goldberg give it a test run on Larry King.
And yesterday we had the McCain campaign release its own investigation, which is probably the most ridiculous thing I have come across in a lot of years following politics.
All of this gives us some hints as to how McCain and Palin would govern:
1) They would abuse their powers for personal vendettas. Both candidates have exhibited this kind of behavior. It is well known that John McCain is simply not capable of treating his opponents with much respect. And Sarah Palin's political vendettas go all the way back to her days in Wasilla.
2) They would not govern on principle but according to the political flavor of the day. It's seen almost daily from McCain and his ever-shifting positions.
3) They would lie and probably even more so they Bush and Cheney. In Tuesday night's debate, McCain said that he had signed a letter with other Senators warning about Freddie and Fannie. He then said Obama did not sign the letter. Unfortunately, there is simply no evidence of such a letter ever existing and Tuesday was the first time McCain had ever mentioned it. This letter simply doesn't exist. Now, it is well established that in early 2007(March 22nd to be precise - Here's the letter) Obama wrote a letter to Bernanke and Paulson warning about the sub-prime mortgage. Coupled with other McCain lies, there's no doubt a McCain/Palin administration would be one of the most dishonest administrations we have ever seen.
4) They will kowtow to the most fringe elements of the extreme rightwing. This past week has proven that.
Add it all up and the very idea of a McCain/Palin administration should send a cold chill through the body of any rational person. They are erratic,deceitful and lack sound judgement. The risk is just too much.
John K: The trooper tasered a 9 year old boy and wasn't fired? No wonder you left wingers support Ayers. All he did was kill Americans in an attempt to overthrow the govt. But look at yourself. In pursuit of power you support an opinion that allows a trooper to taser a 9 year old boy.
you have no comprehension of what you read, do you john?
William Ayers was never charged with murder, but if you want to lie…
Hey, this Wooten guy sounds like he should have been fired. I mean, yeah, the nine year old asked to be tasered. but you gotta have some judgment. However, nobody here wrote the investigator's opinion. Fact is, the Legislative Council thinks the Governor stepped over a line. But unless she faces jail time, it probably won't matter. Now both Republican candidates have been officially found wanting in the ethic's department.
John K: Ayers was not convicted. He does admit he planted those bombs and destroyed property to include the Pentagon. Try again Homer.
John K: The trooper tasered a 9 year old boy and you celebrate that he is free and still on the job. He used his state provided taser to do this. Odd idea of law enforcement you left wingers have.
JK-
Who was tasered and when is not the point. The point is that a bipartisan committee unanimously voted to release a report that said that Palin ABUSED THE POWER OF HER OFFICE.
I can understand why you'd want to change the subject. This looks very very bad for McCain and the GOP.
it's very gonzalezy so i am sure the republican's find nothing wrong with abuse of power.
Right John K. at 9:18am you spoke the truth. At 6:33am (a bit early) you lied about Ayers.
How did I celebrate Wooten? By saying he should have been fired? By suggesting he has bad judgment?
mcslagslag, you remind me of the line from Monty Python's Holy Grail " Let's not bicker and argue over who killed who."
I can certainly understand why Sarah Palin would want to see this state trooper fired. Hell, if he had been married to my sister, I would have wanted him fired (at the very least) too. I might have even, if I felt in a particularly adventuresome mood, have pressured all kinds of public figures to make this firing happen.
In the same way, I could certainly understand why George W. Bush would want to see Saddam Hussein deposed and even killed. Hell, if some foreign power had taken direct action in a bungled attempt to assassinate my father, I would have wanted to do the same thing. I might have even pressured all kinds of public figures to make this happen.
But the key difference here is that I have not been elected to public office.
Once you run for, win, and accept public office, you are -- even though this is difficult, and many have had difficulty pulling it off -- expected to act more in the public's interest than your own. One can argue that it really was in the public interest for this trooper to be fired (or Saddam Hussein to be deposed and hanged). But the point is that we will never really be able to untangle the public interest from the private interests of the executives who pushed too hard for either of these things to happen.
I sympathize with Sarah Palin here. It doesn't sound as though she did a great deal of lobbying herself, and that most of the "pushing" for this firing was done by others, including her husband. I can't say whether she condoned this lobbying or not, or whether she even knew it was going on.
In addition, she was very new to her office, and -- like so many other governors and presidents before her -- made a classic blunder of confusing her personal interests for those of the public. We've seen it before -- the Clinton-era White House Travel Office comes to mind -- in the early days of many administrations. Those first few games in "The Big Leagues" are always difficult, and it's easy to fall back on the same shit that you so easily got away with when you were in the minors.
And finally, this is a bodaciously small state, population-wise, and the personal, political, and professional are always easy to mix up when the number of players is so small. That's why high school is high school, university faculty politics are so bitter, and the City of Pittsburgh's government is one long string of personal friendships and angry feuds.
She did what she did. This report slaps her for doing it. The state legislature will likely respond with (at most) censure or (more likely) by doing nothing at all. And if this were 2007 or if McCain had picked someone else, that would have been it. Not one of us would have noticed any of these events, and she would have continued on doing a generally good job as the governor of Alaska, with a bit more understanding of why she needs to be more careful.
But sympathetic though I may be, it is 2008, McCain did pick her, and she chose to put herself on the national stage. I don't believe that this incident is disqualifying for her, any more than the White House Travel Office thing disqualified President Clinton. But when faced with a choice between two teams, one with this kind of record and the other without, I'd rather go with the one who hasn't (yet) made this kind of mistake.
I really wish people would stick to the issue of the story. The ethics violation that Palin is now proven to have committed have little to do with Wooten.
The allegations have to do with a Governor firing a career civil servant for simply not letting the governor and her unelected family members utilize the people's resources to go on a personal vendetta.
Whether Wooten is good, bad, or something else is regardless to the issue. The Governor does not have the power and should not utilize the people's resources in this manner. She was found guilty of such by the legislation.
Now the real person hurt in this debacle was the Public Safety Director. The man worked over 30+ years for the state and was beloved for his benevolence. Then when he does the right thing again and won't let the Governor misuse the people's trust, his return for doing the right thing is to be fired wrongfully, vilified in the press by the Governor and now right-wing nutjobs, and have his thirty year record pissed on.
Personally, I am tired of the misdirection of this story back to Wooten. The story is about the Safety Director. The Safety Director deserves a public apology from Governor Palin and her family. If they chose to instead misdirect the issue and continue to attack the safety director, the populace of Alaska will let their voices be heard when they vote her out and end her short although unique political career.
Please explain to me why Walt Monehan deserved to be vilified in the press and wrongfully terminated because he would not let the governor and her family misuse the public resources??? Just explain that, and don't say it is because of the trooper.
I would like to echo pretty much exactly the "Admiral's" sentiments. Since Sarah Palin was elected to a public office, she (and her family and staff when it acts on her behalf) is held to higher standard. Hanging around, as an individual or even a state senator, with a former weather underground member does not rise to the same level. I would say Clinton should have known better, having been a state governor (for eight years) and attorney general. The admonition of the Legislative Council will probably be as far as it goes, and voters should make up their own minds what it says.
I will say this incident could almost characterize Sarah Palin. She seems to have very good instincts for how to get ahead in politics. She is an excellent political infighter, which does seem to be almost the definition for vice president. “Almost”. But in a time of two wars (well, war/occupations), a global effort against terrorism (with all the accompanying attacks on civil liberties and ethical questions) and a Wall Street meltdown, Sarah Palin’s lack of curiosity about actual issues beyond natural gas pipelines should be criminal. Just my opinion.
Happy voting.
John K: The trooper also illegally shot a moose. Based on how you left wingers value life, that has to be worse than tasering a 9 year old kid. By the way, the trooper's defense is that the kid asked for it. He wanted to see what it was like. Well no wonder the ethics commission ruled against Palin. Dumb conservative trying to get this guy fired. Who does she think she is.
John K: Speaking of Ayers and his wife Dorn. Isn't it interesting that the left allows a guy who bombed govt buildings and killed US citizens into the school system to teach. Yet, they mock Palin for wanting creationism to be taught in the schools. Interesting how the minds of the left works.
I haven't read the full report yet, I'm just basing it on a couple of MSM "bloggers". They describe a situation much like RKT sums up, but go on to add that the Palin administration was "hilariously incompetant" in its attempts to take care of this Troooper, or pressure for his ouster, by the usual means. So I think you can sting her not just for "abusing her power", but for weilding it badly. Which is forgivable at times, in say, a Mayor, not so great for a President or a modern, empowered Vice President.
A point on Trooper Wooten:
He was an employee of the State of Alaska. As such, he was covered by whatever personnel policies that State has, and probably by a collective bargaining agreement.
His conduct was investigated, under whatever guidelines that cover Alaska State Troopers.
That's it. Was he a scum? Sure. But, apparently, whatever he did, he did not do enough to merit firing, under the personnel policies of Alaska.
(Look at how nearly impossible it is to fire a Pittsburgh City Policeman.)
No matter if he "deserved it" or not. Moneghan couldn't fire Wooten because the investigation into his actions did not call for firing. And, rather than accept that, Palin canned Moneghan.
She couldn't separate her personal views from her official duties.
What's the difference between Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney?
Lipstick.
to JK
Ayers' wife's name is spelled DOHRN not DORN. If your going to unfairly trash someone at least spell their name correctly.
Also, Ayers never killed anyone nor was he ever convicted of anything.
But with Sarah Palin's credibility in tatters I can see why you'd want to dredge up 40 year old anti-war stories.
First, John K. needs to get his facts straight - will Ayers never killed anyone nor was Ayers ever convicted of committing terrorist acts.
Try again.
And it should be pointed out that the charity Ayers and Obama served on was founded by Walter Annenberg, the former ambassador to the UK and good friend of Ronald Reagan.
We've heard the prosecutor who tried Ayers say that this line of attack is nonsense.
We've heard other Republicans who served on that charity echo that sentiment.
Whatever...it's all Republicans have got.
Now, as to this Troopergate investigation, this report was released by 8 Republicans and 4 Democrats that voted unanimously - and they all agreed that while Palin was within her rights to fire Monegan, in doing so she violated ethics laws by making it a personal matter.
When you hold higher office, you simply cannot carry out personal vendettas. If the Palins had a problem with Wooten's behavior, why the hell did they not take this to civil or criminal court?
The simple truth is - as reported by these 8 Republicans and 4 Democrats who compiled the report - that Sarah Palin abused the powers of her office in pursuit of a personal vendetta.
Frankly, she seems to fit in pretty well with her fellow corrupt Alaska Republicans and the Republican Party at large.
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