It's been 5 (?)Days. Let's Recap

[stillcool]

I know there's more but I can't keep up...


Trooper-Gate

MONEGAN SPEAKS: Names Todd Palin & others
http://www.andrewhalcro.com/monegan_speaks_says_todd_palin_pressured_him_to_fire_wooten
Tonight on KTUU Channel 2 News, former Commissioner of Public Safety Walt Monegan broke his silence and admitted that he was pressured on numerous occasions by Todd Palin to fire State Trooper Mike Wooten.

Monegan said he met with Palin numerous times to talk about Wooten as well as Frank Bailey from the governor's office and Commissioner of Administration
http://dwb.adn.com/front/story/5572779p-5504444c.html

Alaska's governor being investigated, too.
Sen. Ted Stevens isn't the only Alaska Republican who might be in hot water. The state's Legislative Council, a bipartisan panel made up of both state senators and state representatives, voted earlier this week to spend up to $100,000 investigating Gov. Sarah Palin's firing of the state's former public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan. The investigation will consider whether Palin sacked Monegan because he wouldn't fire Mike Wooten, a state trooper who's Palin's former brother-in-law, and whether Monegan was pressured to fire Wooten by Palin or members of her family or administration.
http://palininvestigated.blogspot.com/2008/07/alaskas-governor-being-investigated.html

Car Wash-Gate

Sarah Palin
Palin Scrubbing Turns Up an Undeclared Car Wash

Updated 7:28 p.m.
By Matthew Mosk
ST. PAUL -- In addition to being a mayor and raising four children, Sarah Palin found time for another venture in her Wasilla years -- she was part-owner of an Anchorage car wash.

Palin and husband Todd each held a 20 percent stake in Anchorage Car Wash LLC, according to state corporation records filed in 2004.

A review of Palin's gubernatorial disclosure filings indicates that she failed to report her stake in the company on the form that requires candidates for governor to disclose any interest in a nonpublicly traded company.
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Feb. 11, 2007 letter to the governor's business partner advises that the car wash had "not filed its biennial report and/or paid its biennial fees," which were more than a year overdue.

The warning letter was written on state letterhead, which carried Palin's name at the top, next to the state seal.

On April 3, 2007, the state went further and issued a "certificate of involuntary dissolution" because of the car wash's failure to file its report and pay state licensing fees.

Palin's gubernatorial disclosure filings also reveal her involvement in another failed startup -- a marketing business which was to go by the name Rouge Cou, which evidently is a literal French translation of "red neck." On the 2005 form, Palin describes the firm as one for which she secured a license but did not conduct any business.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/09/02/palin_scrubbing_car_wash.html

Bridge to Nowhere-Gate

The Alaska governor campaigned in 2006 on a build-the-bridge platform, telling Ketchikan residents she felt their pain when politicians called them "nowhere." They're still feeling pain today in Ketchikan, over Palin's subsequent decision to use the bridge funds for other projects -- and over the timing of her announcement, which they say came in a pre-dawn press release that seemed aimed at national news deadlines.

"I think that's when the campaign for national office began," said Ketchikan Mayor Bob Weinstein on Saturday.
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In September, 2006, Palin showed up in Ketchikan on her gubernatorial campaign and said the bridge was essential for the town's prosperity.

She said she could feel the town's pain at being derided as a "nowhere" by prominent politicians, noting that her home town, Wasilla, had recently been insulted by the state Senate president, Ben Stevens.
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Palin's 2007 press release announcing her change of course came just a month after McCain himself slammed the Ketchikan bridge for taking money that could have been used to shore up dangerous bridges like one that collapsed in Minnesota.
http://www.adn.com/sarahpalin/story/511471.html

MatMaid Gate

Nov 19: No spilling the milk. A gag order on the Matanuska Maid fiasco
http://www.andrewhalcro.com/nov_19_no_spilling_the_milk_a_gag_order_on_the_matanuska_maid_fiasco
In what has quickly become one of the most costly and poorly thought out decisions since former Governor Murkowski bought the ill fated jet, Governor Palin's decision to keep open the failing Matanuska Maid Dairy has culminated in her ordering a gag on employees from sharing public information about Mat Maid's questionable business practices.

Has being open and transparent gone out of style?

In a November 13 memo from Division of Agriculture Director Franci Havemeister, she writes "Other than Ray Nix, no other Division of Agriculture staff, while serving in his or her official cpacity, may contact or provide information to the media, the legislature or the public regarding matanuska Maid and its disposal."
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"In addition, I would like to remind staff that no one may disclose confidential information. Nor may staff disclose information gained in the course of ones official duties that could any way result in a benefit to the staff member or his or her family."

Board takes action to keep dairy open
Matanuska Maid will continue production with help from a $600,000 grant from state
The Associated Press
PALMER - Alaska's state-owned dairy dodged closure when Gov. Sarah Palin's new Board of Agriculture and Conservation voted to keep it open.

The Agriculture Board on Tuesday dismissed members of the state Creamery Board, installed itself as replacements and rescinded the closure of the Matanuska Maid dairy scheduled for July 7.

Palin dismissed the former Agriculture Board over the weekend. The board oversees the Creamery Board, which refused to accept Palin's offer for financial assistance to extend the life of the dairy.

Palin lacked authority to directly replace the Creamery Board.
http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/062107/sta_20070621009.shtml
http://www.andrewhalcro.com/nov_19_no_spilling_the_milk_a_gag_order_on_the_matanuska_maid_fiasco

Alaskan Independence Party-Gate

Members of "Fringe" Alaskan Independence Party Say Palin Was a Member in 90s; McCain Campaign and Alaska Division of Elections Deny Charge
September 01, 2008 6:52 PM
http://www.adn.com/sarahpalin/story/511471.html

Officials of the Alaskan Independence Party say that Palins was once so independent, she was once a member of their party, which, since the 1970's, has been pushing for a legal vote for Alaskans to decide whether or not residents of the 49th state can secede from the United States.

Lynette Clark, the chairman of the AIP, tells ABC News that Palin and her husband Todd were members in 1994, even attending the 1994 statewide convention in Wasilla. Clark was AIP secretary at the time.
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Clark says that Palin left the party and became a Republican in 1996, when she first ran for mayor of Wasilla.

Hacker-Gate

http://dwb.adn.com/front/story/5572779p-5504444c.html
Palin explains her actions in Ruedrich case

ETHICS: Former oil and gas commissioner's missteps went beyond his partisan work.

By RICHARD MAUER
Anchorage Daily News

Published: September 19, 2004
Last Modified: September 20, 2004 at 12:14 AM

WASILLA -- Sarah Palin never thought of herself as an investigator.
Yet there she was, hacking uncomfortably into Randy Ruedrich's computer, looking for evidence that the state Republican Party boss had broken the state ethics law while a member of the Alaska Oil & Gas Conservation Commission

Ruedrich had resigned on Nov. 8 -- so suddenly that when Palin, the commission's chairwoman, caught the news at the end of a television newscast, she didn't know whether he had quit the commission or quit the party to resolve his conflicts of interest. When she learned it was the commission, Palin wasn't surprised that she'd heard it first from the media, given her difficulty in getting any word from the governor's office about Ruedrich, who played a major role in Gov. Frank Murkowski's election.

The next week, when Palin went back to work at the AOGCC, she noticed that Ruedrich had removed his pictures from the walls and the personal effects from his desk. But as she and an AOGCC technician worked their way around his computer password at the behest of an assistant attorney general in Fairbanks, they found his cleanup had not extended to his electronic files.
--------------------------------
Palin has been mayor of Wasilla, lost the 2002 primary for lieutenant governor by less than 2,000 votes, and has been described as a rising star in the Republican Party. Wanting to explain her actions, particularly to her Mat-Su neighbors, she agreed to an extensive series of interviews about the circumstances surrounding Ruedrich's resignation. She and others at the commission said Ruedrich's questionable activities involved more issues than the partisan matters cited in the ethics charges and made public. She said Ruedrich had conflicts of interest with oil companies, and she said he sought reimbursement from the state for travel that included political events, accusations that Ruedrich denies.
http://dwb.adn.com/front/story/5572779p-5504444c.html

Sarah's Experience-Gate-2006

By TOM KIZZIA
Anchorage Daily News
First of two parts

(Published: October 23, 2006)
BASKETBALL SUCCESS

"I know this sounds hokey, but basketball was a life-changing experience for me," Palin said recently on a rare night home in Wasilla, while her 5-year-old daughter, Piper, worked on homework at the kitchen counter. "It's all about setting a goal, about discipline, teamwork, and then success."

MISS CONGENIALITY

In her high school yearbook, the future gubernatorial candidate quoted the Bible, signed the class page "Sarah Heath #22," and listed a demure ambition: to sit in a broadcast booth with Howard Cosell broadcasting basketball games played by her boyfriend, Todd Palin.

Sarah went on to study journalism and political science in college, graduating from the University of Idaho in 1987. Along the way she competed in the Miss Alaska contest after being chosen Miss Wasilla 1984. In the Wasilla contest, she played the flute and also won the title of Miss Congeniality.
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Palin has cited her mayoral work as a central part of her qualification to serve as governor. But at the beginning of her term, asked by the local newspaper how she would run the city without experienced department heads, she made the job sound like no big deal: "It's not rocket science. It's $6 million and 53 employees."

Candidate at a glance:
Sarah Palin
Party: Republican
Age: 42
Occupation: commercial fishing, volunteer coach/manager
Previous offices: Wasilla City Council, 1992-1996; Wasilla mayor, 1996-2002; Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, 2003-2004.
Education: University of Idaho, B.S. degree, Journalism, 1987
http://dwb.adn.com/news/politics/v-printer/story/8334949p-8231037c.html

Sarah as Mayor:Or Penchant for Firing/Library Gate

Wasilla keeps librarian, but police chief is out (2/1/1997)

S.J. Komarnitsky | [e-mail] / Anchorage Daily News

Published: August 29th, 2008 12:04 PM
Last Modified: August 29th, 2008 10:49 PM

Editor's note: This story was originally on February 1, 1997

City librarian Mary Ellen Emmons will stay, but Police Chief Irl Stambaugh is on his own, Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin announced Friday. The decision came one day after letters signed by Palin were dropped on Stambaugh's and Emmon's desks, telling them their jobs were over as of Feb. 13.

The mayor told them she appreciated their service but felt it was time for a change. ''I do not feel I have your full support in my efforts to govern the city of Wasilla. Therefore I intend to terminate your employment ...'' the letter said.

Palin said Friday she now feels Emmons supports her but does not feel the same about Stambaugh. As to what prompted the change, Palin said she now has Emmons' assurance that she is behind her. She refused to give details about how Stambaugh has not supported her, saying only that ''You know in your heart when someone is supportive of you.''
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Both Stambaugh and Emmons publicly supported Palin's opponent, long-time mayor John Stein during the campaign last fall. When she was elected, Palin questioned their loyalty and initially asked for their resignations. But Stambaugh said he thought any questions had been resolved.
http://www.adn.com/sarahpalin/story/510219.html

Beauty-Gate/Republicans Are Sexist Gate

FEBRUARY 29, 2008 - 4:35 PM

Palin-mania continues: From Rush Limbaugh's Web page.

From Sean Cockerham in Anchorage --

The drooling over Sarah Palin continues.

Rush Limbaugh yesterday, talking to a caller from Kodiak, described the governor as a "babe" and discussed her as a vice presidential possibility.

"The babe is the icing on the cake aspect, something the Democrats can't claim on their side," Limbaugh said.

Palin's Media
FEBRUARY 26, 2008 - 12:05 PM
From Sean Cockerham in Anchorage --

Sarah Palin is getting all kinds of media during her D.C. trip.

Check out this gushing piece in the American Spectator that declares "Sarah Palin, the beautiful conservative Republican governor of Alaska, would be an ideal choice to help McCain slay this unholy ObamaOprah beast."

"Gov. Palin could become the Republican Party's Segolene Royal, the French Socialist Party's glamorous leader known for her heels and political bite. She is the perfect antidote to Sen. Obama's cheap thrills, and would help rejuvenate conservatism."

Miscellaneous:

Shadow Governor?

Coming Thursday: The Shadow Governor
http://www.andrewhalcro.com/shadow_governor
In the aftermath of the Walt Monegan firing, one question keeps surfacing over and over again; why does the governor's husband, Todd Palin appear to hold so much power?

After all, Nancy Murkowski or Susan Knowles were never accused of pressuring a commissioner or inappropriately sitting in on meetings that should have been private.

The stories started last year when Representative Ralph Samuels told me about going into a meeting, he thought would be private, with Governor Sarah Palin. Much to his surprise, Todd Palin was there and proceeded to sit through the entire meeting.

Other lawmakers have shared similar stories and were shocked at how inappropriate Todd's presence was at meetings with the governor. Yesterday on the Dan Fagan Show, Representative Jay Ramras mentioned that Todd was working lawmakers offices during the ACES debate.

But more importantly, Todd's fingerprints on trying to impact personnel decisions appear to go beyond the current scandal revolving around State Trooper Mike Wooten.

Palin's responses on radio talk show very unbecoming
DAN FAGAN

Published: January 27th, 2008 01:12 AM
Last Modified: January 27th, 2008 01:38 AM

The governor's appearance on KWHL's "The Bob and Mark Show" last week is plain and simple one of the most unprofessional, childish and inexcusable performances I've ever seen from a politician.
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The Daily News opinion page addressed the governor's gaffe. They wrote "She came off looking immature herself, almost high-schoolish. It was conduct unbecoming a governor."

It was conduct unbecoming a human being, never mind a governor.
http://www.adn.com/opinion/story/295464.html

[Blue_In_AK]

1. What's the big deal? You guys just don't understand us

Alaskans. For the sarcasm-challenged -- :sarcasm:

[stillcool]

4. She really is perfect...

for the Party..hits all the right notes!

[Morning Dew]

2. bob and mark show audio clip

here:

http://loc.rousefamily.com/leftofcentrist/?p=1123

[stillcool]

3. Thank You!..

I'm going hunting for some Pastor problems I've seen going around.

[Morning Dew]

5. you're welcome

google is my friend. :)

[Karenina]

6. WHAT a CIRCUS!!!

:kick: