Shooting Down The Republican Position On Troopergate

Sarah Palin and Troopergate

Kargo-X over at Daily Kos did an interesting report on Sarah Palin and the report that came out of the Alaska legislature on Troopergate. Read more here, if the clip below interests you...

A month ago, we were asking What Makes Troopergate So Dangerous and noting that there was a pronounced half-assed Cheneyist quality to Sarah Palin's approach to "governance."

The release of the Branchflower report on Troopergate lays it all bare, and Palin's response to it makes the case against electing her:

"If you read the report, you will see that there was nothing unlawful or unethical about replacing a cabinet member," Palin said as boarded her campaign bus in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. "You got to read the report."

But as the very next sentence of the CNN report cited above says:

Palin violated state ethics law by trying to get her former brother-in-law fired from the state police, a state investigator's report for the bipartisan Legislative Council concluded Friday.

Palin says there was nothing unlawful or unethical, just read the report. And the report says? It was unlawful and unethical.

That, under normal circumstances, would tell you all you need to know: the Republican Vice Presidential candidate is a certifiable loon, dangerously disconnected from reality.

I Didn't Know THIS - News on Palin

From Newsweek...

An Anchorage judge three years ago warned Sarah Palin and members of her family to stop "disparaging" the reputation of Alaska State Trooper Michael Wooten, who at the time was undergoing a bitter separation and divorce from Palin's sister Molly.

Allegations that Palin, her husband Todd, and at least one top gubernatorial aide continued to vilify Wooten—after Palin became Alaska's governor and pressured state police officials to take action against him—are at the center of "Troopergate," a political and ethical controversy which has embroiled Palin's administration and is currently the subject of an official inquiry by a special investigator hired by the state legislature.

Court records obtained by NEWSWEEK show that during the course of divorce hearings three years ago, Judge John Suddock heard testimony from an official of the Alaska State Troopers' union about how Sarah Palin—then a private citizen—and members of her family, including her father and daughter, lodged up to a dozen complaints against Wooten with the state police. The union official told the judge that he had never before been asked to appear as a divorce-case witness, that the union believed family complaints against Wooten were "not job-related," and that Wooten was being "harassed" by Palin and other family members.

Court documents show that Judge Suddock was disturbed by the alleged attacks by Palin and her family members on Wooten's behavior and character. "Disparaging will not be tolerated—it is a form of child abuse," the judge told a settlement hearing in October 2005, according to typed notes of the proceedings. The judge added: "Relatives cannot disparage either. If occurs [sic] the parent needs to set boundaries for their relatives."