Thursday, September 11, 2008

Obama Must Call for Palin's Removal from the Ticket

Note: I am including this post from the Anchorage Daily News comments section. The original comment can be found here:

Palin says she's ready to step in as president : comments

Obama Must Call for Palin's Removal from the Ticket

Obama must call for her removal from the ticket in the interests of national security, and call into question McCain's impetuous, imperious, nutball "judgment."

He must make the correct and compelling case that putting this corrupt amateur governor with zero foreign policy credibility in direct line to become president should McCain's health give out is wildly irresponsible, and jeopardizes the health and safety of the nation.

Palin is under investigation for ethics violations in Alaska related to allegations that she used her office to try to fire an ex-brother-in-law state trooper (of all things bush league!) She spends Alaska taxpayer money to take her family on trips, to fund her visits to sporting events, to pay for her husband's jaunts. Total for her husband and daughters alone (including commuting from home to work): $43,490. She bills the state a travel per diem when she spends nights at home in Wasilla (of all things bush league!)

She is withholding e-mails that pertain to so-called "Troopergate," and reportedly implicate her husband in anti-law enforcement union influence peddling. She believes that so-called creationism (read: Bible scripture) should be taught in schools. She tried to get certain library books banned while mayor of Wasilla, then threatened the librarian when her request was refused.

She lies easily, from claiming to have stopped the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere" to saying that Obama opposes nuclear power and offshore drilling. . .to boasting that she is anti-government "earmarks," when in fact she has sought and won hundreds of millions of fat Washington dollars. She tried to cover-up her 17-year-old daughter's pregnancy, and to arrange for a quickie marriage prior to the Republican National Convention. She's had an "affair," as the polite term goes, with her husband's ex-business partner.

Need more?
She belongs to a weird "end times" Evangelical church that believes God has designated Alaska as a refuge for the "annointed." She has called the disastrous Iraq occupation "a task from God," has exhorted church members to pray for an Alaska natural gas pipeline, a project that she insanely labels "God's will." There are reports circulating that she has referred to Obama as "Sambo," and eskimos as "Arctic Arabs."

Then there is her champion, callous hypocrisy concerning teen pregnancy and birth control. Her daughter---who obviously emulates one-time good-time gal Sarah (who in college favored T-shirts such as "FCK---The Only Thing Missing is U")---is five or six months pregnant, probably by a local lout whose Myspace page (long pulled) says he enjoys "fuckin' chillin'." Yet Palin has cut funding to pay for housing---housing---for teen mothers.

And in a move that would have pleased the Marquis de Sade, Palin---who inhumanely insists that pregnant rape victims bear their children---saw to it as Wasilla mayor that rape victims must pay for their own sexual assault exams, at a cost of up to $1200. Now there's compassionate conservatism.

And you can laugh off the fact that she says "pundint," "nook-yoo-luhr" (her RNC teleprompter spelled it phonetically so she would say it correctly) and "Eye-RACK," but these are sure indicators of, well, exactly what she is: a person with a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Idaho. Take it from me: a degree in journalism is like a degree in nose-picking. Anybody with fingers can do it. You learn journalism on the job, not in a classroom. It's definitely a step up from majoring in physical education. And if you disagree with this, you must at least admit that the degree did not prepare her to spell or speak properly.

The woman is a scandal circus. And we've probably only seen the first ring.

Never mind that the country is traumatically split between so-called right and so-called left. (The right is comprised largely of extremist corporatocratic religious fanatics, and the profoundly ignorant; the left largely of cautious "centrists" who are essentially conservative.) Never mind the acrimony and charges of "negative campaigning" that would ensue from calling for Palin's removal. Americans have grown accustomed to having acrimony with breakfast, and the campaign is already ugly. Do the right thing. Palin is unfit for office, and every sensible person can see this (this leaves out, apparently, members of a Hillary support organization called WomanCount, which wretchedly called for backing off of Palin because some have said a mother of five can't do justice to a full-time job.)

Palin's appointment, in other words, is not just a matter of an opponent's policies being "dangerous," "wrong-headed," or various other conventional campaign cliches. It is a matter of a famously impulsive, high-rolling candidate (who loves to play craps) caving in to advisors and picking a frighteningly unqualified person to become vice-president of the United States. Dick Cheney is a towering statesman by contrast. It is a matter of aged McCain throwing caution to the wind---when caution was never more required---and grabbing a nice-looking, young piece of baggage without so much as a routine FBI background check. All the McCain aides did was Google Palin, which is slightly more thorough than making goo-goo eyes at her.

The choice was not merely a cynical grab for hard-core reactionary extremist right-wing Evangelicals. It was not merely a cynical ploy to make the campaign look progressive and compel more ladies to vote for the increasingly corpse-like McCain. It was not merely a cynical means of sexing up a campaign that would otherwise have been led by boring old white guys (God help us---Joe Lieberman.) It was all of these things---but with breathtaking disregard for the safety and welfare of the nation.

If you were running for president, wouldn't your first concerns be that your vice-president is capable of holding the job, and keeping the country stable? And wouldn't your second concerns be that your vice-president would not engage in dishonest or corrupt activities---that is, outside of those dishonest and corrupt activities that are officially sanctioned in D.C.---let alone peccadilloes such as scamming a few free trips? I mean, if you're going to be a crook, go all the Abramoff way, right?

After those concerns are met, then sure, you're free to be as "strategic" (cynical) as you like in your choice.

McCain did not do this. McCain is a hotdog pilot who has clipped power lines and been involved in a number of air crashes. With Palin, he clipped his own power line, and the only thing preventing a crash of his campaign is the ignorance and hatred of the American right-wing.

That's correct. Hatred is what is holding his campaign together, and giving it any kind of fuel. It is not running on inspiration. It is not running on encouraging human cooperation. It is not running on even the commercial-slogan-deep ideals of change and hope, as Obama slickly did in the Democrat primaries. McCain and Palin tap directly into black bile.

Think about it. Their power base comes from resentment: resentment of "Hollywood liberals," blacks, minorities in general, Affirmative Action (can't blame them for that one), welfare abuse (can't blame them for that one, either), illegal immigrants (can't blame. . .) taxation of their hard-earned millions (or billions.) It comes from fear of terrorists and hatred for those who ridicule their generally infantile and often fascistic idea of "Christianity." It comes from hatred of "junk scientists" who want to take away their "Constitutional right to own an SUV" (as many have e-mailed this site through the years), and from hatred of those godless heathens who imagine that humans are descended from apes. It comes from hatred of anyone who does not claim to believe that all human life is sacred (unless they are Iraqis, apparently, or Darfurians)and hatred of anyone who will not allow so-called creationism to be taught in public schools.

It comes from hatred of absolutely anything that can be smeared as "liberal," "socialist," "leftist," when in fact these things are normal, integral parts of any successful society and government. Imagine "privatizing" (read: destroying) social security and veterans' benefits.

And it comes from ignorance. Republicans/McCain supporters are generally of the ilk that simply reads newspapers/websites that reinforce their dumb-as-dirt reactionary thinking and beliefs. To imagine that these people---stupid enough to believe that McCain is some sort of maverick, when he votes with Bush 90 percent of the time, and turned against his own campaign reform spending bill---can be persuaded, reasoned with. . .it's folly.

So write them off, Obama---write off their bile, their rage---and do what's right. Palin and McCain are a danger to the country, and nothing less. Now is the time to say it, and to say it bluntly. The clock is ticking on this election. If they are elected, the clock will be ticking on whatever is left of the country.


Palin leaves open option of war with Russia

Palin leaves open option of war with Russia
CanadaTV
Sept 11 2008
CTV.ca News Staff

In her first interview with the media since being picked as Republican John McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin said that Georgia should join NATO and war might be necessary if Russia invaded the country again.

In the excerpts from the first of three interviews with ABC News' Charlie Gibson, Palin advocated the inclusion of Georgia and Ukraine into NATO.

When asked if the U.S. would go to war if Russia again if it attacked Georgia, the Alaska governor said: ""Perhaps so. I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you're going to be expected to be called upon and help.

"And we've got to keep an eye on Russia. For Russia to have exerted such pressure in terms of invading a smaller democratic country, unprovoked, is unacceptable."

On other questions of foreign policy and security, Palin towed the Republican line...

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Palin leaves open option of war with Russia

The Bush Doctrine...What's That?

The Bush Doctrine...What's That?
Carla Marinucci, SF Chronicle Political Writer
Thursday, September 11, 2008

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, emerging from media silence for her first serious interview as the GOP vice presidential pick, said Thursday that the United States might have to go to war if Russia were to invade Georgia again.

And on the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, she appeared entirely unfamiliar with the Bush Doctrine, the central foreign policy tenet of the current administration, which asserts the right to wage preventative strikes in the wake of such terrorist attacks.

Palin made her statements during an interview with ABC "World News" anchor Charlie Gibson in which she was pressed on her foreign policy credentials and knowledge. Additional Gisbon interviews with Palin will be broadcast today on ABC.

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The Bush Doctrine...What's That?

Fact Check: Palin Wrong on Former VP Credentials

Fact Check: Palin Wrong on Former VP Credentials
FactCheck.org
September 11, 2008

ABC News' Lisa Chinn reports: During her interview with ABC News' Charlie Gibson Thursday Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin attempted to deflect a question about the fact she has never met a foreign head of state by saying that "many" other vice presidential nominees in history hadn't met a head of state either.

However Palin was mistaken, at least where recent history is concerned.

Every vice president over the last 30 years had met a foreign head of state before being elected.

"Have you ever met a foreign head of state?" Gibson asked Palin Thursday.

"I have not," Palin said, "and I think if you go back in history and if you ask that question of many vice presidents, they may have the same answer that I just gave you."

However Palin, who obtained her first passport two years ago, would in fact be the first vice president in 32 years who hadn't met a foreign head of state, if she were elected.

The current Vice President Dick Cheney is a former Secretary of Defense and met foreign leaders in that capacity.

Former Vice President Al Gore was a member of the Senate Armed Forces Committee and went on many congressional trips abroad, known as CODELS, where he met foreign leaders.
Former Vice President Dan Quayle was also a member the Senate Armed Committee and went on many CODELS.

Former President George H.W. Bush was the Ambassador to China before he became a vice president and eventually president.

Walter Mondale, who became vice president in 1977 under President Jimmy Carter, was a senator for 16 years before becoming VP and met foreign leaders.

Read the story here:
Fact Check: Palin Wrong on Former VP Credentials

FactCheck: Belittling Palin?

Belittling Palin?
FactCheck.org
September 11, 2008

A McCain-Palin TV ad accuses Obama of being "disrespectful" of Palin, but it distorts quotes to make the case.

Summary

The McCain-Palin campaign has released a new TV ad that distorts quotes from the Obama campaign. It takes words out of context to make it sound as though the Democratic ticket is belittling Palin:

* The ad says "they said she was doing 'what she was told.' " But the Obama adviser who's being quoted didn't accuse Palin of meekly following orders. What he actually said is that she made a false claim about Obama's legislative record and added, "maybe that's what she was told."

* It says "they lashed out at Sarah Palin; dismissed her as 'good looking,' " But "they" didn't lash out at all. Obama – who is the one pictured – didn't say anything like that. The only one the McCain campaign quotes is Obama's running mate, Biden, and he actually offered the remark as a compliment. Biden said the "obvious" difference between Palin and himself is "she's good looking."

* The ad says Obama was "disrespectful" when he accused Palin of "lying" about her record. But the truth is Palin's claim to have "said no" to the "bridge to nowhere" is indeed a dubious one, as we and many have pointed out.

Read the rest of the story here:
Belittling Palin?

Palin Drops “Bridge to Nowhere” Reference in Speech

Palin Drops “Bridge to Nowhere” Reference in Speech
By Monica Davey NY Times Plotics Blog
September 11, 2008, 5:17 pm

In speech after speech to crowds in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia in recent days, Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican candidate for vice president, has made sure to mention the so-called Bridge to Nowhere, the Alaska project that has become the symbol of earmarks, and what she portrays as her “thanks but no thanks” position on it.

When she landed in Fairbanks in her home state on Wednesday night, though, the bridge was notably absent from an (otherwise mostly similar) speech she made inside an airplane hangar before her homestate crowd.

Ever since she first said it, two weeks ago, critics have questioned her claim that she “told Congress, ‘thanks but no thanks on that Bridge to Nowhere.’”

Her relationship with the bridge to the tiny Alaskan island of Gravina was actually more complicated. In 2006, she expressed support for the bridge project. Later, as support for the project was vanishing in Washington, she announced she was abandoning the project. (Alaska was still able to keep the federal money once intended for the bridge and direct it to other projects.)...

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Palin Drops “Bridge to Nowhere” Reference in Speech

Constitutional showdown over Troopergate?

Constitutional showdown over Troopergate?
Posted by Wesley Loy Anchorage Daily News
Posted: September 11, 2008

Tomorrow morning we’ll see a big event in the ongoing Troopergate investigation and the growing clash between the governor’s office and the Legislature.

The House and Senate judiciary committees are meeting in Anchorage, and members might vote to issue subpoenas to compel members of Gov. Sarah Palin’s administration – but not the governor herself – to go for interviews with the Legislature’s investigator, Steve Branchflower.

But this week, the state Department of Law – representing Department of Administration employees – threatens in this seven-page letter to go to court to block the subpoenas, thus widening the conflict to all three branches of government...

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Constitutional showdown over Troopergate?

McCain criticized Wasilla earmarks in 2001

McCain criticized Wasilla earmarks in 2001
From Randi Kaye
CNN Correspondent

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNN) -- Republican presidential candidate John McCain criticized two of his future running mate's hometown projects in broadsides in 2001 against congressional "pork-barrel" spending, records from the Arizona senator's office show.

McCain and running mate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin have criticized such spending as a central part of their campaign for the White House. McCain has made pork-busting a centerpiece of his maverick pitch for years.

But when Palin served as mayor of her hometown of Wasilla, outside Anchorage, she obtained about $27 million in federal "earmarks" during her last four years in office, according to the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense.

In a 2001 statement opposing a transportation spending bill McCain singled out for criticism about $3 million worth of those projects. McCain's list of "objectionable" spending included a $2.5 million road project for the town that then had a population of 5,500, as well as a $450,000 appropriation for an agricultural processing plant there.

McCain's campaign responded Wednesday by saying the record on pork-barrel spending "is one we are eager to discuss."

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McCain criticized Wasilla earmarks in 2001

Palin Backstab? Commissioner Praised Then Fired

Palin Backstab? Commissioner Praised Then Fired
By BRIAN ROSS, JUSTIN ROOD, ANNA SCHECTER and MEGAN CHUCHMACH
September 11, 2008

Exclusive Video Shows Sarah Palin Praising Commissioner, Just Months Before She Fired Him

Advocates for women's issues in Alaska have come to the defense of the state's former public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, abruptly fired by Governor Sarah Palin in July.
An inquiry is under way as to whether Sarah Palin abused her power as governor.

Monegan spent Wednesday testifying before a legislative commission which is investigating allegations Palin abused her office in firing him. Monegan claims he was dismissed because he resisted pressure from the Governor and her office to fire the Governor's former brother-in-law.

Some women's advocates say Monegan was one of the few state officials to take seriously the "epidemic" problem of violence against women and children in Alaska.

"I don't believe Governor Palin has made this a priority," said Geran Tarr, chair of the Alaska Women's Lobby. "We have not seen anything that would indicate that this is a priority."

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Palin Backstab? Commissioner Praised Then Fired

Blog Buzz: Sarah Palin's Pork

Sarah "Porky (Not Piggy)" Palin
US News

After McCain said earlier this year that he won't "spend $3 million of your tax dollars to study the DNA of bears in Montana," Politico reports that as governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin requested millions of dollars to study the DNA of harbor seals, among other things (including research on the mating habits of crabs.) Liberal and other bloggers are both amused and appalled that Palin, who claims she is conservative when it comes to earmarks, would request federal money for a project nearly identical to one that McCain has mocked. TPM's Josh Marshall says that while the research is not necessarily wasteful, the earmark is yet another example of how McCain and Palin are "hypocrites and liars." Marc Ambinder has a memo from McCain that defends Palin on earmarks.

Read the story here:
Sarah "Porky (Not Piggy)" Palin

PALIN: Troopergate Back in the News

PALIN: TROOPERGATE BACK IN THE NEWS
Posted: Thursday, September 11, 2008
by Mark Murray

The Wall Street Journal: “An informal adviser who has counseled Gov. Sarah Palin on ethics issues urged her in July to apologize for her handling of the dismissal of the state's public safety commissioner and warned that the matter could snowball into a bigger scandal. He also said, in a letter reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, that she should fire any aides who had raised concerns with the chief over a state trooper who was involved in a bitter divorce with the governor's sister.”

”In the letter, written before Sen. John McCain picked the Alaska governor as his running mate, former U.S. Attorney Wevley Shea warned Gov. Palin that ‘the situation is now grave’ and recommended that she and her husband, Todd Palin, apologize for ‘overreaching or perceived overreaching’ for using her position to try to get Trooper Mike Wooten fired from the force.”

CNN reports that an Alaska judge warned Palin back in 2005 against trying to get her then-state trooper brother-in-law fired...

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PALIN: TROOPERGATE BACK IN THE NEWS

Governor Palin May Try to Stop Subpoenas in Trooper Firing Case

Governor Palin May Try to Stop Subpoenas in Trooper Firing Case
By Timothy J. Burger and Tony Hopfinger

Sept. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The Alaska Attorney General's office told lawmakers probing Governor Sarah Palin's firing of the state's top police official that their authority and motivations are suspect, and state lawyers may "move to quash subpoenas" that legislators may issue tomorrow.

"The eyes of the nation have now turned upon us," senior Assistant Attorney General Michael Barnhill wrote in place of Attorney General Talis Colberg, a Palin appointee who recused himself in the case. Barnhill complained in a seven-page letter about public comments made by Hollis French, a Democratic senator, that Palin or her aides may have broken the law by allegedly obtaining personnel files of the fired state public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan...

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Governor Palin May Try to Stop Subpoenas in Trooper Firing Case

Sarah Palin 'lipstick pig' attack advert removed from YouTube after complaint

Sarah Palin 'lipstick pig' attack advert removed from YouTube after complaint
By Matthew Moore

An official John McCain advert accusing Barack Obama of sexism has been removed from YouTube after complaints that it misuses quotes from a leading US news anchor.

John McCain's attack video against Barack Obama - screengrab
The video is still prominent on the official John McCain website

The advert was made in response to a remark made by the Democratic candidate in which he appeared to compare Sarah Palin, Mr McCain's running mate, to a lipstick-wearing pig.

It features a brief quote from CBS news presenter Katie Couric attacking the “continued and accepted role of sexism in American life”.

The placing of the extract appears to imply that Couric was referring to Mr Obama’s jibe, when the clip was actually taken from a discussion recorded several weeks ago about the coverage of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

The video has now been taken down by YouTube, which is owned by Google, after complaints from CBS...

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Sarah Palin 'lipstick pig' attack advert removed from YouTube after complaint

Palin the latest torch bearer for anti-science

Palin the latest torch bearer for anti-science
Sep 11, 2008
JOHN GIBBONS

WHO LITERALLY believes that Jonah made his home in a whale's abdomen? Nobody really, apart from the US president - and the woman who was recently added to the 2008 Republican ticket.

Sarah Palin is the latest politician to carry the torch of science misinformation tainted by religious dogma lit during the Reagan administration and nurtured by George Bush.

Back in the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan endorsed creationism, and the cottage industry of crackpot pseudo-science it has spawned, it signalled perhaps the most profound schism between politics and science in the modern era. "Flood geology", for instance, is an entire wing of anti-science invented to claim that the fossil record stretching back hundreds of millions of years was in fact all deposited during Noah's mythical flood just a few thousand years ago. Vigorous efforts are being made to have this rubbish taught as fact to schoolchildren...

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Palin the latest torch bearer for anti-science

Palin's Ethics Scrapes May Undercut Pledge to End Old Politics

Palin's Ethics Scrapes May Undercut Pledge to End Old Politics
By Timothy J. Burger and Tony Hopfinger

Sept. 11 (Bloomberg) -- John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate sent a signal that he would end business as usual and cronyism in government. Her record shows the Alaska governor engaged in some of the same practices she and McCain now condemn.

Palin's office approved a state job for a friend and campaign aide with whom she shared a land investment, financial records and interviews over the past two weeks show. She hired a former lobbyist for a pipeline company to help oversee a multibillion-dollar deal with that same company.

She named a police chief accused of harassment to head the state police. And she sent campaign e-mails on her city hall account while serving as mayor of Wasilla -- conduct for which she later turned in an oil commissioner on ethics charges...

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Palin's Ethics Scrapes May Undercut Pledge to End Old Politics

Palin's attorney: Investigator 'biased'

Palin's attorney: Investigator 'biased'
Sept 11, 2008
By GENE JOHNSON

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A lawyer for Gov. Sarah Palin is taking another stab at derailing the Legislature's ethics investigation into the firing of her former public safety commissioner, accusing the retired prosecutor who is conducting it of acting unethically himself.

In two letters released Wednesday, Thomas Van Flein called the investigation "unlawful and unconstitutional" and said the man hired to run it, former prosecutor Stephen Branchflower, has a conflict of interest because he's a friend of the fired commissioner. Citing "your seemingly biased conduct of the investigation in recent weeks," he urged Branchflower to stop interviewing witnesses — the second time this month that he's asked Branchflower to stand down.

Branchflower is looking into whether Palin, now John McCain's running mate, canned Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan because Monegan wouldn't fire a state trooper who was involved in a messy divorce from Palin's sister, a probe that has come to be known as "Troopergate."

The investigation has included setting up a secret tip line to "accept and investigate anonymous rumors and complaints outside the scope" of the inquiry, Van Flein alleged. He also said Branchflower has deposed witnesses without proper notice other attorneys...

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Palin's attorney: Investigator 'biased'

Sarah Palin draws Mayor Menino’s fire

Sarah Palin draws Mayor Menino’s fire
Dave Wedge
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Boston Herald Chief Enterprise Reporter

Mayor Thomas M. Menino yesterday took aim at GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s highly touted National Rifle Association membership, saying it flies in the face of efforts to target urban violence.

Menino said the NRA has blocked attempts by big-city mayors to beef up gun laws. “As a member of the NRA, her position is, ‘The laws are great,’ ” the mayor said. “There’s something wrong with that. We have kids being killed in the streets every day.”

A spokesman for the McCain-Palin campaign responded: “Having raised the point, it’s true that while Barack Obama has said he’d back efforts to ban even law-abiding citizens from possessing guns, John McCain believes the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to keep and bear arms.”

Menino, joining other Bay State Democrats at a Boston fund-raiser for Barack Obama’s running mate Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Delaware), predicted the Alaska governor’s star power will fade.

“She’s different, she’s new to the scene, but that will wear off,” the mayor said. “And then it will get down to the issues.”

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Sarah Palin draws Mayor Menino’s fire

Parsing the Palin phenomenon

Parsing the Palin phenomenon
Joni Balter
Seattle Times staff columnist

Alaska. Gov. Sarah Palin appears on the cover of "Newsweek" this week, toting a shotgun, in an opus called "Palintology. " She stirs huge...

Alaska. Gov. Sarah Palin appears on the cover of "Newsweek" this week, toting a shotgun, in an opus called "Palintology." She stirs huge crowds of conservatives everywhere she and Sen. John McCain go. She, not he, is the talk of the 2008 presidential campaign. And polls show voters are charged up for once about the Republican ticket.

No wonder Barack Obama's supporters are feeling a little verklempt, as in, out of sorts, clenched — OK, rattled.

Everybody expected a post-convention bounce for McCain, similar to one enjoyed by Obama after his knockout convention speech. But a legitimate worry is about female voters, a group Obama needs to win, and which has swung pretty dramatically in recent days from strongly pro-Obama to a narrower lead — if you believe the polls, and in some ways I don't. (The swing is even bigger among white women voters.)

Much of the volatility among female voters stems from the fact that women feel tugged in a lot of different directions. Palin offers the chance to smash the glass ceiling, if smashing the glass ceiling is the most important thing.

Palin is the kind of brash, good-looking, in-your-face candidate who connects with working-class women. She's more like everymoms than Obama. Yes, sure, he was raised by a single mother and grandparents, but in the end, he went to Harvard.

Somehow, an election supposedly about issues has devolved into a campaign about personal narrative, and that is how McCain wants it.

I suspect the Palin effect will fade in the days and weeks ahead. She is one deer-in-the-headlights answer away from scaring the very same people currently embracing her...

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Parsing the Palin phenomenon

Palin may seek to quash subpoenas in trooper case

Palin may seek to quash subpoenas in trooper case
Fairness concerns about the investigation are being raised
By Russ Britt, MarketWatch

LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) -- Officials from Gov. Sarah Palin's law department in Alaska may seek to quash subpoenas that would compel some of the vice presidential nominee's subordinates to testify in the probe involving the firing of a state public safety official.

A letter from the Alaska Attorney General's office says the investigation led by Democratic legislators is raising concerns about fairness, and they may move to block the testimony in the probe of whether Palin, now the running mate for Republican presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain, improperly exercised her authority in removing Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan.

State attorneys say Democratic State Sen. Hollis French, who is overseeing the legislative probe, has made several comments alleging the Palin camp may have illegally obtained personnel files regarding a state trooper, Mike Wooten. Wooten was involved in a rancorous divorce with Palin's sister, Molly McCann, and allegedly threatened the father of Palin and McCann. Wooten ended up receiving a suspension.

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Palin may seek to quash subpoenas in trooper case

Former GOP senator calls Palin a 'cocky wacko'

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Former Rhode Island Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee has called vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin a "cocky wacko" and said her selection as John McCain's running mate has energized supporters of Democrat Barack Obama.

Chafee left the Republican Party last year after losing his bid for re-election and now supports Obama. He told an audience Tuesday at the New America Foundation in Washington that the Alaska governor has revived a "lackluster McCain candidacy."

"They've just thrown this firestorm, this tornado, into the whole presidential election," Chafee said in response to an audience member's question about whether the Obama campaign should worry about Palin's presence in the race.

He said her speech at the Republican National Convention had the unintended effect of energizing Democrats and Obama supporters.

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Former GOP senator calls Palin a 'cocky wacko'