Sarah Palin-The Truth

Well, by God that proves it. Shameless hussy Sarah Palin had the unmitigated gall to wear an Arctic Cat coat during a recent snowmobile race, knowing full well Arctic Cat was the sponsor of husband Todd's snowmobile team. Or something like that. I guess its a good thing they finally managed to run her out of office. Had such corruption been allowed to proceed unhindered, who knows how far she would have gone? Thankfully, somebody had the guts to file an ethics complaint about this outrage.

In fact, various people filed a total of nineteen ethics complaints, which according to Alaska state law had to be investigated by an independent investigator appointed by the governor in order to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest. Naturally, this necessitated enough court time and expense to the state that it threatened to keep legitimate government business perpetually bogged down. There was no end in sight to the frivolous charges and filings.

Naturally, none of the Palins critics, such as Frank Lupica in this hit piece in the New York Daily News, bothers to point out that fact when they talk about her recent resignation from the governor's office. The real irony is that it was Sarah Palin who, in one of her first acts as governor, signed a law which made it easier to file such ethics complaints. It was one of her signature issues, and a weapon which she wielded to great effect against her own party.

This was only one among many things that endeared her to the vast majority of Alaskan voters and helped lead to her choice as the running mate of much harried GOP presidential candidate John McCain, whose campaign by the time of the Republican National Convention was practically on life support, and sinking fast. For an all too brief time, until the financial meltdown, Palin breathed new life into his hopeless campaign.

John McCain was beaten by John McCain, of that you should make no mistake. Even at that, Palin came close to dragging the decrepit old bastard across the finish line on top, but it was just not meant to be. Even the most hardy of us can only drag so much dead weight for so long.

And it is worth noting that, since the election, the criticisms of Palin have continued almost non-stop. McCain is almost forgotten. Palin lives on in the fevered nightmares of every Democratic politician and strategist who fears her fund-raising ability and endorsement value, now that Obama's numbers are slipping dangerously toward negative territories.

But just who are these people who hate Palin so much they are willing to do anything possible to sabotage any potential she might have to achieve higher office or exert any degree of national influence?

You might be surprised to learn that a good many of them are Republicans, such as Andree MacLeod. The following snippet from a CNN report should be illuminative-

Although the governor and her supporters have criticized the investigations, Andree McLeod, who has filed four complaints against Palin, thinks they are entirely appropriate.

"I don't really care what other people think. I am holding the governor accountable. Other people's ignorance is not going to stymie me," McLeod told CNN, surrounded by stacks of state documents she has collected from filing information requests and ethics complaints.

"I am exercising my right to get these public records to discover what Sarah Palin is up to," McLeod said.

McLeod, a registered Republican, has filed four complaints, including one alleging a friend of Palin's was given preferential treatment in getting a state job. That filing was dismissed by a state board which investigates the claims.

McLeod has also filed two lawsuits, including one regarding whether it was appropriate for state business to be discussed using private e-mail addresses.

When ethics complaints are filed against the governor or her staff, the state has to hire an independent counsel to investigate the claims to avoid conflict of interest.

That an influential Republican of Alaska might be behind so many frivolous, expensive, time consuming ethics complaints might come as a surprise to outsiders, but of course it will come as no great shock to anyone who has the slightest familiarity with Palin's record as Governor of Alaska or as a candidate for the office.

The following, taken from the Alaska Dispatch, shines much light on Palin's relationship with her own party-

In early 2003, in a move reminiscent of a Greek tragedy, Murkowski paired Palin and Randy Ruedrich on the state's Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, an agency that oversees state energy industries.

Ruedrich was then, as now, the head of the state Republican Party, although he also holds a Ph.D. in engineering and has been involved in the oil and gas industry for 30 years. Besides running for lieutenant governor, Palin had been a Wasilla councilwoman for one term and Wasilla's mayor for two, and already was regarded as a rising star in the Republican Party of Alaska. She had the looks - the Frontiersman, her hometown paper, once called her "the most beauteous mayor in the world" - as well as the right conservative politics and religious convictions, and she'd campaigned hard for Frank Murkowski when he ran for governor. So she was loyal, apparently, and she'd be serving in a relatively low-profile position on the commission.

At least, that seems to have been the plan.

But in 2004, Palin ended up busting Ruedrich for conducting party business on state time, and for leaking a confidential memo to a lobbyist for one of the energy companies he was supposed to regulate. It was a big shiner for Murkowski's administration, one that still hasn't healed, and at the same time it cemented Palin's reputation as a squeaky-clean reformer.

A reformer who advocated for and signed into law the bill that would lead to her own downfall, it seems, with the moderate wing of her party more than happy to nail her to the cross. They have had plenty of eager and willing help, to be sure, but from whom?

Well, Democrats, of course, but that's just too simplistic. It's even too simplistic to point fingers at "The Left" or to the "Liberal Wing" (the flapping one) of the Democratic Party. The usual suspects of course have had their influence. The radical feminists, the Pro-Abortion advocates, gay activists, the anti-Second Amendment crowd, and of course anyone who looks with alarm at Palin and her expressed devotion to fundamentalist Christianity, have all joined in the chorus of condemnation, but I hold that the main ring-leaders of the virtually non-stop assault on Palin has been spearheaded, by and large, by environmental activists, concerned about her record and positions regarding Arctic drilling and her views on Global Warming. The above link details the following, from a post published in the environmental publication Grist-

Grist reports that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin strongly opposes the Alaskan gas tax, threw money at Alaskans to quiet their concerns over rising energy costs, and "recently sued the Interior Department over its decision to list the polar bear as a threatened species."

Ah,but here is another irony, in a press release from the Pew Report on Climate Change.


On September 14, 2007, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin signed Administrative Order 238, establishing the Climate Change Sub-Cabinet. The sub-cabinet will consolidate the state’s knowledge of climate change in order to recommend policies and measures to guide the state’s mitigation and adaptation efforts. It includes the commissioners of the Departments of Commerce, Community and Economic Development; Natural Resources; Fish and Game; Transportation and Public Facilities; and Environmental Conservation (Chair). The Administrative Order also directs the group to consult with the president of the University of Alaska and explore ways to promote development of renewable energy sources such as geothermal, wind, hydroelectric, and tidal resources. Governor also signed a letter adding Alaska as an observer to the Western Climate Initiative.

Is it possible that they feared that Palin's stance as what they might consider a moderate, hence technically a lukewarm, supporter of renewable energy and adaptation to climate change might in the long run make her a more dangerous foe than someone who was outwardly opposed? After all, this was a woman who expressed a belief in climate change, and the need to pursue policies to deal with it, while at the same time advocating for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the construction of a natural gas pipeline from the North Slope, and other measures which might over time be difficult to resist. Oh, and of course she shot wolves and bears from helicopters in what was an admittedly non-politic way to encourage and promote a reduction an overabundance of these wild populations.

Every other complaint leveled against Palin has been almost as frivolous as the for the most part unbelievably stupid ethics charges filed against her. She is a Christian, she is Pro-Life, she is against gay marriage (supposedly), she wants to force a right-wing Christian agenda on the nation (she does not). Oh, and of course, that old chestnut that has been leveled against every nationally known Republican of note and influence since the days of Eisenhower-she is stupid. Yet, somehow, she is at the same time not only some kind of far-right wing radical, but an incredibly devious and manipulative one to boot.

Doesn't that all seem contradictory? It does to me, even more so than the idea of radical Alaskan and nationally based environmentalist wackos joining forces with RINO Republicans. But then again, that's not really a contradiction when you know the whole story. Remember, John McCain was an early and vociferous proponent, at the time of the election, of the Cap-And-Trade policies of the radical environmental activists, and his selection of Palin was as much as anything an attempt to heal the fracture within his party that was caused by his position on this issue, among others. McCain, in his delusion, simply forgot to ask the permission or the input of the oil companies and other big business enterprises who support cap-and-trade, not only because they see the hand-writing on the wall and hope to cut their losses, but even more importantly, because they have so much to gain in the way of a leg up on those competitors who might not be in as good a position to take the hit to their bottom line that such a policy might bring.

When you stop to look at the real under-handed, back-stabbing deviousness that passed these days for power politics in America, it is astounding that so many people are taken in by such relatively trivial issues as a person's religious beliefs, or their views on such a relatively inconsequential issue like abortion.

But that's just the world we live in-a world that needs all the Sarah Palins it can find. Don't count her out just yet.