Bless MSNBC. Even when the jig is up, the still look for the silver lining. In this case, note the headline: “Palin unlikely to meet ‘Troopergate’ investigator”.
Subtextual questions / obligatory reaction pose, for those on the skim: Why not? What does she have to hide? I’M OUTRAGED!”
But were you to, like, read the article, certain things jump out at you. For instance:
The presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain is trying to put to rest the ethical controversy that’s come to be known as “Troopergate,” releasing e-mails supporting Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s contention that she dismissed her public safety commissioner over budget disagreements, not because he wouldn’t fire her ex-brother-in-law.And, the campaign says, Palin is unlikely to speak with an investigator hired by the state legislature to look into the matter.
Among the e-mails released was one of farewell written by the public safety commissioner himself, Walt Monegan, when he was fired in July. In it, he suggested the governor had reason to believe she had lost his support, and urged his former colleagues to communicate better with her.
[...]
Although Monegan was an at-will employee who could be fired for almost any reason, lawmakers wanted to see whether Palin tried to use her office to settle a personal score with Wooten.
[...]
Though the governor initially said she’d cooperate, after she became McCain’s running mate in late July, her lawyer sought to have the three-member state Personnel Board take over, alleging that public statements made by the Democratic chair of the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Hollis French, indicated the probe was politically motivated.
French had said the results of the investigation could constitute an “October surprise” for the McCain campaign. He later apologized.
[...]
McCain campaign spokeswoman Meg Stapleton denigrated Monegan at a news conference Monday, accusing the three-decade cop of “insubordination,” “obstructionist conduct” and a “brazen refusal” to follow proper channels for requesting money.
[...]
When Monegan was fired, the governor offered to let him head the state Alcoholic Beverage Control Board. Asked why someone with a history of insubordination would be given such a position, Stapleton said that without having to deal with a budget, Monegan would be able to focus on alcohol abuse issues.
The governor “respects the fact that he was respected in the community,” she said.
Thomas Van Flein, a lawyer for the governor’s office, cited the newly released e-mails Monday in asking the Personnel Board to find no probable cause for an ethics investigation.
[...]
e-mails made clear that some Palin staffers believed Monegan and the Department of Public Safety worked outside normal channels. One was written in May by Randy Ruaro, then a special assistant to Palin, to the governor’s budget director, and concerned efforts to pay for and build a crime lab.
“I FEEL YOUR PAIN! DPS is constantly going off the reservation,” he wrote.
[...]
In February, Monegan signed a public letter of support for a $3.6 million project designed to keep troubled teens off the street in Anchorage  even though the governor had vetoed the project last year and hadn’t included money for it in her budget this year.
“I am stunned and amazed  do you know anything about this?” budget director Karen Rehfeld wrote to two other high-level staffers when she learned of the letter.
“Think about that: one of the governor’s own cabinet members publicly contradicting her veto decision,” Stapleton said.
Monegan acknowledged he shouldn’t have signed the letter, because it put the governor in the awkward position of defending her veto decision. But he said he thought of the letter as simply making another run at getting funding for a worthy project.
The last straw, the McCain campaign said, was in July, when Monegan planned to travel to Washington to seek federal money for a plan to assign troopers, judges and prosecutors who could exclusively handle sexual assault cases  one of the state’s most intractable crime problems.
In a July 7 e-mail, John Katz, the governor’s special counsel, noted two problems with the trip: The governor hadn’t agreed the money should be sought, and the request was “out of sequence with our other appropriations requests and could put a strain on the evolving relationship between the Governor and Sen. (Ted) Stevens.”
If you bothered to get past the “at-will employee who could be fired for almost any reason” part, and then, being fair, decided to read on beyond the fact that the “Democratic chair of the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Hollis French” bragging that “the results of the investigation could constitute an ‘October surprise’ for the McCain campaign” — you’d find that you have a fired, disgruntled employee’s word against the Governor and the members of her staff who were privately expressing concerns over Monegan’s behavior.
Meanwhile, still no “in-depth” coverage of what happened to that $150 million in CAC funds Obama used to “improve” Chicago schools to the point where no improvement was made.
Although the fact that Obama sends his own kids to private school is suggestive that he’s not overly proud of his accomplishments in this regard.
Unfortunately, we don’t have much to go on, other than through the work of efforts of Stanley Kurtz. Because really, what’s $150 mil in grants for “educational” necessities like a Black Independence Day to a Presidential candidate — particularly when the Governor of a state that enjoys long stretches of darkness has invested in a tanning bed?
(h/t Dan, who has more)
Comment by Dan Collins on 9/16 @ 11:44 am #
Meh, Dan doesn’t really have nearly as much, never mind more.
Comment by Techie on 9/16 @ 11:48 am #
But………..but……………TANNINGGATE.
You won’t escape this millstone, Rethuglikkkans!!!
Comment by Jeffersonian on 9/16 @ 11:50 am #
That tanning bed has a tingle running up both my legs.
Comment by Techie on 9/16 @ 11:58 am #
Also, I don’t see how this helps Michelle Obama’s kids.
Comment by BJTexs on 9/16 @ 12:01 pm #
Time to move on to rape kit costs, books that weren’t banned, 25 year old DUI’s, tabloid accusations of a sexual affair, wanton airplane killings of wolves, fired librarians who resigned, private tanning beds, gutted moose, whiny hockey moms, backwater Boise educations, the fight for Alaska Secession, the bridge to nowhere that actually goes nowhere cause it was never built and the subtle, nuanced difference between backwoods Appalachian hillbillies and tundra snowmobiling caribou hunting drill hicks. Religion is off limits cuz she’s on a mission from GOD!
Wait … wait … what’s that? Why … It’s a … a … GREEN SUN AND PINK CLOUDS!!!
*sigh* It’s great to be back in Bizarro World!
Comment by Mr. Pink on 9/16 @ 12:01 pm #
Couldn’t you cook arugala in that tanning bed?
Comment by BJTexs on 9/16 @ 12:04 pm #
Arugula (heh)
Comment by Log Cabin on 9/16 @ 12:08 pm #
BJTexs, how dare you forget: War with Russia and Iran and her ignorance of The Bush Doctrine?
ISOLATIONIST!!!11!eleventy!!
Comment by Bob Reed on 9/16 @ 12:11 pm #
Palin fires the head of DPS, who serves at the Governors pleasure anyway, for documented insubordination after putting up with it for 19 months…OUTRAGE !!!1!
O! heads up CAC, along with an unrepentant home-grown terrorist-who he characterized in Philly as “just a guy in my neighborhood, which gave $150 mil to questionable organizations and achieved no success; and has actively had investigation of it squelced at the highest levels…Meh…
RAAAAAAAACISTS !!!1!…What about the Tanning Bed!!!1!
Comment by Dan Collins on 9/16 @ 12:36 pm #
See, what the Tannists are trying to do is smear the line between colored and non-colored folk. It’s fundamental melanomics.
Comment by BJTexs on 9/16 @ 12:37 pm #
Bob Reed: I’m pretty sure they accomplished a “Black Liberation Day” as part of Afro-American History month. that’s something. Dan said so.
However that 25 year old DUI against Palin’s husband? OCTOBER SURPRISE!!11!!
Comment by BJTexs on 9/16 @ 12:38 pm #
“melanomics”
BWAA HAHA! I am so stealing that and not giving you any credit!
Comment by Tony LaVanway on 9/16 @ 12:41 pm #
They are not even trying any more, pathetic.
Tony
South Haven,MI
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 9/16 @ 12:53 pm #
you’d find that you have a fired, disgruntled employee’ word against the Governor and members of her staff who were privately expressing concerns over Monegan’s behavior.
Well, when one thinks about the lefts practice of accepting inappropriate behavior accusations at face value they must be gobsmacked by this:
H/T Danny Collins
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/14/BALE12T2N3.DTL
Comment by Puck on 9/16 @ 1:08 pm #
Oh, and hey, looks like the Troopergate “investigators” are in bed with one hep cat from Chicago. But, I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.
http://media.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NTkzNDYwYjRhMWYyNTYwY2JjNTUwMWI5ZDIwYWMzMjA=
Comment by Smedley on 9/16 @ 1:09 pm #
Now that’s stonewalling you can believe in.
Comment by Aldo on 9/16 @ 1:29 pm #
The LAT ran this same Troopergate non-story today, but didn’t print a word about this story.
Priorities, priorities.
Comment by Cowboy on 9/16 @ 2:06 pm #
I wish I had my own tanning bed.
I find the sensation of lying sweaty and helpless in a glowing tube with other people in the building….disconcerting to say the least.
Comment by drjohn on 9/16 @ 2:15 pm #
Although Monegan was an at-will employee who could be fired for almost any reason, lawmakers wanted to see whether Palin tried to use her office to settle a personal score with Wooten.
What part of “any reason” don’t people understand?
Is being insubordinate personal or not?
Comment by Rob Crawford on 9/16 @ 2:16 pm #
I take it you don’t work in a cubicle. Because “sweaty and helpless in a glowing tube” pretty much describes my day at work.
Comment by drjohn on 9/16 @ 2:20 pm #
I also notice that there is no mention that French nixed a witness (Tribbles) that Branchflower included.
Not that French is partisan or anything.
Or that he promised an “October Surprise” that would be damaging to Palin.
Comment by Cowboy on 9/16 @ 2:45 pm #
Yeah, Rob, but nearly naked?
…or maybe that’d be an improvement, huh?
Comment by BJTexs on 9/16 @ 2:47 pm #
They let you sit nearly naked in your cubical at work? So much for visiting you, Rob.
Comment by Eben on 9/16 @ 3:08 pm #
You should discover the joys of living as I do: I don’t read newspapers or watch televised news, I quit two years ago. It’s quite refreshing.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 9/16 @ 3:23 pm #
If she has a tanning bed then she can’t be a vampire.
That’s a good thing, right?
Comment by thor on 9/16 @ 4:18 pm #
She’s tazen the investigation into her corruption!
Here piggy, piggy, piggies, thor’s got some lipstick for yaz.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 9/16 @ 5:26 pm #
The Empress of Blandings makes no reply.
She has class.
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Comment by Rob Crawford on 9/16 @ 6:24 pm #
Like they could stop me.
But for some reason, I never get a cube by a window.
Comment by Swen Swenson on 9/16 @ 11:11 pm #
Oh fine! I was just about to crash for the night and now I’ll be lying awake wondering if Sarah Palin has any interesting tan lines.
Comment by JD on 9/17 @ 8:32 am #
I went to a tanning bed, once. Burnt the holy hell out of body parts that were not designed to tan. Oh, the agony.