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This is the nail in the coffin for McCain's presidential bid. 

http://news.aol.com/elections/article/panel-finds-palin-abused-power/206951?icid=200100397x1210793197x1200673714

Good timing huh? I wonder what they were promised?  ::)

Just saying............

it was a legislative panel in HER state made up of BOTH parties.  they wouldn't look to hurt their governor.  sure, the timing is a little off, but what were they supposed to do, wait around until the election was over?  this is an important piece of information that the public needs to know about.

In one of the weakest states in dire need of services. The timing is too good.  Those that want to see her put on a cross and crucified will believe it.  Those that don't won't .  Nothing has changed.

This election is a joke. Congratulations to the media for electing Obama and brainwashing all of the pea-brained citizens of the United States that have no mind of their own.

Bad Girl..Go over there---->

Maine will give you your Spanking.....

Hey Dave, I think some conservative wiseguy hacked into D_B's account again. 

Or perhaps D_B is just bent out of shape that the media didn't elect him? 

The results we moved up several weeks so they did not come out a day or two before the election. Now the McCain campaign actually has a chance to address it weeks before the election to minimize any possible damage.

The police are there to protect and serve. This piece of shit tasered a 10 year old, and threatened to kill family members. If it had been anyone outside Palins family, this would be a non issue.

But, don't let the facts get in the way. Go right ahead, and defend the cop and his boss who Palin got fired because the boss would not fire that piece of shit.


That guy is lucky that his ex wife didn't use her second ammendment rights.

This story strikes a nerve with me personally.

There is more to it than that, just like the 1100 emails she is claiming executive privilage on, yet she cc'ed to her husband.
Remember this investigation started before she was picked. If McCain had picked one of the other candidates that most people thought he would pick from, this would be a non story too.

And, the issue would have had a different outcome had she not been picked. Why should that piece of shit NOT have been fired?

I dont know, and neither do you because not everything has been put out for all to see. Maybe the police union is strong and forced the guy to keep him.
She is a brand new govenor, she should be worrying more about her whole state and the big important issues, as opposed to what her brother in law did or did not do and if he was punished enough.
I do not think the commision should have been fired if he did make one mistake. She should have shown a pattern of gross misconduct to ensure it did not look like she was abusing her power and fired this guy because of personal reasons.
Guess we will have to wait and see how it all plays out. Dont get too pissed, your side has the ACORN thing to play with to deflect this stuff somewhat.

Bsmooth, I don't want this to be my side vs your side. I really don't. I'm sure you've noticed a difference in the way I post politically now vs a couple years ago. Honestly, all I want is for everyone to realize that electing someone who promises MORE government (Obama) is really preaching more of the same. Now, I realize that McCain is also in favor of more government. Believe me, he was my LAST choice for the GOP nominee. But, seriously, Obama wants to seize major sectors of the US economy. The US as we know it will not survive it. We have both agreed that the government education is a joke. Welfare has done more harm than good. These are two major things that the government has taken over. I ask you not as a conservative/Republican, but as an American to just consider this: Based on the government's track record of success, can YOU really afford to give them more control?

No we cannot, but in truth I see no difference in either party. To me they are both full of amoral, powerhunger whores who will do nothing to feed their own greed and corruption.

Bsmooth, I really do understand where you are coming from. I feel the same way. But, I voted (absentee) for McCain because while he is not the answer, Obama definately is not the answer. Lesser of 2 evils, yes. But, I can't see voting for Bob Barr even though I agree with about 85% of what he says. Right now, a third party isnt going to work as much as we ALL would like it to.

I honestly believe that McCain is not there to feed his own greed. He is very well off. I just wish he would do what he said in the "make them famous" speech, and name the reps and senators who added all the pork to the bailout. As for being genuine, I believe that McCain is more genuine than Obama. Its a sad state when Republicans have to choose their last choice, and Democrats have to choose a guy who isn't a Republican. But, its these two who have a chance. One says that he wants to lower the scale of government (somewhat) and another who puts his faith in the ability of government to fix everything.

That's really what it comes down to. If McCain gets in, and expands the government even further, I really believe that with the anger over the economy, the people could rise up, and demand an impeachment. If Obama gets in, and increases government, they could demand impeachment all they want, but we all know it would never happen. The fact of the matter is this...Whoever wins the election will be the one who has to see this economic crisis out. What led up to it is argueable, and irrevelant. Bush came in, and the economy was strong. The Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, and whoever was responsible, it all went to shit. Who did what doesn't matter anymore. I just want it fixed. Now. I'm sure you do too.

My point is that we need a president who will not grow the government. We need one who will scale back what is there. McCain has promised to do that. Obama has promised more regulation. You have one or the other to choose from if you want your vote to matter. Bob Barr and Ralph Nader have no chance and everyone knows it.

I'm guessing you haven't done any research on why he tasered the kid.  Such a detail is certainly irrelevant, right?  Especially the part where the kid asked to be tasered because he wanted to see what it felt like.

But don't let facts get in the way!  He is obviously a piece of sh*t, and clearly his actions were no different than when an officer shoots a detainee with the taser barbs to subdue them.

Frimp I do not see how anyone can defend her on this. This investigation started over 3 weeks before she was picked, so it was not an attempt to slam McCain. Also the trooper's punishement was decided in 2005 before she became govenor, and both she and her husband used the govenor's office to go after this man, and then the guy they fired had nothing to do with the troopers punishment as he was not hired until after Palin got elected.
This shows a serious character flaw, and a serious lack of judgement besides the abuse of her position.

You are kidding right?  I would have to wonder if someone hijacked your pc.  Thank God he didn't ask for sex, drugs and a chance to rub someone out.

I'm one the fence about the abuse thing because most of the evidence I have seen has shown her not to have abused it but I do realize there are two stories. Oh and BTW ... she isn't exactly loved by many of the crooked Republicans in her state so many would see an opportnity to "get" her and just might take it.  I will wait to reserve judgement. Either way ... the guy should have lost his job.  He was even a trainer and knew the risks of doing it to a kid. But again agiain... the tasering isn't the issue. The issue was whether she fired a guy for not firing him.

And also a serious lack of judgment on the part of McCain.... as well as failure to perform due dilligence when deciding on a running mate. 

  So that is justification to you?  The kid ask for it?   Dang, your judgment must be as off as this guys.  Try being an adult & telling the kid "No"

My kids ask for a ton of things, I deem they do not need.  Just because kid ask for something does not mean as a adult you give it to them.  Especially something like being tasered.  I guess this is an example of what is wrong with a majority of kids today.  Adults not saying "No"



So, what are the fact as to why he tasered his stepson?   Did the kid simply ask him to do it?  If so, then he is a freakin dumbarse & someone with that questionable judgment should not be running around time with a gun.

   You are not going to find a politician that is 100% clean.   While she might have made a mistake on this, its nothing in questioning her judgment. 

For her to want him fired for this guys actions is not a questionable judgment.  The way she did it might can come into question, but the fact she wanted him fired cannot be.  This guy obviously should not be a cop.

I don't really care too much about this issue, but I think that you're missing the point of the whole investigation.

It seems that she wanted this guy fired because of personal reasons.  He was probably a douchebag, so she was able to make it happen.  ...but that her motives might've been personal, and she abused her power in doing so.

  I may be missing the point to a degree.   I'm sure personal reason came into play.  However, the fact he tasered a 10 Yr old because the kid ask for it is grounds for firing IMO.

The fact is there is not one politician that has not abused his/her power at some point for personal gain..

(http://209.85.117.199/1250/23/0/e786//e786.gif)

http://download1.legis.state.ak.us/DOWNLOAD.pdf

There is not a politician alive that has not had someone fired because of personal reasons,heck,the Clintons had people KILLED and still managed to get elected....

My friends, I have a disturbing confession to make.  It has haunted me for many years, but I hope that by finally telling the truth, I can start the process of atonement.

When my little brother was only 6 years old, I shot him, execution-style, in the back of the head.

OK, it was with a Super Soaker.  And he ran away laughing.  But that does not excuse this heinous act.

What kind of morally bankrupt scum would shoot an innocent child in the head?  One can hardly conceive of a act so vile.  Hopefully, one day, I can pay my debt to society and rejoin civilization as a productive and morally centered human.

--

Saying that Wooten "tasered his son" is exactly as accurate (and in the same sense) as my statement that I "shot my brother".  If you seriously believe that this is a legitimate reason to fire someone from his job, and that it has nothing to do with messy divorce and custody battle with the governor's sister, I have some fine oceanfront property in Nebraska that you may be interested in.

Hey, what was Finding Number One, again?  Normally, Finding Number Two comes after Number One.

LMFAO!!!!!  I just spit Peroni all over my monitor!!!!!

That she abused her power. 

I didn't follow this story very closely. As someone pointed out, the cop had been prviously punished and the acts took place before Palin or the guy she fired were in their current positions. It seems clear to me that if these are facts, there was nothing but personal issues for Palin's actions. If these acts took place later than that, you have cause though.

The punishment had been decided months before she was elected. She then hired a new guy and told him to fire the trooper for actions he all ready been punished for. When he did not she fired the new guy and claimed it was for non personal reasons, which has been found to be untrue.
So as a new incoming govenor, one of her first things is to use the powers of her office to engage in a personal vendetta. This shows a huge personality flaw and makes you wonder what she might try and do with the power of the Oval Office behind her.
Cannot wait to see when the emails she has been trying to hide come out, now that a judge has ruled she cannot keep them hidden.

Mr Branchflower concluded that Gov Palin acted within her authority in dismissing Mr Monegan, who she said had disagreed with her on the budget. But the investigator also said that the Wooten stand-off was "likely a contributory factor".


Was Monagen fired or was he reassigned by Palin, and then resigned rather than take that position.

  If you seriously believe your action even come close to comparing to his, then you are one fucked up person.

Yes, it is 100% a reason to fire him.  Tasers have killed adults.  They are not toys as a super soaker is.  Might want to bone up on what are toys & what are not toys.

  If a cop is going to taser a kid for kicks or because he ask for it, then I really do not want him running around town making judgments with a gun in his hand

Some people are intentionally overlooking the death threats to family members by this upstanding citizen on patrol.

He didn't mean it.  We all threaten to kill our family members from time to time, so its not a big deal, its almost as common as going over to the neighbors to borrow a cup of sugar   ::)

Why am I ignoring the "death threats?"  The original investigation into Wooten failed to confirm any such threats.

As for the taser part... not that either of you are going to be persuaded by mere facts, but:

Yes, you read that correctly: several YEARS earlier.  This part is important: all of this stuff happened well before Palin assumed office.

So why is it that somehow, Alaska's government (which has no personal interest in the matter) saw it fit to retain Trooper Wooten (after a reprimand/disciplinary action), and then suddenly, when his former-sister-in-law becomes Governor, his actions of several years prior are now an embarrassment to the uniform?

I can't even think of a more blatant example of a personal vendetta being implemented.  Imagine that you get a DUI, your work finds out about it and suspends you without pay for a week (or takes whatever other internal actions they see fit), and then, 5 years later, your ex-wife becomes CEO and suddenly you get fired for inappropriate conduct?

This is a legitimate use of power?  Give me a break!

P.S. Again, not to stall the lively discussion with boring details, but I found the timeline to be relevant:

http://tinyurl.com/4kh4k4

Let me add one more reason why Palin's kind of thinking is fundamentally corrupt.

The report released yesterday said that Palin was within her rights to fire Monegan, as the Govenor has the specifically enumerated power to hire and fire department heads at will.  Palin chose to exercise this right as part of a petty personal vendetta.

In short: government official improperly abuses clearly defined powers of hiring/firing to settle personal scores.  Hmmm... where have we heard this story before?  I'm going to take a wild guess and say that "you don't recall."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dismissal_of_U.S._attorneys_controversy

But on the bright side, if "having what it takes to be President" means "inappropriate abuse of power to fire people for personal reasons," then I guess Palin has proven that she is ready to step right into Bush's empty footprints, if need be.

This is the woman that seeks to expand the powers of the Vice President.

Excuse me while I go throw up.

You know, you're right. How dare she get rid of a cop that thinks its ok to use a taser on a kid, and make death threats. What a piece of shit she is! I say we storm her hotel, and tar and feather her, and make her clean Obama's kitchen for a month! ::)

I could not locate the actual date of the tasering, but his suspension was served in Mar of '06.  Palin took office in Dec of '06.

This looks to be the official item here.

http://media.adn.com/smedia/2008/07/21/16/Wooten_suspend_letter.source.prod_affiliate.7.pdf

BTW that test setting on a taser can still cause a grown man to cry.

To me, this is not something of great interest.  She used here position to get someone fired, who looks like they needed to be.

Maybe she should have just have had Wooten fired because she knows that he and his ex-wife (her sister) had unreported taxable income back in '93?  Tax evasion is a serious crime.

I mean, if you're going to reach into the distant past to manufacture reasons to fire someone, at least do it with some enthusiasm!

Here's a fairly interesting article on the content of the report:

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1849399,00.html

What the Troopergate Report Really Says
By Nathan Thornburgh/Anchorage

Friday's report from special investigator Stephen Branchflower to Alaska's Legislative Council answered some basic questions about the political and personal bog known as Troopergate.

Did Governor Sarah Palin abuse the power of her office in trying to get her former brother-in-law, State Trooper Mike Wooten, fired? Yes.

Was the refusal to fire Mike Wooten the reason Palin fired Commissioner of Public Safety Walt Monegan? Not exclusively, and it was within her rights as the states' chief executive to fire him for just about any reason, even without cause.

Those answers were expected, given that most of the best pieces of evidence have been part of the public record for months. The result is not a mortal wound to Palin, nor does it put her at much risk of being forced to leave the ticket her presence succeeded in energizing.

But the Branchflower report still makes for good reading, if only because it convincingly answers a question nobody had even thought to ask: Is the Palin administration shockingly amateurish? Yes, it is. Disturbingly so.

The 263 pages of the report show a co-ordinated application of pressure on Monegan so transparent and ham-handed that it was almost certain to end in public embarrassment for the governor. The only surprise is that Troopergate is national news, not just a sorry piece of political gristle to be chewed on by Alaska politicos over steaks at Anchorage's Club Paris.

A harsh verdict? Consider the report's findings. Not only did people at almost every level of the Palin administration engage in repeated inappropriate contact with Walt Monegan and other high-ranking officials at the Department of Public Safety, but Monegan and his peers constantly warned these Palin disciples that the contact was inappropriate and probably unlawful. Still, the emails and calls continued — in at least one instance on recorded state trooper phone lines.

The state's head of personnel, Annette Kreitzer, called Monegan and had to be warned that personnel issues were confidential. The state's attorney general, Talis Colberg, called Monegan and had to be reminded that the call was putting both men in legal jeopardy, should Wooten decide to sue. The governor's chief of staff met with Monegan and had to be reminded by Monegan that, "This conversation is discoverable ... You don't want Wooten to own your house, do you?"

Monegan consistently emerges as the adult in these conversations, while the Palin camp displays a childish impetuousness and sense of entitlement.

One telling exchange: Deputy Commissioner John Glass, who worked under Monegan, told Branchflower he was "livid" after a Palin staffer, Frank Bailey, went outside the chain of command and called a state trooper in far-off Ketchikan to complain about Wooten. Why had Bailey called the trooper? Because, Bailey said, this trooper had gone to church with Sarah Palin back in Wasilla, so he felt "comfortable" talking to him about Wooten. Glass, too, tried to sound the warning that continuing to pressure anyone and everyone in the matter would end in "an unbelievable amount of embarrassment for the Governor and everybody else".

Another amateurish sign: Todd Palin's outsize role in the mess. Branchflower said it was out of his jurisdiction to pass judgment on the First Gentleman, but his report paints an extralegal role for Todd Palin that would have made the Hillary Clinton of 1992 blush. In the report, the head of Gov. Palin's security detail says that Todd spent about half of his time in the governor's office — not at a desk (he didn't have one), but at a long conference table on one side of the office, with his own phone to make and receive calls. It became a shadow office, the informal Department of Getting Mike Wooten Fired.

It was at that long table that Todd Palin first scheduled a meeting with Walt Monegan, days after his wife's administration began. He showed Monegan three huge binders of evidence against Wooten, including a picture of a dead moose that had been shot illegally. After Monegan came back saying that there was no new actionable information, Todd began a very visible campaign of stewing and fuming, trying to get access to personnel files, calling up and down the Public Safety org chart.

The report also raises the suggestion that the final incident that led to Monegan's firing was perhaps the most (unintentionally) hilarious part of the whole saga. In the run-up to Alaska's 2008 Police Memorial Day event, Monegan visited Palin in Anchorage and brought along an official portrait of a state trooper in uniform, saluting in front of the police memorial in Anchorage, for Palin to sign and present at the event. The trooper? Mike Wooten.

Palin signed the photo and didn't say anything, according to Monegan's testimony, but later cancelled her attendance at the event, sending Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell in her place. The head of her Anchorage office followed up with a call to Monegan berating him for his insensitivity. (Monegan swears he didn't know it was Wooten in the picture, and that he didn't even know what Wooten looked like.)

Shortly after that incident, Monegan's fate was cast. But even then, Palin's staffers were blithely adding more evidence to Troopergate. When Monegan's potential successor, Chuck Kopp, asked Bailey, the Palin staffer, why Monegan was being fired, he was told simply: "Todd is really upset with Monegan."

So what does this say about the possible Vice-President of the United States? Certainly not as much as her enemies would have hoped. She was only directly involved in a small bit of the pressure campaign — a meeting or two and a couple of emails. She can thank Monegan for not having her hands dirtier; it was he who told her to keep herself at "arm's length" from any Wooten conversations.

But even though she won't likely face any legal repercussions, the amateurism and cronyism of her brief administration hardly leaves Palin sitting pretty. Troopergate's final verdict may be even more damaging than a rebuke: her administration was, at least this regard, just as self-motivated as the Washington fat cats and lobbyists she hopes to unseat.

Just curious.  Why is this bigger news to you than Obama admission that he did know about Ayers?

Because Obama is a Democrat. They are 100% innocent, and can hang out with all the scumbags, and if we have anything to say about it, we are racist.  ;)

Let us examine this question.

You are comparing the question of:

- whether or not Obama knew with someone who participated in deplorable acts decades before they met
vs.
- whether or not Palin herself participated in a corrupt abuse of power

If we were talking about whether or not Palin knew someone that participated in a corrupt abuse of power, that would be one thing.  But we're not.  We're talking about whether or not Palin herself participated in such acts.

I find it funny that during this election cycle, we are continually comparing what McCain and Palin actually did themselves to what the people who may or may not have known Obama have done.  Because Obama clearly isn't as overtly corrupt as either McCain or Palin, and comparing them directly is just unfair.

You can't even play the "well he's hasn't been in politics long enough to compare!" card, since Palin started her brazen vendetta against Wooten practically the day she took office.

Wow you are O Reily in training. You have latched onto the first part, yet keep ignoring the second part where he said it was personal over the trooper thing. Face it, she let her and her husbands personal feelings cloud their judgement and got involved with something that had been decided prior to her election. McCain fucked up by not vetting her enough.

(http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s246/ddubb17/funny-2.gif)

Wow - more infantile name calling.  What a surprise.  Never saw that coming!

I did not realize comparing someone who is a fanatical GOP supporter to a extremely popular GOP pundit because they use the same tactics in arguments/conversations as childish and infantile. I suppose I could just use a lot of emotes  as responses and then I would only be sophomoric.

Agreed, a man with your multitude of talents definitely shouldn't restrain himself.    ;)

I guess I cannot help myself. When I read your postings, I find myself inspired to greatness.

Cool!  Can you and a bunch of friends dress in fatigues and march in military fashion and each state how I inspire you?  That'd be just super!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wy09UpI60F8

Dubya beat you to it.