Fighting back against allegations she may have fired her then-Public Safety Commissioner, Walt Monegan, for refusing to go along with a personal vendetta, Palin on Monday argued in a legal filing that she fired Monegan because he had a "rogue mentality" and was bucking her administration's directives. "The last straw," her lawyer argued, came when he planned a trip to Washington, D.C., to seek federal funds for an aggressive anti-sexual-violence program. The project, expected to cost from $10 million to $20 million a year for five years, would have been the first of its kind in Alaska, which leads the nation in reported forcible rape. The McCain-Palin campaign echoed the charge in a press release it distributed Monday, concurrent with Palin's legal filing. "Mr. Monegan persisted in planning to make the unauthorized lobbying trip to D.C.," the release stated.
Let’s say we buy this story. This means that the Public Safety Commissioner was pushing for funding of something very important – government efforts to reduce the high rate of rape in his state. One would have thought the governor would be all for this but McCain-Palin now want us to believe that these efforts from Monegan were discouraged by the governor to the point that she fired him. Thank goodness this is not true:
But the governor's staff authorized the trip, according to an internal travel document from the Department of Public Safety, released Friday in response to an open records request. The document, a state travel authorization form, shows that Palin's chief of staff, Mike Nizich, approved Monegan's trip to Washington, D.C., "to attend meeting with Senator Murkowski." The date next to Nizich's signature reads June 18.
So maybe the governor was not so indifferent towards the high rate of rape in Alaska. But then why did she fire Monegan? The story continues:
In response to inquiries about the document Friday, the McCain-Palin campaign provided a statement from Randy Ruaro, another aide to Palin. According to Ruaro, Monegan asked for -- and received -- approval for the travel without telling Palin's staff his reason for going. "As a matter of routine, the travel was approved by Mike Nizich ... weeks before the actual purpose was made clear by former Commissioner Monegan," Ruaro wrote. "When you receive permission to travel, it does not mean that you receive blanket authorization to discuss or do whatever you would like on that trip," he added.
In other words, the governor did not want the Public Safety Commissioner discussing means to reduce rape in Alaska with Senator Murkowski? I’m really confused.
3 comments:
This can be a wonderful turn of events for those of us who have long recognized that McCain is little more than a hot air baloon. Let us hope that this becomes another case of an individual self destructing as a result of efforts to cover up an indiscretion rather than allow that indiscretion to be reviewed in public. It would appear that the people surrounding Palin are no more clever than those sorrounding McCain.
Is it possible that the Obama camp will not do their utmost to have this small item reverberate? Unfortunately that may be. The Democrats have never been that clever about exposing a challenger's flaws to the light of day and doing so in a repetitive manner. Repetition is the key to somethiing becoming common knowledge. Palin here admits to obfuscating Monegan's efforts to deal with violence against women.
How much more can the McCain campaign do to help its own demise?
And now we see Todd Palin refusing a subpoena as if he were Dick Cheney. These people think they are already in the Naval Observatory, if not the White House, heaven forbid!
The Dems should keep their concern for Monegan and Wooten- both with records of abusing women, children and native Americans.
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