In its annual Person of the Year selection contest, Time Magazine named Sarah Palin its runner-up for “the most astonishing political debut in modern times.” Palin shared number-two honors with Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France; Henry Paulson, Jr. US Secretary of the Treasury; and director Zhang Yimou of Chinese Olympics fame. Seen by political insiders as as a “one-women rescue team for the Republican ticket,” her magnetic appeal to the Right Wing of the party and the media was believed to have saved the Republican party, led by John McCain, from an election-night debacle that could have overwhelmed local, as well as national, Republican candidates. For her part, Governor Palin blamed the Bush Admnistration for the defeat of the McCain-Palin ticket, but told the Anchorage Daily News that she loved her time in the national spotlight, and won’t rule out a run for president or vice president in 2012.

In a far-ranging interview after the election with Greta Van Susteren of Fox News, Palin said the Republican ticket represented too much of the status quo, and made people shake their heads over the 10 trillion dollar debt the Bush people ran up, and their blunders on the war strategy. “People wanted change and went as far away from that administration as they could.” She added, “It’s amazing that we did as well as we did.”

The news about the Time Magazine honor and Palin’s continued popularity with the national media dimmed slightly as the Governor and her family faced a new challenge. The mother of Bristol Palin’s boyfriend, soon to be her in-law, was busted on six felony drug counts after an extensive undercover police investigation.

Alaska state troopers searched Sherry Johnston’s home in Wasilla after her arrest for allegedly manufacturing and possessing narcotics, reported Politico.com. In response to Johnston’s arrest, Governor Palin issued a statement to the press: “This is not a state government matter. Therefore the governor’s communications staff will not be providing comment or scheduling interview opportunities.”

Bristol Palin’s baby is due this month, and she is scheduled to marry boyfriend Levi Johnston, the son of Sherry Johnston, this summer.

Another story out of Wasilla that made headlines this month was a suspicious fire that destroyed Governor Palin’s home church. The local fire department is treating the incident as a potential arson case. Palin told Van Susterin that she feared her prominent status might have contributed to the fire in some way by attracting too much negative attention. “Maybe that raised some eyebrows right off the bat,” Palin said of her ties to the church. “I apologized to the assistant pastor letting him know that if there’s anything that I’ve done to draw negative attention to the church.”

What’s next for Governor Palin? Her office reports that Palin has signed a six-figure book deal and all of the major TV talk shows have invited her to be a guest, from Oprah to Letterman and the Daily Show. We can assume that she is going to continue making news and speaking out about the country’s problems and the government’s attempts to fix them.

In early December 2008, the Republican National Committee filed a new campaign spending report with itemized expenses for the candidates and the Republican Presidential campaign with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), as required by law. The final tally for spa treatments, clothing and accessories for Governor Palin and her family, according to FEC records viewed by reporters for Politico.com, was $180,000, an increase of $30,000 over the original report of expenses totaling $150,000 for Palin’s wardrobe.

Listed between expected campaign outlays for media buys, direct mail, and polling expenses, were bills from shopping excursions to Dick’s Sporting Goods, The Limited, Foot Locker, Wal-Mart, Toys R Us and Victoria’s Secret, in addition to outlays at big department stores and boutique clothing shops, including Macy’s, Nordstrom, Nieman Marcus, Kate Spade, and Saks Fifth Avenue, for Palin wardrobe upgrades during the campaign. Also listed in the RNC report were expenses for clothes and accessories purchased at Brooks Brothers, The Gap, Express, Radio Shack, and J.C. Penney, presumably, for other members of the Palin family.

Reactions are Swift

Republican donors reacted angrily to news of the extravagant shopping tabs paid for by the campaign. Usually, campaign accounts are used to expand the reach of advertising and increase voter turnout efforts. But a spokesman for the RNC attempted to quiet the critics by stating, “The accessories have been returned, inventoried and will be appropriately dispersed to various charities.”

Governor Palin derided critics of her extravagant shopping behavior as cowards and jerks, and insisted she never asked for the expensive wardrobe purchased for her use on the presidential campaign.

“I never asked for anything more than a Diet Dr. Pepper once in a while,” Palin said as she returned to the governor’s office after her two-month adventure as the GOP vice presidential nominee. She added that the Republican National Committee paid for the clothes and accessories.

“Those are the RNC’s clothes. They’re not my clothes. I never forced anybody to buy anything,” Palin said.

More Than Lipstick for a Pit Bull

What of new reports in the NY Times and elsewhere of additional payments of more than $165,000 paid to a wardrobe consultant and personal makeup and hair stylists traveling with the governor, whose day rates are paid by stars like Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Lopez?  Palin’s spokeswoman said she had not authorized the services and was “appalled” at the huge amounts of money spent.

The latest Federal Elections Commission filing showed that over the final nine weeks of the campaign, Palin’s fashion consultant was paid $54,900, her traveling makeup artist $68,400, and her traveling hair stylist $42,615. It remains unclear, according to the Times, how the transactions occurred and who made the actual purchasing decisions.

In an era of billion-dollar election campaigns, Hollywood-style rollouts of political candidates, chosen for their looks if not their command of the issues, is likely to be with us for a long time. But campaign strategists as well as candidates might be wise to avoid extravagant expenditures when the country is being rocked by high unemployment, high rates of home foreclosures, and bank failures.

Just ask Joe the Plumber!

Before President-elect Obama even took the oath of High Office, Governor Palin was inviting the media into her home for a series of interviews to set the record straight. Her purpose was to let the public know that she resented the rumors spread by anonymous sources from the McCain campaign about her and her behavior on the campaign trail, and to deny that she was a drag on the ticket. Perhaps, most important was to throw her cap in the ring as the Grand Old Party’s candidate for President in 2012.

In her first interview after the elections, Palin stated that she hopes God will “show her the way” to the White House in 2012. “I’m like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I’m like, don’t let me miss the open door. Show me where the open door is.”

“Even if it’s cracked up a little bit, maybe I’ll plough right on through that and maybe prematurely plough through it, but don’t let me miss an open door,” she told Fox interviewer and host, Greta Sustern, who spent two days with Palin in her home office.

Trash Talk

Other notable features of the interview, as reported by the British newspaper, The Guardian, were Palin’s responses to criticism from top McCain campaign staff members that she and her family were “Wasilla hillbillies who looted Neiman Marcus, coast to coast.” According to Palin, she did not ask for the $150,000 worth of clothes and accessories, and she lays the blame for misperceptions about her on the media, for not correcting the “garbage” from anonymous campaign staffers who she claimed leaked false information about her to all the media.

Palin also denied that she didn’t know Africa was a continent not a country or that South Africa was a country not a region. “Never, ever did I talk about, well, gee, is Africa a country or is it a continent,” she stated, and went on to blame all the damaging allegations made against her on liberal commentators, “those bloggers in their parents’ basements just talkin’ garbage.” Palin added, “Even if I went off script once in a while, I can’t for the life of me remember any one time where it would have harmed the ticket.”

Perhaps not, but just days after the election, the Secret Service of the United States, the special force responsible for the safety of the President and Vice-President, publicly blamed Sarah Palin for a surge in death threats against Barack Obama in the final weeks of the campaign. Palin’s demogogic accusations that Obama was “palling around with terrorists,” citing his association with the sixties radical William Ayers, provoked a “lynch mob attitude” during Palin’s rallies, a spokesman for the service revealed to Newsweek magazine, with supporters at her rallies yelling “terrorist” and “kill him,” until the McCain campaign ordered her to tone down her rhetoric. But now it appears that her wild statements encouraged white supremacists to make threats against Obama’s life and actually plan some attacks. These and other revelations are cited in Newsweek magazine’s history of the 2008 Presidential campaign, now available.

For a chronicle of what really went on in the 2008 campaign, visit Newsweek’s Secrets of the Campaign. In it, you will find the documented true story of the Palin shopping sprees and the Secret Service alarms over the affects of Palin’s fiery campaign rhetoric, among many other, newly revealed eye-witness secrets.

Where To Now?

Capping off a week of intensive post-campaign media coverage, which included Fox News, NBC’s Today Show and CNN’s Larry King Show, in an attempt to remake her damaged image, Governor Palin ended the week at a meeting of conservative Republican Governors in Miami, that will begin the process of finding a new leader for the party and a candidate for the 2012 elections. Palin is defended staunchly by Southern Republican governors who compare her to Ronald Reagan in the excitement she inspires in a crowd, according to Jonathan Martin of Politico.

Palin has been mentioned as a candidate for Senator Ted Stevens seat, if he wins his Senate seat (the election vote count is not over at this writing), but is forced to resign by the Congress because he was convicted of seven felony counts in the waning days of the campaign. If Stevens loses his seat, Palin could run for it in a special election. If not, she could seek re-election in 2010, or challenge Senator Lisa Murkowski for her Senate seat, that year.

Although Palin has faced a storm of criticism, the media is having a field day tracking her every move and word. We haven’t heard the last of Sarah Palin, so stay tuned. We will publish updates as there is more news to report. Meanwhile, we welcome your comments.

He Said, She Said

The Monegan firing became a political hot potato after Palin joined the Republican ticket as the candidate for Vice-President. Promising to co-operate with the legislative investigation, Palin, her husband, and staff stonewalled, refusing to testify under oath despite subpoenas issued to her and her husband. For the Personnel Board investigation, Palin provided three hours of sworn testimony, just days before voting began for the 2008 Election. At issue were two conversations described by Monegan to the legislative committee under oath, in which he said the Governor brought pressure to bear for him to remove Wooten from the State Troopers. In her testimony before the Personnel Board, Palin flatly denied that those conversations ever took place.

The Personnel Board’s legal analysis took issue with Monegan’s sworn testimony, which contradicted Palin’s testimony before them. Some key legislators, including the Chair of the bipartisan Legislative Council, disputed the Personnel Board’s findings, but as of this time, no further action is planned in the matter.

Monegan, at the center of the controversy, had asked for a hearing before the Personnel Board to clear his name, but he was told that the Board wasn’t the proper place to do that. Asked if he planned to sue anybody, Monegan said, “No…I think we just have to move on with life…”

As the campaign dwindled down to the last few days, bitter infighting broke out between McCain “handlers” and Palin staff over management of Palin’s role in the campaign, according to numerous media reports (CNN, AP, Politico, and others). Team Palin said they were frustrated by the marching orders given to their candidate, blaming the McCain honchos for a series of embarrassing public relations bloopers involving Palin. For that reason, her aides said, Palin disregarded the advice of team McCain and started to use her campaign events as a platform for establishing her credentials for a future run for the White House.

A seasoned McCain aide said Palin is looking out for herself more than for the McCain campaign. “She is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone. She has no relationship of trust with any of us, her family, or anyone else. Divas trust only themselves.”

Palin’s press secretary, Tracy Schmidt, acknowledged that after the governor’s ill-fated, interviews with Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric, senior McCain managers tried to limit her media interactions. Palin’s frustration with this rule led her to take control of her own messages. How this played out was seen in a recent impromptu news conference on a Colorado tarmac. Palin stopped to take some questions and make some comments to the press and McCain staffers tried repeatedly to scuttle the event.

Palin’s loss of confidence in most of the McCain staff spurred Palin to go “off-message,” repeatedly. An advocate for Palin said McCain advisors “… are probably going to try and shred her after the campaign to divert blame from themselves for a failing campaign.”

McCain advisor, Steve Schmidt, gave this rationale for curtailing Palin’s press exposure after her initial interviews, “Her lack of fundamental understanding of key issues was dramatic.” Another aide who had coached Palin for the Gibson and Couric interviews volunteered that it was harder to get her up to speed than probably any candidate in history.

An observer commented sadly that this is what happens with a campaign that’s behind. “It brings out the worst in people, finger pointing and scapegoating.” And then there was the gift that kept on giving - the $150,000 designer wardrobe!

To a campaign audience in Florida, Palin explained, “This whole thing with the wardrobe, I try to just ignore it because it’s so ridiculous, but I’m glad now that [The View's Elizabeth Hasselbeck, who introduced her at the rally,] brought it up. It gives me an opportunity, without the filter of the media, to get to tell you the whole clothes thing…They are not my property. Just like the lighting and the staging and everything else that the RNC purchased, I’m not taking them with me. I’m back to wearing my own clothes from my favorite consignment shop in Anchorage, Alaska.”

Straight-Talk Express, Palin-Style

McCain’s campaign advisors expressed unhappiness with Palin’s sidebar in the court of public opinion. They had delivered the day’s talking points to Palin’s campaign plane that morning, and comments on her high priced shopping loot was definitely not on the list. The campaign “handlers” were attempting to turn media attention off designer labels and back on to straight talk from Senator McCain about the economy. By bringing the issue up again, Palin was shining the floodlights back on the dreaded issue, and guaranteeing another day in the glare of media attention. But what really was going on was that Palin was taking a time out to repair her public image.

The handlers weren’t happy about it. They protested to the press (anonymously) that this was another sign that Palin was “going rogue,” ignoring the campaign playbook in order to launch her own independent drive for the 2012 Presidential election. Palin was going off-script more frequently, complaining about McCain campaign tactics in interviews with sympathetic conservative journalists and talk show hosts.

The picture the McCain campaign wanted to paint was of a “team of mavericks” out to save America from Obama’s nefarious plans (purportedly, to raise taxes on the middle class). In Leesburg, Virginia, Palin was firmly back on message. “What we believe in, John McCain and I, is what Ronald Reagan believed in,” she told the crowd.

Fading in Full Sight

But in the final days of Campaign 2008, a new Pew Poll showed that Palin has become a drag on the Republican ticket. In a nationwide survey Oct. 16-19, Pew found that 49 percent of respondents had unfavorable views of Palin, while 44 percent saw her favorably. A month earlier, 54 percent had seen her favorably and 32 percent viewed her negatively. What accounts for the negative shift? Pundits say that Palin  hurt herself by becoming largely invisible to the general public, except when she got media attention for starting controversies - such as charging that Obama was “palling around with terrorists” - or receiving $150,000 in clothing and accessories from the Republican Party.

Another factor was her exclusive identification with the most conservative wing of the Republican party, making no room for moderates and independents under her tent.

The final factor was what vice-presidential expert Timothy Walch, from the Herbert Hoover presidential library calls, the albatross of American comedy. “Every time (comedian) Tina Fey appeared on Saturday Night Live imitating her, it diminished Palin,” said Walch. “For somebody essentially unknown, she’s diminished when she becomes a caricature of herself.”

Time will tell. But don’t write Palin off just yet. So many people can relate to her! She really appeals to everyday housewives, people who hunt and fish, and those with strong social and cultural “values.” Can she vault to the top of the Republican ticket next time as a moral crusader? She has boundless energy and great determination, says Laura Chase, an acquaintance from Alaska. “I admire her, but the idea that she could be the leader of the free world scares the hell out of me.”

Larry Persily, a senior civil servant who used to work for Palin as well as for three previous Alaska governors, believes Palin is immature, inexperienced, and has poor judgment. Agreeing that she could still become President, he adds, “That should scare the hell out of everybody.”

Meanwhile, she is getting seven figure book deal offers from publishers, proposals for TV shows, and entertainers from Oprah to Ellen have invited her on for guest appearances. She has been recruited to turn out the crowds for Senator Saxby Chambliss’ re-election vote recount, and she continues to stage feel-good interviews with visiting media and press.

Is she running for something? You betcha! If the door opens, she’s ready to barge through it, as she’s told us before.

Hockey moms huddled at freezing hockey games are usually bundled up in sweat pants, turtlenecks, ankle boots and bulky coats, not Valentino jackets and Manolo Blahnik stilletos. But looking gorgeous on the campaign trail, even for a self-proclaimed pit bull and hockey mom like Sarah Palin, gets a lot of attention when you are the Republican candidate for Vice President. Some say Palin’s high-style fashion revision is her attempt to revive the cratering US economy by investing in the designer couture sector. Not everyone agrees.

“With all the important issues facing the country right now,” said a McCain campaign spokeswoman questioned about the propriety of Palin’s conspicuous consumption at a time of global economic crisis, “You’d think we would have more important things to talk about than pantsuits and purses!”

But when the subject is shelling out more than $150,000 on clothing and accessories from the most pricey, upscale retailers in the US, including $4,716 on hair and makeup, $75,062 on wardrobe and accessories from Neiman Marcus and $49,425 from Saks Fifth Avenue in the months of August and September alone, it is not surprising that shopping sprees of such a heroic nature would rivet our attention, especially when the outlays were paid for by the Republican National Party as campaign expenses.

The clothes were purchased for Palin by her fashion image team who thought that $150,000 was not excessive for a woman in such a prominant position. After all, one outfit worn by Cindy McCain at the Republican convention, wife of Republican presidential candidate John McCain, was estimated by the editors of Vanity Fair to cost $313,100. But then, Cindy McCain can afford to buy her own clothes. She is heir to a family beer fortune. When asked, McCain, both Bydens, and both Obamas said they pay for their own clothes, too.

Maverick Makeover

The average US household spends about $1,874 a year on clothes and services, according to the federal government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Joe and Josephine Sixpack, the “real Americans” from Main Street continually praised by Palin and McCain, might consider these expenditures over-the-top. Hockey mom Wanda Routier, interviewed by a reporter from the Anchorage Daily News said, “It is a lot of money to spend when the economy is the way it is and ordinary Americans are suffering.” Suddenly, Walmart, Target and Marshalls are not good enough for Mrs. Joe Sixpack?

Cindi Leive, editor-in-chief of Glamour Magazine, asked readers to vote in an online poll on whether the Palin clothing expenditures were too high; 72 percent said they were. Editor Leive’s unsolicited comment to Palin about the fashion fiasco was, “Honey, I could have dressed you for a lot less than that! In general, you look terrific, but if you asked me to figure out where the $150,000 went, I’m not sure I could tell you.”

A watchdog group has filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that the Republican Party violated campaign finance laws by buying Sarah Palin and her family the $150,000 in clothes for campaign appearances. The complaint names as defendants Palin, the Republican National Committee (RNC), and operatives associated with the RNC. The Federal Election Campaign Act specifically prohibits expenditures for such purposes.

For her part, Palin says the new duds aren’t really hers but belong to the Republican National Committee, and will be donated to charity when the campaign is over. Back home in Alaska, Palin says, her family shops frugally and her favorite store is a consignment shop. Except for her titanium eyeglasses, that is! You betcha they didn’t come from a used clothing store!

Palin, who used the occasion of barnstorming for the Republican ticket as an excuse to fill her closets with the best threads she could buy, a personal perk that no other national candidate, past or present, has ever enjoyed, is not finished amassing her political wardrobe.

On Monday, October 20th, the day before the Alaska governor appeared at a Reno rally, according to the Reno Gazette-Journal, one of Palin’s assistants bought her a new suit for the occasion at an Ann Taylor store in an upscale Reno mall. The McCain campaign said her newly purchased ensemble, like the others acquired for $150,000, will be donated to charity after the election season.

Palin’s pricy threads continue to rankle both inside and outside of Republican ranks. The embarrassing price tag of her lavish campaign wardrobe has caused well-heeled Republican donors to gnash their teeth, decry the campaign’s political insensibility and the burden Palin has become to the ticket, while the campaign’s finance specialists question the legality of the spending. Meanwhile, media attention, which has focused like a laser on this ongoing saga, may remind some voters of the adage, “The Devil wears Prada.”

Late on Friday, October 10, 2008, a 263-page report released by Alaska’s Legislative Council, a bipartisan body of Alaska House and Senate members, found that Governor Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, abused the powers of her office by exerting pressure on subordinates to fire her former brother-in-law, a state trooper. The Legislature concluded that although Palin was within her rights to dismiss public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, the trooper’s boss, allowing and encouraging repeated attempts by her husband and subordinates to press him for the trooper’s firing were:

“…impermissable and create conflicts of interests for subordinate employees who must choose to either please a superior or run the risk of facing that superior’s displeasure and the possible consequences of that displeasure.”

The report cited Palin for wrongfully allowing her husband, Todd, to use state resources as part of the effort to have the trooper fired, stating that Palin “knowingly permitted a situation to continue where impermissable pressure was placed on several subordinates in order to advance a personal agenda.” In conclusion, the report chastised Governor Palin for violating the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act.

The accusations were shrugged off by the McCain campaign, which continues to maintain that the allegations are not serious and that Palin is not guilty of any wrongdoing. However, they undermine the portrayal of Governor Palin as an ethics reformer and a maverick who fights for “hockey moms and Joe sixpacks,” the rationale offered for her selection as the nominee for Vice-President on the Republican ticket.

John Cyr, head of the union that represents state troopers, commented,”I would say a violation of the public trust strikes me as a relatively serious offense for a sitting governor, especially one who ran on truth, trust and transparency.”

Palin Fights Back

Sarah Palin shrugged off findings of the state inquiry at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania. Defiantly, she insisted that no-one had proved she had broken the law. “If you read the report,” she told her audience, “you will see that there was nothing unlawful or unethical about replacing a cabinet member.”

Palin’s lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, said there was no evidence that she broke any ethics code. ”In order to violate the ethics law, there has to be some personal financial gain, and the report failed to identify any financial gain,” he said. However, the strong, damning verdict delivered by the investigator, Stephen Branchflower, a retired prosecutor appointed last July by a Rupublican-dominated committee of the Alaska state legislature, found that Palin breached the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act because her actions benefited her personally if not financially, and either cause is a violation of the public trust.

Under Alaskan law, it is the state personnel board, which is conducting its own inquiry, that will decide whether Palin violated state law. If she did, they must refer the matter to the Senate President for disciplinary action. Violations carry a fine of up to $5,000.

Investigator Branchfolwer also cited the office of the state’s attorney general, Talis Colberg, for failing to release information about the case from various email accounts. Palin is known to have used at least two personal emails, gov.palin@yahoo.com and gov.sarah@yahoo.com, to conduct official business. These accounts have now been shut down.

A freedom of information campaigner, Andree McLeod, has brought a case against Palin, forcing her and the attorney general to release the information held in these emails pertinent to Troopergate. They may surface in a court case scheduled for Friday, October 17, shedding more light on Troopergate and on Palin, the politician who would be a heartbeat away from the presidency if John McCain is elected President.

Are the claims made in the McCain campaign by Sarah Palin worse than those of campaigns past? Not by a long shot, say historians and political scientists interviewed by Politico.com. The experts cite the swift-boating of Kerry in 2004, the implication that Dukakis was unAmerican in 1988, and the anti-Catholic rhetoric against Al Smith in 1926, as evidence of campaigns that crossed the line. Tactics used by the McCain campaign, personified by Sarah Palin, the designated attack dog of the campaign season, are no different than what we’ve seen in recent years, and “less bad” than Presidential campaigns of recent decades, says Professor John Greer, author of In Defense of Negativity: Attack Ads in Presidential Campaigns. The book is based on Greer’s study of campaign ads from 1964 to 2004.

Before the collapse of Wall Street, the McCain campaign put out an internet ad that accused Senator Obama of calling Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin a pig, when he used the common phrase putting “lipstick on a pig” to criticize the GOP for trying to make a bad economic situation look better. Obama was alluding to Palin’s own description of herself as a pit bull in lipstick.

Next was the charge that Obama voted for legislation that would have taught “comprehensive sex education to kindergarteners,” a stretch of the facts pertaining to legislation that would teach age-appropriate sex education to kids in grade school, designed to help children in kindergarten learn how to reject advances by sexual predators.

The next wave of assault ads from the McCain campaign accused presidential nominee Obama of a plan to impose “painful tax increases on working American families.” Fact Checkers at ABC-TV found the ad flat-out wrong because the Obama plan would produce a tax cut for the majority of American families.

Politics Becomes Personal

But the self-described, “lipstick on a pig” Republican nominee for vice president, followed this up by launching a personal attack against Obama’s character in a campaign appearance in Englewood, Colorado. Palin told the crowd that,

“This is not a man who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he is palling around with terrorists who would target their own country. We see America as a force for good in this world. We see an America of exceptionalism.”

In Palin’s latest attack on Obama’s character, she cited a story in the New York Times that described Obama’s association with William Ayers, a member of the Vietnam-era Weather Underground. The Associated Press later found Palin’s reference exaggerated at best, if not outright false. There is no evidence showing that Obama and Ayers were “pals,” or even close when they worked on community boards years ago in Chicago, or when Ayers hosted a fundraising event for Obama very early in his political career. Obama was 8 years old when Ayers was planting bombs, and since then, Obama has denounced Ayers’ radical views and activities. Ayers is now a professor of English at a local University in Chicago, his bomb-throwing days 40 years past.

Beware the Dark Stranger

Whether intended or not, Palin’s words create the impression that Obama is “not like you and me.” It suggests that Obama’s swarthy skin is similar to the dark-skinned, radical Islamic terrorists we are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, and implies that Obama, who is Hawaiian-born and a Christian, at the core is un-American. At rallies this week where Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin made sinister insinuations about Obama, attendees yelled out “Treason!” “Terrorist’” and “Kill him!” in reference to Obama. At a Florida rally for Palin, a supporter used a racial epithet to attack an African-American member of the media.

In Tampa, Florida, the next day, Joe Biden, Democratic nominee for vice president, said, “to have a vice-presidential candidate raise the most outrageous inferences, the ones that John McCain’s campaign is condoning, is simply wrong … This is beyond disappointing.” This is wrong, Biden told Diane Sawyer of Good Morning America,

“I think it goes way too far. Look, this really is a case where when you don’t have anything to talk about, attack. And it gets really over the edge. I mean, some of the stuff she’s saying about Barack Obama and the stuff that people are yelling from the crowd, if she hears it, she should be at least saying, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa; that’s overboard. This is volatile stuff.”

It makes you wonder who is Sarah Palin who only came to national attention six or seven weeks ago. A new book says she, like the author, is a “Holy Roller,” a member of a charismatic, fundamentalist Pentacostal Church where shouting out and speaking in tongues is practiced, among other out-of-the-mainstream forms of worship that demonstrate the Holy Spirit has touched you.

Author Diane Wilson grew up in a family of Holy Rollers, and she says she has three things in common with Sarah Palin: fishing (Wilson is a shrimper from Texas), five children, and belonging to a church of Holy Rollers. Her latest book is Holy Roller: Growing Up in the Church of Knock Down, Drag Out; Or, How I Quit Loving a Blue-Eyed Jesus.

Do Holy Rollers where lipstick?

It is an event that only happens once every four years. The tens of millions of people who will be watching the debate will be polled as soon as the debate is over, and they, along with pundits and pollsters, will pick the perceived winner. The winner will get a boost in his or her standing in the polls and generate enthusiasm among likely voters. More enthusiasm allows a campaign to raise more money and attract more volunteers, two essentials for winning an American election.

Where Do Questions Come From?

The questions are divided between foreign and domestic policy, but specific questions are chosen by the moderator, in this case, Gwen Ifill of “The NewsHour” and “Washington Week” of Public Television. Ifill moderated the Cheney-Edwards Vice Presidential debate in 2004. More people are expected to tune in this year because of the high interest in this campaign and the economic crisis facing the country.

More than 50 million people watched the first presidential debate on September 26th, 2008, but interest in Governor Palin’s candidacy could boost viewership even higher. Gwen Ifill, the moderator, says her goal is to help viewers learn something about the candidates they didn’t know before. She gets questions from people everywhere she goes. Colleagues suggest questions. So do viewers, people at her gym and folks she meets on the street. She politely takes them all, recognizing she has no monopoly on wisdom, but it doesn’t necessarily mean she’ll actually use them.

The candidates are not told which questions they will be asked and they usually are given two minutes for each of their answers, a brief time for rebuttal and, at the discretion of the moderator, two minutes for mutual discussion. Candidates can ask each other questions and also have a chance to make short final statements. The debate takes place over a 90 minute period without commercial interruptions.

What national policy questions would you like to see Governor Palin answer? You can submit your questions to the comments page and we will pass them along. To get your juices going, here are our choices of questions, divided into foreign and domestic policy areas, that you might want to send to Gwen Ifill at CSPAN or to any of the news anchors on TV networks carrying Thursday’s debate. All major networks will carry the debate. Or, you can leave your questions on our website and we will mail them in to the moderator for you before the debate.

Foreign Policy Questions

Here are our questions, based on a review of the previous statements and positions of Governor Palin.

• Governor, you have been heard saying to President Peres of Israel, in your recent meeting with him at the United Nations in New York that, “The only flag at my office is an Israeli flag, and I want you to know and I want Israelis to know that I am a friend.” What did you mean by that, and do you think you could participate in negotiations for a lasting peace in the Middle East, given your expressed partisanship toward Israel?
• Please explain to us your foreign policy credentials. In the past, you’ve spoken of trade missions between Russia and Alaska. But recent reports from Alaska have said there aren’t any trade missions and there haven’t been any for many years. Are there any other foreign interactions that you have had with Russian diplomats or other foreign officials in your official capacities as Governor or Mayor?
• You have said that Alaska is a first line of defense against Russian invasion of the US air, water or ground space. Governor, what do you know about the national air-ground defenses of the United States, and what vulnerabilities at our borders concern you?
• You have used the fact that you can see Russia from your bedroom window and monitor whether Russian planes or people on the ground are invading Alaskan airspace or territory, as an indication of your foreign policy experience. Would you care to explain how that prepares you for a role in international affairs and making foreign policy decisions?
• Today we face more challenges around the world than in recent memory. In addition to the two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Iran, Russia, Pakistan, Venezuela, North Korea, and China present challenges to us. How do you see us engaging in meeting these challenges in the next four years? What would your priorities be? And what should be the goals of our diplomatic missions and assistance?
• You have spoken about the war on terror and the need for the US to take the fight to any and all who wish to destroy us at home. Who are those people that we should be prepared to fight and what do you mean by “taking the fight to them?” Another part of that question that you have spoken about is bringing our American way of life to other cultures. Should we be doing that with guns and bombs or some other ways?
• You told Katie Couric in your recent interview that the US has achieved victory in Iraq and now we can turn our attention to Afghanistan more completely. According to Senator McCain your running mate, we will continue to occupy Iraq for many years to come. What is the purpose of the continued occupation of that country if the war is won?
• You visited the United Nations in New York, last week. Do you think we should continue to support and work through that organization? What are the pluses and minuses of working with the UN? How does NATO help us in ways that the UN does not?
• Governor Palin, the US is a party to a number of multinational global treaties and conventions covering weapons of mass destruction, the environment, nuclear non-proliferation, treatment of prisoners of war, maritime safety, and many more. Are there some of these you favor more than others?
• There is a global effort underway to increase literacy in the world, especially in less developed and more rural societies where the literacy rates are low. Based on your experience as the mayor of a small, rural town, in what ways should the US contribute to this worldwide effort? Should we be doing more to encourage learning to read by children and adults? What are some ways you favor?

Domestic Policy Issues

• Governor Palin, we find ourselves in an economic crisis of historic proportions. Banks are going out of business and Wall St. is rocking and rolling. Hundreds of thousands have lost their jobs, and a million people have lost their homes. Credit has frozen up and kids can’t get their school loans, and pensions are shrinking in value. Money is tight, gas is high, food is high, and consumers have stopped buying anything else they can do without. How do we resolve this credit crunch and the pain people are feeling on Main Street?
• Given our economic contraction, how can we continue to fight two wars and lead the global fight against terrorism while giving people in our communities hope that their economic future will be secure, that they will have better jobs, healthcare, access to education, and homes they can afford? This is what we used to call the American way of life.
• Many seniors depend on their monthly social security checks, yet your running mate, Senator McCain has said he would like to privatize social security. Do you think we should do that?
• A lot of single mothers are working two and three jobs to make ends meet. Yet, when you were Mayor of Wasilla, sexual assault victims were charged for the cost of rape kits and forensic examinations. What was your thinking that to cut costs-a few thousand dollars a year- assault victims were made to pay instead of insurance companies? One result of billing rape victims was to discourage women from reporting sexual assaults and to protect their attackers. We know that the Alaska State Legislature approved a bill to stop this practice in 2000, but please explain why this policy was followed under your leadership.
• You have said that you would like to see Creationism taught in classrooms side by side with the teaching of evolutionary science. Do you believe that teaching creationism is scientifically comparable to the study of evolution? What is the scientific proof for that, the studies and reports that show that creationism is as powerful a way to explain observed reality as scientific evolution?
• As governor, you recently sued the Interior Department to keep the polar bear — the symbol of your state - from being listed as a threatened species under the provisions of the Endangered Species Act. You argued that additional protections might inhibit oil and gas drilling and pipeline construction in the region. Are you prepared to sacrifice any species of wildlife to your drive to drill for more oil and gas in Alaska, even when scientists say that many animal and bird species depend on scavenging bear kills for food, and that bears are a keystone species and their value to biodiversity can’t be overstated?
• Finally, what is your perspective on the fact that 47 million people have no health insurance, and many more who are losing their jobs in record numbers right now, can’t afford to buy health services. What would you do about this problem as vice president, a heartbeat away from the presidency?

Do you have a question you would like to have Governor Palin answer? Write it down as a comment and we will submit these questions to Gwen Ifill, moderator of the vice presidential debate. But please submit your question by 12:00, Thursday, October 2nd, 2008.

Todd Palin, Sarah Palin’s husband, did not heed a subpoena to appear before an Alaska legislative committee on September 19th, 2008 to testify about his role in Troopergate. He was not alone. Two other key witnesses summoned to appear that day also failed to show up — they are Randy Ruaro, Gov. Palin’s deputy chief of staff, and Ivy Frye, an aide.

Palin is being investigated by an independent investigator, hired by a unanimous vote of a bipartisan committee of the Alaska Legislature, “to investigate the circumstances … surrounding [the termination of the public safety commissioner],” and potential abuses of power and/or improper actions by members of the executive branch.

The three who failed to show up to testify have been referred to the full Alaska Senate for contempt, according to state Sen. Hollis French, a democrat chosen by the bipartisan state Legislative Council to head up the Legislature’s investigation of the firing of Walter Monegan, the former public safety commissioner, because he wouldn’t give in to demands from the Palin administration to pressure the state troopers to fire Palin’s former brother-in-law.

Action on contempt charges is unlikely until the state Legislature meets in January 2009 for its regular session. State law says if a witness refuses to obey a subpoena, the full state Senate or House may “commit the witness for contempt” and take “such action as may be considered necessary.” That could include physically bringing the witness in, or imposing fines and jail time. Under state law, only the full Senate or House may cite a witness with contempt who fails to appear for a hearing. The only other option is to force testimony at a special legislative session. But that requires approval by two-thirds of the legislators, which is seen as unlikely as many members of the body, on both sides of the aisle, are now questioning the legislature’s investigation.

The witnesses’ refusals to respond to subpoenas has left French with few options but to direct Steve Branchflower, the former Anchorage prosecuting attorney hired by the Legislature to conduct the investigation, to continue his work.

French said Branchflower is expected to make his official report on October 10. Just how much detail will be in that report is uncertain.

Just a week earlier, state lawmakers agreed to issue 13 subpoenas to:

• Frank Bailey, current state Boards and Commissions Director who is now suspended from working by Palin herself after it was revealed that he made what Palin calls an “inappropriate” phone call to a supervisor at the Alaska State Troopers to complain about Wooten, Palin’s former brother-in-law
• Frank Bailey’s cellular telehpone records
• Annette Kreitzer, state Administration Commissioner
• Dianne Kiesel, state Human Resources Manager
• Nicki Neal, state Personnel and Labor Relations Director
• Brad Thompson, state Risk Management Director
• Mike Nizich, Gov. Palin’s Chief of Staff
• John Bitney, Gov. Palin’s former legislative liaison now working as an aide to state House Speaker John Harris, a Republican
• Janice Mason, Gov. Palin’s scheduler and Executive Secretary
• Murlene Wilkes, owner of Harbor Adjustment Service, which is an Anchorage-based business that processes state worker’s compensation claims
• Todd Palin, husband of Sarah Palin
• Ivan Frye, Gov. Palin aide
• Randy Ruaro, Gov. Palin’s Deputy Chief of Staff

However, most of the subponeas were not officially served as Alaska Attorney General Talis Colberg, a Palin appointee, filed a lawsuit requesting state courts to invalidate the Legislature’s subponeas.

The Palin administration initially said it would cooperate with the Legislature’s investigation. Palin herself told Alaskans, “Hold me accountable,” adding that she had nothing to hide. But that was before John McCain tapped her to join him on the Republican national presidential ticket.

Since Palin entered the national political spotlight as the 2008 Republican nominee for Vice President, handling of the Troopergate affair has switched from strictly the business of Alaskans to a spectacle engulfing the whole nation.

The McCain campaign sent attorney Ed O’Callaghan to Alaska in mid-September to assess the Troopergate situation and inform local media that Todd Palin would not testify. O’Callaghan is a former New York federal prosecuter now working for the McCain campaign and a consultant to Thomas Van Flein, an Anchorage attorney representing the Palin family and the Palin administration.

O’Callaghan, told local media on September 18th that his client had objections to the subpoena.

Van Flein said that Palin’s campaign travel schedule would not accomodate her return to Alaska to testify before the legislative committee. But O’Callaghan added this interesting tidbit … It seems that while the governor has been resisting the legislative investigation, Palin and her staff plan to cooperate fully with a separate investigation launched by the state’s three member, personnel board. The chairwoman of the three-member board was just re-appointed to a six-year term by Governor Palin.

The work of the state personnel board is not open to public scrutiny. Nor can it finish its investigation prior to the November 4th election - unlike the state Legislature’s investigation that has a mid-October completion date, well in advance of the November 4th election.