Abuse of power. Violations of ethical standards. Using an official position to pursue personal interests. Cover ups. Failing to co-operate with an investigation.
Oh, yes: Lying.
After eight years of Congress letting George Bush and Dick Cheney get away with all of these high crimes and misdemeanors, it took a heavily Republican-dominated committee of the heavily Republican-dominated Alaska state legislature to call out a Republican senior government official for malfeasance.
Put bluntly, the Legislative Council nails Gov. Sarah Palin for abusing her office, authority and state employees to settle a personal score with a former relative.
She is the pot who spent all of last week calling the kettle black.
Sarah, the GOP’s “everywoman,” turns out to be a cheap political weasler.
She is the phoney “hockey mom” earning a six figure salary who holds a wooden cross of goodness and light high above her head yet turns out to be nothing more than a craven idol, a garden gnome being carted around the real world by pranksters.
The supposed ally of a “Joe Sixpack” who’s trying to survive financially after a disastrous Republican president ruined the economy is worse than the Wizard of Oz in cheap pumps, hiding behind a curtain of false sanctimony. At least the Wizard of Oz tried doing some good; all Palin did this week was promote fear and hate mongering.
Set aside the $35,000 sun tanning bed she installed in the governor’s igloo; forget about charging the state $19,000 for days when she was living in her own home; forget about her whining that she couldn’t always use a state airplane when she wanted to go somewhere; forget about her not remembering the name of a single newspaper she reads; forget about claiming she fired the cook at the governor’s mansion when all she did was change the job title and assign the cook’s salary – but not her duties – to a different department; forget about her lack of knowledge, understanding or even curiosity about the world; forget about her attending five universities in six years; forget about her countless gaffes uttered during interviews; forget about her suspicious connections to a group that demands Alaska secede from the Union.
Forget about all of that.
All you need to know about Sarah Palin is that she is a mean, vindictive, political climber who abuses her public trust regularly, sending the little mister and her official staff out in her name to get someone fired that she doesn’t like.
Not even during the heyday of the Cook County IL Democratic machine with all of its tentacles reaching onto every street corner in the city and no civil service anywhere would the original Mayor Daley (father of the current Mayor Daley) ever try pulling a stunt like this. I know: I lived in Chicago during the last seven years of the life, times and mayorship of the beloved and all-powerful “Hizzoner.”
Sarah Palin is the “Peter Principle” come to life.
Worse, with the documented evidence of abusing her office, violating the law, using her office to pursue personal interests, engaging in cover ups, failing to co-operate with investigators and lying, she is Dick Cheney in drag.
Tom Degan
1958-2023
To all Tom’s faithful readers of the Rant, we are sad to announce that he
passed away on December 7th, 2023. Thank you so much for th...