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Some vetting! Walt Monegan, Commissioner of Public Safety was ousted because the Palins demanded the illegal firing of a trooper. He said he was never contacted by the vetters. A bipartisan legislative committee appointed a top-flight retired prosecutor to see if illegal influence was exerted. Palin's appointed attorney general was tasked to do a parallel investigation to apparently frustrate the legislators' initiative. A former D.A. and House leader suggested she could actually be impeached, depending on the results of the investigation.
Palin has been unable to get along with the Republicans who lead both houses of the state legislature. Neither was the Senate President contacted by McCain's Keystone Kops.
Unlike McCain, who has assembled a group of screwball advisors around him such as "Senator Deregulation" Phil Gramm, Nixon's Jew hunter Fred Malek, criminal fugitive Ahmed Chalabi's escort, Randy Scheunemann, who never met a Near East invasion he didn't like, Palin has drawn top state appointees from insular friends, neighbors and church members. These include a distinctly unaccomplished Attorney General, a control freak Commissioner of Administration and Sarah's high school buddy as Commissioner of Corrections. (A recent no-confidence vote in that Commissioner by the state's corrections officers passed by close to 90%.)
The pregnancy of her 17-year-old daughter has been an open secret amongst her Valley peers for months. Sarah's own pregnancy at her age, 44, was mystifying, given that Down Syndrome occurs in 2 1/2% of all pregnancies in mothers that old. Contrast that with the odds of Bristol having a similar child: About 1 in 2,000, or .05%. Palin had her water break while giving a speech in Texas, then flew for nine hours and drove another 50 miles so she could give birth in a local clinic that would have been unable to care for a critically ill neonate. This should rightly reflect on her chronic lack of judgment though the radical right sees it as an attribute.
It's hard to keep up with relevations of Palin's missteps. The latest confirmed story is that she, as mayor, tried to purge the city library of books she deemed to be undesirable.
For those who were afraid that McCain wouldn't kowtow to religious fanatics, who weren't convinced by his sucking up to Pat Robertson, Bob Jones, John Hagee, Rick Warren and Rod Parsley, Palin fit the bill. A scientific illiterate, Sarah advocates teaching creationism in public schools and doesn't believe in anthropogenic global warming. She holds noontime prayer meetings in her state offices.
The prospects of a Palin presidency should terrify anyone who has some understanding of the actuarial liklihood of a 72-year-old ex-prisoner who has suffered multiple melanomas failing to survive his entire term.
