Repubs Try To Hide Palin's Ethics Problems

There seems to have been a change of heart among Alaska Republicans about the "Troopergate" investigation of Governor Sarah Palin. Palin is accused of firing Alaska's Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan because he wouldn't go along with her request to fire her brother-in-law after a particularly nasty divorce. Basically, the governor is accused of using her public office to settle personal or family vendettas.

Before McCain picked Palin as his running-mate, there was nearly unanimous and bipartisan feeling that the scandal should be investigated by a committee of the Alaskan Senate. That has now changed.

Five Republicans who are not on the senate investigating committee has now filed suit in court to stop the investigation, or at least get it delayed until after the election. All of a sudden they think the investigation is "unlawful, biased, partial and partisan."

This comes after a key aide to Palin refused to testify last week, claiming the committee didn't have the juristiction to conduct the investigation. This was an obvious delaying tactic, as no one doubted the committee's authority before Palin was picked by McCain as his running-mate.

There is some evidence that there is right-wing pressure from outside of Alaska to stop the investigation. A Texas legal group called the Liberty Legal Institute, a notorious group known for defending right-wing fundamentalist attempts to set aside constitutional guarantees, has entered the fray to help Palin fight the investigation.

Ed O'Callaghan, spokesman for the McCain campaign, is now calling the investigation "tainted". I don't know how he has reached that conclusion, since the only thing that has changed is that Palin is now the Republican candidate for Veep. The committee has done nothing that would taint the investigation.

As Patti Higgins, chairwoman of the Alaska Democratic Party, says, "Rather than cooperating with the investigation, the Republican presidential campaign is doing everything it can to stall and smear." Why are the right-wingers and the McCain campaign so afraid of this investigation?

Obviously, they either know or fear that she is guilty of the ethics charge, and they don't want the campaign to have to bear the burden of that guilt. All of this could have been avoided if McCain had just done a little vetting before making his pick.

But McCain made the pick without thinking it through, and now he must live with the consequences. Are these the kind of ill-thought-out decisions he would make as president?