Thursday, July 2, 2009

Saradise Lost - Book 2 - Chapter 76 - Which Lie Unveiled This Week is Biggest? - Updated

The only thing this past week in Alaska politics more sickening than watching the Anchorage Daily News run a fundraiser for Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on the newspaper's front page, was watching the governor herself being shredded by the harsh glare of the truth.

In a radio broadcast, shortly after the Soviet Union joined Nazi Germany in their joint attack upon Poland, Winston Churchill described Russia: "It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma."

After going through just one week of Sarah Palin's lies, it seems she is a falsehood, wrapped in a fabrication, protecting a distortion, cloaking a misrepresentation, encircling an invention, veiling a fiction, shrouding a whopper. And on and on.....

There are more layers to the tearful bullshit put out by this person than in a big, fat onion.

Lie Number One:

Gov. Palin, in a press release that announced the State's rejection of an Andree McLeod request for clarification of executive ethics statutes, the governor stated, "In the past two years, the state of Alaska has spent millions of dollars processing ethics complaints, public records requests, and related lawsuits."

Yesterday, Sean Cockerham at the ADN wrote, announcing figures released by the state, "Ethics complaints against Gov. Sarah Palin and top members of her administration have cost the state personnel board nearly $300,000 over the past year, almost two-thirds of which appear to be from the Troopergate investigation of the governor."

Perhaps the "millions of dollars" claim will turn out to be more-or-less accurate. I doubt it, though. As I wrote at the time she made the claim, "I suspect that statement is complete bullshit. Millions of dollars means from $2,000,000.00 on up, if I am correct."

Lie Number Two:

Last Saturday, Palin twittered from Kosovo, "half of the people in Emmonak have met subsistence needs and the other half believe they can do the same."

She may have been misinformed by her rural affairs coordinator, John Moller. We won't know his role in this until he comes back from fulfilling his "needs," fishing, though. But the word coming out of the lower Yukon is that Palin and her administration lied. Palin spokesperson Sharon Leighhow emailed the ADN's Kyle Hopkins, "The good news – At the Federal Subsistence meeting in Emmonak last week, Nick Tucker reported that 50 percent of the residents have met subsistence needs and other 50 percent are confident they will meet their needs."

The eloquent Nick Tucker, being told of the Palin administration's us of his iconic voice on their behalf, put it this way:
“I want them to take it back! I’ve never said that. Ten times over, I’ve never said that. It was from one fisherman in Alakanuk. I do not believe that we in Emmonak – Emmonak never said that.”
BoldLie Number Three:

As a result of the Runner's World story that came out this week, here's The Mudflats' coverage of Lie Number Three:

But then there came a part about her swearing the Secret Service to silence so the story would never get out…and that they’ve kept her secret to this day, bless their hearts.

RW: I don’t remember news reports about it.

SP: Heck no! I made those guys swear to secrecy. And I probably should have gotten a couple stitches. But I was insisting with these guys, “Absolutely not, let’s just wash it out.” I appreciated how much care they took to help me out. So anyway, I have a little scar on my hand, and I’ve seen a couple of pictures from the debate or of me waving to someone on the campaign trail with that Band-Aid and I think, nobody else knows about it.

Huh?

First of all, why try to keep this a secret?

Second, remember the day when she showed up with a ginormous bandage on her hand, and it was all over the media that she’d taken a spill at the McCain ranch?

I did. Well, so did this diarist on Daily Kos, and anyone who read or watched the news during the debate period.

Here’s the photo.

Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin waves with a bandaged hand as a result of falling while jogging, as she and her husband Todd Palin board her campaign plane at the Flagstaff, Arizona airport for the trip to St Louis, Missouri. Palin will face-off with her Democratic counterpart Joe Biden in the Vice-Presidential debate later on October 2, 2008

Guess those Secret Service guys are going to be in big big trouble.


Lie Number Four:

In a multiple document email exchange with McCain campaign staffer, Steve Schmidt, about todd Palin's membership in the Alaska Independence Party (Max Blumenthal and David Neiwert interviewed multiple people in the Mat-Su Valley last fall, about Todd's involvement in the AIP), Palin, not satisfied with one lie, dug herself into a situation of having to tell a series of them. Here's part of the first email:

Pls get in front of that ridiculous issue that’s cropped up all day today - two reporters, a protestor’s sign, and many shout-outs all claiming Todd’s involvement in an anti-American political party. It’s bull, and I don’t want to have to keep reacting to it … Pls have statement given on this so it’s put to bed.


And from a followup email:

That’s not part of their platform and he was only a ‘member’ bc independent alaskans too often check that ‘Alaska Independent’ box on voter registrations thinking it just means non partisan,” Palin wrote. “He caught his error when changing our address and checked the right box. I still want it fixed.

AK Muckraker at The Mudflats deals nicely
with this particular falsehood.

That's just four of the lies this week. Thee must be more, but I've got work to do today. If you can think of others from this past week, please note them in the comments.

Update:

1. New lies coming into the comment section. I'm only looking for lies either told or brought to light since last Friday (June 26th)

2. David Neiwert has a post up at Crooks & Liars, about the AIP and other stuff he was abl to dig up while staying with us in Wasilla last year.

16 comments:

EyeOnYou said...

TN proceedings begin tomorrow re: democrat lawmaker's son's hacking my & my family's personal, private email then broadcasting them on net.
3:17 PM Jun 29th from TwitterBerry



It was her email on yahoo, not her families email accounts and it was the one she was using for government business, not her personal one.

Once again she brings her family into this when it had nothing to do with "hacking her families emails".

Philip Munger said...

IonU,

Excellent! - That'll be five so far...

Unknown said...

Seeing the questionable Fox News story about "suppressed" EPA memos. Her tweet was minutes after it was shown, and included the word "suppressed".

EyeOnYou said...

Public Health Division Director Bev Wooley's last day was Wednesday. Alaska's Chief Medical Officer.
Last week Wooley sent an e-mail to her staff saying her departure was "per Governor Palin's request." However, she didn't say if she was given a reason for the governor's displeasure.

Palin spokeswoman Sharon Leighow, however, denied the governor was involved in Wooley's departure and deferred further comment to Commissioner Bill Hogan of the Department of Health and Social Services.

http://www.adn.com/life/health/story/851390.html
Is this the truth?

It doesn't look like it!


Butler said he suspects Wooley’s departure may have been related to conflicts between Palin’s anti-abortion views and state health staff’s reluctance to present medical information they believed was inaccurate about a bill requiring parental consent for abortion.

“I know there was some concern about the parental consent for abortion issue, there was a lot of discussion about the role of Public Health in testifying to deliver the administration’s statements,” Butler said.

The parental consent bill stalled in the Legislature, with some members publicly questioning Palin’s commitment to advancing the bill after Department of Health and Social Services staff failed to show up to testify in its favor.

Rep. Lindsey Holmes, D-Anchorage, an abortion rights advocate in the Legislature, said she also believes Palin’s attempt to get support for her anti-abortion views played a role in Wooley’s departure.

Holmes said Wooley’s view was “I can go so far as being neutral,” but would not support a bill she thought could present a danger to minors seeking abortions.

Anonymous said...

In the same VF piece, claiming she and Todd had no health insurance when they did.

About the fall at the McCain ranch.

And last week, asking people to donate to a nonexistent charity to pay travel expenses for soldiers to get home when on leave.

Anonymous said...

This just in from Crooks & Liars blog, originally from Salon post back last year, detailing her HEAVY involvement in AIP and their influence in her mayoral campaign and tenure as mayor of Wasilla.

http://crooksandliars.com/node/29344

Philip Munger said...

anon @ 1:18 pm - David and Max stayed with Judy and me while they did their research in the valley, and Max stayed at Shannyn's while he did some research in Anchorage.

Anonymous said...

Okay, how about that little white lie that she told to national media (CNN, Blitzer, I think) not long ago that the reason for rejecting stimulus energy funds was because of the "strings?" That one has stuck in my craw because it was so blatant and so patently false. Legislators had found no strings, yet she continued to spew the same tripe. She even went so far as to say something like "Alaskans don't want that," or some such crap.

Same thing as after the initial Troopergate ruling when she was interviewed and told the reporter how happy she was to have been cleared of any ethics charges.

Anonymous said...

To be accurate, this is the exact text of the Emmonak tweet:

John Moller just returned from Emmonak, reports 50% of residents have subsistence needs met already, others confident they can do the same.
12:48 PM Jun 26th from web

Technically Palin can slither out by saying that she did not specify which residents.

To see old tweets go to
http://twitter.com/akgovsarahpalin

and press the "more" button at the bottom of the page

Philip Munger said...

I'm looking for lies since last Friday only.

Also, she can't slither out of it based on the tweet, because Leighhow insinuates Palin right back into the equation.

Anonymous said...

I may get nowhere w/DoD efforts to fully fund troops' rtn trips so pls join charity drive to raise $ for flights. Nonsense troops must pay!
10:05 PM Jun 28th from TwitterBerry

----
May be this is not exactly a lie. But I can not find on the web that Gov. Palin has organized the "charity drive" yet. And no acknowledgement that her look-at-me tour could have funded a lot of trips home for deployed soldiers.

Jackie said...

Ok I'm just copying someone's post from ADN - looks like a lie to me too.

A_OK wrote on 07/02/2009 12:44:17 PM:
Palin- STOP LYING! You DID directly fire Wooley. The whole Div. of Public Health knows it! Here, this is an excerpt from an email written by Bev Wooley- this is what she sent to Public Health clearly stating that it was Palin who fired her.
"Dear DPH Team – You are an incredible group of individuals whose efforts make a positive difference in the lives of thousands of Alaskans every day. I’m sorry I was not able to personally convey this news to many of you, but time did not allow. I will be leaving state government service, effective July 1, 2009, per Governor Palin’s request." Bev Wooley

Anonymous said...

This is another part of Lie#4, but in Schmidt's smack-down of SP's request for the AIP issue, he pointedly lets her know that he knows there have NOT been "two reporters, protest sign, multiple shout-outs" - that is that for purposes only known to her brain, she is MAKING UP a narrative in which she is being harassed, and demanding Schmidt to "fix it".

All this is indicative of 1. paranoia 2. lying and 3. control issues.

I think the VF article on the whole, was a message to the R party: yes, she is attractive and charismatic and P.S. will make your life a living hell with her bs and constant demands.

Philip Munger said...

thanks for the help so far, folka!

I'm painting - cumulonimbus clouds again building over the Talkeetnas - headed straight for our house!

Unknown said...

Keep painting Phil - it's a release!!

Great post as always - thanks!

KaJo said...

Anonymous said...July 2, 2009 2:29 PM "I may get nowhere w/DoD efforts to fully fund troops' rtn trips so pls join charity drive to raise $ for flights. Nonsense troops must pay! 10:05 PM Jun 28th from TwitterBerry"
"May be this is not exactly a lie. But I can not find on the web that Gov. Palin has organized the "charity drive" yet. And no acknowledgement that her look-at-me tour could have funded a lot of trips home for deployed soldiers."


My understanding is that the DoD is responsible for getting the National Guard soldiers back to U.S. soil, or where they embarked from -- and then it's up to their State National Guard (and thus, Sarah Palin's personal piggy bank, the state coffers) to get them back to their homes.

I could be wrong about that last part, though.

I found some interesting information on this site, which has a Q & A dated September 2006.

The information is probably still current, don't you think?