so palin abused her power
 

Report stings Palin over Troopergate flap - Yahoo! News

the article is much longer, but hey, this just shows that maybe she is ready to be VP. She takes after cheney :)

Oh, she's VERY much an executive in the Cheney mold. Never really been any doubt. Cuter, but just as vicious.

Not surprising that she abused her power...It's expected that politicians will do that.

No, you're wrong about that. The idea that executive power is supreme and transcendental is Republican. You can trace this notion of the executive back to the political theories of Carl Schmitt[1], who had something of a revival in academia in the eighties and early nineties, but in the context of contemporary US politics, Nixon is the more immediate source. Nixon's young turks (Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush I...) took to it like flies to shit. As for Palin, her theory of the executive changed remarkably once she was nominated. Suddenly she was above subpoenas.


[1] There were others espousing more or less the same theories, e.g., in Japan in the 1930s, but Schmitt is best known.

Sorry, no republicans do not have a monopoly on abuse of power.

Mayor Daley of Chicago - Democrat (executive)

William Jennings Jefferson of Lousiana - Democratic

Boss Tweed of Tammany Hall NYC - Democrat

Gerry Studds - Democrat

Gary Condit - Democrat

Jim McGreevey - Democrat (executive)

Heck, I can't even list all the NJ Democrats that have abused their power.

That's not what i'm talking about, Cyn. You're talking about run-of-the-mill corruption of officials, a kind of corruption which is part and parcel of the bourgeois state. I'm talking about a particular theory of executive power.

and burgerflipp simply stated

I don't see anything up in that quote that expounds on bourgeois state or any particular theory of executive power.

And thus, I'm in agreement that is isn't a monopoly held by the republicans, EVEN at the executive level as I cited with Mr. Daly and Mr. McGreevey.

Abuse of power is abuse of power, not if only they don't answer subpeonas. Since one could even look to Bill Clinton and see how he didn't wish to honor subpeonas as well.

Jim McGreevey, for one, wasn't "corrupt", he was an idiot. He used his position to get someone he had a crush on into a job for which that person didn't have a lick of knowledge.

We could add Elliot Spitzer to the list as well-he was both corrupt and power-mad, using his position as NY governor to twist arms in addition to thinking it was ok to rail against prostitution, but use it himself.
New York is fast tying with New Jersey with its growing list of corrupt, power hungry Dems.

Nepotism is still an abuse of power.

Yes, I wasn't missing Mr. Spitzer in my list. I had actually typed him out but somehow erased him during an edit. NJ doesn't have a monopoly on corrupt politicians either.

Ah yes, the man who gave a whole new meaning to "I'm the President...Blow me!"...

I don't care. I think there was some political things going on with that report and this whole mess.

OK Cyn, i'll address the issue of run-of-the-mill corruption.

The Palin case is interesting because the McCain campaign has used the theory of executive supremacy in a case of ordinary corruption. As an ordinary governor, she abused her executive powers in a family feud. It doesn't reflect well on her, but ultimately, it's a family feud in someplace far away. However, once she became the VP candidate, the McCain campaign defended her with the theory of the supreme & transcendental executive. This idea has been propagated by Republican executives and their agents. It's on paper, in the Yoo torture memo , in Nixon's idea of executive privilege, in Carl Schmitt's books. The new development is that in Schmitt and even in the torture memos, supreme power is necessary because we're in a "state of exception", a crisis for the body politic. The crisis in Palin's case seems to be "we're doing poorly in the polls and would do worse if we got busted for this."

Oh you mean like Palin did once she became governor. Except it wasn't crushes she put into power it was high school friends.

So it's more interesting because someone else makes the "theory of the supreme & transcendental executive" claim and very different than executive privilege Mr. Clinton was using when he was not willing to acknowledge subpeonas from Whitewater to Ms. Lewinsky?

or can we not simply agree, that abuse of power is abuse of power, no matter the rationale or reason?

cyn---yours is basically the republican line on the bush administration's attempts to basically refashion the relations between the executie and legislative while staying loosely within the rules. it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that what addington/cheney were doing went well beyond the more routine usage of executive privilege that the clinton administration (and nearly every other president) invoked.

if the mc-cain camp tried to defend palin's actions in alaska on the grounds of a transcendent executive, it was a clumsy move. the grounds are effectively an argument for executive impunity.
there was no state of exception stripped of the context that makes the Leader desirable (for schmitt), it's nothing more than that.

i don't think the move was a theory of power so much as the campaign shucking and jiving ahead of this report, which will probably end up a small nail alongside the Much Larger Ones being pounded by the real world into the box that contains the ruins of mc-cain's presidential aspirations.

Why do you keep adding words and thoughts to my entries?

I didn't mention bush at all, nor do I mention the republicans line on refashioning anything.

I'm taking a very simple position here. Abuse of power is abuse of power, not a republican thing, not a democrat thing, but a person in position who abuses that position.

Yet it seems that everyone seems to think that there's a partisan thing to it, when plainly and simply there is an abuse of someone's position, democrat or republican, or simply put POLITICIAN.

The fact is that the VP nominee of one of the major parties was found by a bi-partisan oversight committee of her state legislature that unanimously released a report (12-0, 8R and 4D) to have violated state ethics laws and the public trust.

The others are irrelevant to this discussion.

Clinton argued that lawyer-client confidentiality trumped the Whitewater subpoena. His argument was essentially personal privacy, not a theory of the executives overarching supremacy. In the Lewinsky affair he first said that he was busy and that Starr was biased (which was entirely true), but eventually he testified. You may or may not buy his initial justifications for dragging his feet, but he argued with particularities and contexts rather than with a theory of the executive. But enough about that idiotic affair -- the only good to have come of it was that it made Bob Barr into an even bigger joke.

I don't think all abuse of power is the same. It sucks for Monegan to have been caught in the middle of the Palin family feud, but taking the country into war under false pretenses is far worse.

and the story won't matter much since McCain/Palin are so far behind in the polls. Their detractors will say "we told you so" and their supporters will say "unfair investigation, mainstream media, blah blah blah" and the net effect will be negligible

Perhaps. It might give ammunition to the McCain & Palin's enemies in the GOP or perhaps to one faction or another of their campaign. I think McCain's campaign is split, and part of the confusion you hear in McCain is a reflection of that division. So who knows. They'll probably have to keep showing up together so he can protect her, but that's going to limit the number of places they can cover.

No doubt the Palin crowd will play the victim, which is pretty much their standard position. What would Reich say?

I agree that it will little impact but will add to the chaos in the McCain campaign camp.

I do find it amusing that McCain/Palin are the first ticket in US history in which both candidates were found to have violated ethics standards and the public trust.

The "character counts" candidates!

i mean, palin is definitely the victim here...how dare people look into what she's done in her life and positions in the past...


viiiictim

if anything, this will be a negative on her record if/when she runs for president in 2012 (and don't think she won't)

much like mccain's illegitimate black child is hurting him now...err, rumors of...

people forget what happened in 2000 when looking at mccain..

anyone with a brain knew the illegitimate child story was straight up Karl Rove attack machine. The Palin thing was a bi-partisan investigation. Huge difference.

hmm, i reread what i wrote..and i did not realize i was defending mccain...I merely meant i was shocked he'd go very low in his campaign considering what was done to him....

i honestly think the meds were kicking in...


ohhhh, it was in reference of the 'character counts' reference. Either way, this is just amazing and historic...if for nothing else than to show the future how not to run a campaign.

i still think mccain will win...

i'd love to see the string of logic you're using to get us to a McCain win in the next 3 weeks

The argument of abuse of power being owned by Republicans or Democrats is a distraction and should not even be discussed.

The important findings here is 1) that Palin used her position to enact revenge for a personal vendetta, 2) she doesn't believe that is wrong, and 3) Todd Palin has way to much influence/power on Sarah's job. There is no reason for him to be in the meetings and included on the emails that he was.

I see that coming. She and McCain aren't even on the same page now. She's slowly working to separate herself from what's quickly becoming a losing ticket. The country is in a dire conditions, regardless of who wins it's unlikely they'll make much of a turn around in one term. If the country's still in poor shape in 24 months she can start making moves for the GOP pick. I can hear it now. "If I'd have been elected would we be in better shape? You betcha!" My guess is she'll wink at the camera while she says that.
-----Added 11/10/2008 at 03 : 44 : 26-----

I saw a guy from the McCain camp this morning give an interview where he explained how the report vindicated her of all wrong doing. He said the report was a positive for her and the campaign.

I read through some of it, it's pretty long. My attention span is pretty short. I don't see it the same way he does, but then I didn't read the whole thing.

I would have done what she did, "abuse of power" or not. Those who would not have, well consider yourselves truly exceptional and worthy of a special place in heaven (if you believe in it).

derwood: voter fraud :) diebold still being a republican company 'committed to getting gwb ohio" things people forget about the 2000 and 2004 elections...

rekna: i agree wholeheartedly, todd palin wasn't elected and was WAYYY too involved for the spouse of a governor. I think i see how republicans must have felt about hillary during clinton's admin..

I'm a cynical person when it comes to people saying they'd do this or do that in a given situation - I think most people are fairly selfish at the end of the day. But I don't think most people would abuse their power in this manner as part of a family feud.

wait--so the republican argument about sarah palin is that she's so much just like you that you would have done the same thing she did because, after all, you're just like her? because of course being just like her that is what you would have done and you're just like her. it's like a series of statements masquerading as questions, isn't it? what do these statements mean? is this a tautology?

one word.....TERRIFYING

Fear not dear friend. Hope is within our grasp... ΑΩ.

What is disappointing is that with all the "abuse of power" etc.... Wooten is still a state trooper.

I am surprised that anyone would side with a guy that threatened to kill a family member. Drinking in a police car wile armed etc... would just get the rest of us fired. Thereatening my family could get someone killed.

Todd Palin was doing the people in the state of Alaska a favor by trying to rid the force of Wooten. Unfortunately, the union favors him.

This is part of what I never understood about the situation. If this trooper did all these things and I'm not saying he didn't. Why didn't Palin et el just come out and say "Damn right I tried to protect my family from this guy. I'd have taken the same action if any other family contacted my office and alerted me that a trooper was engaging in these dangerous behaviors aimed at their family. As Governor I have to take action to protect the families of Alaska. We have to think outside the box sometimes when families are in danger." Why she first choose to partake in the investigation then refused is beyond me. Seems to me she could have put this to sleep fairly easily.

The way she went about it makes her look like just another power hungry politician. But I think she could have added to her (I can't believe I'm using this word) maverick image had she been more up front from the beginning.

Except it wouldn't have been "Damn right I...", it would have been "Yer darn tootin' I..."

It's political inexperience, plain and simple. Anybody who's been around a while would know how to spin it and come out clean--there are successful politicians who we currently think well of who have weathered MUCH worse.

I haven't followed this story closely but I guess it is because most people are supposed to be considered innocent until proven otherwise. Divorces can get ugly and family members sometimes pick sides. After they investigated him wasn't he only suspended for shooting a moose using a permit that someone else gave him while hunting with Palin's father? Also I thought I read that his son wanted to see what a taser felt like and he used it at the lowest setting.

You're right about the lingo.

But again this was mostly done after the McCain people (many of whom have mas experience with this kind of thing) why didn't they spin this the other way? It's like the McCain camp can't figure out how to do even the most basic political move. They currently seem to be trying to move in several different direction at once. The GOP used to the guys you count on to all get on the same page and spew the same answers to ever question.
-----Added 12/10/2008 at 11 : 54 : 01-----
Again I haven't really followed the facts either. I don't know what actual facts are, the trooper could be completely clean here. My guess is the public will never actual know what happened and the facts are likely somewhere in the middle. I do know it damn near impossible to get a public employee fire in some states. Where I used to work we had a city officer pulled over by another officer for DUI. Think he blew a .18 at around noon. The union got involved and he was sent to treatment.

My main point isn't what did or didn't happen. My main point was why wouldn't they spin this so the average working family would be more likely to see someone trying to protect her family and the public at large against a bad cop. The way they did it more people, IMO, are going to see this as someone abusing their power and then trying to cover it up

It looks to me like the McCain/Palin "team" is badly fractured at the moment. I'm not sure Palin's people have any real interaction with McCain's people--if they do, you wouldn't know it by the inconsistency of the two's speaking points. And the way McCain has been zigging and zagging, it seems clear to me he's being pulled in different directions, probably by different people.

Whatever it is, you're right--their ability to form a coherent message is very seriously off, and that used to be THE thing the GOP had complete mastery of.

they're boxed in and there's no obvious way out barring some Big Event that flies in from Outside. they're boxed in by the bush administration, they're boxed in because that leaves them with the old conservative identity politics to work with and the context is such that their old claims that conservative=american is not getting any traction. they're boxed in by their own tactics, which presuppose that the larger socio-economic situation is predictable and that therefore you can focus on lint and gossip. they're getting hammered by the economic situations because there's no rational basis for separating mc-cain from it. phil gramm from it, and mc-cain from the bush administration. palin seems a lunatic choice from a tactical viewpoint, and this is just another element of a demonstration of what that's the case.

the mc-cain camp has to hope for a deus-ex-machina.

barring that, their most reasonable option is to resign, like you would in a chess game in the context of which you're clearly fucked and playing it out would be tedious.

they've been in a tight situation from day one--bad moves in a tight situation are worse than bad moves in a normal situation.

McCain and Palin are making an appearance here today. It's been interesting reading the comments from their faithful.

At this point, it's apparent that not much will sway voters either way.

Ace, it's a good thing you aren't running. The fact that you believe the majority of people would do this tells me all I need to know. You are really out of touch.

I am flawed. I am not as forgiving as I should be. If a person tazed my nephew, abused my sister - I would make that person's life difficult.
-----Added 13/10/2008 at 12 : 45 : 16-----
I vote for people who share my values, as simple as it is it bears repeating because because I often wonder on what basis others vote.
-----Added 13/10/2008 at 12 : 49 : 00-----
Hear, Hear! (or tautology, tautology).

It is like the left is unable to comprehend the other side of the issue.

you're voting, it seems, based on identification, which is different from sharing values. you excuse anything that is done by a conservative because of this and nothing that is done by anyone else for the same reason. this circuit of projection/identification in the place of thinking about policies and how they might address basic problems is infantile. i don't blame you for that, ace, because you perform the relation that is prescribed for you by the political discourse that you invest in.

this is not about what you think so much as about who you imagine yourself to be. who you imagine yourself to be and who you imagine sarah palin to be are close enough that you put yourself in her position. so rather than thinking about abuse of power, you think "i'd have done that" because you're so much like her. you're so much like her because she's so much like you. that's why you support her. it's like supporting yourself. so there is no particular distinction between your subjective world and the world other people know about because you're so much like her. so instead of thinking about the world, you groove to elective affinity. because you're told to.
because you want to be told to.
because you're so much like her.
and she'd want you to want to be told to.

Remeber Libby? After Libby, only an idiot would cooperate with a politically charged investigation.
-----Added 13/10/2008 at 12 : 55 : 28-----
I give you the benefit of the doubt in the fact that you don't know me. I disagree with conservatives all the time, and I vote against them too. Regarding our federal government I am always biased toward "outsiders" and non-incumbents. I think "insiders" and people who have been in Washington too long get corrupted by the :system and they often discontinue to share the values of the people who put them there.

I don't believe that politically charged BS argument here. The numbers don't add up GOP/Dem.

But if that were true how big of an idiot do you have to be to first agree to cooperate then refuse?

well, ace, i don't pretend to see around the sentences you post here. but if what you say is the case, then your ace persona is engaged in a peculiar game, because i would never have guessed how you characterize yourself from what you post. here you seem to adopt more or less straight conversative arguments on almost everything. maybe it's a rhetorical exercise.

the rhetoric has consequences though, and in the characterization of those consequences, i stand by what i wrote above.
interpellation, dontcha know.

it's good to think that you may be treating your identification with that rhetoric as a writing experiment.
keeps the irony muscles flexing.

As big as an idiot who only meets a potential VP candidate once in person, may or may not have been aware of the seriousness of charges by a legislature controlled by his and her own party of violating state ethics laws and the public trust....and still selects her to run with him?
-----Added 13/10/2008 at 02 : 28 : 28-----
Even with the false characterization of this particular case as a "politically charged investigation"....if you didnt do anything wrong...all you have to do is tell the truth...and live up to your oath of office (and/or ethics rules).

What is the basis for believing that Wooten did the things the Palins accused him of? Branchflower didn't buy the accusations, nor did the mostly Republican committee that signed off on the report. The divorce/custody judge pointed out that the Palins' vendetta was not in their own interests -- and certainly not in the children's best interest. He called the attacks on Wooten a form of child abuse.

The image you get of Todd Palin in all this is one of a crazy stalker dude, too vindictive and too stupid to know that he's hurting everyone.

This thread should probably be closed or at least renamed. I found out recently, from Palin herself no less, the report completely cleared her of any wrong doing. Turns out we all read it wrong, nothing to see here, move along folks.

guyy was answering this question, but people weren't particularly interested in what he wrote.

It's not that abuse of power is owned by Republicans, but that some Republicans' theory of the executive is justification for wielding power as they do. To offer an alternate explanation is to undermine that theory of how the executive should operate. Even if that reason makes sense, offering it substantiates the position that an executive branch is answerable to outside review.


Tully, are you being facetious about the report clearing her?
It only cleared her in respect to whether she can or can not fire the guy. The investigation found that the pressures they applied to him was an abuse of power.

Facetious? I was shooting for sarcasm. But I'll take facetious.

Perhaps you underestimate the complexities of people who don't pretend to be perfect, who are honest, direct and sincere. It is not difficult to see some of my inner conflicts in my writings. That is in-part why I write, it helps me resolve those conflicts. TFP is like my psychoanalyst.

Also, I am a Gemini.:thumbsup:

Me too!