Slashdot Mirror

Wasn't Palin's email full of personal stuff and not full of emails from lobbyists and the like offering bribes?

It's illegal in all 50 states to conduct state business on a Yahoo account:

In response to similar but separate public records requests, McLeod and Henning this summer received four banker boxes of e-mail and telephone records for two Palin aides: Frank Bailey and Ivy Frye. Henning was operating on behalf of the Valley group Last Frontier Foundation, which lists property rights and public records as among its core issues on its Web site.

"I think that it's total hypocrisy from what she stood for at the beginning of her campaign," Henning said. "Because she campaigned on open government, and she knew that using a private e-mail account would take it and basically hide stuff that people couldn't see."

As far as McLeod can tell, all but one of the e-mails to the governor used her private e-mail address. The one time an aide e-mailed the governor's state account, he was reminded not to.

"Frank, This is not the Governor's personal e-mail account," an assistant to Palin wrote to Bailey in February.

"Whoops~!" Bailey responded in an e-mail.

The state public records law says these are public documents like any other official government business conducted via snail mail. They are subject to public review via FOI requests, but they're not being kept in any kind of public archive. Asking Palin to surrender and not delete all her relevant Yahoo correspondence on the honor system is pointless.

Todd Palin had an account used for some interesting state business as well.

Wasn't Palin's email full of personal stuff and not full of emails from lobbyists and the like offering bribes?

It's illegal in all 50 states to conduct state business on a Yahoo account:

In response to similar but separate public records requests, McLeod and Henning this summer received four banker boxes of e-mail and telephone records for two Palin aides: Frank Bailey and Ivy Frye. Henning was operating on behalf of the Valley group Last Frontier Foundation, which lists property rights and public records as among its core issues on its Web site.

"I think that it's total hypocrisy from what she stood for at the beginning of her campaign," Henning said. "Because she campaigned on open government, and she knew that using a private e-mail account would take it and basically hide stuff that people couldn't see."

As far as McLeod can tell, all but one of the e-mails to the governor used her private e-mail address. The one time an aide e-mailed the governor's state account, he was reminded not to.

"Frank, This is not the Governor's personal e-mail account," an assistant to Palin wrote to Bailey in February.

"Whoops~!" Bailey responded in an e-mail.

The state public records law says these are public documents like any other official government business conducted via snail mail. They are subject to public review via FOI requests, but they're not being kept in any kind of public archive. Asking Palin to surrender and not delete all her relevant Yahoo correspondence on the honor system is pointless.

Todd Palin had an account used for some interesting state business as well.

There was a time when peak oil was an economic argument, but now it is firmly a doom-and-gloom, we're-killing-the-earth argument.

The use of fossil fuels is both an economic and an environmental issue. Just because more people are concerned about pollution that doesn't negate peak oil. Well, environmental issues become economic ones too. More than 20 years later the fish still have not recovered, nor have the fishermen been compensated, from the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill. Fishermen in Alabama and LA are already feeling the economic effects of the Gulf spill.

Falcon

The good news is that there will be a charity concert in New Orleans, so BP won't have to pay so much money to their victims.

If it ends up like Vladez oil spill BP won't have to pay anything. More than 20 years later the fish have not recovered and the fishermen have not been compensated. Heck, oil still persists, is still found. Large corporations laugh while going to the bank to make another deposit while the people pay.

Falcon

The Valdez was inside the Prince William Sound, so most of the oil was contained.

11 MILLION gallons, at 50k barrels a day it will take ~ two months

Putting million in all caps doesn't make it a larger number. At 42 gallons to the barrel, 11 MILLION gallons is 261 THOUSAND barrels, or just over 5 days at 50k barrels/day.

They aren't?

You are aware that the Federal Government has law enforcement that sometimes search and seize and even no-knock paramilitary attack folks right? Ruby Ridge comes to mind, so does Waco.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-knock_warrant

Federal Judges and Magistrates.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_and_seizure#United_States

Protected by the Fourth Amendment, so yea, thats Federal.

The BLM owns the bulk of the lands here in the West where those dangerous animals live.

http://www.adn.com/2010/03/09/1175725/wolf-blamed-in-death-of-villager.html

If the US population is dangerously armed, do you feel the same way about Israel, Finland and Switzerland too?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_ownership#European_Union

What's next, asking for your login for your banking information, so they can see how you spend your personal money?

Don't get your panties in a twist, that information is already available for a couple of dollars online to anyone.

No, the next logical step is to ask for all your email account and password account information. It's pretty obvious they're asking for passwords because you've had the gall to make your facebook page private, and you've had the gall to communicate with your family and friends privately. And private communications between individuals, that sounds like some kind of communist idea! I certainly don't think the people of Montana are ready for this kind of responsibility. Think of the resulting anarchy that will almost certainly ensue. Think of the children for Christ's sake!

Also, the people who give you their password, at least you know they're going to be loyal to you. It's an ultimate act of surrender. It's just like the resignation letters Sarah Palin asked city employees to sign as a form of loyalty test. She only tried firing the people who wouldn't sign it, the people who did sign -- they had nothing to worry about.

Stevens is not necessarily retired: Palin, Republicans call for special Senate election.

He could still be re-elected if Palin and the Republicans get their way. It would be a good thing too, my tubes were just again becoming clogged by too many internets. I keep trying to fix it myself, but I think my problem might be that I'm thinking of the internet as a big truck and that's just not right. It's not a big truck -- I really wish some helpful senator would come fix it for me. No!

See this response I posted to someone who argued this as well. Although she's the governor, and the capital is in Juneau, she spends most of her time in Anchorage and Wasilla. She even got paid per diem travel "expenses" when working from home. More background.

I think you can actually SEE the ash cloud on Doppler.... (not from Sarah's yard). Try antimating this map and comparing it to this map.

Looks like the Doppler is picking up the plume.

The Anchorage Daily News is reporting 5 eruptions here

/Former resident of Eagle River, AK
//Saw Mt Redoubt the last time it erupted.
///Well, at least until the ash obscured the view.

http://www.adn.com/news/environment/story/504410.html

I googled other references to the same thing, and they all appeared to be crappy re-hashes of the AP release from the original story, though I did manage to learn that the fixtures will be provided by Cree. It seems to be restricted to 150W LPS and 250W LPS on residential streets and "feeders" (residential streets used as through streets, not actual main streets). If your numbers for power per watt are correct, they are going from 150 W * 100 lumens (15000 lumens) LPS with 75W * 40 lumens (3000 lumens) LED, and that's using the worst numbers for LPS and best for LEDs. With the best for LPS and worst for LEDs, it's horrible. But, if you look at the article, the one LED light out front of the line of LPS lights, it looks like it isn't really different in light provided. And there is no LED replacement for the 8000 W interchange lights. And at least they are waiting to see how the initial phase goes before going after the 400W lamps on the arterials and the non-road lights (bike trails, ski areas and such). There is mentioning that the LEDs have less glare, less spill, and such, but I doubt that would really make up for the (ideally) 5 times worse light output.

The government is definitely keeping information away from the public in regard the activity at Yellowstone National Park. Read "CNN Oversimplifies The Danger of Yellowstone National Park" http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=314 . This article literally traveled "around the world" and is still being read today - many times per day. To those of us who have been following these events, we know that something is brewing, especially considering that Yellowstone is over 45,000 years overdue for a major eruption, which is an "extinction level event." CNN tried initially to categorize Yellowstone as an "ancient Volcano", when in fact it is the only known "super volcano" on earth. It's also interesting that since this phenomena began, we can directly correlate the beginning of unparalleled corporate greed and the wealthy who are now engaged in building huge underground facilities that have for the most part been accomplished under secrecy so as not to alarm the rest of the population. Also note the President's purchase of land in South America atop the world's largest aquifer. You can't use "Google Images" to see the construction - as it's blacked-out with older images, but it's there, and there has to be a reason for it. Keep in mind that the ground has swelled more in the past three (3) years than it has in the past hundred years - a fact which has to be significant and demonstrates that the Yellowstone caldera is more active now than at any other time in our recorded history. When CNN attempts to pass-off such a blatant lie, we know they are hiding something, and you can bet the wealthy and those who have access to information we don't are hastily attempting to gather the funds to protect themselves at anyone's expense - including theft and murder on a scale that so far has been unparalleled in history. We need answers - but they won't be forthcoming. I predicted a major volcanic/seismologic event before the end of the year for the west coast or Alaska, as well as noting that the earthquakes were moving up from South America to the US. I wasn't disappointed: "Eruption of 3 volcanoes has scientists asking questions" http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/551521.html "How likely is it that three neighboring volcanoes would all erupt at the same time -- as the Kasatochi, Okmok and Cleveland volcanoes in the Aleutians did this summer? About as likely as a storm that only appears once in a thousand years, says Anchorage volcanologist Peter Cervelli, who'll deliver a paper on the subject this winter to the American Geophysical Union. In other words, seldom enough that Cervelli is now exploring the question of whether Alaska's triple eruption was only a coincidence involving three independent volcanoes or whether it was triggered by some common mechanism." On January 18th, 2008, I wrote "Volcanic Activity Appears To Be Working Itâ(TM)s Way Around The âoeRing of Fireâ UPDATED" http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=385 On May 6th, 2008, a Chilean volcano erupted that had been dormant for over 9,000 years. Is that a coincidence? "Thousands flee as Chilean volcano erupts" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/chile/1924533/Thousands-flee-as-Chaiten-volcano-erupts-in-Chile.html It's obvious that we live in interesting and dangerous times, however, it would be fair to everyone if the government would fill us all in as to what they "think" is happening - but we all know that will never happen. William Cormier

I am referring to Alaska Resource Rebate Palin signed in:
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/487182.html
http://www.pfd.state.ak.us/ResourceRebate.aspx

The Permanent Fund was set up long ago, but the rebate bill imposed so-called windfall tax on oil industry and distributes the money as extra dividend from the Fund.

http://www.adn.com/sarah-palin/story/515512.html

I've not seen any proof of problems with ethics and accountability. There may be some questions but the e-mail hack put some of those questions to bed (though that didn't stop people from claiming it confirmed them). The biggest issue I see is that she's a woman who's attained a relatively high office and isn't beholden to the Feminist movement. They -can't- allow her to succeed. She's not cut from the right mold.

The bipartisan Alaska Legislative Council found that she abused her power and violated ethics laws in the so-called "Troopergate" scandal. Palin has been going around claiming that it clears her of any wrongdoing, but the report itself says:

For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 2952.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act.

You can read the full report here. Also, the email hack did not put any questions to bed. Some of them in the hacked account do appear to have been illegally conducting government business, but either way, we haven't seen all of the emails in that account, and that specific account was not even the one she was accused of using to conduct government activity with. She had two Yahoo accounts, kind of like she's under multiple investigations.

This story comes from the guy doing the Tasering, not from the child being Taser'd. Weight the evidence accordingly.

From the Anchorage Daily News (reporting on the formal investigative report):

In his interview with troopers, the stepson said it hurt for about a second, according to Wall's report. The boy said he wanted to be tased to show his cousin, Palin's daughter Bristol, that he wasn't a mama's boy. The probe left a welt on his arm, he said. His mother was upstairs yelling at them not to do it, the boy said.

http://www.adn.com/politics/story/476430.html

There is some dispute as to how much it hurt the boy, but all parties in the incident seem to agree on the general outline: the kid wanted the father to do it. The dad maybe shouldn't have done it, but the kid got at most a little bit of temporary pain. This is all quite contrary to the original implication, which holds that Wooten is a monster who tasers the crap out of kids.

Palin, as governor of the state, is essentially the CEO of the state. State employees technically work for her. She felt the PSC wasn't doing his job and removed him. If he'd been dragging his heels on a case like this I'd have fired him, too

But she didn't fire him because of Wooten! She fired him because of something else. Then it was something else. I think along the way he was being too helpful to rape victims or something. The reasons kept changing. In any case, let's be clear about this whole "Wooten is CEO and can do what she wants line". There are strong limitations on what the governor can do with regards to state employees.

... With each of the calls, Monegan became more concerned and warned each caller about exposing the state to litigation from Wooten. Monegan told Tibbles: "This is not your issue. This is something I am supposed to handle. Every time we talk about this, it is discoverable. Do you want this trooper to own your house?"

Basically the guy who "wasn't doing his job" wasn't doing it because he was concerned he was breaking state law and exposing the government to massive liability. Which /is/ his job to avoid.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/30/AR2008083002366_3.html?hpid=topnews

And Al Capone was sent to prison for tax evasion because that's the only thing the government could get on him. Doesn't mean that Capone wasn't guilty of far more heinous things the government couldn't get a solid case on.

Al Capone was a murderer and criminal. Wooten's rap sheet includes things like misusing cellphone time and shooting a moose without a permit (apparently the permit was in his wife's name and she asked him to pull the trigger). He once said something threatening about his father-in-law, which was truly nasty but doesn't make the guy into a monster.

But let's forget about the pesky details. The simple fact is that Sarah Palin has a lot of baggage beyond this one thing. So much baggage that more than 55% of those polled cite her as the reason they're not voting for McCain. She gutted the "inexperience" argument they'd built against Obama over many weeks. For whatever reason you choose, she's a lousy candidate to have on a ticket that wants to win. McCain's people should have done enough research to figure that out and stayed the heck away. Now they're going to lose the election and have nobody but themselves to blame.

Such a law exists for the executive branch of the federal government, but so far nobody's shown whether there is such a law for the executive of Alaska...

Such a law does exist for the Alaska state government. What do you think the DEC/FOIA lawsuit, followed by legal foot-dragging and exorbitant copying fees are all about? The plaintiffs want access to emails about polar bears, and the Palins want to make that very difficult.

They desperately need to avoid having their "private" emails from Yahoo and other non-governmental mail servers subpoenaed and made public, because then the jig is up. Secretly using private email accounts to conduct public business, in order to keep it beyond public scrutiny (they even sent an assistant to AK's Law Dept find out if it was illegal), is not the way to run an "open and transparent" state government. While this sort of behavior in a public official might warm the cockles of Cheney's heart, it's the kind most of us want kicked to the curb on November 4th.

And fortunately, for those of us who care about the rule of law, it looks like that's just what's going to happen.

Perhaps though that's why i like Palin's bio as a cleaner of Alaska's Republican Augean stables and am frustrated by the one-sided coverage of her.

That's your problem. You have this image of her as a corruption fighter, which couldn't be farther from the truth. Like I said, she's just like Gingrich - she didn't take on corrupt figures because she wanted to clean out the system, but because she's a ladder climber who was looking to make a name for herself:

• She takes Bush's peonage appointments and turns it up to 11.
• She tried to ban books and tried to fire the Wasilla librarian when she rebuffed Palin's request for the third time.
• She fires officials that don't support her during elections.
• She requested earmarks that McCain specifically complained about as being wasteful spending.
• She fully supported the bridge to nowhere until Congress said it would have to be paid for with state money, yet took the federal funds anyway. Now she's lying by saying "I told Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks,' on that bridge to nowhere."
• She illegally uses personal email accounts for state business.
• Abused her position by trying to have her ex-brother in law fired, and when the state commissioner refused, she fired him instead.
• And most dispicably, signed off on charging rape victims for examination kits.

I am SAYING that these are facts, and that reporting them is (of course) fair. My complaint is the failure to report other pertinent facts.

Like those Fox News talking heads that wished that the rest of the media would stop talking about all the bad things happening in Iraq - like bombings that would kill a hundred people at a time, roadside bombs killing our troops, and ethnic cleansing between Shiites and Sunnis - and focus on the positive things like construction of a new clinic inside the Green Zone. I'm sure the women of Iraq who would wear mourning robes for years at a time - another family member would be killed before it was time to take them off - would concur.

With all due respect there's a pretty big difference between being endorsed by a pastor and having someone BE your pastor for over 20 years.

With all due respect you're rationalizing a racist smear. If you watch more than "Goddamn America" soundbyte played on the media, he's speaking about how the United States kept slaves "in perpetuity", the "separate but equal" Dred Scott decision, Jim Crow, forced American Indians onto reservations, interned Japanese Americans during WWII, and the Tuskegee experiments on black men with syphilis. Funny how the media never mentioned that this Angry Black Man hated the United States sooo much he voluntarily gave up his student deferment and served two terms of duty as a Marine in Vietnam, and then re-enlisted as a medical corpsman and was so good he was the valedictorian of his class and was on LBJ's surgical team in 1966.

It is at least conceivable that McCain wasn't fully aware of

Just one simple link will do. Any takers?

I have yet to see a single (not one) source that shows she was using this account for government business. If this is the case, why are there no links to copied of said email(s)? If this is all speculation, then for the love of god, shut the fuck up till there is proof.

Don't assume. Thank you.

If you're referring to her personal account, then this post lists the email headers. I haven't looked for a link to an article, but they look like the same ones that were in an earlier article, probably already linked here somewhere. It'll take a judge to release the full emails since she's already deleted her Yahoo accounts. The second Yahoo account was quite obviously being used for state business, and not even Palin is denying that.

Once again, the account that got hacked was not the account that she used for official email. The one that McLeod is referring to is gov.sarah@yahoo.com, not gov.palin@yahoo.com. You're correct that the hacking of her account was pointless. That's because Alaskans were already investigating the other account that she used for official business.

They already knew about her using commercial accounts for state business. Read this article. They already had boxes of emails from her aides, all sent to her yahoo address (save one which was a mistake).

Personal email accounts called gov.palin@yahoo.com and where the subjects clearly implied she was talking business?

Sorry, I don't believe for a second they were personal.

gov.palin@yahoo.com was her personal use account. gov.sarah@yahoo.com was the one that she was using for official state business.

Not that I'm for the ditz, but isn't everyone entitled to their privacy? Even online.

As in, being free to delete whatever non-work emails come to you.

The problem is that she was using a commercial account for state business, which circumvents the security and accountability of using official state email services. She essentially made state business subject to Yahoo's terms of service rather than the laws of Alaska. Her official email is supposed to be public record, but the state can't access or archive her commercial account.

They've already seen boxes of emails from her aides to her Yahoo account. In fact, all but one email was sent to her gov.sarah@Yahoo.com account. That's the account she used for state business. It's not the account that got hacked.

Thank you, I'll take your word for that. I'll repeat part two for you to answer now:
Has it been proven that she used a personal (or simply a Yahoo) email account to conduct personal business?

Yes. More than enough to warrant an investigation.

Except she did not use it for official business. The guy that hacked it even said he did not find anything that showed her account being used for official business. But if it would make you happy i think they should investigate it. While they are at it they should investigate all of congress too because I am sure everyone does it if the Governor of Alaska does it.

Actually, you're right that she didn't use that account for official business. It was a different Yahoo account that she used for official business. I do agree that any public official that does this in violation of state or federal law should be punished for it.

There was NO government business or smoking gun found. He said so himself, and every credible report of the content of the e-mails has concluded likewise. Sarah Palin is entitled to private e-mail just like the rest of us. Sarah Palin was clearly NOT conducting state business using her private e-mail account.

(Furthermore, it's unreasonable to expect anyone in public office to *never* mention political words in their private e-mails. A casual mention of a person who holds political office to a mutual friend in a private e-mail is not a violation of any laws, and maintaining that kind of ridiculous assertion will only encourage pols to keep every communication they can out of the system, so it's clearly self-defeating.)

The complaints against Palin are sour grapes and a desperate attempt to defend an indefensible violation of privacy on an unfounded suspicion that there might be some "smoking gun" there.

Personally, I don't think five years in prison is nearly long enough for this sort of deliberate, premeditated, e-crime with the intent to cause harm. A 20-year sentence without parole for any sort of knowing, deliberate breaking of or tampering with public, private, or government e-mail or file/document storage accounts would be more appropriate.

She was definitely using a Yahoo account for state business. It's not the one that got hacked. Do some research before you spout off.

Palin knowingly and deliberately circumvented Alaskan laws that exist to ensure accountability of public officials. Think she should get 20 years?

Take your partisan hate-spewing elsewhere. I'm sick of the team loyalty at all costs mindset this country seems to have. Any public official using commercial email accounts in violation of the law should face punishment for it. Period.

It's not there. As mentioned in all of the comments above, the "hacker" was disappointed by not finding anything. You can find all the email online, there's nothing illegal there.

The assertion that there is something illegal has been created in a sort of slashdot liberal love-fest, that ignores facts.

She was definitely using a Yahoo account for state business. It's not the one that got hacked. Those are the facts.

It did not happen. Even the guy that hacked the account said he did not find anything. It is more media spin.

This is getting tedious now. She was definitely using a Yahoo account for state business. It's not the one that got hacked.

It amuses that there are two competing and mutually exclusive anti-Palin memes going on simultaneously:

(1) She was using insecure free email for Important State Business! That information needs to be kept secure so that not just anyone can hack in and see it!

(2) She was using private free email for Important State Business! That information needs to be made available so that anyone can file a request and see it!

How are those mutually exclusive? She should be using a secure email account that adheres to Alaskan law and properly archives the communications so that they can be subpoenaed if necessary.

She was obviously not doing that.

On one hand, we have the Governor of Alaska and potential VP of the United States using a public e-mail system (with a really simple password hint) for state work.

Sometimes the written word is tough to interpret, so please don't take this as some sort of macho challenge, but do we really have any official proof that the governor was doing what you've said? I don't want anyone to simply answer "Yes" or give some anecdotal diatribe. I want someone to provide some real proof that I and a bunch of other curious people can read.

It's already widely known that she was using a Yahoo account for official business. It's not the same account that got hacked though.

Actually the "hacker" has stated that he read every email in her account and couldn't find any government business being conducted. The emails to and from government officials had to do with her campaign and would have been illegal if sent using government accounts.

The hacker didn't hack the account she was using for state business. That was a different Yahoo account, and is already common knowledge.

Cool glad I missed it. Where is your proof? Where is the investigation? What law did she break etc. The two people who have "used" the account (Palin and Kernell) said that Palin did not use the account for government business.

She was using a Yahoo account for state business. That is common knowledge now. It's not the same account that got hacked.

Why should she be indicted? None of her emails were very inappropriate.

What we have is some people who thought that Palin was conducting official state business on her personal account, and for some reason, even though her personal emails have been exposed and cleared as appropriate, they still can't drop their belief that she was/is conducting state business on her personal account.

Let it go--she obviously wasn't, and we know that thanks to the idiot who accessed her emails.

She was using a Yahoo account for state business. That is common knowledge now. It's not the same account that got hacked.

If the only proof of the Palin using yahoo to conduct official business came out becuase of the hacking of her account then its going to be hard to get it admitted as evidence. Its all fruit of the poisonous tree. He did much more harm than good. Besides doing something completely illegal.

That's not the only evidence. It's already widely known that she was using a Yahoo account for state business. That's not the one that got hacked.

Which is what she did.

Not hardly.

...this bozo gave Palin a perfect excuse to close the account and (presumably) destroy all the evidence. (And any evidence that can be recovered will be tainted.)

Yahoo already closed it. I think they had closed it before the first article hit Slashdot.

Once again, the account that got hacked is not the same account that was being used for state business. They were two different Yahoo accounts that she had and used for two different purposes, one for personal and the other for official communications.

Well they have a rather large .zip, in there. I'm still trying to figure out why people think there was incriminating stuff in there, though, since he claimed to have read all the emails and not found anything.

Nobody (who has half a brain) thinks there was incriminating things in her personal account. What people in Alaska found out before the hacking even took place, was that she had a Yahoo account that she was using for state business, and which therefore was circumventing the security and archival laws regarding official communications. That's not the account that got hacked, and both accounts were later deleted, so we aren't likely to find out what was in them. That could possibly come back to haunt her if there is an investigation.

I do think that Bidens and all other congressional emails (through GOV accounts) should be available/read by 3rd party. And when corruption is found like in palins case...

Uh, nothing was found. You can keep saying that, but there was nothing there. Sorry.

No kidding. Because she had two Yahoo accounts. The one used for official business was already made public. He found another one that she used for personal communications. Of course he wasn't likely to find much official-looking stuff in that one.

Government officials are still citizens. They deserve privacy just like you or I do. If they are not above the law, then they have the same rights as you or I. Otherwise, we would be allowed to see into the private lives of the old lady at the DPS office. She is just as much a government employee as the governor.

But, hey! Don't let the facts cloud your judgment.

There happen to be laws that apply to government employees regarding the security and archiving of communications. It allows for accountability if there is an investigation that needs to subpoena those communications. She's not above those laws either.

Even if Palin had improperly conducted state business on yahoo (which would be stupid and illegal), hacking her email account is still immoral and illegal. I'm surprised that many people who normally are pro-freedom turn out to have very situational ethics when it comes to people they regard as political enemies. As others have said in this thread, a guy called Richard Nixon seemed to think that way.

This, I agree with. There are two crimes here. The kid hacking into her account, and her using a commercial account for state business. Both deserve their own punishment.

Earlier it was just some prank to me, I really wanted to get something incriminating which I was sure there would be, just like all of you anon out there that you think there was some missed opportunity of glory, well there WAS NOTHING, I read everything, every little blackberry confirmation, all the pictures, and there was nothing

There was no government business conducted from the account, moron.

That's because she had two different Yahoo accounts. He hacked the personal one. There was another one used for official business.

Two separate crimes. Neither excuses the other.

Actually that's NOT a fact. There's no evidence that anything there was anything illegal in her emails. There's a thread in here that reveals a link to a public post from the alleged hacker who said he was looking for dirt, but didn't find anything. And even if there were, the ends do NOT justify the means. In fact, even if there were anything illegal about the emails, it's now tainted and could not be used for prosecution.

Once again... for those who haven't been paying attention. He didn't hack the account she uses for official business. So we wouldn't really expect to find much in there anyway, and the account was only compromised for a brief time before someone changed the password and reported it.

If he had hacked in and found nothing (which is what he found, nothing) then just left it at that then Sarah would have had to reset the password again but probably would not think anything of it. Instead the moron posted to Wikileaks information that really was not very interesting I have to admit. In fact it would be subject to deletion for not being important had it not come from a hacked email account.

It's well-established that she and her staff have been using private accounts for state business. Anchorage Daily News has a decent story on it. It wasn't the one that got "hacked", which is why it's stupid that people keep saying that there's no story here because we haven't seen any official email.

The kid is an idiot for hacking the account. He's an unbelievably HUGE idiot for posting the emails the way he did. But really, he got into her personal account, and I don't see how that warrants any more of a punishment than if he'd gotten into anyone else's personal account.

Most importantly Obama voted to allow newborn babies who survived abortion attempts to be denied medical care, food or milk and allowed to die in a closet. Yes, look it up. He did it. Know your candidate.

Get your facts straight, idiot.

Your other arguments are too dumb to bother responding to. It's rather hilarious that you call others mindless.

I seem to see dozens of posters who have decided that Palin was conducting government business over her email. I thought I'd read all the email that had been made public. Did I miss some? Where is this idea coming from?

According to The Anchorage Daily News her use of secret accounts for state business was already an issue before McCain selected her as his running mate. A records request this summer by a fellow Republican (Andree McLeod) turned up the fact that she was playing fast and loose with the state records laws.

The governor's Yahoo account is "the most nonsensical, inane thing I've ever heard of," said Andree McLeod, who is appealing the administration's decision to withhold e-mails.

"The governor sets the tone and the tone that has been set by this governor is beyond the pale," McLeod said. "Common sense tells you to use an official state e-mail account for official state business."

[snip]

"I think that it's total hypocrisy from what she stood for at the beginning of her campaign," Henning said. "Because she campaigned on open government, and she knew that using a private e-mail account would take it and basically hide stuff that people couldn't see."

As far as McLeod can tell, all but one of the e-mails to the governor used her private e-mail address. The one time an aide e-mailed the governor's state account, he was reminded not to.

"Frank, This is not the Governor's personal e-mail account," an assistant to Palin wrote to Bailey in February.

"Whoops~!" Bailey responded in an e-mail.

The Republicans in Alaska had had just about enough of her before McCain swooped in. There was bipartisan support for several investigations against her and a growing consensus towards impeachment.

Now, of course, that's all forgotten, at least in some quarters.

Has anyone actually SEEN an email that was "conducting government business"? If so, can you please post the content?

I think that's the whole point. They haven't seen the emails, but their existence has been made clear by (among other things) the privilege logs, other e-mails, and sworn testimony of her staffers. So far, she's refusing to turn them over.

--MarkusQ

> She wanted a trooper fired for tasering his child? ...

Not that I condone his actions - highly unprofessional - but the way you said it may give the idea to some readers that he used the taser to subdue the child.

"In his interview with troopers, the stepson said it hurt for about a second, according to Wall's report. The boy said he wanted to be tased to show his cousin, Palin's daughter Bristol, that he wasn't a mama's boy. The probe left a welt on his arm, he said. His mother was upstairs yelling at them not to do it, the boy said."

http://www.adn.com/politics/story/476430.html

Reality is indeed scarier than fiction, but my facts aren't crossed. The Snopes articles is correct, but you're conflating two separate episodes: the one referenced by Snopes occurred when she was mayor; the one referenced in my quote from the NYT article occurred a year or two earlier, during her tenure on the city council — before being elected mayor.

The latter episode, as I understand it, came in the context of a loyalty test of the librarian who had balked her earlier. That librarian was subsequently fired, then re-hired after convincing Palin of her loyalty.

I mean... "In fact, Palin asked for the resignation of a handful of department heads to test their loyalty, according to reports at the time."... wtf is that?

Her opponent had appointed them, and they'd made statements supporting hin during the election. She sent out letters asking them to support her policies or resign.

http://www.adn.com/sarah-palin/story/510219.html
Reached at home, Stambaugh said he still doesn't understand why he's been fired. ''There never was an appropriate response,'' he said. ''How did we not support the administration?''

Now he's talking to an attorney. While both Stambaugh and Emmons serve at the mayor's pleasure, Stambaugh said he has a contract that prohibits the city from firing him without cause.

Both Stambaugh and Emmons publicly supported Palin's opponent, long-time mayor John Stein during the campaign last fall. When she was elected, Palin questioned their loyalty and initially asked for their resignations. But Stambaugh said he thought any questions had been resolved.

Stambaugh has headed the Wasilla Police Department since it was created in 1993. Before that, he worked 22 years with Anchorage Police Department, rising to the rank of captain before retiring.

Emmons, who has been the city's library director for seven years, would not comment about the affair.

She did try to do something about it.

I am from Alaska. I have family in Wasilla, some who know Palin. The facts: Palin asked the city librarian if she would remove books from the library. The librarian said, essentially, "Not on my watch." So Palin attempted to change the watch.

She did try to do something about it, at the cost of a well-liked city librarian. She did so because of her scary fundamentalist ideology, the same thing that caused her to push through measurements requiring rape victims to pay for their rape test kits.

This "censorship" thing is not a strawman. I'm not sure if two cases make a pattern, but the "Troopergate" (stupid name, I know) affair indicates she likes to fire people she doesn't like, or who stand in the way of her doing things like censor libraries.

This is a governor whos administration has been openly hostile to an open and transparent mode of operation. Bill McAllister, her communication director as governor, provides a voice clip here where you can find out just how desperate these people are to make excuses for doing nothing more than finding loopholes in the law to try and disguise what they really are talking about. At the end he says "in fact the final decisions will be public, will be documented and will be substantiated and they always have been."

So basically, shut up and stop trying to listen in on what's going on behind the curtain and be happy with what we decide to show you is the real deal. If she's this disdainful of actually wanting to prove to her constituents in Alaska that she's done no wrong and doesn't want to do anything wrong, then why doesn't she just backtrack and say you know what, you're right, I talked about transparency and open government, let's get right on that.

The fact that anyone can look at all this and not see anything suspicious just goes to show how blindly one can follow a political ideology, regardless of who's "championing" the cause, which she certainly is not as far as what Republicans truly want in office. Is it really enough for you that she wants to drill? That she wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade? What on Earth can people see in this snake? I can understand Alaskans loving her because she's always talked up Alaska first Alaska first but the rest of the nation should be terrified that Palin takes the exact same approach to governing as Bush and Cheney when it comes to divulging information.

P.S. -- Remember that "Bridge to Nowhere"? Still going on. And now there's the completed "Road to nowhere". Oh joy, she's just full of straight talk just like Johnny.