TPMMuckraker
September 14, 2008 - September 20, 2008

French: Trooper-Gate Report Will Come Out on Schedule

Zachary Roth | September 19, 2008, 5:24PM

Despite Republican stonewalling, the Alaska legislature will release its report on Trooper-Gate on time, Sen. Hollis French, the Democrat overseeing the investigation, said today. The report is scheduled to be completed October 10th.

None of the subpoenaed witnesses showed up to testify at a legislative hearing today. The McCain-Palin campaign, which has challenged the legitimacy of the investigation, had been actively working to ensure that the witnesses did not testify.

Steven Branchflower, the independent investigator conducting the probe, has already spoken with several witnesses. But it remains to be seen whether his report will be able to reach any definite conclusions without access to testimony by key players like the Palins and several top gubernatorial aides.

PERMALINK | COMMENTS (63) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (30)
Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

John McCain

Palin Under Fire At Home For Trooper-Gate Stonewalling

Zachary Roth | September 19, 2008, 5:08PM

Over the last eight years, the Bush administration's approach to governing has been characterized by a reflexive penchant for secrecy, a willingness to stonewall legitimate investigations, and an aggressive media relations strategy, which sees the press as just another interest group, rather than as playing an important public function.

In recent days, the McCain-Palin campaign has doubled down on that same governing style in shutting down the Trooper-Gate investigation.

When Trooper-Gate first broke, Palin pledged full cooperation. But in the last week, the McCain-Palin campaign has brought in a high-powered ex-federal prosecutor and a team of communications experts to all but shut down the probe.

Essentially co-opting the office of state Attorney General, and working closely with Palin's own lawyer, the GOP operatives -- led by Ed O'Callaghan, a former terrorism prosecutor with the US Attorney's office in New York, and Megan Stapleton, a GOP operative who had worked on Palin's 2006 campaign for governor -- have ensured that many of the key witnesses subpoened in the case, including the Palins themselves, have refused to testify. (No witnesses showed up to a committee hearing today.) At daily press conferences, they've disparaged a respected former public employee, Walt Monegan, offering an entirely new line on why Palin fired him. They've made flatly false statements designed to paint the Democratic legislator overseeing the probe, Hollis French, as having overstepped his authority and as running a partisan witch-hunt. And they've aggressively challenged reporting that they've perceived as unfavorable -- in one case, as we reported yesterday, by phoning a reporter at home to complain about an accurate story.

There's little question that despite -- or perhaps because of -- these efforts, the tone of the Trooper-Gate coverage has grown noticeably more negative in the last few days. And Alaska-based commentators and bloggers have reacted with fury in recent days to the McCain-Palin camp's tactics.

In an unusually pointed editorial published yesterday, the state's most prominent newspaper, the Anchorage Daily News concluded: "Palin and McCain are trying to ignite a partisan firestorm that wipes out the Troopergate investigation until after the election."

And in an opinion piece published Tuesday in the same paper, conservative radio host Dan Fagan -- a frequent Palin critic -- referred to Palin's "transparent delay tactics," and argued that "Americans deserve to know what Palin is trying to hide before we vote her a heartbeat away from the leader of the free world."

Bloggers have been even more critical. One at Alaska Report, a liberal site that has tracked corruption in Alaska state government, wrote yesterday: "National political assassins have invaded Alaska. They were visible and in full force at the McCain-Palin press conference yesterday. Alaskans don't roll that way."

And another at Mudflats -- tagline: "Tiptoeing through the muck of Alaskan politics" -- added: "The damage that this stonewalling has had on Sarah Palin's 'image,' that the out-of-state lawyers and the McCain campaign were trying so fervently to craft, has yet to be measured."

There may be signs that the angry reaction to the GOP tactics has spread beyond opinion writers. Matt Zensey, the ADN's editorial page editor, told TPMmuckraker that letters to the editor had been running at somewhere between 60 and 66 percent anti-Palin in recent days.

"We are not alone among those who are taken aback" by Palin's abrupt transformation from a being an advocate of openness and accountability to stone-walling the investigation at every turn, said Zensey. "People are noticing the disconnect."

Zensey said that the take-no-prisoners tactics of the McCain-Palin PR team are not in keeping with Alaska's tradition of civil political discourse. "The 11-minute tirade that Megan Stapleton launched against Walt Monegan is something that was unfamiliar to a lot of Alaskans."

Zensey added: "The politics of personal destruction have come to Alaska."

Still, what ultimately matters is whether the dissatisfaction with Palin's about-face on Trooper-Gate filters into the broader narrative of the presidential campaign. Already, though, Democrats may being taking comfort in the fact that, in recent days, her national approval ratings appear to have slipped noticeably.

PERMALINK | COMMENTS (39) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (44)
Topics: Alaska, John McCain, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

House Judiciary

Conyers Calls on McCain to Halt GOP Voter Suppression Efforts

Kate Klonick | September 19, 2008, 2:56PM

In reaction to recent claims that the GOP is attempting to block voters in Michigan whose homes have been foreclosed on, one of the state's representatives is speaking out and demanding action from Republicans.

Rep. John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, called on Sen. John McCain to "step forward now and halt the Republican Party's efforts to profit politically from the economic misery of others."

"The Republican Party has had a long record of blocking eligible voters from voting," Conyers wrote. "In the past two Presidential elections, the country witnessed appalling efforts to limit voter participation in Ohio, Florida and throughout the country. It is beyond disgraceful that the Republican Party now seems to be targeting those who are suffering the most. . . It should surprise no one that the people who gave us the worst economy since the Great Depression would now want to prevent those victimized by this economy from voting in the coming elections."

Separately, Conyers and 22 of his Democratic colleagues in the House, also joined Senate Democrats, who earlier this week demanded an investigation from the DOJ into what has become known as the "lose your house, lose your vote," after the title of the article in the Michigan Messenger which sparked awareness of the GOPs plan to challenge voters registered at addresses on foreclosure lists.

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Topics: House Judiciary, John Conyers, John McCain, Voting

Alaska

Palin Still Bad-Mouthing Trooper

Zachary Roth | September 19, 2008, 11:08AM

In his recent New Yorker story, Philip Gourevitch noted that even as Sarah Palin was arguing to him that she had fired Walt Monegan for other reasons, "she seemed to be saying something else--that her vendetta against Wooten was wholly justified."

And watching Palin's recent interview with Sean Hannity, we got the same impression.

Palin told Hannity: "This trooper tasered my nephew...that was...it's all on the record. It's all there. His threats against the first family, the threat against my dad. All that is in the record. And if the opposition researchers chooses to forget that side of the story, they're not doing their job."

Sounds like she still feels she had a legitimate beef.

PERMALINK | COMMENTS (115) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (32)
Topics: Alaska, Mike Wooten, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

The Daily Muck

Kate Klonick | September 19, 2008, 9:53AM

Former Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL), isn't expected to be charged for sending lascivious emails and instant messages to underage Congressional pages, two federal officials told the AP. Foley resigned in 2006 shortly after ABCNews.com exposed a series of messages to pages and has been under investigation by the FBI as well as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Since resigning, Foley has gone to a treatment for alcoholism and come out as being gay, also claiming he was molested as a child by a priest. An official announcement regarding Foley's investigation is expected today. (AP)

"Alaska's Congressman," 35-year incumbent Rep. Don Young, has narrowly eked out victory in his GOP primary race against Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell. The race came down to only a 304-vote margin of victory. Parnell declined a recount and conceded the race on Thursday. Young now faces a former Alaska state representative Ethan Berkowitz in the general election. With federal investigations dogging Young, Berkowitz is heavily favored to win, leading the polls by double digits. (The Hill)

Indicted Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) has been okayed to start a legal expense fund to help pay for his defense in his corruption trial set to begin next week. Stevens' lawyers have filed dozens of motions in the weeks since the veteran senator's indictment including requests for the medical records from the prosecution's star witness, Bill Allen. Yesterday, a judge ruled that Stevens' defense can probe the mental health of Allen and ordered the government to hand over records to Stevens'. (CQ Politics, AP)

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Topics: The Daily Muck

Todd Palin

Todd Palin Refuses to Testify in Trooper-Gate Investigation

Kate Klonick | September 18, 2008, 10:19PM

Todd Palin, who was subpoenaed just last week in the Trooper-Gate investigation, has said he will not testify.

From the AP:

Todd Palin, who participates in state business in person or by e-mail, was among 13 people subpoenaed by the Alaska Legislature. McCain-Palin presidential campaign spokesman Ed O'Callaghan announced today that Todd Palin would not appear, because he no longer believes the Legislature's investigation is legitimate.

Earlier this week, Talis Colberg, the Alaska attorney general wrote a letter to state legislators, informing them that the state employees who were subpoenaed in the investigation would not be testifying.

Initially, Gov. Sarah Palin promised full cooperation in the investigation, but has been increasingly opposed to the probe since she was named as the Republican vice-presidential nominee.

Late update: Todd Palin's attorney, Thomas Van Flein, sent a letter yesterday to Trooper-Gate investigator Stephen Branchflower, informing him that his client would not be cooperating with the subpoena. The letter can be seen here.

PERMALINK | COMMENTS (37) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (17)
Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

John McCain

McCain Press Aide Calls Alaska Reporter At Home To Complain About Unfavorable Coverage

Zachary Roth | September 18, 2008, 6:03PM

Here's a little more evidence that the McCain-Palin campaign is playing the hardest of hardball on Trooper-Gate -- especially in regard to press relations.

Jason Moore, a reporter with Anchorage-based KTUU-TV, just confirmed to TPMmuckraker that Megan Stapleton, a spokeswoman for the McCain-Palin campaign in Alaska, called his home to complain about one of Moore's news reports, and accused Moore of calling Stapleton and another McCain staffer liars.

Moore's report looked at the McCain-Palin campaign's "Truth Squad," an aggressive Alaska-based public relations campaign that's being led by Stapleton and former federal prosecutor Ed O'Callaghan and is designed to help thwart the Trooper-Gate investigation.

Moore reported that the Truth Squad was not always entirely truthful itself. He noted that Stapleton had said in a Friday press conference that it was Hollis French, the Democrat overseeing the investigation, who had pulled one name, that of former Palin chief of staff Mike Tibbles, off the list of witnesses to receive subpoenas. Stapleton had pointed to this as an inappropriate political maneuver by French.

But in fact, Moore reported, it was GOP Rep. Jay Ramras, a McCain supporter, who took Tibbles' name off the list. Moore quoted Ramras saying so.

Stapleton and O'Callaghan have another "Truth Squad" press conference scheduled for 7pm EST tonight.

Moore told TPMmuckraker that he and Stapleton -- who was a press aide to Palin before eventually moving over to the McCain campaign -- used to work together as co-anchors on KTUU. "We're friends," he said.

When Stapleton called his home, said Moore, she reached Moore's wife, and immediately told her: "Your husband just called two Hoyas liars." Stapleton, O'Callaghan, and Moore's wife all attended Georgetown University, whose mascot is the Hoyas.

Moore added that Stapleton had also called the news director of KTUU to complain.

Asked whether he and Stapleton really remained friends, Moore allowed: "It hasn't been too friendly this week."

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Topics: Alaska, John McCain, Palin's Press, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

Oversight Committee

House Oversight Steps into Fray of Financial Crisis

Kate Klonick | September 18, 2008, 5:40PM

It looks like Congress has stepped into the fray of the Wall Street crisis.

In letters to Lehman Brothers and AIG sent today, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chair of the House Oversight Committee, requested the communications from the last 180 days of the CEOs and board of directors at the two companies. He also requested information about how the CEOS and board members would be compensated following the bankruptcy and government bailout of the two firms.

Additionally, a tipline has been set up to assist Congress with their "investigation into the collapse of Lehman Brothers and AIG."

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Topics: Henry Waxman, Oversight Committee

Sarah Palin

AK Lawmaker on Trooper-Gate: "I Don't Think This Is Gonna End Quietly."

Zachary Roth | September 18, 2008, 12:05PM

The no-holds-barred effort by the McCain campaign and its Alaska Republican allies to bury the Trooper-Gate investigation at all costs may be bearing fruit.

Republicans have in recent days been calling on Democratic senator Kim Elton to reconvene the bipartisan legislative council with ultimate responsibility for the probe. And yesterday Elton told the Associated Press that he may do so, allowing for a vote on whether to delay the investigation or replace Democratic senator Hollis French as its manager.

The council, which contains 10 Republicans and four Democrats, had voted unanimously in July to launch the investigation. But many observers believe that, now that the probe could play a role in the presidential race, the committee's GOP members will vote to shut it down if given a chance.

Other recent developments confirm that the GOP is pulling out all the stops.

Talis Colberg -- the Palin-appointed Attorney General who was directly involved in efforts to pressure the former Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan over Trooper Mike Wooten -- said Tuesday that ten state employees would not honor subpoenas to testify in the case. Palin, of course, had originally pledged her office's full cooperation in the probe.

A group of five GOP legislators filed suit -- with the help of a right-wing Texas-based legal foundation -- to stop the investigation in its tracks.

The McCain campaign officially took charge of the effort, trotting out a hard-charging former federal prosecutor, Ed O'Callaghan, as its point-man on the issue.

And the ADN reported today that Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, is no longer being paid for by the state of Alaska, but could not say whether the McCain camp was helping to pay his bills.

But the GOP's hardball tactics could end up doing more harm than good, by adding to the suspicion that Palin has something to hide.

In an editorial published this morning, the ADN accused Palin and McCain of "trying to ignite a partisan firestorm that wipes out the Troopergate investigation until after the election."

And the liberal journalist David Corn observed last night on MSNBC: "In the last few days the Republicans are treating this like its another Watergate and they better shut it down right way."

So: Where do things go from here?

Van Flein told the ADN that he'd likely decide today whether Todd Palin, who also been subponaed but is not a state employee, will testify, which would occur at a session of the Judiciary Committee tomorrow.

Meanwhile, the band of lawmakers struggling to maintain control of the investigation -- French, Elton, and their supporters in the legislature -- certainly aren't backing down.

Despite saying he might agree to GOP calls to reconvene the legislative council, Elton sent a letter yesterday to Colberg, the Attorney General, accusing him of going back on an agreement to allow the ten state employees testify. "Bluntly, I feel like Charlie Brown after Lucy moved the football," Elton wrote to Colberg.

Sen. Bill Wielechowski, a Democrat and French ally, told TPMmuckraker: "Hollis French has no intention of buckling under," and said that the same holds true of Elton.

The operation, Wielechowski continued, is "clearly politically driven by the McCain campaign."

"I've never seen an effort like this in this state to kill something," he added. "I don't think this is gonna end quietly."

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Topics: John McCain, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

The Daily Muck

Matt Berman | September 18, 2008, 9:31AM

Two former officials at the Department of Justice appear to be tied up in the indictment of Jack Abramoff connected lobbyist Kevin Ring. Former Solicitor General Paul Clement and chief of staff to former Attorney General John Ashcroft both have had correspondence with Ring that prosecutors Wednesday said they intend to turn over to the court. Ring was indicted on conspiracy, obstruction of justice, bribery, and fraud charges earlier this month. (AP)

Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) said during FBI Director Robert Mueller's testimony Wednesday that he does not believe that suspect Bruce Ivins acted alone in the 2001 anthrax attacks. Leahy, who was one of the targets in the attacks, added that he was not convinced that Ivins was involved at all. Mueller noted that the National Academy of Sciences will conduct an independent review of the scientific evidence in the case. (AP)

A law enforcement investigation into Alaska State Sen. Lesil McGuire (R) over a disturbance on a recent Alaska Airlines flight has ended without charges. According to witnesses, State Sen. McGuire refused to turn off her BlackBerry during the flight and acted out when she was denied alcohol. The incident was revealed in an official report released Tuesday. (Anchorage Daily News)

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Topics: The Daily Muck

Alaska

Trooper-Gate's Attorney-General Problem

Kate Klonick and Zachary Roth | September 17, 2008, 6:37PM

Earlier today, we learned that Talis Colberg, Alaska's Attorney General, is the latest figure to lend support to the GOP effort to stymie the Trooper-Gate investigation. Colberg sent a letter to Sen. Hollis French, who's overseeing the investigation, asserting that the state employees who have been subpoenaed to testify in the probe won't honor those subpoenas.

So it's worth stressing a point that might be getting lost in the flurry of moves and counter-moves: Colberg is no independent player in this case. In fact, he's a Palin appointee, who was personally involved in the effort to pressure Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan to terminate Trooper Mike Wooten, and who has already led an investigation into the matter at Palin's behest.

When the legislature announced that it would hire an independent investigator, Stephen Branchflower, to look into charges that the governor had wrongfully terminated Monegan, Palin revealed that she had already requested that Colberg conduct his own parallel investigation. Colberg had begun gathering documents and evidence in late July, weeks before Branchflower had even begun his probe.

At the time, legislators raised questions about Colberg's involvement and the possibility of witness tampering.

"I think it is harmful to the credibility of the administration, harmful to the process and harmful to all the parties involved," Rep. Jay Ramras, the Republican chair of the House Judiciary Committee told the Anchorage Daily News. "It's just the worst possible thing to be doing."

As a result of new information uncovered by Colberg's investigation, Palin held a press-conference in mid-August and admitted that one of her staffers, Frank Bailey, had been tape recorded making a call to a state trooper's office, requesting the removal of Wooten.

And crucially, she also admitted that Colberg himself -- as well as Todd Palin -- had called Monegan and talked to him about Wooten. Thanks to these calls, Palin acknowledged, Monegan might have felt pressure to fire Wooten. Palin had previously denied that either she or her staffers had ever pressured officials to fire Wooten.

For a time, it appeared that Colberg had distanced himself from the investigation as a result of this conflict of interest. When Palin hired Thomas Van Flein to represent her in the case, Van Flein cited Colberg's call to Monegan as a reason why Colberg himself could not represent Palin. "The Department of Law had a potential conflict of interest, because Mr. Colberg, Attorney General Colberg, made contact with Mr. Monegan about Trooper Wooten," Van Flein said at the time. "That would make him a potential witness, and thus there's a potential conflict."

Last week, Senior Assistant Attorney General Michael Barnhill -- not Colberg -- authored a letter threatening to quash subpoenas if they were issued by the state legislature. Bloomberg even reported that Colberg had recused himself from the investigation.

But in the light of Colberg's letter to French announced this morning, that no longer appears operative.

So in other words, Palin and her lawyer have admitted that Colberg, a Palin appointee, called Monegan and pressured him to fire Wooten, and that he has a clear conflict of interest in the case. And yet Colberg is still working to quash subpoenas issued in a bipartisan vote by the state legislature.

The attorney general's office did not immediately respond to a call from TPMmuckraker seeking to clear up the confusion.

Colberg's background doesn't suggest he's a figure with much independent clout
Before he was appointed attorney general by Palin, he was a little known assemblyman from the Matanuska Valley, in which Palin's hometown of Wasilla sits.

In an article Sunday in the New York Times, a family friend of Colberg described a conversation with him on his move from a one-room law office in rural Alaska to one of the highest offices in the state, supervising over 500 people: "I called him and asked, 'Do you know how to supervise people?'," Kathy Wells told the Times. "He said, 'No, but I think I'll get some help.'"

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

Charles Rangel

Wrangling Over Rangel: What Do We Know?

Zachary Roth | September 17, 2008, 4:15PM

There's nothing that inspires confidence like the chair of the House Ways and Means Committee -- the body that writes our tax laws -- submitting a financial disclosure form in which the value for one piece of property varies by as much as 10 times from one page to another. But that's the case with embattled New York Democrat Charlie Rangel.

We learned yesterday that, with crucial support from Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Rangel will defy GOP calls for his resignation and stay on as chair of the powerhouse committee. So given that Rangel's going to be around for at least a while longer, we thought it was worth running down the allegations against the Harlem Congressman.

The trouble started for Rangel in July, when an investigation by the New York Times found that Rangel rents four rent-stabilized apartments -- one of which he uses as a campaign office -- in the same Harlem building, at well below market rates. City and state regulations prevent the use of rent-controlled apartments for purposes other than as a primary residence.

The more serious charge, first reported by the New York Post at the end of August, is that Rangel failed to disclose -- either on his tax returns or on Congressional disclosure forms -- over $75,000 in income from a rental villa he owns in the Dominican Republic. Rangel has called the disclosure failures an oversight, and has admitted that he owes around $10,000 in back taxes and penalties.

The Ways and Means Committee, which Rangel chairs, is in charge of writing federal tax laws, making the news particularly embarrassing for Rangel.

A few days after the Post's report, Bloomberg News reported that Rangel received an interest-free loan from the developers of the villa, when he bought it in 1990. But, according to the director of the complex that contains the villa, several other non-Dominican investors received similar breaks at the time, because the project wasn't producing sufficient income.

Rangel has asked the House Ethics Committee to look into both the rent-stabilized apartments issue and the Dominican villa issue, as well as a third matter -- that he used his Congressional office letterhead to solicit donors for an educational center named for himself, and run by the City College of New York. In addition, Rangel directed a forensic accounting expert to pore over his tax returns and financial disclosure statements to Congress, and to submit a report to the Ethics Committee.

On Monday, it was announced that the accountant had found additional discrepancies.

As summarized by the Associated Press:

-Rangel's papers over the past 10 years show no reference to the sale of a home he once owned on Colorado Avenue in Washington.
-The details of a property bought in Sunny Isles, Fla., are bewildering at best. The stated value changes significantly from year to year, and even page to page, from $50,000 to $100,000 all the way up to $500,000.
-Some of the entries for investment funds fluctuate strangely, suggesting that the person either didn't have accurate information or didn't fill out the paperwork correctly.

In a statement put out alongisde the announcement of the discrepencies, Rangel said:

"While over the years I delegated to my staff the completion of my annual House financial disclosure statements, I had the ultimate responsibility. I owed my colleagues and the public adherence to a higher standard of care not only as a member of Congress but even more as the chair of the House Ways and Means Committee," he said.

And it was reported today that Rangel has asked the Ethics Committe to allow him to use campaign contributions to pay for the forensic audit of his tax returns and disclosure forms -- which could end up costing more than $100,000.

Right now, the jury is still out on what this all adds up to. At best, Rangel has been irresponsibly lax in the management of his financial affairs. And he may have been deliberately mendacious. But as things currently stand, there's little evidence of a quo for the quid.

On the issue of the Harlem apartments, Rangel did have a 2005 meeting with a lobbyist for the Olnick Association, the company that owns the building in question, when Olnick was seeking government approval for two building projects in the Bronx and Harlem. But both Olnick and Rangel say the Congressman took no action on the company's behalf, and neither project advanced.

And as for the Dominican vila, there's no evidence whatsoever that Rangel took steps to help the company that owned the complex, or that his failure to pay taxes on the villa income, or make proper disclosures to Congress, was abetted by anyone seeking favors from him.

Still, at the very least, Rangel's inability to personally comply with the tax laws doesn't inspire much confidence that he's the best person to be writing those laws.

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Topics: Charles Rangel

The Daily Muck

Matt Berman | September 17, 2008, 9:58AM

Embattled Rep. Charlie Rangel will not step down as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Rangel's lawyer, Lanny Davis, said Tuesday that Speaker Nancy Pelosi supports Rangel's decision to keep the position. Rangel has been taking increasing fire over items not reported on his financial disclosure forms. (New York Times)

FBI Director Robert Mueller testified to the House Judiciary Committee Tuesday that the new proposed rules for FBI national security investigations would help protect Americans from terrorists. Many of the Democrats on the committee were dubious of the new guidelines, saying that they do not trust the FBI or the Department of Justice to protect civil liberties and privacy rights. Mueller returns to Congress today, this time to the Senate Judiciary Committee. (AP)

A scientist who had assisted in the government's investigation of the 2001 anthrax mailings, told the Los Angeles Times yesterday, that he made an "honest mistake" in classifying the anthrax he examined as weaponized. Peter Jahrling's statement came shortly after FBI Director Robert Mueller said in a hearing yesterday (see above) that the National Academy of Sciences would be overseeing the review of the FBI's findings that another scientist, Bruce Ivins was behind the anthrax attacks. (Los Angeles Times)

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Topics: The Daily Muck

Alaska

Judge Rules Against Stevens Motion; Denies His Charges Violate the Constitution

Kate Klonick | September 17, 2008, 9:25AM

Indicted Sen. Ted Steven's (R-AK) most recent attempt to have his case thrown out, on the grounds that it violated the constitutional separations that prohibit members of Congress from being prosecuted for legislative actions, has been rejected by a U.S. District Judge.

From McClatchy:

[U.S. District Judge Emmett Sullivan] turned down Stevens' lawyers' request to throw out the seven-count indictment against the senator and said Tuesday in a hearing that if evidence arises at trial that looks as though it violates what's known as the speech-or-debate clause of the Constitution, he will consider barring it.
. . . Sullivan reviewed grand jury transcripts to determine whether witnesses were asked questions that would've violated the speech-or-debate clause, which limits what sort of evidence executive branch investigators can use when they probe acts by members of Congress. He said he saw a handful but that they were "in no way pervasive."

Stevens, in the midst of a re-election bid, didn't attend the court hearing Tuesday. However, he was in Washington at the Capitol.

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Topics: Alaska, Ted Stevens

Trooper-Gate

AK AG: Subpoenaed State Employees Will Refuse to Testify

Kate Klonick | September 17, 2008, 9:07AM

Less than a week after the Alaska State Senate Judiciary Committee voted to issue subpoenas in the investigation into Gov. Sarah Palin, those state employees who were ordered to testify won't be honoring the subpoenas, the Alaska attorney general said yesterday.

In a letter to Sen. Hollis French (D), who is overseeing the investigation, Attorney General Talis Colberg requested the subpoenas be withdrawn and spoke for the employees, stating their refusal to testify unless compelled by the full state Senate or the entire legislature.

From the AP:

Colberg, who was appointed by Palin, said the employees are caught between their respect for the Legislature and their loyalty to the governor, who initially agreed to cooperate with the inquiry but has increasingly opposed it since McCain chose her as his running mate.
"This is an untenable position for our clients because the governor has so strongly stated that the subpoenas issued by your committee are of questionable validity," Colberg wrote.

The legal action surrounding the investigation into Palin's firing of former Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, known as Trooper-Gate, has markedly increased since Palin was named the Republican vice-presidential nominee. When the investigation began just two months ago, Palin pledged the full-cooperation of herself and her staff.

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

Sarah Palin

GOP Legislators Enlist Right-Wing Lawyers to Stymie Trooper-Gate Probe

Zachary Roth | September 16, 2008, 6:16PM

The GOP campaign to thwart the Trooper-Gate investigation cranked into even higher gear early this morning, with an emailed announcement by Anchorage attorney Kevin Clarkson that, on behalf of five Republican members, he is suing to halt the investigation. Clarkson argued in the email that Democratic senators Hollis French and Kim Elton, and independent investigator Steve Branchflower have inappropriately politicized the probe "in an attempt to unlawfully smear Gov. Palin." The Republican legislators behind the move are Representatives Wes Keller, Mike Kelly, and Bob Lynn, and Senators Fred Dyson and Sen. Tom Wagoner.

In addition, the GOP Speaker of the House, Rep. John Harris, released a letter today in which he asserted that what "started as a bipartisan and impartial effort is becoming overshadowed by public comments from individuals at both ends of the political spectrum."

And McCain staffers were all over the airwaves making a similar claim, and arguing that, as a result, the matter should be turned over to the state personnel board -- a request made originally by Palin's lawyer.

There's evidence of additional involvement by national Republicans in the effort to stymie the probe. Clarkson told the Associated Press he's working with the Liberty Legal Institute (LLI) a Texas nonprofit legal firm that's donating its time. The LLI is the legal arm of the Free Market Foundation, a conservative activist group that describes itself on its website as "the statewide public policy council associated with Dr. James Dobson's Focus on the Family." Dobson, of course, is a key religious right leader and GOP power-broker.

As for Clarkson himself, one veteran Anchorage attorney described him, in an email to TPMmuckraker, as "a religious conservative who is known for taking on politically charged cases that get his name in the paper," but added that he "is not a heavy hitter".

By all accounts, this particular effort to get the courts to stop the probe is unlikely to succeed, as few courts would be likely to want to intervene in the management of an internal legislative matter. But the move may be designed as much to create political pressure on French and his allies to back down or soft pedal the investigation.

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

Voting

Senators Seek DOJ's Help in Preventing Disenfranchisement of Voters Losing Homes

Kate Klonick | September 16, 2008, 5:55PM

After reports that the Michigan Republican party planned to challenge voters whose homes had been foreclosed, thirteen senators have petitioned Attorney General Michael Mukasey to ensure that such voters would not be harassed or intimidated at their polling places.

"Foreclosures are devastating enough for affected families and neighborhoods without adding the outrage of disenfranchisement," wrote Sens. Charles Schumer (D-NY), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Joseph Biden (D-DE), Herb Kohl (D-WI), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Russell Feingold (D-WI), Richard Durbin (D-IL), Benjamin Cardin (D-MD), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Barack Obama (D-IL), Carl Levin (D-MI), Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), and Sherrod Brown (D-OH).

In their letter, the senators called the tactic "simply a new variant of the destructive practice of voter 'caging.'" Voter caging is a term used to describe discouraging eligible voters to vote.

"In the middle of the worst economy in recent memory, with so many Americans fighting to stay in their homes, these allegations suggest a mean-spirited and desperate attempt to suppress the vote," said Whitehouse, who has authored legislation on voter suppression.

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Topics: Voting

Sarah Palin

Source: Sex Assault Program Cited in Monegan Firing Targeted Child Abusers

Zachary Roth | September 16, 2008, 4:58PM

So Sarah Palin's latest explanation for why she fired Walt Monegan is that he had gone over her head in seeking federal money for an initiative to combat sexual assault crimes, before she had approved the program.

But it now appears that the program in question is one that most elected officials would be wary of admitting they hadn't strongly backed. According to Peggy Brown, who heads the Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, Monegan wanted to use the federal money to hire retired troopers and law enforcement officials, and assign them to investigate the most egregious cases of sexual assault -- including those against children.

In other words, if Palin's new story is true, she fired Monegan for being too aggressive in going after child molesters.

ABC News reported yesterday that, although Alaska leads the nation in reported rapes per capita, Palin hasn't made the issue a priority as governor.

Monegan, however, appeared eager to change that. "He seemed to get the issue and really took it seriously," Brown told TPMmuckraker.

According to the Palin camp, too seriously.

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

Voting

MI Dems Fight Back Against GOP Attempts to Challenge Voters on Foreclosure Lists

Kate Klonick | September 16, 2008, 4:41PM

It's happened before, and it's threatening to happen again -- obstacles placed in the way of voters in low-income, highly Democratic areas.

The most recent charges come out of the swing county of Macomb in Michigan where late last week, the Michigan Messenger quoted the chairman of the Macomb County Republican Party, James Carabelli as stating that the party would be blocking voters who are registered at foreclosed addresses.

"We will have a list of foreclosed homes and will make sure people aren't voting from those addresses," Carabelli told the Messenger.

Michigan state voting laws allow "election challengers" to monitor the polls for the parties. If those challengers have "good reason to believe" that a person is ineligible -- such as not being a resident of the city or township -- they can lodge a challenge with the chairperson of the election precinct.

But according to voting rights experts, a foreclosure notice does not mean that a person is no longer a resident -- making it an inadequate basis for a challenge.

Just a few days after the article was published, Carabelli back-tracked on his statement, telling the Macomb Daily that the party has "no plans to do anything." He has now issued a full-throated denial, calling the original article "not true."

Today, Michigan Democratic Party Chairman Mark Brewer told the AP that he "simply [does] not believe [Carabelli's] denial. This fits the pattern we've seen here in Michigan."

And just in case, Obama's Presidential Campaign, the Democratic National Committee and a number of voters filed for an injunction today, in order to prevent any GOP efforts to disenfranchise voters whose homes have been foreclosed on.

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Topics: Voting

Sarah Palin

Trooper-Gate: Palin's Shifting Stories

Zachary Roth | September 16, 2008, 3:51PM

There's a moment in a lot of political scandals when the contradictions and inconsistencies in the story being put out by the figure accused become so glaringly obvious that they themselves turn into an important part of the story. We may now have reached that point in Trooper-Gate -- especially as regards Sarah Palin's stated reasons for firing Walt Monegan.

A court filing made yesterday by Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, asserts that Palin fired Monegan as the state's public safety commissioner because of a series of instances of Monegan's insubordination on budget issues, including Monegan working with an Alaska legislator to seek funding for a project Governor Palin had already vetoed. This alleged pattern of "outright insubordination" is said to have culminated in Monegan planning a trip to Washington to go after federal funds for an initiative to fight sexual assault crimes, which had not yet been approved by the governor. (Van Flein's account was in sync with the line taken last night by a McCain campaign spokesman at a press conference in Alaska.)

The issue of Monegan's work on the sexual assault initiative doesn't come completely out of the blue. In a lengthy exploration of Palin's record on combating sexual assault crimes, ABC News reported yesterday that Monegan was the "chief proponent" for an "ambitious, multi-million dollar initiative to seriously tackle sex crimes in the state," and that Palin's office "put the plan on hold in July," just days before Monegan's firing.

But whatever the role of the sexual assault initiative in Monegan's departure from state government, this is by now the third substantive explanation given by Palin for that departure. And, to one degree or another, all those explanations contradict each other.

In this interview from July, Palin said she fired Monegan because she was dissatisfied with his performance on filling vacant trooper positions and on bootlegging and alcohol abuse issues.

Around the same time, she told The New Yorker, for a story published this week, that she hadn't actually fired Monegan, but rather had wanted to reassign him to combat alcohol abuse, and that he quit instead.

She said that one of her goals had been to combat alcohol abuse in rural Alaska, and she blamed Commissioner Monegan for failing to address the problem. That, she said, was a big reason that she'd let him go--only, by her account, she didn't fire him, exactly. Rather, she asked him to drop everything else and single-mindedly take on the state's drinking problem, as the director of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board. "It was a job that was open, commensurate in salary pretty much--ten thousand dollars less"--but, she added, Monegan hadn't wanted the job, so he left state service; he quit.

But the new line from the Palin camp is that Monegan was fired for his insubordination on budget issues, culminating in his effort to win federal money for the initiative to combat sexual assaults -- an explanation that neither Palin nor anyone around her had raised until now, two months after the firing.

That's by no means the only contradiction in Palin's story.

As we've explained before, Palin at first said no one in her office had exerted pressure to fire Mike Wooten -- the trooper who was embroiled in a bitter dispute with the Palin family. But after a tape surfaced of Palin-aide Frank Bailey raising the issue with a trooper official in a phone call, Palin backtracked and admitted that "pressure could have been perceived to exist," though she maintained that Bailey had been freelancing.

Similarly, she at first said that she had never contacted Monegan about Wooten except in the context of expressing concerns about the safety of her family. But recently, The Washington Post published emails sent by Palin to Monegan in which she expressed frustration that Wooten was still on the job.

And of course, Palin at first pledged total cooperation with the investigation. Now, through her lawyer, she refuses to testify, saying that the probe has been inappropriately politicized.

Update: According to TPMmuckraker's reporting, the initiative to combat sexual assault that Palin now claims she fired Monegan for trying to get federal money for, was designed to go after child sex abusers.

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin, Trooper-Gate

Barack Obama

Noted Bamboozler Behind Latest Obama Smear

Zachary Roth | September 16, 2008, 12:14PM

Since yesterday, the right-wing blogosphere has been all aflutter over a report in the New York Post, written by the Iranian-born journalist Amir Taheri, that Barack Obama has privately tried to delay an agreement between the Iraqi government and the Bush administration on a draw-down of American forces from Iraq.

Here's the key passage:

According to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, Obama made his demand for delay a key theme of his discussions with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad in July.

"He asked why we were not prepared to delay an agreement until after the US elections and the formation of a new administration in Washington," Zebari said in an interview.

Obama insisted that Congress should be involved in negotiations on the status of US troops - and that it was in the interests of both sides not to have an agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in its "state of weakness and political confusion."

Yesterday evening, the McCain camp sought to get some mileage out of Taheri's report, releasing a statement from Randy Scheunemann, McCain's top foreign policy aide, asserting that: "If news reports are accurate, this is an egregious act of political interference by a presidential candidate seeking political advantage overseas."

But there are a couple reasons why the bloviation looks to be uncalled for. The Obama camp yesterday put out a statement of its own asserting that the story "bears as much resemblance to the truth as a McCain campaign commercial," and charging that Taheri has confused a long-term Status of Forces agreement with negotations over a shorter-term drawdown.

It's worth looking at that distinction more closely to get a sense of what the Obama camp means here and where Taheri may have erred. In terms of a Status of Forces agreement, Obama has consistently made clear that he believes any such agreement should be delayed until after the election -- so that a President Obama or McCain would not be bound by an agreement negotiated by a weakened Bush administration. The McCain camp did not object when, in June, Obama told reporters at a press conference that he had made exactly this argument to Zebari in a phone call.

The Obama campaign's statement released yesterday in response to the report was consistent with this position: "Barack Obama has consistently called for any Strategic Framework Agreement to be submitted to the U.S. Congress so that the American people have the same opportunity for review as the Iraqi Parliament," though, perhaps unwilling to alienate antiwar voters, it artfully omitted the fact that Obama has argued that this should be delayed until the next administration is in charge.

As for a shorter-term drawdown -- which is what Taheri seems to mean by "a draw-down of the American military presence" -- Obama has never suggested that this should be delayed. And again, yesterday's statement backs that up: "Unlike John McCain, he supports a clear timetable to redeploy our troops that has the support of the Iraqi government. Barack Obama has never urged a delay in negotiations, nor has he urged a delay in immediately beginning a responsible drawdown of our combat brigades."

Still, if Taheri's report were accurate, and Obama had indeed talked to Zebari about delaying any shorter-term deal, it would at least represent a change of position for the candidate.

But Taheri doesn't exactly have a reputation for care and precision in his work. In May 2006, he published an explosive story in the Post (since removed from the paper's site), as well as Canada's National Post, about an Iranian law that forced Jews to wear a yellow stripe, stoking fears of a second Nazi Germany. Only problem: it turned out to be a complete fabrication.

That turned out to be typical of Taheri's work. A 1989 review of Taheri's book, Nest of Spies: America's Journey to Disaster in Iran, written for The New Republic by noted Iranian scholar Shaul Bakhash and unearthed by TPMmuckraker in 2006, noted that Taheri "repeatedly refers us to books where the information cited does not exist," and is "capable of generalizations of breathtaking sweep and inaccuracy." According to Bakhash, "[Taheri's] interpretations of the documents are often egregiously inaccurate," and he "has trouble transcribing even the simplest information."

One Iraq scholar told TPMmuckraker after the false yellow-star report, referring to Taheri: "This is a person who doesn't have any credibility."

Doesn't exactly sound like a reliable source.

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Topics: Amir Taheri, Barack Obama

The Daily Muck

Matt Berman | September 16, 2008, 10:05AM

House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY), who is facing increasing criticism over his finances, met Monday night with Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). Rangel refused to comment on the meeting last night, but Pelosi insisted that it was focused on Monday's stock market plummet. Pelosi also claimed she did not ask Rangel to step down as House Ways and Means Chairman. (Politico)

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick's former chief of staff turned down a plea deal Monday. The aide, Christine Beatty, is at the center of the Kilpatrick scandal due to their affair and the ensuing text messages. Beatty is charged with lying under oath about her relationship with Kilpatrick. Kwame Kilpatrick resigned as part of a plea deal earlier this month and will leave office Thursday. (New York Times)

Anchorage mayor and Sen. Ted Stevens challenger Mark Begich (D-AK) has run into trouble for omitting items on his state financial disclosure statement. The Alaska Public Offices Commission is considering a recommendation that Begich pay a $1,420 fine for the error. Alaska Republican Party spokesman McHugh Pierre filed a compliant to the commission earlier this summer. (Anchorage Daily News)

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Topics: The Daily Muck

Sarah Palin

Palin Won't Testify in Trooper-Gate

Zachary Roth | September 16, 2008, 8:48AM

Sarah Palin is unlikely to testify in the Trooper-Gate investigation, according to a spokesman for the McCain campaign.

Speaking at a press conference in Alaska last night, spokesman Ed O'Callaghan argued that the probe had become "tainted." Palin's lawyer, and Alaska GOP legislators, have pointed to public statements made by Sen. Hollis French, the Democrat overseeing the investigation -- including that it could provide an "October surprise" -- as inappropriately politicizing the probe.

Palin had initially pledged her cooperation with the probe. After lawmakers voted unanimously to investigate her firing of former public safety commissioner Walt Monegan, she said: "We have absolutely nothing to hide, and so certainly we would never prohibit or be less than enthusiastic about any kind of investigation. Let's deal with the facts and you do that via an investigation."

But in recent weeks, that cooperation has ground virtually to a halt. In early September, her lawyer asserted that Palin would not testify unless the investigation were transferred to the state personnel board, whose members are appointed by the governor.

French and Steve Branchflower, the indepedendent investigator, have ruled out subpoenaing Palin, but had still expressed the hope that she would testify voluntarily.

Todd Palin was subponaed Friday. O'Callaghan said he did not know whether Todd would challenge that subpoena, though in a letter sent last Thursday, the state attorney general's office appeared to lay the groundwork for such a challenge.

The McCain campaign -- now clearly running the show on Trooper-Gate damage control -- also trotted out a new line to explain Monegan's firing. It released emails suggesting that Monegan alienated the governor's office by seeking federal money to go after sexual assault cases, even though the governor hadn't agreed that the money should be sought.

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Topics: Alaska, John McCain, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

John McCain

A Bridge Too Far: McCain Falsely Claimed Palin Vetoed Earmarks

Kate Klonick and Zachary Roth | September 15, 2008, 6:49PM

Looks like the level of earmark bamboozlement coming from John McCain is even deeper than we'd known.

Speaking to reporters today, McCain defended his running mate, Sarah Palin, for lying about her opposition to the Bridge to Nowhere with the following claim, as reported by the Associated Press:

"The important thing is she's vetoed a half a billion dollars in earmark projects -- far, far in excess of her predecessor and she's given money back to the taxpayers and she's cut their taxes, so I'm happy with her record."

McCain had said a similar thing on ABC's The View Friday morning: "Earmark spending; which she vetoed half a billion dollars worth in the state of Alaska."

The notion that Palin "vetoed earmarks" has become a fully-fledged GOP talking point in recent weeks. Here, for instance, is Republican congressman Jeb Hensarling repeating the claim at a news conference 12 days ago.

But governors don't "veto" federal earmarks. As Palin's own gubernatorial spokesman, Bill McAllister, told TPMmuckraker: "She can choose not to submit the request, but once Congress makes them, they're there."

The provenance of McCain's half a billion figure appears to be related to this claim, which Palin made this morning during a speech in Colorado:

"Nearly half a billion of excessive spending in our state budget, that's what vetoes are for."

It's true, as the Boston Globe reported over the weekend, that as governor, Palin vetoed over $500 million in state legislative spending requests over two fiscal years.

But generic spending requests, which Palin rejected through the use of her line-item veto power as governor, aren't remotely the same thing as earmarks. As McAllister told us: "It's called line-items, generally. [Earmarks],that's not common parlance." And the money that Palin cut didn't come from the federal government, which is the starting point for the whole earmarks debate. So that $500 million figure has nothing to do with earmarks.

In other words, McCain has taken a statistic from one issue, and applied it to defend Palin's record on a different one -- under the assumption that the press won't look closely enough at the details to call him on it.

Ironically, an ad released almost two weeks ago by the RNC makes the necessary distinction between cutting spending through line-item vetoes, and cutting earmarks. It asserts that Palin "vetoed nearly half a billion dollars in wasteful spending and cut earmark requests by hundreds of millions of dollars." That latter claim refers to requests for pork made by the state to its congressional delegation, which did go down under Palin as compared to her predecessor as governor, Republican Frank Murkowski. But note that the half a billion dollar figure clearly refers not to the reduction in earmark requests, but rather to the cuts in spending.

And yesterday, Palin seemed to suggest that she was aware of that same distinction, remaining technically truthful, if misleading, by telling a crowd in Nevada: "We reformed the abuses of earmarks in our state. I vetoed nearly half a billion dollars of wasteful spending in looking at it as an executive responsibility."

But McCain hasn't been as scrupulous, either on The View or in talking to reporters today.

CBS News has already noted McCain's dissembling, after his appearance on The View. Will anyone else?

The McCain campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Topics: Alaska, Bridge To Nowhere, John McCain, Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin

It's Sunny All Year Round at the Governor's Mansion in Alaska

Kate Klonick | September 15, 2008, 6:15PM

On the campaign trail, Sarah Palin likes to brag about how she put the Alaska state jet on eBay and fired the governor's personal chef. One item that doesn't appear in her stump speech, however, is the personal tanning bed Palin had installed in the governor's mansion.

This morning NarcoNews reported that that a tanning bed had been installed in the governor's official residence in 2007, sourcing a Department of Transportation employee familiar with renovations at the mansion. This evening, Politico's Ben Smith reported that Palin had paid for the tanning bed with her own money.

Now, Palin's own gubernatorial spokesman Bill McCallister has confirmed to TPMmuckraker that a tanning bed had been installed in the governor's official residence in 2007, and that it wasn't paid for with state funds.

"She paid for it herself," McCallister told TPMmuckraker. "It was surplus from a local athletic club."

The news of Palin's luxurious purchase -- beds can cost as much as $35,000 -- presents a sharp contrast to the blue-collar persona she projects on the campaign trail.

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Topics: Alaska, Sarah Palin

Trooper-Gate

Official at Center of Trooper Gate: Sarah Palin Lied to ABC

Kate Klonick | September 15, 2008, 2:33PM

Former Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, whose firing is at the center of Trooper-Gate, says the Sarah Palin lied in her interview with ABC when she told Charlie Gibson that she dismissed Monegan based on poor job performance and said she "never pressured him to hire or fire anybody."

"She's not telling the truth when she told ABC neither she nor her husband pressured me to fire Trooper Wooten," Monegan told ABCNews.com, "And she's not telling the truth to the media about her reasons for firing me."

According to Monegan, he met with Todd Palin in December of 2006, just two months after Palin had been elected to office.

From ABCNews.com:

"I was called to her Anchorage formal Governor's office to talk with Todd Palin about an issue that was a private family matter," recounted Monegan. Todd became "upset," Monegan recalled, when told the allegations had already been investigated and the case would not be re-opened.
"When Sarah later called to tell me the same thing, I thought to myself, 'I may not be long for this job.'" But, Monegan said, he stood by his position. "I held the public trust. As Chief, I was responsible."

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Topics: Alaska, Palin's Press, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, Trooper-Gate

Sarah Palin

Former Palin Backer: State Ag Director Job Was "Payoff" To Supporter

Zachary Roth | September 15, 2008, 12:57PM

In a lengthy investigation into Sarah Palin's hiring practices as mayor of Wasilla and governor of Alaska published yesterday, the New York Times reported in its lede:

[W]hen there was a vacancy at the top of the State Division of Agriculture, [Palin] appointed a high school classmate, Franci Havemeister, to the $95,000-a-year directorship. A former real estate agent, Ms. Havemeister cited her childhood love of cows as a qualification for running the roughly $2 million agency.

It's not just the Times that doesn't appear to think much of Havemeister's fitness for the job. Nick Carney, who ran the Division of Agriculture under Republican governor Jay Hammond -- and who later went on to help launch Palin's political career -- told TPMmuckraker that Palin's appointment of Havemeister was a "payoff" to a political supporter, that was "characteristic of how Sarah operates."

Carney described Havemeister, who he knows personally (Carney's daughter was a high-school classmate of Palin's and Havemeister's) as "a very nice gal," but added: "I don't believe that she really does have those kinds of skills," needed to run the agency.

It was Carney who first convinced Palin to run for city council in 1992 -- a fact confirmed by another source who was active in Wasilla politics during the period. A council member himself at the time, Carney told TPMmuckraker that he believed the council needed someone who represented non-business interests, which then dominated the council. But once Palin became mayor in 1996, the two fell out over a number of issues, including Carney's successful opposition to an effort by Palin to appoint to the city council two conservative supporters -- both of whom opposed recent council decisions to institute a sales tax and to start a police force.

Carney also shed some light on Palin's hiring of a city manager, John Cramer, to help her run Wasilla, a few months into her mayoralty. Though the hiring -- which Carney described as a first for the city -- added $50,000 to Wasilla's budget, Palin has defended the move in the past as necessary for the fast-growing exurb of Anchorage. Carney backed up that claim, but added that Palin's own shortcomings as an executive were also a factor in the council's support for the decision: Palin, he told TPMmuckraker, "had absolutely no management skills and couldn't manage the city on her own."

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Topics: Alaska, Palin's Hiring, Sarah Palin

Charles Rangel

Rangel Face New Discrepancies in Finances, Hires Forensic Accountant

Kate Klonick | September 15, 2008, 12:52PM

Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) just keeps finding himself in more and more and more of a mess as his accounting is unraveled -- this time with the help of a forensic accounting expert that he's hired to look into his finances.

From the AP:

The accountant's report will not be reviewed by Rangel or his advisers before it is given to the committee "as quickly as possible," Davis said. The lawmaker also promised that once the report is complete, he will publicly release his tax returns for the past 20 years.

. . . As more questions have been raised about Rangel's records, his lawyers and accountants have uncovered new discrepancies in the personal financial disclosure documents that he files every year to Congress. Every lawmaker is required to file such paperwork disclosing major assets.

Among the new discrepancies:

Rangel's papers over the past 10 years show no reference to the sale of a home he once owned on Colorado Avenue in Washington.

The details of a property bought in Sunny Isles, Fla., are bewildering at best. The stated value changes significantly from year to year, and even page to page, from $50,000 to $100,000 all the way up to $500,000.

Some of the entries for investment funds fluctuate strangely, suggesting that the person either didn't have accurate information or didn't fill out the paperwork correctly.

Rangel spent the past week trying to answer questions about his ethics and his finances.

He acknowledged that he owes the Internal Revenue Service about $5,000 in back taxes for unreported income from the rental of his vacation villa, and probably a smaller amount to state and city tax collectors.

Late update: Roll Call fleshes out the story behind Rangel's condominium in Sunny Isles, FL. According to Florida land records and real estate listings, Rangel originally bought the home for $335,000 and sold it two years later for $405,000 -- a profit of $70,000. Neither purchase price, sale price, or the profit made were correctly listed in Rangel's financial disclosure forms.

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Topics: Charles Rangel

The Daily Muck

Matt Berman | September 15, 2008, 9:56AM

The Justice Department proposed new FBI guidelines on Friday that would apply to national security and foreign intelligence threats. The guidelines, which would expand physical surveillance, have come under heavy criticism by the ACLU and some Democrats for possibly allowing for racial, ethnic, and religious targeting. FBI Director Robert Muller is set to testify to the Senate Judiciary Committee about the guidelines on Wednesday. (AP)

Hunter Biden, son of Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), has quit federal lobbying. Hunter, who was at the lobbying firm Oldaker, Biden & Belair, announced that he was stepping down from the industry in a letter dated from August that was made public last Friday. Biden's firm primarily tried to get money for colleges and hospitals from appropriation bills. (AP)

The Air Force was criticized Friday by a Pentagon advisory group for poor management of the nuclear weapons arsenal. The panel, which recommended that the Air Force consolidate nuclear command, said that the poor handling has resulted in a deterioration of international confidence in the United States' protection ability. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the Air Force is considering the panel's recommendation. (AP)