McCain-Palin Response to Troopergate: Call in the Old Boys’ Network

[Joanne98]

John McCain is trying to make reform a centerpiece of his sputtering presidential campaign. The idea that someone who has been in Congress for 26 years, worked to get the current (failed) president re-elected, is endorsed by that same failed president, and relies on money raised by the same President Failure W. Bush, can somehow make himself over as an agent of reform is ludicrous on its face. But I guess when you’re out of ideas, you start to throw things at the wall in the hopes that something sticks, or at least distracts the traditional media long enough for you to avoid talking about real issues you are hopelessly unprepared to deal with.

Even setting aside the obvious problems with a “reform” candidate whose party has held the presidency for 20 of the past 28 years, and whose top advisers include Washington insiders like Phil “you’re all a bunch of whiners who don’t appreciate my heroic efforts to make the current financial crisis possible” Gramm, Rick “this election is not about issues” Davis, Randy “lobbying for Georgia made me rich, but I have no conflict of interest” Scheunemann, McCain’s hypocrisy is overwhelming. He and his running/soul mate Gov. Palin brag about shaking up the “old boys’ ” network and putting an end to politics based on backroom deals, strong arm tactics, and influence peddling. They are, one assumes, trying to tap into resentment that ordinary people have about the way things work in Washington, D.C. where there is said to be one set of rules for insiders and another set for everyone else.

Funny thing–McCain and Palin are actually giving us a textbook example of how to practice politics based on backroom deals, strong arm tactics, and one set of rules for insiders, another for everyone else. Exhibit A: Troopergate. The Alaska legislature, on a bipartisan basis, decided to investigate whether Gov. Palin abused her power by first pressuring the public safety commissioner to fire her brother in law, a state trooper, and then firing the commissioner when he wouldn’t help her carry out a personal vendetta on the state’s dime. Gov. Palin, ordinary folk that she is, would surely not use her position and resources to influence this process, would she?

Umm, actually, she would. Palin is using every tool at her disposal to make sure that she gets special treatment and a back room deal is worked out to make this investigation go away. One of her buddies, state Rep. John Coghill, who happens to chair a key committee in the state House of Representatives, is doing his best to make this disappear through backchannels. Presumably, Chairman Coghill, like Gov. Palin and Sen. McCain, is a staunch critic of the old-boys’ network and is just making a one-time exception to help out a friend in her time of need.

If Coghill can’t get it done, don’t worry, Gov. Palin has a new friend, Sen. McCain, who can throw a little weight around when he needs to. Sen. McCain, in what will surely be his last time cashing in on a favor, has sent an inside the Beltway lawyer out to Alaska to see if he can “shut down” (Newsweek’s words, not mine) the investigation. I’m sure McCain’s man, a former Justice Dept. prosecutor, will simply ask Alaska lawmakers to treat Gov. Palin’s case the same way they would anyone else’s–after all, we know team McCain rejects the idea of special treatment for people who have the right connections, friends in the right places.

I am confident that none of this has anything to do with the old boys’ network or special rules for insiders. But there are actually some Republicans in Alaska who see this differently. One Republican state Senator, from Palin’s home town in Alaska, voted to subpoena 13 witnesses, including Gov. Palin’s husband, citing concerns that political maneuvering was interfering with the investigation. (Fortunately, Mr. Palin has a nifty way to deal with that–he says he won’t comply with the subpoena. Real reformers don’t need to worry about the rule of law, I suppose.)

John McCain claims that he will clean up Washington and get rid of the old way of doing things that favored insiders with the right connections. It’s kind of hard to believe any of this when we see that his plan for making Troopergate go away depends on using insiders with the right connections and influence to work out a backroom deal. The truth is that McCain and Palin are both old hands when it comes to the old boys’ network–in fact, some Alaskans say that Palin simply replaced one old boys’ network with her own set of cronies. McCain and Palin seem to think that they can fool American voters with gauzy rhetoric about reform, but there are a lot of facts standing firmly in their way.

http://www.theseminal.com/2008/09/19/mccain-palin-response-to-troopergate-call-in-the-old-boys-network/

[Blue_In_AK]

1. McCain has totally blown Sarah's cover.

I guess we Alaskans should thank him.

[SaveAmerica]

2. That's brilliant!!