Former Palin aide irked by portrayal in book
By Associated Press | Tuesday, November 24, 2009 |

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The first legislative director for former Gov. Sarah
Palin, John Bitney, is unhappy with the way he’s portrayed in her book,
"Going Rogue."

"I’m just pilloried right and left and turned into the big bad wolf here
for stuff I didn’t do," said Bitney, who is now an aide to Valdez
Republican Rep. John Harris. "It’s like I’m this fictional character
that she’s decided to make me out to be this sort of incompetent slob."

He told The Anchorage Daily News he’s unfairly blamed for Palin’s poor
relationship with lawmakers.

After her first legislative session in 2007, legislators complained that
Palin blindsided them with the scope of her budget vetoes and she rubbed
it in by saying there had to be an "adult in the house."

Palin doesn’t use Bitney’s name but said it was her legislative director
who failed to advise lawmakers the vetoes were coming and advised her to
tell lawmakers that they were in need of adult supervision.

Bitney said in an interview that he joked with Palin in her office about
how there needs to be an adult in the room when it comes to the state
budget, but he said he never advised her to say it to anyone.

Bitney said he has tried to be fair to Palin in media interviews over
the past year but "Going Rogue" is too much.

"I’ve had it. Enough. Just enough; leave me alone," he said.

Bitney was a high school classmate of Palin’s from Wasilla who helped
her win the 2006 campaign for governor. He was fired in July 2007 for
poor job performance.

Palin’s lawyer, Tom Van Flein, said in an e-mail to The Anchorage Daily
News that Bitney and others have been talking about "their perceptions
of, and distortions about" Palin for more than a year, since after she
was chosen as Sen. John McCain’s vice presidential running mate.

"’Going Rogue’ is Sarah Palin’s book to set the record straight. It is
her right to speak about the events that occurred in her administration
and neither Mr. Bitney nor anyone else has the right to stifle that
speech," Van Flein said. "The statements in ’Going Rogue’ speak for
themselves, and it is Sarah Palin’s turn to get the truth out there
after a year of misrepresentations, half-truths and dissembling by her
critics."



....Palin getting the truth out? Palin?



--
If you are flajim, herring, loogy, GC boater, johnson, topbassdog, rob,
achmed the sock puppet, or one of a half dozen others, you're wasting
your time by trying to *communicate* with me through rec.boats, because,
well, you are among the permanent members of my dumbfoch dumpster, and I
don't read the vomit you post, except by accident on occasion. As
always, have a nice, simple-minded day.