September 2, 2008
Disclosures on Palin Raise Questions on Vetting Process
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NY Times

ST. PAUL — A series of disclosures about Gov. Sarah Palin, Senator John
McCain’s choice as running mate, called into question on Monday how
thoroughly Mr. McCain had examined her background before putting her on
the Republican presidential ticket.

On Monday morning, Ms. Palin and her husband, Todd, issued a statement
saying that their 17-year-old unmarried daughter, Bristol, was five
months pregnant and that she intended to marry the father.

Among other less attention-grabbing news of the day: it was learned that
Ms. Palin now has a private lawyer in a legislative ethics investigation
in Alaska into whether she abused her power in dismissing the state’s
public safety commissioner; that she was a member for two years in the
1990s of the Alaska Independence Party, which has at times sought a vote
on whether the state should secede; and that Mr. Palin was arrested 22
years ago on a drunken-driving charge.

Aides to Mr. McCain said they had a team on the ground in Alaska now to
look more thoroughly into Ms. Palin’s background. A Republican with ties
to the campaign said the team assigned to vet Ms. Palin in Alaska had
not arrived there until Thursday, a day before Mr. McCain stunned the
political world with his vice-presidential choice. The campaign was
still calling Republican operatives as late as Sunday night asking them
to go to Alaska to deal with the unexpected candidacy of Ms. Palin.

Although the McCain campaign said that Mr. McCain had known about
Bristol Palin’s pregnancy before he asked her mother to join him on the
ticket and that he did not consider it disqualifying, top aides were
vague on Monday about how and when he had learned of the pregnancy, and
from whom.

***While there was no sign that her formal nomination this week was in
jeopardy, the questions swirling around Ms. Palin on the first day of
the Republican National Convention, already disrupted by Hurricane
Gustav, brought anxiety to Republicans who worried that Democrats would
use the selection of Ms. Palin to question Mr. McCain’s judgment and his
ability to make crucial decisions.***

At the least, Republicans close to the campaign said it was increasingly
apparent that Ms. Palin had been selected as Mr. McCain’s running mate
with more haste than McCain advisers initially described.

Up until midweek last week, some 48 to 72 hours before Mr. McCain
introduced Ms. Palin at a Friday rally in Dayton, Ohio, Mr. McCain was
still holding out the hope that he could choose a good friend, Senator
Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, a Republican close to
the campaign said. Mr. McCain had also been interested in another
favorite, former Gov. Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania.

But both men favor abortion rights, anathema to the Christian
conservatives who make up a crucial base of the Republican Party. As
word leaked out that Mr. McCain was seriously considering the men, the
campaign was bombarded by outrage from influential conservatives who
predicted an explosive floor fight at the convention and vowed rejection
of Mr. Ridge or Mr. Lieberman by the delegates.

Perhaps more important, several Republicans said, Mr. McCain was getting
advice that if he did not do something to shake up the race, his
campaign would be stuck on a potentially losing trajectory.

With time running out — and as Mr. McCain discarded two safer choices,
Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and former Gov. Mitt Romney of
Massachusetts, as too predictable — he turned to Ms. Palin. He had his
first face-to-face interview with her on Thursday and offered her the
job moments later. Advisers to Mr. Pawlenty and another of the finalists
on Mr. McCain’s list described an intensive vetting process for those
candidates that lasted one to two months.

“They didn’t seriously consider her until four or five days from the
time she was picked, before she was asked, maybe the Thursday or Friday
before,” said a Republican close to the campaign. “This was really kind
of rushed at the end, because John didn’t get what he wanted. He wanted
to do Joe or Ridge.”

In the final stages, two Republicans familiar with the process said, Mr.
McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, emerged as a key advocate for Ms.
Palin.

Mr. McCain’s advisers said repeatedly on Monday that Ms. Palin was
“thoroughly vetted,” a process that would have included a review of all
financial and legal records as well as a criminal background check. A
McCain aide said that the campaign was well aware of the ethics
investigation and that it had looked into it.

“It was obviously something that anybody Googling Sarah Palin knew was
in the news and there was a very thorough vetting done on that and also
on the daughter,” the aide said.

People familiar with the process said Ms. Palin had responded to a
standard form with more than 70 questions. Although The Washington Post
quoted advisers to Mr. McCain on Sunday saying that Ms. Palin had been
subjected to an F.B.I. background check, an F.B.I. official said Monday
that the bureau did vet potential candidates and had not known of her
selection until it was made public.

Mark Salter, Mr. McCain’s closest adviser, said in an e-mail message
that Ms. Palin had been interviewed by Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr., a
veteran Washington lawyer in charge of the vice-presidential vetting
process for Mr. McCain, as well as by other lawyers who worked for Mr.
Culvahouse. Mr. Salter did not respond to an e-mail message asking if
Ms. Palin had told Mr. Culvahouse and his lawyers that her daughter was
pregnant.

In Alaska, several state leaders and local officials said they knew of
no efforts by the McCain campaign to find out more information about Ms.
Palin before the announcement of her selection, Although campaigns are
typically discreet when they make inquiries into potential running
mates, officials in Alaska said Monday they thought it was peculiar that
no one in the state had the slightest hint that Ms. Palin might be under
consideration.

“They didn’t speak to anyone in the Legislature, they didn’t speak to
anyone in the business community,” said Lyda Green, the State Senate
president, who lives in Wasilla, where Ms. Palin served as mayor.

Representative Gail Phillips, a Republican and former speaker of the
State House, said the widespread surprise in Alaska when Ms. Palin was
named to the ticket made her wonder how intensively the McCain campaign
had vetted her.

“I started calling around and asking, and I have not been able to find
one person that was called,” Ms. Phillips said. “I called 30 to 40
people, political leaders, business leaders, community leaders. Not one
of them had heard. Alaska is a very small community, we know people all
over, but I haven’t found anybody who was asked anything.”

The current mayor of Wasilla, Dianne M. Keller, said she had not heard
of any efforts to look into Ms. Palin’s background. And Randy Ruedrich,
the state Republican Party chairman, said he knew nothing of any vetting
that had been conducted.

State Senator Hollis French, a Democrat who is directing the ethics
investigation, said that no one asked him about the allegations. “I
heard not a word, not a single contact,” he said.

A number of Republicans said the McCain campaign had to some degree tied
its hands in its effort to keep the selection process so secret.

“If you really want it to be a surprise, the circle of people that
you’re going to allow to know about it is going to be small, and that’s
just the nature of it,” said Dan Bartlett, a former counselor to
President Bush.

Former McCain strategists disagreed on whether it would have been useful
for Ms. Palin’s name to have been more publicly floated before her
selection so that issues like the trooper investigation and her
daughter’s pregnancy might have already been aired and not seemed so new
at the time of her announcement.

“It’s a risk,” said Dan Schnur, a former McCain aide who now directs the
Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern
California. “No matter how great the candidate, it’s a significant risk
to put someone on the ticket” who hasn’t been publicly scrutinized.

“They obviously felt it was worth the risk to rev up the base and
potentially reach out to Clinton supporters,” Mr. Schnur said.

Reporting was contributed by Kate Zernike, Jim Rutenberg and Peter Baker
in St. Paul, and Serge F. Kovaleski in Juneau, Alaska.

-- -


Sarah of the 21 Days?

On Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:48:45 -0400, hk wrote:

September 2, 2008
Disclosures on Palin Raise Questions on Vetting Process
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NY Times

ST. PAUL — A series of disclosures about Gov. Sarah Palin, Senator John
McCain’s choice as running mate, called into question on Monday how
thoroughly Mr. McCain had examined her background before putting her on
the Republican presidential ticket.


Sarah Palin H-A-T-E-S the United States of America. There's concrete
proof of that fact. She belonged to a group who hated the U.S. so much
that their purpose was to have Alaska succeed from the U.S.

Stick her with a fork. She's done.

wrote:
On Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:48:45 -0400, hk wrote:

September 2, 2008
Disclosures on Palin Raise Questions on Vetting Process
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NY Times

ST. PAUL — A series of disclosures about Gov. Sarah Palin, Senator John
McCain’s choice as running mate, called into question on Monday how
thoroughly Mr. McCain had examined her background before putting her on
the Republican presidential ticket.


Sarah Palin H-A-T-E-S the United States of America. There's concrete
proof of that fact. She belonged to a group who hated the U.S. so much
that their purpose was to have Alaska succeed from the U.S.

Stick her with a fork. She's done.




Isn't *that* a ****er?

hk wrote:
wrote:
On Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:48:45 -0400, hk wrote:

September 2, 2008
Disclosures on Palin Raise Questions on Vetting Process
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NY Times

ST. PAUL — A series of disclosures about Gov. Sarah Palin, Senator
John McCain’s choice as running mate, called into question on Monday
how thoroughly Mr. McCain had examined her background before putting
her on the Republican presidential ticket.


Sarah Palin H-A-T-E-S the United States of America. There's concrete
proof of that fact. She belonged to a group who hated the U.S. so much
that their purpose was to have Alaska succeed from the U.S.

Stick her with a fork. She's done.




Isn't *that* a ****er?
And you are going to vote for obama with ties to the black panthers, and
is currently attending a Muslim convention in Ohio when he claims to
have no Muslim connections.

Keith nuttle wrote:
hk wrote:
wrote:
On Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:48:45 -0400, hk wrote:

September 2, 2008
Disclosures on Palin Raise Questions on Vetting Process
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NY Times

ST. PAUL — A series of disclosures about Gov. Sarah Palin, Senator
John McCain’s choice as running mate, called into question on Monday
how thoroughly Mr. McCain had examined her background before putting
her on the Republican presidential ticket.


Sarah Palin H-A-T-E-S the United States of America. There's concrete
proof of that fact. She belonged to a group who hated the U.S. so much
that their purpose was to have Alaska succeed from the U.S.

Stick her with a fork. She's done.




Isn't *that* a ****er?
And you are going to vote for obama with ties to the black panthers, and
is currently attending a Muslim convention in Ohio when he claims to
have no Muslim connections.


Absolutely right I am going to vote for Barack Obama.


--
"The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade
and a woman's right to choose a safe and legal abortion,
regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts
to weaken or undermine that right."

..

On Sep 2, 9:19 am, wrote:
.

Obamessiah admitted to using drugs and all the Dimocrats can find is
that Palins husband had a DUI 22 yrs ago. WOW, that'll disqualify her.

On Tue, 2 Sep 2008 09:50:29 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

On Sep 2, 9:19 am, wrote:
.

Obamessiah admitted to using drugs and all the Dimocrats can find is
that Palins husband had a DUI 22 yrs ago. WOW, that'll disqualify her.

She HATES the United States with a passion. She joined an organization
that hates the U.S. so much that it's founder was buried in Canada,
because he didn't want to be buried under the US flag. The
organizations sole purpose was to have Alaska seceed from the U.S.

She's on the same page as Timothy McVeigh and the Uni-Bomber.