Daily Archives: September 13, 2008

NY Times’ Palin Profile

The New York Times has published an expose on Governor Palin.

So when there was a vacancy at the top of the State Division of Agriculture, she 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.

I thought that was the requirement for FEMA director…

In Wasilla, a builder said he complained to Mayor Palin when the city attorney put a stop-work order on his housing project. She responded, he said, by engineering the attorney’s firing.

I suppose Obama should have picked Paul Clark as his running mate.

While Ms. Palin took office promising a more open government, her administration has battled to keep information secret. Her inner circle discussed the benefit of using private e-mail addresses. An assistant told her it appeared that such e-mail messages sent to a private address on a “personal device” like a BlackBerry “would be confidential and not subject to subpoena.”

That is a page right out of the Karl Rove playbook for how to circumvent legality.

Many lawmakers contend that Ms. Palin is overly reliant on a small inner circle that leaves her isolated. Democrats and Republicans alike describe her as often missing in action. Since taking office in 2007, Ms. Palin has spent 312 nights at her Wasilla home, some 600 miles to the north of the governor’s mansion in Juneau, records show.

During the last legislative session, some lawmakers became so frustrated with her absences that they took to wearing “Where’s Sarah?” pins.

This sounds a lot like the first 8 months of GWB.  But my favorite quote is this one:

“You should be ashamed!” Ivy Frye, the assistant, told her. “Stop blogging. Stop blogging right now!”

Both sides will find something to like in Palins record in Alaska.  Go read it.

QOD

Does anyone remember the time they were told that their parents were divorcing? 

I sort of liken it to one of those times you will always remember where you were and what you were doing.  Some life changing event that rocked your soul to its’ core and upended you.  It shook you around uncontrollably, then threw you against the wall at 100 mph.  That shaking and rocking and eventual slam back to reality hurt you so bad you couldn’t do anything but cry and run.  Run away from that place that caused you so much pain.  Run far, run hard and cry.  Cry and try to tell yourself this wasn’t happening.  That this wasn’t real, that this event your parents just told you was a joke.  That all the fighting they had done was just what parents do.  The spankings, the food throwing, the leaving one spouse behind at a restaurant to walk home was all normal.  It was all normal watching your father yell at you in public for not swinging correctly at a ball.  It was normal for your mom to come up to your room and console you after your father just ripped your ass raw with a leather belt.

I remember it like it was yesterday.  It was 24 years ago though. 

I was sitting in the family room of our all brick Chesapeake style 4 bedroom, 2 car garage, fenced in yard home.  I was sitting on our ugly green and yellow couch that was pushed up against the wallpapered wall.  The couch faced towards the large window that looked across the street to the O’Donnell’s.  A horrible print of some ballerinas that I believe was from Monet rested above the couch.  A blue lazy boy recliner on the other side of the room about a leg away from the the brick fireplace that had one of those brass firewood holding type things holding 3 pieces of wood.  You entered the room to the right of the front door.  So if you are facing the house the room is on the right hand side.  Continue reading →