A Bush-Style Whitewash

For anyone who followed the storyof how and why Sarah Palin fired her state's public safetycommissioner, last week's release of a legislative investigation whichfound that she had violated state ethics statutes was anticlimactic.After all, everyone knows that she and her husband, Todd, tried to pushWalt Monegan, then Alaska'spublic safety commissioner, to fire a state trooper named Mike Wooten,who was involved in a bitter divorce from Ms. Palin's sisterand thatafter Mr. Monegan refused, he lost his job.

But while the state probe'sconclusions were unsurprising, there is still something to be learnedfrom its findings and the McCain-Palin campaign's response. Frombeginning to end, this episode demonstrates a disregard for the rule oflaw and a contemptuous attitude toward truth that are all too familiarby now.

Here, too, the election of the Republican ticket will mean moreof what we have already experienced for the past eight years.

Itis a pattern that can be traced back through the years of the Bushadministration whenever a whiff of scandal arises: Promise a thoroughinvestigation and full cooperation with the lawful authorities. Thenstonewall and withhold evidence and testimony so that the investigationcan never quite be completed. Insist that the partial investigation isactually a full and complete exoneration, even if official reports andprosecutors clearly indicate otherwise. Create a “reality”that will be mirrored and echoed by friendly media and the partisanbase, while denigrating any effort to discuss actual facts as aconspiracy by the “liberal” media.

Whitewash, rinse and repeat.

Palin Was Not Cleared of Wrongdoing

Thesame seedy pattern can be traced in the White House response to theValerie Plame scandal and more recently in the probe of the firing ofU.S. attorneys, both of which implicated the former deputy chief ofstaff, Karl Rove. And it can be seen just as clearly in the way thatPalin and her campaign handlers have dealt with the problems of“Troopergate”which culminated in her strange statement over theweekend claiming that the scorching report on her firing of Monegan had“cleared” her.

“I'm very, very pleased to be cleared of any legalwrongdoing, any hint of any kind of unethical activity there. Verypleased to be cleared of any of that,” she told reporters. “Ifyou read the report, you'll see that there was nothing unlawful orunethical about replacing a cabinet member.” Or as McCain campaignmanager and lobbyist Rick Davis assured the credulous audience of FoxNews Channel: “The reality is there was absolutely no wrongdoing foundin the report … [and] no violations of any kinds of laws or ethicsrules.”

Reading the 263-page report, however, it is obviousthat Palin was no more cleared of unethical activity than she blockedthe “bridge to nowhere.” In fact, precisely the reverse is true. Thelegislative report, filed by one of Alaska'smost respected and nonpartisan prosecutors, states with absoluteclarity that, as governor, Palin violated the Executive Branch EthicsAct, which prohibits any official from seeking to “benefit a personalinterest.” She, her husband and her aides tried on nearly 20 separateoccasions to induce Mr. Monegan to fire her former brother-in-law. Thewording of the report's conclusion could not be plainer namely that“impermissible pressure was placed on several subordinates in order toadvance a personal agenda, to wit: to get Trooper Michael Wootenfired.”

But she didn't violate state lawas far as theinvestigation could determinebecause that law permitted her to fireMr. Monegan for any reason whatsoever. The ethics violations occurredbefore the firing.

The other bad habit that Palin seems toshare with Rove and the Republicans currently in power is her allergyto disclosure, even when required by law. The 263-page report notesacidly that the Palin probe suffered from stonewalling by members ofher administration, with at least 10 top officials refusing to testifyor ignoring subpoenas, presumably on the advice of the New Yorklawyer hired by the McCain campaign. Some of those same individualslater “agreed” to provide responses to written questionsnot the sameas sworn testimonylong after their answers would have been useful tothe investigators. Moreover, the Palin administration refused toprovide e-mails and other documentation that the investigatorsrequired. Executive privilege, they cried, parroting the perennial Bushline.

John McCain enhanced his reputation over the past eight years byhis occasional demurrals from the worst abuses of the Bushadministration, including torture. Aware of the president'sbottoming poll numbers, he said the other day that “we cannot spend thenext four years as we have spent much of the last eight.” But that isprecisely what we will do if he and his unethical pit bull enter theWhite House.