An Administration of Secrecy and Loyalty

We've all heard of the record loss of millions of White House e-mails that are required to be archived under the Federal Records Act. We have followed the investigation into how Karl Rove and other White House officials used Republican National Committee accounts to send thousands of official government e-mails, even though rules required that such messages be sent through official government communication channels. These actions demonstrated an administration obsessed with secrecy, a characteristic that does not bode well in a democracy.

An article published Saturday in the New York Times illustrates what a Palin administration is like, and one characteristic of that far-north governorship is secrecy.

The governor and her top officials sometimes use personal e-mail accounts for state business; dozens of e-mail messages obtained by The New York Times show that her staff members studied whether that could allow them to circumvent subpoenas seeking public records. (Jo Becker, Peter S. Bookman, Michael Power, "Once Elected, Palin Hired Friends and Lashed Foes," The New York Times, September 13, 2008.)

In other words, these staff members haven't inadvertently used private e-mail accounts because they don't understand the law; they are looking for ways to circumvent the law.

It's time to quit talking about Sarah Palin's kids and Sarah Palin's gender and Sarah Palin's fitness for motherhood. It's time we started talking about what kind of government Sarah Palin would lead. The vice-president is not only just a heartbeat from the presidency. Following the footsteps of Dick Cheney, the vice-president can have unaccountable influence on a living, sitting president. Past behavior is a pretty darn good predictor of future behavior. And what is emerging about Sarah Palin's governance should make any American who truly cares about democracy and the rule of law sit up and pay attention.

The Palin governing style exhibits other questionable traits:

• Although she told Charlie Gibson that the reports of her interest in banning books as mayor of Wasilla are pure myth, observations suggest otherwise: "ABC News: Did Sarah Palin Try to Ban Library Books?", Sept. 10, 2008. See also: Nathan Thornburgh, "Mayor Palin: A Rough Record," in Time, Sept. 2, 2008.
• She has surrounded herself with loyalists, "with people she has known since grade school and members of her church," according to The New York Times article.
• In addition, reminiscent of the bubble that George Bush has been accused of living in, Palin remains too much within her inner circle:

  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.(From "Once Elected, Palin Hired Friends and Lashed Foes," p. 4)

• Palin and her staff keep score and enact revenge on people who have disagreed with them or who have supported opponents:

  The administration’s e-mail correspondence reveals a siege-like atmosphere. Top aides keep score, demean enemies and gloat over successes. Even some who helped engineer her rise have felt her wrath.
  
  Dan Fagan, a prominent conservative radio host and longtime friend of Ms. Palin, urged his listeners to vote for her in 2006. But when he took her to task for raising taxes on oil companies, he said, he found himself branded a “hater.”
  
  It is part of a pattern, Mr. Fagan said, in which Ms. Palin characterizes critics as “bad people who are anti-Alaska.” (From "Once Elected, Palin Hired Friends and Lashed Foes, p. 5).

  See also Wikipedia's entry on "Alaska Public Safety Commissioner Dismissal." The entry has a long list of sources at the end. See also: Kenneth Vogel's "Palin's Cold Shoulder," (Sept. 5, 2008) on Politico.

I'm not one for conspiracy theories. I like facts, research, thoughtful analysis. But as I've been reading the articles I've linked to in this post, a thought has coalesced in my mind. We've seen the disastrous consequences of the Bush administration and nothing in the way John McCain has led his campaign or in Sarah Palin's record as mayor and governor indicates that change will be forthcoming. The partisan divide has only grown wider. However, if the McCain-Palin ticket doesn't win, we haven't seen the last of Sarah Palin. She's no 72-year old tortured warrior. The Republican party has found a gun-toting, Armageddon-hearted heroine to groom for higher office. And she has shown no repugnance toward Karl Rove-style politics. Get ready.

See also:
Philip Gourevitch, "Letter from Alaska: The State of Sarah Palin", The New Yorker.
Also: Gary Kamiya, "The Culture War: It's Back," at Salon, posted Sunday, Sept. 14, 2008.