The Palins' un-American activities

The Palins' un-American activities
"My government is my worst enemy. I'm going to fight them with any means at hand."

This was former revolutionary terrorist Bill Ayers back in his old Weather Underground days, right? Imagine what Sarah Palin is going to do with this incendiary quote as she tears into Barack Obama this week.

Only one problem. The quote is from Joe Vogler, the raging anti-American who founded the Alaska Independence Party. Inconveniently for Palin, that's the very same secessionist party that her husband, Todd, belonged to for seven years and that she sent a shout-out to as Alaska governor earlier this year. ("Keep up the good work," Palin told AIP members. "And God bless you.")

AIP chairwoman Lynette Clark told me recently that Sarah Palin is her kind of gal. "She's Alaskan to the bone ... she sounds just like Joe Vogler."

So who are these America-haters that the Palins are pallin' around with?

Before his strange murder in 1993, party founder Vogler preached armed insurrection against the United States of America. Vogler, who always carried a Magnum with him, was fond of saying, "When the [federal] bureaucrats come after me, I suggest they wear red coats. They make better targets. In the federal government are the biggest liars in the United States, and I hate them with a passion. They think they own [Alaska]. There comes a time when people will choose to die with honor rather than live with dishonor. That time may be coming here. Our goal is ultimate independence by peaceful means under a minimal government fully responsive to the people. I hope we don't have to take human life, but if they go on tramping on our property rights, look out, we're ready to die."

This quote is from "Coming Into the Country," by John McPhee, who traipsed around Alaska's remote gold mining country with Vogler for his 1991 book. The violent-tempered secessionist vowed to McPhee that if any federal official tried to stop him from polluting Alaska's rivers with his earth-moving equipment, he would "run over him with a Cat and turn mosquitoes loose on him while he dies."

Vogler wasn't just a blowhard either. He put his secessionist ideas into action, working to build AIP membership to 20,000 -- an impressive figure by Alaska standards -- and to elect party member Walter Hickel as governor in 1990.

Vogler's greatest moment of glory was to be his 1993 appearance before the United Nations to denounce United States "tyranny" before the entire world and to demand Alaska's freedom. The Alaska secessionist had persuaded the government of Iran to sponsor his anti-American harangue.

That's right ... Iran. The Islamic dictatorship. The taker of American hostages. The rogue nation that McCain and Palin have excoriated Obama for suggesting we diplomatically engage. That Iran.

AIP leaders allege that Vogler, who was murdered that year by a fellow secessionist, was taken out by powerful forces in the U.S. before he could reach his U.N. platform. "The United States government would have been deeply embarrassed," by Vogler's U.N. speech, darkly suggests Clark. "And we can't have that, can we?"

The Republican ticket is working hard this week to make Barack Obama's tenuous connection to graying, '60s revolutionary Bill Ayers a major campaign issue. But the Palins' connection to anti-American extremism is much more central to their political biographies.

Imagine the uproar if Michelle Obama was revealed to have joined a black nationalist party whose founder preached armed secession from the United States and who enlisted the government of Iran in his cause? The Obama campaign would probably not have survived such an explosive revelation. Particularly if Barack Obama himself was videotaped giving the anti-American secessionists his wholehearted support just months ago.

Where's the outrage, Sarah Palin has been asking this week, in her attacks on Obama's fuzzy ties to Ayers? The question is more appropriate when applied to her own disturbing associations.

McCain, Bush, Obama and Iran

Politics scuttles plan to put US diplomats in Iran
The Bush administration has shelved plans to set up a diplomatic outpost in Iran, in part over fears it could affect the U.S. presidential race or be interpreted as political meddling, The Associated Press has learned.

The proposal to send U.S. diplomats to Tehran for the first time in three decades attracted great attention when it was floated over the summer, but has now been placed on indefinite hold as November's election nears and Iran continues to defy demands to halt suspect nuclear activities, officials told the AP.

Two administration officials familiar with the matter spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration deliberations on the sensitive subject.

The officials said a decision had been made to leave the decision to the next U.S. president because it could be seen as a reward for Iran's nuclear intransigence, especially when Iran policy has become a key part of the heated campaign between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain.

Obama has called for unconditional direct talks with the leaders of adversaries such as Iran and North Korea, assuming that groundwork by lower-level officials indicated that the top-level talks would be fruitful.

McCain has ridiculed the suggestion as naive.

Thus, opening an interest section, or de facto embassy, in Tehran could be interpreted as a Republican president helping a Republican nominee by neutralizing a distinction that might make the Democrat appealing. Or, it could be seen as hurting McCain by leaving him to defend a more hard-line position than the current Republican president's.

Either way, the administration concluded that now was not the time.

"There is no desire to inject this into the campaign," the second official said.

The idea's demise represents the end of any marquee efforts to remake the U.S. relationship with its most formidable Mideast adversary before President Bush leaves office in January. Although Bush once called Iran part of an "axis of evil," along with North Korea and prewar Iraq, and says Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is dangerous, he also had allowed a variety of tentative overtures to Tehran.

More McCain Corruption Paxson Communications

Newsweek catches McCain in a serious contradiction
But what is significant is the seriously misleading statements that McCain made when denying key parts of the NYT story. One of the central claims of that story was that Paxson Communications, a major McCain contributor and provider of jet travel, repeatedly requested that McCain intervene on its behalf with a pending FCC matter, and thereafter, McCain personally contacted the FCC to demand that it expedite its ruling on a matter of vital important to Paxson (a contact which prompted a "scolding response" from the FCC Chairman, who called McCain's letter on behalf of Paxon "highly unusual" and inappropriate).

In issuing a very specific, point-by-point denial of the NYT story, McCain specifically denied that he ever talked to Paxson's CEO, Lowell Paxson (or any other Paxson representative) about this matter:

No representative of Paxson or Alcalde and Fay discussed with Senator McCain the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proceeding. . . . No representative of Paxson or Alcalde and Fay personally asked Senator McCain to send a letter to the FCC regarding this proceeding.

But Newsweek's Mike Isikoff today obtained (or was given) the transcripts of deposition testimony which McCain himself gave under oath several years ago in litigation over the constitutionality of McCain-Feingold. In that testimony, McCain repeatedly and unequivocally stated the opposite of what he said in this week's NYT denial: namely, that he had unquestionably spoken with Paxson himself over the pending FCC matter:

"I was contacted by Mr. Paxson on this issue," McCain said in the Sept. 25, 2002, deposition obtained by NEWSWEEK. "He wanted their approval very bad for purposes of his business. I believe that Mr. Paxson had a legitimate complaint."

While McCain said "I don't recall" if he ever directly spoke to the firm's lobbyist about the issue -- an apparent reference to Iseman, though she is not named -- "I'm sure I spoke to [Paxson]."

It's hard to imagine how there could be a clearer contradiction in McCain's statements than (a) "I'm sure I spoke to [Paxson]" and (b) "No representative of Paxson or Alcalde and Fay discussed with Senator McCain the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proceeding."

Making matters much worse, when the McCain campaign today was confronted by Newsweek with this glaring contradiction, they plainly told another untruth. They said that when McCain testified that "he" spoke with Paxson, he merely meant that his staff did:

"We do not think there is a contradiction here," campaign spokeswoman Ann Begeman e-mailed NEWSWEEK after being asked about the senator's sworn testimony five and a half years ago. "We do not have the transcript you excerpted and do not know the exact questions Senator McCain was asked, but it appears that Senator McCain, when speaking of being contacted by Paxson, was speaking in shorthand of his staff being contacted by representatives of Paxson."

But just look at what McCain actually testified to, and there is no doubt that the McCain campaign's excuse -- that Paxson merely spoke with his staff members, not McCain himself -- is patently false:

[T]he campaign's insistence that McCain himself never talked to Paxson about the issue seems hard to square with the contents of his testimony in the McCain-Feingold case.

[Deposition questioner Floyd] Abrams, for example, at one point cited the somewhat technical contents of one of his letters to the FCC and then asked the witness, "where did you get information of that sort, Senator McCain?"

McCain replied: "I was briefed by my staff."

Abrams then followed up: "Do you know where they got the information?"

"No," McCain replied. "But I would add, I was contacted by Mr. Paxson on this issue."

"You were?"

"Yes."

Abrams then asked McCain: "Can you tell us what you said and what he said about it?"

McCain: "That he had applied to purchase this station and that he wanted to purchase it. And that there had been a numerous year delay with the FCC reaching a decision. And he wanted their approval very bad for purposes of his business. I said, 'I would be glad to write a letter asking them to act, but I will not write a letter, I cannot write a letter asking them to approve or deny, because then that would be an interference in their activities. I think everybody is entitled to a decision. But I can't ask for a favorable disposition for you'."

Abrams a few moments later asked: "Did you speak to the company's lobbyist about these matters?"

McCain: "I don't recall if it was Mr. Paxson or the company's lobbyist or both."

Abrams: "But you did speak to him?"

McCain: "I'm sure I spoke with him, yes."

That is nail-in-the-coffin testimony demonstrating the deliberately false nature of McCain's denials this week.

As I indicated, the one relevant part of the NYT story -- whether McCain inappropriately intervened with the FCC on behalf of a major contributor and all-around McCain benefactor -- is an old story, and the NYT story added little or nothing to it. But what is not old is McCain's deliberately dishonest claims in response to that story.

Media Treats McCain as Special

Despite attacks on media by McCain campaign, case studies show disparate coverage in McCain's favor
Media Matters found that while the five major newspapers -- the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post -- and the three evening network news broadcasts have frequently mentioned Obama's ties to Ayers and Rezko, they have rarely mentioned McCain's dealings with donors whom he reportedly benefited and have completely ignored McCain's association with Liddy. Indeed, since The New York Times first reported on April 22 that McCain facilitated land deals that benefited major donors, these media outlets have mentioned those deals in only six additional reports, but news reports and editorial and opinion pieces by or in those media outlets have mentioned Obama's ties to Rezko -- who was convicted in June in a case in which Obama was never accused of any wrongdoing -- 44 times during that same time period. Moreover, while these same media outlets have frequently mentioned Obama's ties to Ayers -- 69 mentions so far in 2008 -- they have yet to mention McCain's connections to Liddy, whom McCain has praised and repeatedly associated with in public and in campaign settings. In addition to serving more than four years in prison for his role in the Watergate break-in and the Daniel Ellsberg case, Liddy also admitted that he plotted to murder journalist Jack Anderson; plotted to murder fellow Republican operative E. Howard Hunt; and plotted to firebomb the Brookings Institution. Liddy also reportedly gave advice on how to shoot agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and reportedly admitted to naming shooting targets after the Clintons.

The Truth about Obama and Ayers

A Look Into Crossed Paths
CHICAGO — At a tumultuous meeting of anti-Vietnam War militants at the Chicago Coliseum in 1969, Bill Ayers helped found the radical Weathermen, launching a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and United States Capitol.

Twenty-six years later, at a lunchtime meeting about school reform in a Chicago skyscraper, Barack Obama met Mr. Ayers, by then an education professor. Their paths have crossed sporadically since then, at a coffee Mr. Ayers hosted for Mr. Obama’s first run for office, on the schools project and a charitable board, and in casual encounters as Hyde Park neighbors.

Their relationship has become a touchstone for opponents of Mr. Obama, the Democratic senator, in his bid for the presidency. Video clips on YouTube, including a new advertisement that was broadcast on Friday, juxtapose Mr. Obama’s face with the young Mr. Ayers or grainy shots of the bombings.

In a televised interview last spring, Senator John McCain, Mr. Obama’s Republican rival, asked, “How can you countenance someone who was engaged in bombings that could have or did kill innocent people?”

More recently, conservative critics who accuse Mr. Obama of a stealth radical agenda have asserted that he has misleadingly minimized his relationship with Mr. Ayers, whom the candidate has dismissed as “a guy who lives in my neighborhood” and “somebody who worked on education issues in Chicago that I know.”

A review of records of the schools project and interviews with a dozen people who know both men, suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers, 63. But the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers, whom he has called “somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8.”

Obama campaign aides said the Ayers relationship had been greatly exaggerated by opponents to smear the candidate.

“The suggestion that Ayers was a political adviser to Obama or someone who shaped his political views is patently false,” said Ben LaBolt, a campaign spokesman. Mr. LaBolt said the men first met in 1995 through the education project, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, and have encountered each other occasionally in public life or in the neighborhood. He said they have not spoken by phone or exchanged e-mail messages since Mr. Obama began serving in the United States Senate in January 2005 and last met more than a year ago when they bumped into each other on the street in Hyde Park.

In the stark presentation of a 30-second advertisement or a television clip, Mr. Obama’s connections with a man who once bombed buildings and who is unapologetic about it may seem puzzling. But in Chicago, Mr. Ayers has largely been rehabilitated.

Federal riot and bombing conspiracy charges against him were dropped in 1974 because of illegal wiretaps and other prosecutorial misconduct, and he was welcomed back after years in hiding by his large and prominent family. His father, Thomas G. Ayers, had served as chief executive of Commonwealth Edison, the local power company.

Since earning a doctorate in education at Columbia in 1987, Mr. Ayers has been a professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, the author or editor of 15 books, and an advocate of school reform.

“He’s done a lot of good in this city and nationally,” Mayor Richard M. Daley said in an interview this week, explaining that he has long consulted Mr. Ayers on school issues. Mr. Daley, whose father was Chicago’s mayor during the street violence accompanying the 1968 Democratic National Convention and the so-called Days of Rage the following year, said he saw the bombings of that time in the context of a polarized and turbulent era.

“This is 2008,” Mr. Daley said. “People make mistakes. You judge a person by his whole life.”

Palin twists the facts on Darfur

Palin twists the facts on Darfur

Vice Presidential Debate.

"When I and others in the legislature found out we had some millions of dollars in Sudan, we called for divestment through legislation of those dollars to make sure we weren't doing anything that would be seen as condoning the activities there in Darfur.
--Sarah Palin, Vice Presidential Debate, October 3, 2008.

Sarah Palin suggested that she was at the forefront of a campaign in Alaska to sell stock in companies that do business with Sudan in protest against the mass killing of civilians in the southern part of the country. But the record shows that her administration was against the divestment movement before it was for it.
The Facts

The Save Darfur Coaltion has been urging states to divest from companies that do business with Sudan for the last two years, arguing that the investments "help fund genocide." An Alaska saving fund, The Alaska Permanent Fund, has around $22 million invested in international trading companies such as China Petroleum and Alstom of France, that do business with Sudanese oil interests.

Alaska Permanent Fund officials made clear from the outset that they were opposed to any divestment effort. Executive director Mike Burns told a local Anchorage TV station, KTUU, on December 11 that they were looking for the "best return" on the investments, and never took into account "socially responsible investments . . . whether it's tobacco or alcohol or hospitals that perform abortions or hospitals that don't perform abortions."

In January 2008, a bill known as HB 287 was introduced into the Alaska House of Representatives restricting investments in companies that do business with Sudan. During a committee hearing in February, a Palin administration representative, deputy revenue commissioner Brian Andrews, testified against the legislation on the grounds that it would do nothing to help "the afflicted in Sudan," and would add to the fund's administrative costs.

While acknowledging that the legislation was "well-intended" and "the desire to make a difference is noble," Andrews warned that "mixing moral and political agendas at the expense of our citizens' financial security is not a good combination."

A co-sponsor of the legislation, Anchorage Democrat Les Gara, said that Governor Palin apparently had a change of heart on the divestment issue in March. During a brief hallway conversation, she expressed sympathy for his bill. By that time, however, the bill had effectively died in committee.

Sarah Palin 's General McClellan

McClellan, McKiernan, You Know, One of Those Army Guys
Wading into the debate over the future of the war in Afghanistan, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin tried for a moment to sound as if she knew what she was talking about. This is what we got:

MODERATOR: Governor?

PALIN: Well, first, McClellan did not say definitively the surge principles would not work in Afghanistan. Certainly, accounting for different conditions in that different country and conditions are certainly different. We have NATO allies helping us for one and even the geographic differences are huge but the counterinsurgency principles could work in Afghanistan. McClellan didn't say anything opposite of that. The counterinsurgency strategy going into Afghanistan, clearing, holding, rebuilding, the civil society and the infrastructure can work in Afghanistan. And those leaders who are over there, who have also been advising George Bush on this have not said anything different but that.

Setting aside for a minute the fact that the substance of Palin's babbling, incoherent response was wrong, she apparently got her centuries and wars crossed.