In response to a freedom of information request, the State of Alaska is releasing some 24,000 pages of Sarah Palin's e-mails sent from mostly private accounts while she was Governor. News organizations are asking for help from the public in sorting through them for the most interesting parts.
As the State of Alaska has announced that it is releasing some 24,000 pages of Sarah Palin's e-mails sent using mostly private accounts during her half-term as governor. The release is at 9 a.m. Alaska time on Friday, 1 p.m. in New York. The e-mails cover the time period from December 2006 to September 2008, a month after she became John McCain's running mate. Some 2,000 pages have been with held for privacy & executive privilege, and many have been redacted by the state's lawyers. The documents are available to pick up in Juneau, but the NYTimes will have reporters on hand to scan the documents and post them on-line at NYTimes.com, and will create a searchable on-line data base, and MSNBC, ProPublica and Mother Jones magazine are working with a research company to create an online database of the documents.
The NYTimes would like a little help from readers finding the interesting parts=
We’re asking readers to help us identify interesting and newsworthy e-mails, people and events that we may want to highlight. Interested users can fill out a simple form to describe the nature of the e-mail, and provide a name and e-mail address so we’ll know who should get the credit. Join us here on Friday afternoon and into the weekend to participate.
Even with all the deletions and redactions, the e-mails should at least shed more light on how seriously she took her duties as governor.
5:12 PM PT: The Washington Post is also inviting readers to help sort through the Palin e-mails. Chris Cillizza and The Fix have 100 spots for people to work in small collaborative teams to find the most important information in the e-mails.
Fri Jun 10, 2011 at 5:58 AM PT: Palin's supporters have flooded the NYTimes comment section with comments attacking the Times "witch hunt" , and loaded with talking points like "Why didn't the Times ask us to read the 2,300 page healthcare bill?". If you try to post a comment, you get a message that says "Unable to process your request. Try again later"
Fri Jun 10, 2011 at 3:30 PM PT: Here's the link to the NY Times section where the released Palin e-mails are being posted-
http://projects.nytimes.com/...