Palin to Law: Drop Dead

Just. Like. Cheney.

A top law enforcement official in Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's administration is considering steps to block a legislative probe into allegations she improperly fired the state's No. 1 police official.

The legislature's report on the conduct of Republican vice presidential nominee Palin may be released next month, just weeks before the presidential election.

Senior Assistant Attorney General Michael Barnhill, in a letter to Alaska lawmakers, questioned whether the investigation is biased and threatened try to quash subpoenas for seven Palin administration officials who have refused to be interviewed in the probe. Legislative leaders meet tomorrow to consider issuing the subpoenas.

Warning to Democrats Americans: Republicans are fighting this investigation like it was Florida 2000. If you're harboring any thoughts of taking a hands-off approach, rising above the fray, and then doubling back to investigate it later if she gets elected, think again. At that point we'll be hearing nothing but how it was "thoroughly investigated" by the Alaska state legislature. The quashing of the subpoenas won't be mentioned, and all will be forgotten. You know it's coming.

This is a direct parallel to federal issues playing out as we speak in Washington, with Harriet Miers a no-show once again today on a subpoena that's now well over a year old.

No less a flat-out lie than Palin's b.s. about the Bridge to Nowhere, the Republicans are telling you another whopper in claiming they have a leg to stand on in shutting this investigation down. Take a look at what that "leg" is:

``We have to prevent this because it is going to diminish the reputation of Alaska,'' [Republican state Rep. and House Judiciary Committee chair Jay] Ramras said.

There you go, America. You can't find out whether a potential Vice President can be trusted with her power, because "it is going to diminish the reputation of Alaska."

When two-thirds of your Congressional delegation is under federal investigation for corruption, there's not a whole lot more you can to to diminish the reputation of Alaska. But there is one thing you can do to make it worse: pretend it's not happening, and try to cover it up.

If Alaskans let their guard down on this, Troopergate becomes just another one of those vague, nagging ghosts of history like Iran-Contra. We're certain it happened, but... if nothing came of it, did it really? Gosh, if no one got in any trouble, did anyone really do anything wrong?

The storyline here is, at its heart, the same as it always is. The same way it was described by Hunter the other day, who was actually talking about a completely different Republican. But it's no coincidence (and you'd be a fool to mistake it for one) that the modus operandi is exactly the same:

So let's make this perfectly clear -- yet again. This isn't "political hardball", or "an aggressive campaign strategy", or any of those other rancid euphemisms that we've taken to using in our national discourse instead of calling corruption out as corruption. Haley Barbour is doing an illegal thing because he thinks he can, and because doing an illegal thing will help his Party.

Sarah Palin is pulling out all the stops to derail a perfectly legitimate investigation into very serious charges. And along the way, she's simply telling you the flat-out lie that it's somehow actually unconstitutional for people to ask these questions.

And if we allow this storyline to continue to one played out by an army of McCain lawyers shipped up into Alaska (even as he accuses Democrats of being the ones to do this!) working behind the scenes against Alaskan state legislators, that's going to become the standard. That it's unconstitutional to ask the executive branch to explain why dozens of people on their "enemies lists" are suddenly finding themselves fired, attacked in the press, and disposed of.

That's what Slick Sally Palin does with her enemies (or Todd's) as Governor of Alaska. You don't want to know what she'll do with them once plugged into the Dick Cheney "Fourth Branch" Vice Presidency.