“Such impermissible and repeated contacts create conflicts of interest for subordinate employees who must choose to either please a superior or run the risk of facing that superior’s displeasure and the possible consequences of such displeasure. This was one of the very reasons the Ethics Act was promulgated by the legislature”

It was not Monegan who punished Wooten’s tasering of a boy with a four day suspension – that didn’t happen on his watch. It is clear from the report that Monegan was pressured to compensate for this ‘slap on the wrist’ by finding some other reason to fire Wooten.

I’ve had friends put in this position. The boss says “We would be better off without this person, let’s find a reason to fire them.” Public employees should not be pressured to follow the personal agenda of the executive when making personnel decisions, however well-intentioned that personal agenda may be.

In 2007, Palin became governor, shortly after, a number of her aides and her husband began an off-the-record campaign to get Wooten fired, with a total of 36 contacts were made that were determined to have placed Monegan under the impression that he should fire Wooten.

While Palin can hire or fire at will, Monegan can’t. His hands were effectively tied, and he told Palin that she should stop putting pressure on him to this end. She fired him, then hired Kopp to replace him. 10 days later, Kopp stepped down when a prior sexual harassment claim against him came to light. He received $10,000 severance pay for the two weeks he was on the job.

Prior to her selection as the VP pick, she requested and anointed the investigation into the situation. Then she was selected and refused to participate in the investigation, then requested her AG to say that her employees would not be honoring the subpoenae.

The report came out, ahead of the date that was scheduled prior to her selection, so as not to place undue influence on the election.

All of this paints a pretty strange picture, and apparently, the bar of qualification to be Republican vice-president is pretty low. Scary stuff.

The child would be removed from the home and the drones from Child Welfare would have set up an office in his living room never to leave.

We have had several officers terminated for various things. The most common is lying to a superior. That brings instant and irrevocable termination.

In a case like this he would have had his hearing and been gone and none of the other officers would have shed a tear for him. That’s without even getting into the driving a patrol car under the influence and the domestic violence complaints.

I guess things are different in Alaska

It is simply this: It is an abuse of power to use Governmental powers to try to punish enemies of your family. No matter how bad the State Trooper was, the fact is, as a former brother-in-law, it is a conflict of interest to try and get an ex-relative fired (or hired).

There were TWO questions, not one. First, did Palin have the authority to fire the Commissioner. Answer: Yes.

Second – which everyone keeps ignoring here – did Palin abuse her authority in trying to pressure the state troopers to fire a trooper that was a personal enemy of her family.

Answer: YES. The questions are completely separate.

If Palin had used her power to HIRE a brother-in-law it would be just as bad. That’s the point, yet the postings here are full of willful blindness.

bobc: Palin talked REPEATEDLY to government employees. That was the overreaching the GOP majority led commission said was Abuse of power.

No offense, but you are mistaken. From my analysis, cited earlier:

5. Violation of the ethics provision requires that an executive officer knowingly make an “effort to benefit a personal or financial interest” of him or herself or a family member.

An oversimplified, but accurate, take on this is that both Todd and Sarah Palin spoke continuously about Wooten, the brother-in-law, bringing discredit to the department, about the inadequacy of the disciplinary action taken against him and about the negative impact he would have on DPS recruiting.

Arguably, all of these considerations fall within the Governor’s OFFICIAL, NOT PERSONAL, areas of interest. Branchflower simply chose not to see it that way or to even put forward the case for that interpretation.

The council’s charge was not simply to investigate the firing, but (more importantly) to measure the degree to which Palin may have violated the ethics standards that her own administration amended in 2007 to correct the massive ethical lapses displayed by the previous governor. The state constitution clearly permits the governor to fire commission heads for no cause; no one has ever disputed that. This constitutional provision does not, however, permit the governor to abuse her office by using her husband — an unelected adjunct to the executive branch — as well as her subordinates to settle a private score.

Sarah Palin and her husband did not like the results of the investigation that led to Wooten’s suspension. They believed it was their prerogative to revise the results of that investigation or to urge other public officials to revisit a closed investigation. They were wrong, and the report clearly explains why.

Obama lead in the polls will go up,

if I am wrong I will send you money

That was the overreaching the GOP majority led commission said was Abuse of power.