It has long been a tactic of the Left to hire an army of trial lawyers to litigate their way into office. The most aggregious use of the courts for political purposes may have been Al Gore's attempt to steal the 2000 election by demanding selective recounts in areas of Florida where Democratic poll workers botched the election process. Years after the debacle, every conceiveable scenario of recounting showed that Bush still would have won the Florida vote albeit by a paper thin margin.
When disinformation and race baiting fail them, Democrats always resort to the courts, and thus far, they've been unable to make charges of racism stick, if for no other reason than Senator McCain having a solid record on such issues. Likewise, Obama and his Chicago Cogs have not been able to make lies, slander and outright actionable libel stick. Their only remaining tactic -- and one we will see a lot of in battleground states -- is ideological suppression. That's a fancy term for silencing opposition.
Obama has loosed his legal beagles in Missouri by recruiting several district attorneys and sherrifs to file criminal complaints against people who express opinions about Hhis character, campaign or policies that do not present him in the favorable light He feels is most appropriate for one of his stature. This report on KMOV St. Louis points out Obama's "Truth Squad" is not merely a blog that corrects factual errors about his candidacy. In point of fact, use of statewide law enforcement officers and state attorneys to "enforce" his speech code with an iron fist seems more appropriate in a different historical setting -- 1930s Germany, perhaps.
McCain also has a "Truth Squad", but thus far it has confined its activities to contesting what the McCain campaign feels are inaccurate or unfair attacks such as those typical of a Democrat campaign. The latest example is accusing the McCain camp of "racism" because it featured two "sinister black men" in an ad about his economic policy advisors. The "sinister black men" just happen to be Obama himself and his chief economic advisor, Franklin D. Raines, the guy who drove Fannie Mae into the ground causing the current economic crisis. His failure and criminal conduct have nothing to do with his race; they have everything to do with the reason Obama should not be trusted with the presidency -- especially on economic issues. Most people get that. That's why The One feels it necessary to file criminal complaints against anyone who dares criticise Him.
Not merely criticize in a campaign ad. The state attorneys and sherrifs have been instructed to file criminal charges against ANYONE who makes a false statement against The One. Clearly, He has not bothered to read the constitution. He may have taught "Con Law" as an adjunct years ago, but it doesn't appear the "Con" is short for "Constitutional".
"Anonymous", a group of prOama hackers, managed to spoof YAHOO! into releasing Sarah Palin's password. They did several screen grabs and then released emails, contact lists and private phone numbers of the governor along with her friends and family. The goal of this latest dirty trick seems to be to prove that Palin's promise of transparency was broken because she used the YAHOO! email account to secretly conduct government business.
Laying aside the foolhardiness of using YAHOO! for anything official or which requires security, I find it hard to believe Palin and her associates were naive enough to believe that a commercial email account would somehow protect them from scrutiny. YAHOO! may be a great service, but it is subject to a host of laws (both privacy and anti-terrorist) just like its competitors.
Accusations that Palin and others used private email to avoid scrutiny simply aren't grounded in reality. YAHOO! is far more likely to be hacked than a government account, and even if the account was "deleted", YAHOO! has to maintain archives of the content that passes through its service for situations just like this.
YAHOO! is not going to subject itself to litigation or worse, criminal complaints, in order to protect any of its members. On the other hand, it's also going to do all it can to ensure the privacy of its members -- especially after such a high profile breech. People need to trust that YAHOO! Mail is at least as secure as Gmail, AOL or any other major player. However, if you take the time to read the Terms of Service for any decent Web provider like YAHOO!, you'll find disclosures in their privacy statements that they will release information about their members' accounts in cases of criminal government investigations and the like.
Palin and other staffers had to know that using private YAHOO! accounts to conduct government business was not only less secure than a .gov domain maintained by the state of Alaska, they certainly knew that their emails were subject to being viewed by any investigation into her conduct as governor. Just looking at the dozens of names of private citizens on the account along with other staffers shows that there was no expectation that Palin and others using YAHOO! intended to hide anything.
Refusal to release emails in conjunction with the current Democratic witch hunt is not the same thing as violating a pledge of transparency. Such cases involve a lot of complex litigation, negotiation and discovery. It is no different than President Clinton seeking to protect his private correspondence or privileged (executive) correspondence during Whitewater or Reagan and his staff seeking to protect privileged correspondence during the Iran-Contra investigations.
The truth will come out as it did in those cases. However, we shouldn't expect the targets of any investigation to simply volunteer information (or emails) that can be scoured for nuggets of political cannon fodder that can be taken out of context and used to smear a candidate's character. Democrats of all people should understand this as the prObama hackers used the same tactic against Bill and Hillary.
Did the ABC News/Charles Gibson Interview Reveal More About Gibson?
As I watched the first Gibson interview with Sarah Palin, I commented that the banner headlines in the mainstream media would shout that Palin lacks the experience and judgment to be president because she supports admission of Georgia and Ukraine into NATO and that she did not know what the Bush Doctrine was.
To be honest, I thought the Bush Doctrine amounted to “America will treat other nations that harbor or aid terrorists – as terrorists” with the promise that the terrorists would be hunted down and defeated. According to Charles Gibson, I was wrong – it was the doctrine of “anticipatory strike” or “pre-emptive war” that Gibson identified as the Bush Doctrine.
As it turns out, I was no more wrong than any other American – or Governor Palin herself – in not getting Gibson’s interpretation. I just assumed since he is a very well informed member of the media, his interpretation was the only correct one. A blog on Weekly Standard here suggests there is no one fully agreed-upon meaning of the Bush Doctrine, but the most common one cited in ABC News’ own reportage happens to be the “if you’re not with us, you’re against us” theme that if you harbor or aid a terrorist, we will recognize you as a terrorist (the one that came to my mind as I watched the interview).
Charles Gibson seemed horrified at Palin’s unflinching support for Georgia – and later mention of Ukraine – entering NATO. The idea that when one NATO ally is attacked it is considered an attack on the whole alliance was perceived as a foolhardy provocation of Russia. Palin reminded Gibson that we do have the same obligation to our existing NATO partners – something of which he is keenly aware. The “Don’t Poke the Bear” mentality of the Democrats and the mainstream media didn’t immediately register with Palin – she simply restated her support of the states in which Russia has shown an expansionist interest.
Score points for global impact wisdom on Palin’s part for deflecting questions about whether the U.S. has a right to cross the Afghanistan – Pakistan border without Pakistan’s permission. Such incursions were authorized by Bush to chase down border insurgents who support the Taliban from “safe havens” within Pakistan. President Bush recently signed a “secret” finding authorizing such attacks (which is why it’s an issue). Palin was smart enough to realize it is not the place of a candidate to second-guess the diplomatic implications of such a finding resorting to the tried and true “all options should be on the table”. Had she said “yes”, she could then be accused of creating an international diplomatic incident with Pakistan and if she said, “no” she would be making an un-supported comment about the current administration’s policy. Neither Clinton nor the current president Bush made such mistakes when they were running. Criticizing the current president’s approach on such issues is one thing, making a blanket statement about an ongoing diplomatic issue – especially with Pakistan’s government in a state of flux – would be outright stupid (which apparently Gibson thinks Palin is).
I have to admit, I wasn’t dazzled by Palin’s overall performance, but I was impressed – especially by two important things:
