[Vision2020] Vision2020 Digest, Vol 28, Issue 307

Wed Oct 22 15:21:11 PDT 2008

October 22, 2008
AP: Sarah's Kids Traveled With Her!
Randall Hoven

Who says journalists don't investigate any more? The AP is getting to
the bottom of Sarah Palin's children traveling with her on state
business. No news yet on Barack Obama's dealings with Rezko or Ayers,
or how his wife nearly tripled her six figure income at a hospital
when became a US Senator and then got earmarks for it. But first
things first, I'm sure.

The AP report has three names in the byline: Brett J. Blackledge, Adam
Goldman and Matt Apuzzo. From the story's timeline, the AP had
requested her expense reports prior to August 6. Brett, Adam and Matt
must have been part of that army of lawyers and journalists who
descended on Wasilla within days of McCain announcing Sarah as his VP
pick.

Their story is comprehensive, if you go by word count. My computer
says its over 1,400 words. If you can wade through the article, they
seem to describe every single trip any of Sarah's kids took with her —
juicy stuff. In all, we're talking $21,012. Twenty one thousand
dollars! Michelle Obama would have to do community outreach for three
or four weeks to haul in that much cash.

Oh. They are not yet sure if it was OK to do that. Or maybe it was OK
for some trips but not others. It kind of depends on Alaska's rules,
and no one can give a solid reading of the law of expense reports for
a governor's children just yet. It seems murky. Apparently, in all of
Brett's, Adam's and Matt's investigations, they have yet to find out
if a law was broken or, short of that, if something improper was done.
So, what the heck, let the readers decide.

Let's see, their investigation started before August 6. Their story
ran October 21. Three reporters, 11 weeks? That's over 1300 man-hours
plus air-fare, lodging and per diem, if they were full time on that.
How much did that cost? Over $21,012? (I easily estimate three times
that, but maybe they weren't all full time.)

Frankly, I think Sarah's guilty. I'd bet only half of that $21,000 was
really allowable expenses. The other half, about $10,000, was Sarah's
greedy need to be with her children while away from home on state
business. Remember her other scandal involved trying to get a guy
fired who tasered her 10-year-old nephew. There's a definite pattern
at work here. If my guess is right, she sometimes kept her children
out of school when they really weren't sick just so she could play in
the snow with them.

But I'll let the lawyers sort that out.

In the meantime, it's nice to know that Brett, Adam and Matt are now
getting freed up from that intensive dive into the darkest secrets of
Sarah's past so they can get back to the Rezko, Ayers, wife's job
investigations thingies they must have been pulled from temporarily.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/10/ap_sarahs_kids_traveled_with_h.html

On 10/21/08, donald edwards <donaledwards at hotmail.com> wrote:
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> AP: Palin children traveled on state expenses
> VP hopeful charged state for children's travel, amended expense reports
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> Al Grillo / AP
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> updated 1 hour, 4 minutes ago
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> ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Gov. Sarah Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business.
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> The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.
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> In all, Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. In some other cases, she has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.
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> Alaska law does not specifically address expenses for a governor's children. The law allows for payment of expenses for anyone conducting official state business.
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> As governor, Palin justified having the state pay for the travel of her daughters — Bristol, 17; Willow, 14; and Piper, 7 — by noting on travel forms that the girls had been invited to attend or participate in events on the governor's schedule.
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> But some organizers of these events said they were surprised when the Palin children showed up uninvited, or said they agreed to a request by the governor to allow the children to attend.
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> Several other organizers said the children merely accompanied their mother and did not participate. The trips enabled Palin, whose main state office is in the capital of Juneau, to spend more time with her children.
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> "She said any event she can take her kids to is an event she tries to attend," said Jennifer McCarthy, who helped organize the June 2007 Family Day Celebration picnic in Ketchikan that Piper attended with her parents.
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> State Finance Director Kim Garnero told The Associated Press she has not reviewed the Palins' travel expense forms, so she could not say whether the daughters' travel with their mother would meet the definition of official business.
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> After Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain chose Palin his running mate and reporters asked for the records, Palin ordered changes to previously filed expense reports for her daughters' travel.
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> In the amended reports, Palin added phrases such as "First Family attending" and "First Family invited" to explain the girls' attendance.
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> "The governor said, 'I want the purpose and the reason for this travel to be clear,'" said Linda Perez, state director of administrative services.
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> When Palin released her family's tax records as part of her vice presidential campaign, some tax experts questioned why she did not report the children's state travel reimbursements as income.
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> The Palins released a review by a Washington attorney who said state law allows the children's travel expenses to be reimbursed and not taxed when they conduct official state business.
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> Taylor Griffin, a McCain-Palin campaign spokesman, said Palin followed state policy allowing governors to charge for their children's travel. He said the governor's office has invitations requesting the family to attend some events, but he said he did not have them to provide.
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> In October 2007, Palin brought daughter Bristol along on a trip to New York for a women's leadership conference. Plane tickets from Anchorage to La Guardia Airport for $1,385.11 were billed to the state, records show, and mother and daughter shared a room for four nights at the $707.29-per-night Essex House hotel, which overlooks Central Park.
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> The event's organizers said Palin asked if she could bring her daughter.
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> Alexis Gelber, who organized Newsweek's Third Annual Women & Leadership Conference, said she does not know how Bristol ended up attending. Gelber said invitees usually attend alone, but some ask if they can bring a relative or friend.
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> Griffin, the campaign spokesman, said he believes someone with the event personally sent an e-mail to Bristol inviting her, but he did not have it to provide. Records show Palin also met with Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Goldman Sachs representatives and visited the New York Stock Exchange.
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> In January, the governor, Willow and Piper showed up at the Alaska Symphony of Seafood Buffet, an Anchorage gala to announce winners of an earlier seafood competition.
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> "She was just there," said James Browning, executive director of Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation, which runs the event. Griffin said the governor's office received an invitation that was not specifically addressed to anyone.
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> When Palin amended her children's expense reports, she listed a role for the two girls at the function — "to draw two separate raffle tickets."
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> In the original travel form, Palin listed a number of events that her children attended and said they were there "in official capacity helping." She did not identify any specific roles for the girls.
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> In July, the governor charged the state $2,741.26 to take Bristol and Piper to Philadelphia for a meeting of the National Governors Association. The girls had their own room for five nights at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel for $215.46 a night, expense records show.
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> Expense forms describe the girls' official purpose as "NGA Governor's Youth Programs and family activities." But those programs were activities designed to keep children busy, a service provided by the NGA to accommodate governors and their families, NGA spokeswoman Jodi Omear said.
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> In addition to the commercial flights, the children have traveled dozens of times with Palin on a state plane. For these flights, the total cost of operating the plane, at $971 an hour, was about $55,000, according to state flight logs. The cost of operating the state plane does not increase when the children join their mother.
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> The organizer of an American Heart Association luncheon on Feb. 15 in Fairbanks said Palin asked to bring daughter Piper to the event, and the organizer said she was surprised when Palin showed up with daughter Willow and Bristol as well.
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> The three Palin daughters shared a room separate from their mother at the Princess Lodge in Fairbanks for two nights, at a cost to the state of $129 per night.
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> The luncheon took place before Palin's husband, Todd, finished fourth in the 2,000-mile Iron Dog snowmobile race, also in Fairbanks. The family greeted him at the finish line.
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> When Palin showed up at the luncheon with not just Piper but also Willow and Bristol, organizers had to scramble to make room at the main table, said Janet Bartels, who set up the event.
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> "When it's the governor, you just make it happen," she said.
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> The state is already reviewing nearly $17,000 in per diem payments to Palin for more than 300 nights she slept at her own home, 40 miles from her satellite office in Anchorage.
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> Tony Knowles, a Democratic former governor of Alaska who lost to Palin in a 2006 bid to reclaim the job, said he never charged the state for his three children's commercial flights or claimed their travel as official state business.
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> Knowles, who was governor from 1994 to 2002, is the only other recent Alaska governor who had school-age children while in office.
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> "There was no valid reason for the children to be along on state business," said Knowles, a supporter of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama. "I cannot recall any instance during my eight years as governor where it would have been appropriate to claim they performed state business."
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> Knowles said he brought his children to one NGA event while in office but didn't charge the state for their trip.
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> In February 2007, the three girls flew from Juneau to Anchorage on Alaska Airlines. Palin charged the state for the $519.30 round-trip ticket for each girl, and noted on the expense form that the daughters accompanied her to "open the start of the Iron Dog race."
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> The children and their mother then watched as Todd Palin and other racers started the competition, which Todd won that year. Palin later had the relevant expense forms changed to describe the girls' business as "First Family official starter for the start of the Iron Dog race."
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> The Palins began charging the state for commercial flights after the governor kept a 2006 campaign promise to sell a jet bought by her predecessor.
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> Palin put the jet up for sale on eBay, a move she later trumpeted in her star-making speech at the Republican National Convention, and it was ultimately sold by the state at a loss.
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> That left only one high-performance aircraft deemed safe enough for her to use — a 1980 twin-engine King Air assigned to the public safety agency but, according to flight logs, out of service for maintenance and repairs about a third of the time Palin has been governor.
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>
> > From: vision2020-request at moscow.com
> > Subject: Vision2020 Digest, Vol 28, Issue 307
> > To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> > Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:00:41 -0700
> >
> > Send Vision2020 mailing list submissions to
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> > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
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> > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
> > vision2020-request at moscow.com
> >
> > You can reach the person managing the list at
> > vision2020-owner at moscow.com
> >
> > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> > than "Re: Contents of Vision2020 digest..."
> >
> >
> > Today's Topics:
> >
> > 1. the most looming crisis that threatens Obama's campaign right
> > now (No Weatherman)
> > 2. PRESS RELEASE Farmers Market Extension 08 (Stephanie Kalasz)
> > 3. Re: Questions for No. Weatherman (Chasuk)
> >
> >
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 1
> > Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:34:42 -1000
> > From: "No Weatherman" <no.weatherman at gmail.com>
> > Subject: [Vision2020] the most looming crisis that threatens Obama's
> > campaign right now
> > To: "Vision 2020" <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> > Message-ID:
> > <28a621640810211434j4e7c9cedpd184eb20eeed26f0 at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
> >
> > Palin Reacts to Joe's Crisis Warnings
> > Posted by: Amanda Carpenter at 12:44 PM
> >
> > Joe Biden took a day off from the campaign trail yesterday after
> > making some unfortunate remarks about his running mate and Sarah Palin
> > is busy taking it to Biden today.
> >
> > Palin mocked Biden for telling supporters a President Obama would be
> > "tested" by some kind of international crisis during his first days in
> > office.
> >
> > "Thanks for the warning, Joe," Palin said at a stop in Reno, Nevada.
> >
> > She then laid out a series of "crisis scenarios" she could imagine
> > under an Obama Administration, citing Obama's willingness to meet with
> > "the world's worst dictators without preconditions" and cutting
> > funding for the war, leaving Iraqi citizens at the mercy of terrorist
> > extremists.
> >
> > But a different kind of threat is more immediate to Obama's candidacy
> > Palin warned.
> >
> > "The most looming crisis that threatens Obama's campaign right now is
> > Joe Biden's next speaking engagement," she quipped.
> > http://townhall.com/blog/g/9522c00d-19c6-4ddd-903c-2bd5933a62a9
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2008 14:53:34 -0700
> > From: "Stephanie Kalasz" <skalasz at ci.moscow.id.us>
> > Subject: [Vision2020] PRESS RELEASE Farmers Market Extension 08
> > To: "v2020" <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> > Message-ID:
> > <7FF17F158107374CB6E4E16ADD5B125008045B69 at mail1.CI.MOSCOW.ID.US>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
> >
> > Press Release
> >
> > To: Interested Media
> >
> > From: Gina Baldwin, Assistant to Arts Director 206 E. 3rd St., Moscow,
> > Idaho 83843, telephone: (208) 883-7036, Fax: (208) 883-0737 e-mail:
> > gbaldwin at ci.moscow.id.us <mailto:gbaldwin at ci.moscow.id.us> or
> > kburns at ci.moscow.id.us <mailto:kburns at ci.moscow.id.us> .
> >
> > Date: October 21, 2008
> >
> > Re: Moscow Farmers Market Extended to November 1 & 8th.
> >
> >
> >
> > Moscow Farmers Market and Events
> >
> >
> >
> > Join us at the Moscow Farmers Market at Friendship Square in Downtown
> > Moscow! The market runs Saturdays from 8am-12pm and features live
> > music, local produce, craft vendors and food vendors. On October 25th,
> > come down for live music provided by Bear grass Band from 9:30-11:30am
> > at 208-883-7036 or email gbaldwin at ci.moscow.id.us
> > <mailto:gbaldwin at ci.moscow.id.us> .
> >
> >
> >
> > Moscow Farmers Market Extended!!!!
> >
> >
> >
> > Produce keeps on coming! Apples, Pears, Broccoli, Winter Squash are for
> > sale at the Moscow Farmers Market. The market will be open on November 1
> > & 8th from 8-12pm. Come down and purchase your case products and canning
> > fruit and vegetables. Friendship Square and Jackson Street Parking lot.
> > Call for questions @1.208.883.7036. Support your local Farmers Market!
> >
> >
> >
> > ####
> >
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> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 3
> > Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:00:31 -0700
> > From: Chasuk <chasuk at gmail.com>
> > Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Questions for No. Weatherman
> > To: "No Weatherman" <no.weatherman at gmail.com>
> > Cc: Vision 2020 <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> > Message-ID:
> > <ef6f41de0810211600n7f73640of4f95f6e0a80702a at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
> >
> > I can't reply to any of this. I have no idea where to start. It
> > veers off point, is bombastic, disrespectful, and uses intemperate
> > language so many times that I am really at a loss. I thought we had
> > established boundaries.
> >
> > As I indicated earlier, I have a very busy schedule, so I need dialogue to be
> > constrained to one topic at a time -- I'll stretch to two -- and streamlined.
> >
> > Can you pick one or two points from your 30+ paragraphs and ask them
> > succinctly, please?
> >
> > Chas
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
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> >
> > End of Vision2020 Digest, Vol 28, Issue 307
> > *******************************************
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