Proud Member of The Moms Clean Air Force
Print This Post
Oct
24
This charge isn’t new, and it would seem logical to say, what about the senate offices of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and that would be and is fair. This Plain Dealer expose on patronage in a Cuyahoga County office is a good example of charting out the problem.
But, as we keep being told, Alaska Governor and GOP VP candidate, Sarah Palin, has executive experience unique to being a governor. And likewise, the Los Angeles Times reports today, she had the hiring responsibilities to go along with that. The article details its findings that Palin placed donors and friends in jobs throughout her administration.
Much like the issue of the RNC spending $150,000 on clothing for Palin and her family, which isn’t about the perception that optics matter (Palin’s optics wouldn’t matter so much if what she said was appealing) but about the hypocrisy of suggesting you are one thing and looking and behaving as though you are something else, this issue of patronage isn’t as much about the suggestion by the article that she favored people who gave her money or were her friends or are relatives.
Rather, the issue, as the Times article points out at the very outset, is that although Palin declares repeatedly that she’s shaken up government and taken on the “old politics,” that just does not appear to be the case when it’s come to hiring practices in her administration:
Most new governors install friends and supporters in state jobs. But Alaska historians say some of Palin’s appointees were less qualified than those of her Republican and Democratic predecessors.
University of Alaska historian Steve Haycox said Palin has been a reformer. But he said she has a penchant for placing supporters, many of them ill-prepared, in high posts. He called it “cronyism” far beyond what previous governors have done and a contradiction of her high-minded philosophy.
Terrence Cole, an Alaska political historian, said Palin had in some cases shown “a disrespect for experience.”
Further investigation of the examples the Times outlines is necessary. But the issue remains: if the other administrations did the same thing, then, rather than make her actions acceptable, it shows her to be a hypocrite for saying that she’d stop politics as usual.
Honestly, I still cannot fathom how it is that John McCain can imply with a straight face that Barack Obama flip flops or is hypocritical by repeating to crowds that Obama will say anything to win. Just cannot fathom. Unless McCain has that short a memory.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:02 pm October 24th, 2008 in Ethics, Government, Sarah Palin, Vice President, Voting, WH2008
Comments
One Response to “LA Times contends Palin promotes patronage in her administration”
Voted into Top 25 Political Mom Blogs
Now on sale-WLST essay included!
Posts About Pepper Pike City Council2010 WE Magazine 101 Women Bloggers to Watch
Category Specific RSS
Pepper Pike Cleveland+ Politics Women Ohio Elections Law Jewish
Palin says that she’s putting the government on the side of the people, so I guess the true measure would be not who has been hired, but whether the state government is now more responsive to the people, and is it more transparent to the people.