which rapidly became worse after McCain people got involved.

RE Wooten: no one who lives up here, that I have talked with, wants him in a position to protect public safety; he has disqualified himself. The Troopers are bad enough in their insousciance and superciliousness, which you would perceive if you lived here; but for the public to have to tolerate an out and out bombastic drunk on the force is too much.

This has nothing to do with Palin, since Wooten's unprofessional behavior is stand alone.

RE Monegan: This is more complicated. I would repeat your query regarding him: If he was out of line, why did Palin offer him another job, rather than just fire him outright? In any case, don't believe he never broke a plate.

I am not a partisan concerning these issues. Just for your information, in my opinion, the best governor Alaska ever had was Jay Hammond who was a very able administrator. Alaska is not a simple entity, even though its main source of revenue is mining (under which subsume oil and gas). One must live up here for many years to understand how things fit together. There are many parochial issues that are remote from the rest of the USA. Government officials in Juneau are generally regarded as too shut up in an exclusive club. Their "family feuds" are a constant cauldron
and grist for gossip mills.

When McCain announced Palin as his choice, thoughtful people up here were bewildered, since we were still trying to figure her out, and of course her resume was hardly a match for the position. My first thought was that she had not yet mastered the governor position.

But back to politics of AK state government: the lawyers are in uncharted territory, and pressured by unusual puiblic exposure. Ambiguities are turning up, and of course Palin/McCain are threatened by the amplification of every nuance. In Alaska we can't understand why this has all been allowed to fester.