Well, first we have updates on troopergate, we have documentation from the fired state police head Walter Monegan that Palins husband and senior staffers pressured him to fire Michael Wooten, who had been involved in a messy divorce with Palin’s sister.

He also claims to have emails from Sarah Palin on the matter, additionally, the Anchorage Daily News quotes him as saying that Palin talked to him personally on the matter twice.

Also, we have the Juneau Empire^* is no reporting that a political appointee of the Alaska State Troopers reversed an internal investigation by professional staff in order to take disciplinary measures against him.

What’s more, this is not the first example of blatant cronyism and retribution by Palin. In 1996, while mayor of Wasilla, she fired the chief of police and directory of libraries because they suppored her opponent, which leed to an abortive recall campaign.

It also appears that the McCain campaign had not vetted Palin at all before her selection. It appears that her local paper, The Valley Frontiersman, does not have its archives online, and a Democratic Party Opposition researcher was informed by staff that their inquiry was the first such request.

It appears that Obama gave a good speech, and the sick old man, John Sidney McCain, panicked.

Even better, her mother-in-law says that she might not vote for her.

I have to agree 90% with Barack Obama when he says that a family should be off limits, so the story of Bristol Palin, her 17 year old daughter being pregnant out of wedlock should be generally off the table.

However, I will argue that the situation does point to a problem with Sarah Palin’s policies: She is strongly opposed to comprehensive sex education, and her daughter’s situation indicates that her position is wrongheaded and stupid.

In any case, this appears to be a Thomas Eagleton moment.

^*I spent 4 Years in Juneau growing up, and I always thought of the paper as the Vampire…It was, at least in the 1960s, kind of right wing.