What is the Palin/McKenna connection?

Sometimes the simplest things open up a can of worms. Its time to start digging into the relationship between McKenna Brothers Paving and the Palins. Maybe it's nothing. Then again, maybe there's much more. Why else would they be so quick to fire an employee for merely saying what he saw if not to protect the Palins? And why would they be so anxious to protect them? Alaska's a big state but a small community. Ive just got a feeling there's more out there that involves these two families. It either involves Palin's time as mayor or as governor-maybe both. I'd be real interested to find out what public contracts the McKenna Brothers received during those tenures.

Law & Disorder-Republican Governor's Unit

A little round up of the antics of some of the higher profile republican governors-Law & Order style.

Crossing Christie What the bridge scandal says about the Governor’s political style, and his future

A great article by Ryan Lizza in the New Yorker magazine.

On April 1st, Chris Christie, the beleaguered Republican governor of New Jersey, attended a celebrity roast, in Newark, to celebrate the ninetieth birthday of Brendan Byrne, the state’s governor from 1974 to 1982. “He’s an inspiration,” Christie told the audience, referring to Byrne, who won reëlection against long odds, because he has “shown that political comebacks can actually happen.”

Christie sat on a long dais with five former governors and five local comedians, listening to the guitarist John Pizzarelli sing an ode to the state: “I may leave for a week or two, but I’m always coming back.” Christie was seated next to former Governor Thomas Kean, a longtime supporter, but he did not say hello or shake his hand, and he glared at the comedians as they delivered their lines. “You scare the shit out of me,” Stewie Stone said to Christie during his routine.

Just five months earlier, Christie had won a sweeping reëlection, securing nineteen of New Jersey’s twenty-one counties, sixty per cent of the vote, and endorsements from Democratic officeholders. He won fifty-one per cent of the Hispanic vote and twenty-one per cent of the African-American vote. His plan was to shed part of his Jersey persona, and perhaps a few more pounds, and begin in earnest the transition from state politician to Presidential candidate.

But the past was catching up with him. In September, an unusual incident had occurred in Fort Lee, the small town on the Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge. Without warning, the number of access lanes from Fort Lee to the bridge’s toll plaza had been reduced from three to one. The lanes were closed for four days, and the resulting traffic jams caught the attention of several Democratic legislators. They opened an investigation and eventually accused the Christie administration of engineering a plot to punish the town’s Democratic mayor, Mark Sokolich, for his failure to endorse Christie’s reëlection. The accusation seemed so ludicrous that Christie belittled a reporter for asking about it. “I moved the cones, actually, unbeknownst to everybody,” he said during a press conference in early December. But on January 8th an e-mail surfaced showing that Bridget Anne Kelly, Christie’s deputy chief of staff, had instructed David Wildstein, who was the Governor’s second-highest appointee at the Port Authority, the agency that runs the bridge, to engineer the gridlock. Months of scrutiny and withering criticism followed, and Christie’s approval rating fell twenty points.

Bridgegate report: New crisis, different woman, same Old Boys

Wow, here's a pretty good summation of the tactic of portraying Bridget Kelly as an unstable woman scorned. Kapow Mr. Mastro, take that! Here's an excerpt. You need to read the whole thing. It isn't that long.

In a report designed to clear Gov. Chris Christie of any wrongdoing in the George Washington Bridge controversy, the characterization of Bridget Anne Kelly by Christie’s attorney, Randy Mastro, was a direct lift from “The Old Boys Club Handbook.”

As read by Mastro before a bank of television cameras, the report portrayed Kelly essentially as a woman scorned, saying Christie’s former deputy chief of state and his former campaign manager, Bill Stepien, had been “personally involved,” that she had “seemed emotional,” and that Stepien had ended the relationship.

Despite the fact the investigating attorneys had interviewed neither Kelly nor Stepien, their report implied the two were not speaking at the time the access-lane closures had been ordered, and that Kelly’s jilted-woman status may have been at the root of the order.

It’s the classic psychological profile of a woman — if you’re from the 14th century. It holds that, at times of crisis, women become emotional, irrational, unstable and unreliable.

Mastro told American Lawyer that his report had no sexist undertones. Kelly’s irate attorney, Michael Critchley, begged to differ.

“(T)he report’s venomous, gratuitous and inappropriate sexist remarks concerning Ms. Kelly,” he said, “have no place in what is alleged to be a professional and independent report.”

Venomous, gratuitous, inappropriate. Got that right.

US Attorney in New Jersey Presses Inquiry on Christie Ally

Source: WNYC

The U.S. Attorney in New Jersey is looking into whether Gov. Chris Christie's top man at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, Chairman David Samson, acted improperly when he authorized two contracts worth $2.8 billion for companies that his private law firm was representing. U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman launched the investigation last week, according to sources who couldn't speak publicly because of the ongoing investigation.

Fishman, who is seeking the documents, is already investigating Bridgegate and whether the Christie administration threatened the Hoboken Mayor with a loss of Sandy aid if she didn't approve a development deal for a Samson client.

Samson is a top Christie confidante, and the U.S. Attorney's examination brings the investigation significantly closer to the Governor. Christie's press team hasn't commented on the new probe, and in his most recent public comments on Samson, Christie said he "strongly, firmly" backed Samson.

Samson's private attorney, Michael Chertoff, issued a statement saying he "isn't commenting on the investigations."

The new subpoena, first reported by the New York Times, is examining whether Samson had a conflict of interest when he pushed plans to raise the Bayonne Bridge and rebuild the Goethals bridge, while also representing the companies who got the massive contracts.

The projects were of great importance to Christie and the Laborers Union, which became the first union to endorse the governor at a a pivotal point in his re-election bid.


Read more: http://www.wnyc.org/story/us-attorney-new-jersey-presses-inquiry-christie-aly/

Release of previously redacted GWB messages reveals new information

Source: Bergen Record

The private messages that linked Governor Christie’s office to lane closures at the George Washington Bridge also contain jokes about causing “traffic problems” at the home of a New Jersey rabbi associated with the Port Authority, newly released documents show.

The information is contained in 20 pages of messages that previously had redactions shielding who sent and received texts between former Port Authority executive David Wildstein and others. The documents do not shed any new light on potential further involvement of the governor’s office.

Link to Pdf of emails here: http://dng.northjersey.com/media_server/tr/2014/02/26emails/Wildstein.pdf

Read more: http://www.northjersey.com/news/Previously_redacted_GWB_messages_released_revealing_new_information.html