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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: greenspirit who wrote (370267)	6/25/2010 9:14:06 AM
From: Snowshoe	Respond to of 793939

No, Talis Colberg was her first Attorney General who resigned after he was censured by the Legislature over Troopergate. The guy I'm referring to is her personal attorney, Thomas Van Flein. He's been the main guy defending her against all the ethics complaints starting with Troopergate. Here's the relevant finding from the settlement... 24. Several of the attorneys retained expressed great confidence to their client, Governor Palin, that the Trust, as written, complied with all relevant laws At no time did the attorneys warn that the two grounds for violation described herein were a problem. There was disagreement amongst the attorneys as to one critical point. One of the attorneys, Mr. Van Flein, strongly advised that the Trust be submitted to the Department of Law for pre-approval pursuant to AS 39.52.210, as had been done twice before by Governor Palin with respect to other ethics matters, resulting in her ultimate conduct being found to be lawful. Governor Palin chose not to accept the advice of Mr. Van Flein, and followed instead the advice of another attorney who recommended against seeking the advice of the Governor's ethics supervisor (the attorney general), who advised to simply contest the "inevitable" complaint when it came. In retrospect the advice to seek preapproval from the ethics officer provided to the Governor under the statute seems the better course, particularly when this was the first attempt at such a trust agreement in Alaska and ethics complaints were likely. Governor Palin was nevertheless following the express advice of one of her attorneys who told her the Trust complied with all laws and was indeed unassailable. The decision not to seek prior Department of Law approval, while contrary to Mr. Van Flein's advice, was approved by another attorney. media.adn.com