Ex-aide attacks Sarah Palin in new book

Washington, Feb 20 (IANS/EFE) Frank Bailey, formerly the right hand man of Sarah Palin, ex-governor of Alaska and Republican candidate for vice president of the US in 2008, has attacked his one-time boss in a controversial book of which extracts have been published.

The manuscript has been previewed by certain media such as the Alaska Dispatch, which cites Bailey as saying that Palin violated state electoral laws during her campaign for governor in 2006 and that she had a “penchant for always playing the victim”.

The book to be entitled “Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin: A Memoir of Our Tumultuous Years”, relates Bailey’s experience of working with Palin from the time she announced her bid for governor until she abruptly left office in July 2009 without completing her four-year term.

According to the Alaska Dispatch, the book shows Palin to be “a narcissistic liar who was an incompetent governor and a manipulative self-promoter who would stop at nothing to destroy those who crossed her”.

The daily reports that Bailey’s memoirs begin during the final stage of Palin’s governorship, when she was constantly repeating that she hated her work: “On April 28, 2009, Sarah wrote a simple, but frequently repeated message: I hate this damn job…”

As a member of her inner circle of aides, Bailey mentions the private e-mails to which he had access during the controversies surrounding Palin during the 2006 campaign and later, after losing on the ticket with John McCain when he ran for president in 2008.

Among other things, according to the Alaska Dispatch, Bailey says that in 2006 when Palin was governor, she made “illegal coordination” with the Republican Governors Association, something she later denied.

State candidates cannot be allied with pressure groups that contribute soft money to the campaign, such as the Republican Governors Association.

Soft money consists of contributions for a political candidate or party that are bound by no limits and are not subject to federal control, and which, in practice, offer a powerful lobbying platform for big corporations.

Bailey admits in his book that he knew that this coordination violated campaign regulations.

“As far as dealing with a guilty conscience, I’d suffer that collateral damage in silence, not daring to even discuss this with my wife,” the Alaska daily quotes him as saying.

The manuscript, which in its almost 500 pages gathers extracts of 60,000 e-mails sent and received while he worked with Palin, is a blend of analysis, gossip and accusations, according to the Miami Herald.

Up to now Sarah Palin has made no comment.

–IANS/EFE