Since John McCain tapped Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, she has been put into isolation to protect her from the media. Her few forays out into the real world have horrifyingly demonstrated that Palin is totally unprepared for the role she is being groomed for.

The McCain team has sent a small army of litigators to Alaska in an attempt to bottle up the Alaska State Legislature's so-called Troopergate investigation into Palin's alleged abuse of the Governor's office to settle a personal score within her family.

Before she was called by McCain, Palin was defiant of the bi-partisan investigation, saying that she had nothing to hide and both she and her husband Todd, who has a shadow role in Alaska state affairs, would cooperate fully. "Hold me accountable." Palin challenged the Alaskan people.

Since the descent of the McCain team on the state, local Republicans have lost their enthusiasm for finding the truth of the matter and are being used by McCain forces to delay justice until after the November election.

This situation has evolved in recent days to the point where Governor Palin is no longer allowed to speak for her own office. All inquiries into the status of either Palin's position on the matter or the status of the investigation are being referred to, and handled by, staffers of the McCain campaign.

In fact, all inquiries into Palin's service as the Governor of the state are being written by the McCain people. The Governor is apparently not trusted to speak to the citizens of her state.

Alaskans are not happy about Palin abdicating her responsibilities, or about McCain's people taking control of their Governor's office.

Following are some excerpts from a Saturday editorial by the Anchorage Daily News, "Abdication by Palin: When did the McCain campaign take over the governor's office?"

"Is the McCain campaign telling Alaskans that Alaska's governor can't handle her own defense in front of her own Alaska constituents?

Way back when, before John McCain chose Palin as his vice presidential running mate, Palin promised to cooperate with the investigation.

Now she won't utter a peep about it to Alaskans. Nor will her husband, Todd, who definitely needs to explain his role in Troopergate.

Instead, Alaskans have to sit back and listen to John McCain's campaign operatives handling inquiries about what Alaska's governor did while governing Alaska. Residents of any state would be offended to see their governor cede such a fundamental, day-to-day governmental responsibility to a partisan politician from another state. It's especially offensive to Alaskans.

BOTTOM LINE: Official state business -- like Troopergate -- should be handled by the governor of the state, not by McCain presidential campaign operatives."

Sarah Palin is being hyped as a reformer. A "real" reformer.

Someone who has rooted out government waste and saved untold amounts of dollars for the taxpayers of Alaska.

It turns out Palin has been charging the Alaskan taxpayers to sleep in her own bed. 312 nights in her own bed. Almost every night that she has been Governor.

And for meals in her own kitchen.

"She's entitled to it," said Palin spokeswoman Sharon Leighow.

Because her "job station" is in the state capital of Juneau, but Palin prefers to stay at home in Walissa, she is legally entitled to draw the per diem.

Is that the standard of this vigilant protectress of taxpayer dollars? It's not illegal?

I wonder how the taxpayers of Alaska feel about that? Maybe not too bad, since Palin sent them each a check for $3,200.

As Michael Kinsly points out in Time magazine, "Of the 50 states, Alaska ranks No. 1 in taxes per resident and No. 1 in spending per resident. Its tax burden per resident is 2 1/2 times the national average; its spending, more than double. The trick is that Alaska's government spends money on its own citizens and taxes the rest of us to pay for it."

"As if it couldn't support itself, Alaska also ranks No. 1, year after year, in money it sucks in from Washington. In 2005 (the most recent figures), according to the Tax Foundation, Alaska ranked 18th in federal taxes paid per resident ($5,434) but first in federal spending received per resident ($13,950). Its ratio of federal spending received to federal taxes paid ranks third among the 50 states, and in the absolute amount it receives from Washington over and above the amount it sends to Washington, Alaska ranks No. 1. "

That's real reform. That's real change.

Well, Sarah Palin is a maverick, I'll give her that.

I'd even grant her a capital M - Maverick. Hell, I'd go all the way to extremest, and, depending on what else we learn about her, maybe further. This lady is so far out of the mainstream, I don't think she knows which direction it flows.

Lynette Clark, the chairman of the Alaskan Independence Party ("Alaska First -- Alaska Always"), says that Sarah was a member until 1996 when she decided to throw her hat in the ring for mayor of Wasilla (Population 8,471 according to Wikipedia).

The AIP is a group that challenges the legality of the Alaskan statehood vote, citing the United Nations Charter and international law(!)

That's right, this party maintains that Alaska was never a state.

As in the United States.

Of America. One nation. Indivisible.

It's not accurate to characterize the AIP as a secessionist party, really. Not all members think Alaska should be a separate country. Only some of them.

Others think a commonwealth would be nice. Kind of like Bermuda is to the U.K.

What they all agree on is that Alaska never was, and is not now a state.

As in U.S. of A.

The McCain campaign denies it, but Clark, former secretary of the AIP, seems pretty darn sure that Sarah Palin and her husband Todd were members in 1994 when they attended the party's convention. There is plenty of video on youTube that seems authentic of Sarah adressing the convention and being discussed as a former member who only left the party to join the Republican party so she could "get along" politically.

Okay, this is getting too weird. Did anyone actually spend a few hours with Sarah Palin before they selected her?