Is would-be VP Sarah Palin a hacker?

[undeterred]

Does the GOP VP nominee possess hidden computer skills? Can she possibly bring the White House into the 21st century, technologically at least? Cringely has a few thoughts.
TAGS: Hackme Inc., Political pandering, Wikinomics


As we've learned over the last few days, the presumptive GOP candidate for vice president is many things: a reformist governor, a hunter, an ex-beauty queen, a mother of five, a physical fitness nut, and a lover of caribou burgers.

But is she a hacker?

According to the Anchorage Daily News she is. In a front page story from September 2004, the ADN describes Palin thusly:

Sarah Palin never thought of herself as an investigator.....Yet there she was, hacking uncomfortably into Randy Ruedrich's computer, looking for evidence that the state Republican Party boss had broken the state ethics law while a member of the Alaska Oil & Gas Conservation Commission.

In the great north, where political corruption vies with oil and gas for the state's primary export, it seems Palin was asked to rummage around former state GOP leader Ruedrich's hard drive.

... The next week, when Palin went back to work at the AOGCC, she noticed that Ruedrich had removed his pictures from the walls and the personal effects from his desk. But as she and an AOGCC technician worked their way around his computer password at the behest of an assistant attorney general in Fairbanks, they found his cleanup had not extended to his electronic files.

http://weblog.infoworld.com/robertxcringely/archives/2008/09/is_wouldbe_vp_s.html

[katandmoon]

1. Maybe she can find the White House's deleted emails!!!!

[paparush]

2. Maybe she social engineered a password. Maybe she installed a keylogger.

Hardcore hacker? Nah.

Besides, if you have unrestricted, physical access to the machine and a good boot CD, you're in.

[undeterred]

3. Not a hacker.

But smart enough about computers and the internet to know how to get pictures off herself and her family off the internet quickly, who to go to, etc. Good to know.

[wolfgangmo]

4. Hacker my ass...

... she HAD the password.

It ain't hard to hack into a system that you use all the time.

She presents herself as a reformer and above the inbred corruption in Alaska,, but in truth she is neck deep in the shit. She ran a 527 for Steven's for gosh sakes. This bitch is dirty.

The fact that she used a password that she knew already , in order to create a sacrificial goat, in no way makes her a hacker, nor should it imply that she has skills beyond obeying her husband and having babies.

[undeterred]

5. I get the impression that she dominates her husband-

we haven't heard a peep out of him this whole time. He's like a prop.

And while I don't think she's a "hacker", she's not stupid and she knows her way around a computer. She knows how to impress the right people. How the hell do you get elected to be governor with just a journalism degree?

[stillcool]

6. There's a few stories..

from Alaska about his involvement with the Governor's office.

http://www.andrewhalcro.com/monegan_speaks_says_todd_palin_pressured_him_to_fire_wooten

MONEGAN SPEAKS: Names Todd Palin & others

Tonight on KTUU Channel 2 News, former Commissioner of Public Safety Walt Monegan broke his silence and admitted that he was pressured on numerous occasions by Todd Palin to fire State Trooper Mike Wooten.

Monegan said he met with Palin numerous times to talk about Wooten as well as Frank Bailey from the governor's office and Commissioner of Administration Annete Krietzer who also pressured him to fire Wooten.

http://www.andrewhalcro.com/shadow_governor

Shadow Governor?

Coming Thursday: The Shadow Governor

In the aftermath of the Walt Monegan firing, one question keeps surfacing over and over again; why does the governor's husband, Todd Palin appear to hold so much power?

After all, Nancy Murkowski or Susan Knowles were never accused of pressuring a commissioner or inappropriately sitting in on meetings that should have been private.

The stories started last year when Representative Ralph Samuels told me about going into a meeting, he thought would be private, with Governor Sarah Palin. Much to his surprise, Todd Palin was there and proceeded to sit through the entire meeting.

Other lawmakers have shared similar stories and were shocked at how inappropriate Todd's presence was at meetings with the governor. Yesterday on the Dan Fagan Show, Representative Jay Ramras mentioned that Todd was working lawmakers offices during the ACES debate.

But more importantly, Todd's fingerprints on trying to impact personnel decisions appear to go beyond the current scandal revolving around State Trooper Mike Wooten.

http://community.adn.com/node/127769

Todd Palin's role

Posted by Alaska_Politics

Posted: July 25, 2008 - 8:06 pm

From Sean Cockerham in Anchorage --

[CitizenPatriot]

7. is that legal?

did they have a search warrant? that sounds a lot like what she did by exposing her ex brother in law's confidential human resources file to her minions to stir up trouble and try to get him fired on innuendo and rumor.

If it is legal, is it ethical?