Palin's ex-friend she fired and trashed in "Going Rogue" will run her Alaska rival's Senate campaign

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Monday, Jan 18, 2010 20:20 EST
Sarah Palin unites her enemies
The ex-friend she fired and trashed in "Going Rogue" will run her Alaska rival's Senate campaign

By Shushannah Walshe



Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin at a book signing, left. U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, right.

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/sarah_palin/index.html?story=/news/feature/2010/01/18/palin_murkowski

John Bitney, chief architect of Sarah Palin’s 2006 victory over Alaska Gov. Frank Murkowski, will start as the campaign manager for Palin rival Sen. Lisa Murkowski in April, Salon has learned.

Sources with knowledge of the negotiations confirmed the hire but wanted to remain anonymous because the move hasn't been officially announced by Murkowski’s office.

Bitney was a close Palin confidant and one-time high school band mate. He is the political operative widely credited for turning the small-town mayor with a talent for retail politicking into a credible candidate for governor. Bitney would go on to be Palin’s legislative director before their relationship soured, badly. Bitney is well regarded in Alaska and Murkowski no doubt chose him for his skills, not merely to tweak Palin. Still, their alliance is just one more example of how former friends burned by Palin could cause trouble if she decides to seek the Republican nomination for president in 2012.

In 2007, Palin heaped praise on Bitney for the work he did as her legislative director during her successful first year-and-a-half in office, declaring at a post-legislative press conference, “Whatever you did, you did right.”

But their relationship quickly soured when she discovered that Bitney was having an affair with the wife of a family friend -- a woman he would go onto marry -- and Palin ordered her chief of staff to fire Bitney. He only learned of his dismissal when his state-issued BlackBerry, key card and e-mail account stopped working.

In her memoir, "Going Rogue," Palin refuses to even use Bitney’s name, instead referring to him as a "BlackBerry games addict who couldn’t seem to keep his lunch off his tie."

[peace frog]

1. "How to lose friends and alienate people"

Palin is the master.

[SpiralHawk]

2. Up in the Air

She got somebodyelse to fire him, and do it via Blackberry. How gutless. Just like George Clooney's new film, "Up in the Air."

Typical republicon. No honor, no dignitude.