Anonymous attacks, claims follow Palin home (Palin reprimanded for calling Rush)

Anchorage Daily News ^

[mathwhizz]

Stapleton said some campaign staff members controlled Palin too tightly, keeping her from the press and admonishing her when she made calls to radio hosts Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and others.

"Instead of just letting her be who she wanted to be they still felt this need to control. ...There were a few times where she actually did sneak in phone calls and was reprimanded for picking up the phone and placing a few calls on her own," Stapleton said.

"She felt that she really did want to go out and speak and get out there more. One of them was to (the Daily News). There were a number of times where she reached out and really wanted to speak and she was told she needed to follow the script and she needed to follow what they wanted her to do and that wasn't in the plan."

Stapleton said Palin called the staff of Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly. But the campaign got wind of it and told her O'Reilly had canceled the interview, which wasn't true.

Randy Scheunemann, McCain's foreign policy aide, contacted the Daily News at Stapleton's request Thursday and defended the governor. He praised Palin and said anonymous attacks from other staffers are "disappointing and dishonorable."

"It's really amazing, I think it's unprecedented in terms of presidential politics to have this level of vindictiveness and pettiness. It's like these people fell out of favor with a middle school 14-year-old girls' clique. It's really unbelievable," Scheunemann said.

[papersonusa]

Exactly. Until the cowards come forward, ALL the McCain campaign staffers are suspect. To paraphrase Sarah, these staffers are pallin’ around with petty, small people.