Presidential candidates usually have to wait until they’re elected to start obstructing investigations into their own wrong-doing. But ready on day one as he is, John McCain and Sarah Palin are getting a jump on this front too. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen an instance of a president, let alone a presidential candidate, quite this nakedly doing everything in his power to shutdown an investigation. And look closely — Palin herself has at this point entirely turned the obstruction over to the McCain campaign. They’re even the ones who make the announcements. (I won’t get into the battery of lawyers plumbers up in Alaska getting all the small fry to clam up and digging up dirt on all Palin’s accusers.)

Meanwhile, the claim that the Obama camp has ‘tainted’ the trooper-gate investigation is truly risible. This investigation was well underway and already looking bad for Palin and her husband well before John McCain picked her as his running mate. (We know: we were already covering it.) What I do not think that many people know is that this investigation up in Alaska has actually been authorized and is being run by Republicans. They make up a majority in the state senate. The committee member overseeing the investigation happens to be a Democrat. But at any moment of their choosing, they could pull him off the case, overrule his decisions, or shut the investigation down entirely.

Palin’s response to this — to the question of how Obama could have tainted the investigation which is under the control of Alaska Republicans — is to claim that there are actually a lot of Republicans in Alaska who oppose her. And that’s true. But observing that a sizable number of officeholders of your own party think you’re probably a crook too does not amount to an affirmative defense. Really, it doesn’t.

The fall back defense, when claims about Obama’s ‘taint’ fall flat, is that Palin’s someone who ‘shakes things up’. That’s what she’s done in Alaska and that’s what she’s going to do in Washington.

But a pattern of crony hiring and politicized firings of public officials all followed up by stonewalling and obstruction of justice really would not amount to ‘shaking things up’ in Washington. After eight years of President Bush, that’s more like steady as she goes.