As Zachary Roth points out at TPMmuckraker, the McCain campaign has largely succeeded in its mission to shut down the Trooper-Gate investigation into Sarah Palin until after the election.

The legislative investigator still plans on issuing his report in October into whether Palin abused her power as governor, but with Palin and the McCain camp refusing to comply with his subpoenas of key witnesses, his report will be incomplete at best.

If there's one lesson to be drawn from the Bush years, it's that the old chestnut about the cover up being worse than the crime is just not true. It's a lesson the McCain camp has learned well. They made the calculation that whatever political price would be paid by impeding the duly authorized investigation of the Alaska legislature would be less than the political damage resulting from a full investigation. So far, it looks like they calculated correctly.