I said to keep an eye on this story, and I think it's about to become one. This is the first really well written assembly of the case against Sarah Palin's story.

Click the link, long story, excerpt below.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/ta ... new-an.php

I think they meant "heart attack away from the presidency."

What about the 36:1 odds that the Kos was using to refute it's own piece this weekend? I didn't look too deeply into it but wouldn't the mainstream media have already broken the story by now if any of it was remotely true? Sure they're stupid but not enough to make a few phone calls to local hospitals and whatnot.

Wasn't that said about the Edwards story?

This situation is entirely different as it involved a very public pregnancy of an acting female governor, not a senator's mistress on the side that was obviously never meant to be made public. For so long most of the left has prided itself on not stooping to the levels of their far right-wing counterparts in turning highly personal and subjective issues into political strategy against their opponents (think McCain's adopted daughter, the swiftboat attacks, the radical Muslim accusations).

Now that progressives finally have an upper-hand in the country politically speaking, is this a story that's really worth digging into, even if done with honest intentions? Because what's involved is the first GOP female candidate for VP and her family which includes a 16 year-old daughter and a child with Down Syndrome. I'd honestly love to hear more about all this but somebody is going to have to do the dirty work here.

Sarah Palin Baby Story Ender
by The Red Pen
Sun Aug 31, 2008 at 08:50:00 PM PDT



OK, there is a visibly-pregnant Sarah Palin talking with a CBS 11 (Dallas Juneau) reporter at the Governor's meeting in Texas end of the Alaska legislative session. She clearly appears to be pregnant.

Unless someone has counter evidence, we can drop this crap now. Yes, there are still some interesting questions, such as why she flew to Dallas and back when she was this pregnant, and why the Alaska Airlines crewmembers insisted that she was not visibly pregnant on the flight. Nevertheless, until this photo is debunked, we look stupid pushing this rumor.

That is all.

UPDATE: I found the photo on Free Republic.
http://www.freerepublic.com/...

It is a photo of a real CBS 11 Reporter (I watch CBS 11 news.)

Yes, it may be a fake pregnancy suit, but we have no evidence of that, other than self-serving testimony of Alaska Airlines crew claiming that they had no idea Palin was pregnant (if they'd had any idea, they should have kept her off the flight).

UPDATE 3: Looking into this further, this is not CBS 11 in Dallas, but CBS 11 in Anchorage. This is possibly KTVA reporter Laura Oates. The photo was supposedly taken at the end of the Alaska legislative session, which is in late Spring. Thus, this isn't the famous day of the flight.

UPDATE 4: Thanks for the rec list! I just wish this had been a better-prepared diary. I found this photo while lurking on Free Republic and I wanted to get it up here ASAP.

UPDATE 5: It's past my bedtime, but I'd like to add one more statement:

Yeah, I found this image on Free Republic. I looked for it there. Why? Because the Freepers desperately want this rumor to be false, so if there was any counter-evidence, they'd find it and post it because they were looking for it.

This seemed like pretty substantial counter-evidence, so I posted it here.

Flogging this rumor in light of what seems to be pretty solid counter-evidence is just squandering whatever credibility we have. In the words of Janor Hypercleats, "They's laughin' at you, boy." There is so much more that we could be highlighting regarding Palin; we don't want that to be tarred with "from the same people who smeared Palin's teenage daughter..."

G'night.

UPDATE 2: I'd just like to say that I thought this diary would help. Poll added (answer "Yes" if you think it's helping — sorry for the 'or' question.)

I have just seen bits and pieces of this...

So there is speculation that the GOP VP nom is lying saying that her Grandson is actually her son to protect her (then) 16 year old daughter?

If this is true, why does it matter exactly. Lying to protect your child is totally acceptable.

Only until universal health care becomes reality, in which case it will become perfectly acceptable for the government to dictate what a man or a woman does with his or her body.

I was going to link PD's post, but it disappeared when I wrote that. This is what I meant:



"From what I can make out from this abortion of a sentence, my reaction would be that I thought a woman had a right to do whatever they want with their body.

"

Now my conclusion is, only when it's politically expedient.

Leave it to the liberal blogging community to find a way to drum up support for some two-bit creationist nutjob by posting blowups of her daughter's pot belly. Nice.

It's kind of sad that the left has so little confidence in Obama/Biden that they feel they need to stoop to this level.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008 ... egnant/?hp

Well, if the daughter wasn't pregnant before, she is now. According to the article, the daughter is five months along, McCain knew about it beforehand, and the campaign plans this: "The campaign intends to cast this as the kind of situation that ordinary American families face."

Wait, are you serious?

40 million people watching a DNC convention speech, millions of new registered voters, a rival party in utter decline, you'd have to be woefully misinformed and desperate to make such an accusation. It's simply groundless, saying bullshit for the sake of saying bullshit.

Way to announce this on a day when it will get zero media coverage.

This race is like some weird soap opera.

OMG this woman is going to go down as the worst VP selection in the modern age. Her 17 year old daughter is pregnant? hahahahaha

I don't want an "ordinary" American as my Vice President. I don't even like ordinary Americans serving me french fries.

John McCain is a fucking moron.