How We Found Out.

I am not a fan of Dave Weigel as a rule, but THIS was certainly worth sharing.

You can read more here.

More tidbits from "The Rogue."

Here are a few of the juicier portions courtesy of Joe McGinniss interview on Slate.com:

The juiciest quotes and stories in The Rogue come from anonymous sources, but McGinniss says he nixed "90 percent of the anecdotes I heard," sticking to the ones he could confirm. 

McGinniss reports that the Palins told the original owner (Of the house that Joe rented) that they were going to cut a path through her property. "Todd told her, very plainly, that Sarah was mayor and they could do whatever they wanted, and it would be a mistake for her to try and stop them." The Palins even put up a fence with the ugly back side facing the neighbor's house. 

One friend recalls that Sarah wasn't much in the kitchen when she married Todd. "She can't cook shit. She couldn't do grilled cheese. She'd burn water." John Bitney, the husband of a woman who took care of Palin's kids, notes that when Todd was out, "I'd walk into that kitchen and Bristol and Willow would be sitting there with a burnt pot of Kraft Mac and cheese on the stove and they'd be trying to open one of those Ramen noodle packs, and Sarah would be up in her bedroom with the door closed saying she didn't want to be disturbed." 

On the governor's own diet: "One day she came in with Oreos, bread, bags of fast food, and she ate everything and then disappeared and came out of the bathroom later with blurry eyes, her hair up, and her knuckles red." 

Another friend says that Track Palin joined the army on the advice of his father: "You're gonna do this because you owe us. This is gonna look good for us and you're gonna do it." The state trooper who drove Track and Sarah to the enlistment office tells McGinniss that "there was quite a lot of emotion in the back seat of that car, but patriotism was not one of the emotions." (Joe also confirms Mercede's version of Track's enrollment as having been done to get him out of the way while Sarah was the Governor of Alaska.)

In high school, a classmate claims, Palin liked to sleep in the nude, because "she said it wasn't healthy for girls to sleep with clothes on." Later on, Palin's rivals in her first mayoral race claim she spread rumors of them acting luridly in a step-aerobics class, telling the instructor that she felt uncomfortable because they were "ogling her butt." 

I will also report a little tidbit from MY reading concerning Sarah and Todd's sex life, which just as Levi reported two years ago, is virtually non-existent. Joe also includes a quote that I have heard attributed to Todd numerous times of "Well I know I had sex at least four times, because I have four kids."

And that was BEFORE Sarah's "pregnancy" with Trig.

I have paged ahead a little to see what awaits me, and though Joe does not DEFINITIVELY state that Palin faked her pregnancy, he gives the bizarre circumstances surrounding the "delivery" at Mat-Su Hospital and the fact that people close to her have serious doubts, PLENTY of space in the book.

In other words there is no way this will NOT keep coming up as a topic of discussion on talk shows and during interviews.

Let me close this post out by offering up today's Doonesbury comic.

And by also providing a link to the Mike Tyson interview about Palin and Glen Rice that everyone is discussing. But let me warn you that THIS is quite raunchy! So if you have any doubts about not being offended, DO NOT click the link!

In case I have been too vague in the past let me just say definitely that YES you need to buy and read this book!

McGinniss is a very gifted writer, and even if this were NOT about Sarah Palin it would still be a fascinating book to read. But since it IS about her, that just makes it all the more satisfying.

Andrew Sullivan addresses Weigel's assertion that he called the Mat-Su Regional Medical Center.

From the Daily Beast:

The Dish did call Mat-Su Hospital in 2008 and were told that Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) privacy rules prevent them from talking about individual patients. But we confirmed, like Wiegel, that the list of newborns is voluntary.

I will confirm that I ALSO called the hospital, at least twice, and was told that because of HIPAA they simply could not answer any questions about their patients without the express permission of said patient. In fact I was quickly adding it up in my head and can confirm that over a dozen bloggers, journalists, and authors have made similar requests, and that ALL of them were told what Sullivan and I were told.

So the fact that Weigel received an actual answer is, to say the least, shocking. Either he has mad journalistic skills or......

Andrew also mentioned the amount of research he did concerning the "wild ride."

We also interviewed ten OB/GYNs to check whether the story Palin tells, of her water breaking in Texas and flying back to Alaska, was plausible. None would say it was impossible, but all of them agreed that Palin should have gone to the hospital in Texas and that a woman getting on a plane after her water breaks is extremely dangerous. Neither Dave nor Salon really want to touch the wild ride, for good reasons. Because any sane person would immediately ask questions.

I can also confirm that I have spoken to about four or five doctors specifically about this as well.  Hmm I wonder how many Weigel has interviewed on this topic? 

Let's face it Wiegel's incredibly lazy brand of "journalism" simply cannot measure up to the hours of research, number of interviews, and incredible dedication that many of us who have been focused on this story have dedicated to it in these last three plus years.

So for him to strut around as if he has miraculously repudiated the idea of Sarah Palin faking her last pregnancy with a mere phone call to Wasilla makes him look like a idiot and a phony.

BTW speaking of interviewing doctors, Laura Novak has her second interview with a pediatric specialist up on her blog.  Go take a look and see if it makes Sarah Palin's version of Trig' birth any more likely.

Dave Weigel calls the Mat-Su Hospital. Does this really answer anything? Update!

Dave Weigel, who famously went WAY out of his way to discredit Andrew Sullivan on his own blog, decided to call the Mat-Su hospital and ask if Trig Palin was born there:

The clerk, realizing that Washington, D.C. reporters don't typically cold call her hospital, asked me if this call was about "our former governor." It was. Was Trig Palin born there?

"Oh, that's not even a question," she said. (If my reception was better I could have heard her eyes rolling at this point.) "Yes. Everybody here remembers that. Yes, this is where the Palins come -- this is their family hospital."

Well that is more than most journalists have been able to get out of the Mat-Su Hospital, who usually has taken the "We don't discuss our patients with the media" approach to these questions.  If indeed they are willing to go on the record now, that is a good thing.

But having said that who accepts "Yes. Everybody here remembers that. Yes, this is where the Palins come -- this is their family hospital." as an answer to the question that Weigel posed?  Was there somebody in the building who was there the day that the Governor gave birth? Why didn't Weigel wait to write his story after he talked to somebody with more information than this clerk? Or did he try, and nobody else would respond?

And while we are on the subject how does Weigel, or anybody, explain why CBJ, who was once a very approachable fixture in Wasilla, is now essentially channeling Greta Garbo? Here is what Phil Munger, the only Alaskan blogger who knows Johnston, recently wrote about this bizarre situation:

CBJ, as she was often called locally, was a very public fixture around Wasilla up to the time of Trig's birth. Our daughter attended ballet with one of CBJ's kids for years, and I often saw CBJ somewhere or another around Wasilla or Anchorage at least once a week for well over a decade. Between the time of Trig's birth - early 2008 - and the issuance of the election eve letter purported to be from her, CBJ was far less evident. Since the letter was issued, CBJ has been unavailable to comment on it or on any other matter related to Trig and Sarah Palin.

(And Phil if you read this feel free to chime in.)

I have developed very little confidence in Weigel's journalistic abilities ever since he misquoted Shannyn Moore, and used that as the basis for attacking Sullivan on the babygate issue. (BTW neither Moore, nor Weigel, has ever publicly corrected that story, which still burns my ass.)

This article also makes mention of strange policy decision which took place at Mat-Su Hospital:

One of the original concerns Sullivan had with the Trig Palin story -- one that's based on an absent fact, and not on innuendo -- was that Mat-Su Regional did not list Trig Palin's birth on its website. There's a portion of the web site, the baby nursery, where newborns are listed. Trig, born on April 18, 2008, is not there. And that's somewhat curious. So: Is every baby born at the hospital listed on the web site?

"No, it's not automatic," said the clerk. "Truth be told, we do take security photos of all the babies, but if the parents want their babies listed on the web site, they can request it. We're really sensitive about it, though. I think the hospital took up the policy not to publish names automatically because of possible baby kidnapping issues."

I would like to point out that Mat-Su made this decision AFTER the birth of Tripp Johnston, and that it remains the ONLY hospital in Alaska to make this strange, and unnecessary, choice. Oh and by the way, there has NEVER been a baby kidnapped from the Mat-Su Hospital.

The fact that something stinks in Wasilla about this birth, should be a scent that even a pathetic excuse for a journalist like Dave Weigel should have the ability to sniff out.

Update: Phil Munger is clearly no fan of Dave Weigel either. Make sure to read what Phil says about the Mat-Su Regional Medical Center and how unlikely that it was the Palin "family hospital."

(BTW, and completely off topic, for those who are having trouble leaving comments, I do know about it and have contacted Google.  Other bloggers are having similar difficulties and have complained, so I hope it will be rectified soon.  Until then your best bet is to use a Google account. Apparently THOSE are getting through just fine.  Thank you for your patience.)

Andrew Sullivan is back and wastes little time in deconstructing Dave Weigel's ridiculous post supporting the idea that Sarah Palin DID give birth to Trig.

From the Daily Dish:
I love Dave Weigel and enjoyed all his posts in my absence and was delighted he took on the Trig question. The aim of the Dish has been to air this debate on all sides in order to get as close as we can to the readily available evidence Sarah Palin insists on keeping from us. Sadly, Dave's posts seemed to me to add nothing empirical to the debate - except an insight into those whose minds are simply closed.

Please do take the time to read ALL of Andrew's post. It does not beat around the bush before debunking the ridiculous argument and completely eviscerating Dave Weigel, as well it should.

It is kind of funny that today is the day that Andrew came back and addressed this because just now as I was driving home from the gym I was pondering the Dave Weigel post myself.

I was very troubled about it the moment that it came out, however since I was busy doing other projects I did not get to take it on myself, instead leaving that job up to the more than capable Litbrit.

But the one thing that really stuck in my craw about the piece, and trust me I choked on a lot of it initially, was the title, "Believing Sarah Palin."

You know personally I am not much of a believer. I am more of a thinker. Somebody who analyzes something from all angles before assigning a definition to it.

The idea that I would CHOOSE to believe something simply because it is convenient, or because everybody else believes it, or perhaps just to fit in, is completely alien to my way of thinking. I simply cannot do that.

I suppose the thing about Weigel's title that I could not digest was the idea that he was essentially declaring his intention to "believe" Sarah Palin rather than to keep an open mind to the possibility that someday new information might be revealed that either proved she DID give birth to Trig, or proved she did NOT.

Isn't that what a REAL journalist would do? I mean despite what you might personally find the most palatable, or the most audience friendly, isn't the truth what all journalists are constantly in search of? How can you find any truth, if you have decided what it is before there is evidence to support it?

Especially when you are dealing with a person who is now famous for her lack of honesty and constant use of misinformation? After all, Geoffrey Dunn's book is called "The Lies of Sarah Palin: The Untold Story Behind her Relentless Quest for Power", not exactly a title that is chosen for a book about a person famous for truth telling, now is it?

By the way Dave Weigel also offered a follow up to his pro-Palin post in which he claims that there were many "who told me that Alaskans were well aware of Palin's pregnancy", and he goes on to cite an Alaskan blogger who also confirmed this to him.

My policy is to NEVER question the accuracy of a statement made by one of my friends. However I have interviewed dozens and dozens of people who knew or worked with Sarah Palin, and not ONE of them said they knew she was pregnant until she made her announcement on March 7, 2008. In her book "Going Rogue" Palin says she did not even tell her family until right before she announced it to the media. However I have it on good authority that the first time her family heard about it was AFTER it was announced to the media.

So if even her own family was unaware that she was pregnant, then WHO were these "Alaskans" that "were well aware of Palin's pregnancy?"