What leads to this seemingly illogical statement? In short, how birth certificates are handled in the face of an adoption. I have researched this with the help of an associate who has interviewed an Alaskan attorney who handles adoptions. The path to adoption - and the paperwork involved - is as follows. This outlines what would happen in the case of a closed, private adoption, with the parents and birth mother knowing each other prior to the birth, and making some of the arrangements before the baby is born.
1. A baby is born. An attendant at the birth (can be any facility staff person, not necessarily the doctor) files a “Report of Live Birth.” The birth mom fills out the form with her name and the name of the father. Other info includes the name of the facility and the name of the doctor, if there is one. This document is confidential. In the case of a subsequent adoption, only parties to the adoption ever see this, like the parents (birth and adoptive) and their attorneys. This report is saved for 100 years but it is impossible to get because it is confidential. The adoptive parents would take the baby home from the hospital.
2. There is a hearing within a week or two. This proceeding is confidential.
3. A decree of adoption is issued. Once again, this is a confidential document.
4. A birth certificate with the child’s new name and adoptive parents’ names is issued by the state. You cannot tell by looking at that birth certificate that the child has been adopted so even if it is released, it would be of little value. The birth certificate contains ONLY the following information: the child's (new) name, the adoptive parents' names, the date, and place (city and state) of his birth. Here's an example of an "heirloom" birth certificate you can order for an Alaska birth. It's more decorative than a regular one, but contains all the same info.
Different people born at different times in different places may have other information on their birth certificates. When I was born (long long ago and far far away) the state in which I was born seems to have combined the "birth certificate" and the "report of live birth." My birth certificate contains not only my parents' names, my name, time, place, and date, of course, but the hospital of my birth, my parents' marital status, the number of my mother's previous pregnancies, and the attending doctor's signature as well.
Since the beginning of my investigation into this I have assumed that, if Trig is not Sarah and Todd Palin's biological child, by the time of the campaign, he would have already been long since legally adopted. Therefore, releasing his birth certificate would prove nothing, since it would list his adoptive parents' name, his name, the date, and place of his birth. It would be tell us nothing.
But then I started thinking about this recently. OK, maybe that's true, but then.... why NOT release it? It might not be proof positive for those of us who understand the adoption procedure, but it would have still given the Palins political points. "Look, [eyes rolling] we released the damn birth certificate. They asked for it..." [and many did] "... and we gave it to them. What more can these loonies want?" And those who might have tried to explain about the nuance of adoption law would, at least to many, appear as if they were again splitting hairs. I'll say it again... the Palins could have gotten a fair amount of mileage out of releasing it.
But they didn't. After numerous calls from multiple sources for many months, they still have not. Why not, when they should have had nothing to lose, and potentially at least something to gain? When the document should contain nothing but the names of Sarah and Todd Palin, and the information that Trig was born on April 18th, 2008 in Palmer, Alaska?
Well, here's one answer. Here's why my original statement was that, while releasing it would not have proved anything conclusively, NOT releasing it may be telling us a lot.
What changes when the child is adopted, from the "Report of Live Birth," to the "Birth Certificate?" The baby's name and the parents' names. That's all. What does not change, CANNOT change? The date and place of the birth.
If the child that we now know as Trig Paxson Van Palin was NOT born in Palmer Alaska on April 18th, 2008, his birth certificate would show us that, no matter who the parents are. Could this be the reason no birth certificate has ever been released? Not because they won't, but because they can't?
754 comments:
1 – 200 of 754 Newer› Newest»Audrey, great post! Exactly the way to go, sticking with the 5 W’s in this investigation: the WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN AND WHY!
Audrey, you have changed your mind, which is allowed, but why?
The suggestion of the birthdate as reason for not releasing the certificate has been around for months. Didn't you comment that we shouldn't speculate on a much earlier birthdate for Trig, in part because someone's labor explained the wild ride? Or have you come to think like Patrick that Palin actually returned from TX as planned and scheduled?
I'm not trying to be snide. As I've said before, you are almost always right. Just curious as to why you are having seecond thoughts now.
Remember in this investigation too, also ; ) walk that mile in their shoes! Meaning all players in the deception, not just SP!
Since the beginning I've thought as Jennifer asks:
"Shouldn't we be more focused on getting the word out to law enforcement officials than the media?"
I could see depositions and a grand jury... Isn't fraud a factor here? Any possibilities with legislators? Corrupt state Gov, law enforcement and the national connections would definently do their best to obstruct. Can Alaskans file a petition to get clear answers? Their fourth estate isn't going to probe. California dumped a Gov pretty much b/c he was dull. Not Sarah's problem, but her mental health prevents her from being an adequate state employee at any level.
The "wild ride" is alarming, to say the least. There are other patterns. And the lack of trust she provokes is astounding for a public servant.
What child protection agency has authority? Wasilla's could be fully corrupted with the area's history of drugs and domestic violence.
CBJ is not talking. I doubt locals would file complaints. Especially, if the area has alot of incest.
I feel there is child neglect and abuse and the evidence can be produced. What would you do if your neighbor was exhibiting similar patterns and you believed their children were harmed? What if a cult or a questionable religion was involved?
I can't believe there is not enough evidence to file complaints. If Wasilla's jurisdiction is corrupt, the complaints should not stop there.
First, the children's well being.
Second, is the alleged hoax by an elected official. Didn't she take a pledge?
Her image should not prevent children from getting their needs met. Sarah has the "great" Gov & VP campaign, American family, churchlady image. Remember the history of child abuse is often from those you'd never suspect.
The pixel probe is worthy and vital to continue. I just see child abuse and neglect as top priority and pursuing legal channels regarding hoax and fraud.
Sarah's DNA test offer is a joke when she wants to play it that way. She can also claim she made the offer.
Sarah Palin really needs that April 18 birthdate for Trig, plus a 2008 birthdate for Tripp, in order for her alibi to work.
***Moderator request***
Would the commenter known as Dede please contact Audrey privately at info@palindeception.com
Thank you.
Thanks for the comment, B. I should clarify... probably should update the post. I doubt very seriously Trig was born "months" earlier. I've never discounted the possibility, however, that he was born earlier by, let's say, a day or so. Even eight hours before the announced birth time would be back on April 17th, at a time when it is documented Gov. Palin was known to be on an airplane.
THANK YOU, Audrey, for addressing this. It was my understanding of the process, but I wasn't certain. It's good to have this cleared up, and to have a lucid explanation to point to when commenters bring it up in the future.
Great post. Hit the nail on the head. As I've said before, just when you think you/we might be wrong and that SP had baby #1, then you think of all the weird things that swirl around this story and you realize that, nah, none of it adds up. None of it!
Has anyone theorized that maybe there were 3 babies? That BP had a baby in the late winter/early spring that she gave up for adoption only to get pregnant the same month her mother had Trig? Would that explain why she seemed so confusingly post-partum/pregnant at the RNC? It would make sense with how adolescent and dysfunctional the entire family appears to be.
Final note: the close-up of Trig in the hospital conference room and SP and TP introducing him, I repeat what someone posted elsewhere: that is NOT a 3-day-old premature baby with bilirubin problems! L.A. in S.F.
lets take her up on her DNA ofer!
Sarah has done several interviews at “her home” where she has brought up the Trig birth rumor.
She could have easily gone to her file cabinet and pulled the birth certificate to show Matt Lauer, Greta or her new buddy Ziegler.
I was actually hoping Lauer had the huevos to ask to see the birth certificate when Sarah mentioned the birth rumor during the interview. All he had to say... “Todd could you get the birth certificate, and I will tell all the viewers it shows you and Sarah as Trig’s parents”
Greta and Zieler were too busy licking feet to ask.
She chose not to produce it for whatever reason. I agree, not showing it tells a lot.
I agree - that if SP had a legit birth certificate to show, she would. I think it is possible that she still hasn't officially adopted Trig, because confidentiality aside, it still requires more people to know the truth, something she is trying to avoid. Maybe that is why she went mental about Bristol being called a dropout - because she needs to make sure that the insurance coverage stays in place for her dependent of a dependent?? Otherwise, I think it is as speculated - the date is incorrect...
OR BOTH!!
BluTx asks: "What would it take to put this to rest?"
To turn your question on its head, if you were Sarah Palin, to what lengths would you go to put this question to rest and silence the blogs? If a growing number of people were questioning whether you were your child's mother and you knew it was true because you had a valid birth certificate with the birthdate matching the date you gave the press, medical records proving the birth took place, ultrasound pictures and photos of you in the hospital bed holding said baby just after the birth would you be willing to release those things?
I can tell you right now what I'd do. I'd throw all that stuff in a packet, take it to the press and tell the bloggers and doubters to go fuck themselves.
HOWEVER, I *could* do that because I am my kids' mom and have proof.
Can Sarah do that? Does the have the proof? If she does, why isn't she releasing it? That's the question.
BlueTX, I have answered this question numerous times before. Had Cathy Baldwin Johnson, accompanied by Norm Stephens, CEO of Mat-Su Regional Hospital,jointly given a news conference on 9/1 and stated that she personally delivered Trig Palin on April 18th 2008 at Mat-Su Hospital and that Sarah Heath Palin is his biological mother, none of us would be here now.
If this news conference happened now, while I might still always harbor secret misgivings about some of the photo evidence that I believe to be compelling or the Wild Ride which I will never believe fully, I would drop the issue.
BlueTx asked: What would it take to put this to rest?
Even if Audrey took down this site it wouldn't stop me from knowing that Palin faked a pregnancy. I looked at pictures of Palin when she was supposed to be about 7 or 8 months pregnant and she wasn't. Therefore the only thing that would do it for me is some kind of proof that the pictures were dated at a different time when she wasn't pregnant. I'm very confident that Palin is not going to get away with this and so it doesn't matter whether it's proven on this site or not.
On a positive note, Palin's deception could cause her to not run for another political office outside of Alaska because she must know that an election campaign's involvement with her shortcomings will do her in. Time is not on her side.
I think it is possible that Trig was born a day or two earlier than April 18, but SP wanted to go to Texas for her speech so she couldn't claim Trig yet. If the birth was private, they might have planned to keep it secret until she returned from Texas.
But it is on record that Trig had mild jaundice problems, which may have required a trip to the hospital, so Sarah had to claim him as soon as possible, even though she was in Texas. That might explain the hole-ridden story to explain Trig's arrival on April 18. This is speculation, but we must try to explain these three facts concurrently:
1) Why SP's labor and delivery story is so weak;
2) Why she had to rush back to Alaska;
3) Why Trig showed up on April 18.
One explanation is that it's the truth, but there are so many inconsistencies that truth seems an implausible explanation.
I also want to point out a HUGE inconsistency that hasn't received enough attention IMO: SP said that her labor was calming down to explain why she decided to give her speech and fly back to Alaska without seeking a medical exam. Then she bypasses opportunities for an emergency exam in Anchorage to drive to Palmer. Yet, what is the first thing she does? GO TO A HOSPITAL!!
Either it was an emergency or it wasn't. Other statements she made indicated that things were somewhat urgent, but others that they weren't. Which was it? Her immediate trip to the hospital speaks louder than her words, indicating it was urgent. But if not for medical reasons -- to explain not seeking treatment in Texas or Seattle or Anchorage -- what other urgent reason would there be for her to go to the hospital?
This is why SP would not last five minutes under cross-examination. If anyone wishes to try to answer these kinds of questions for her, I'd love to put them to you. Until then, our doubters can put up or shut up.
Dangerous
Audrey,
That would be enough proof for me. And I agree, the photos are still a conundrum even with a press conference with the individuals you've mentioned but I would be satisfied.
Of course then the story of the wild ride would take on new importance for Palin's future political aspirations as it would clearly demonstrate a reckless abandon of the saftey of her unborn child. Do we REALLY want someone with the finger on the button acting on that kind of logic?
Regardless of the final outcome of this story, Palin's credibility, her promises of transparency and her ongoing behavior spell an end to her political career...as long as those of us who have followed her meteoric rise make sure the rest of the nation doesnt forget when 2012 rolls around!
BlueTx, Since the site is Audrey's and hers alone, obviously that decision is up to her.
As for those who come here regularly? A clear, unequivocal statement from the doctor and hospital personnel would satisfy some. Others would also require: 1) a birth certificate, because while this would not clarify the issue of the parents, it would settle doubts about the birth date; 2) real medical records; 3) Bristol with Tripp and his dated birth certificate; 4) the restoration of all the photographs yanked from the State of Alaska's website.
Without that evidence, I suspect the more heavily involved bloggers here would simply spin off and create their own websites, so that instead of two sites, Sarah would have a dozen or so--and I doubt they would be as civil or restrained as Audrey's has been.
Wow Dangerous, I hadn't thought of that til you mentioned it. She states that things were calming down.....why did she go to the hospital at the end of her wild ride instead of going home?
If there is to be a cross examination I nominate you to the position.
Whereas medical insurance records are private, I'm wondering about the Federal tax returns Todd and Sarah will have to file for 2008. They may delay these for a while, and they will be complicated by all the gifting, but aren't public officials usually required to publish these? Dependents have to be identified in some manner if deductions are taken. Would listing a grandchild as child constitute perjury?
What would a tax court require for proof of parentage?
sandra in oregon
Blue, Tx -
Are you taking an informal survey for SP so she can decide her next step?
BlueTx-I'm with Audrey. If SP & CBJ both make the precise, declarative statement below, I will certainly accept them at their word.
"I SP gave birth to my son, Trig Palin, on 4/18/08 at Mat Su Regional Medical Center with CBJ in attendance along with the following named, licensed MatSu staff members: names."
"I CBJ confirm that I was present as the attending physician to SP as she gave birth to her son Trig Palin on 4/18/08 at Mat Su Regional Medical Center. Other Mat Su staff members present were:
names"
The statement would need to contain the date, place and precise statement that SP gave birth to Trig Palin and CBJ was present and attended SP.
Seems so simple, I hope she can do that for her son at least.
Well-reasoned post, Audrey, as always. Many thoughtful comments about how SP could put this all to rest by the rest of you. I'm assured by your thoughtful voices--since I'm not calm about Palin nor reasoned. (I'm glad to be the resident tin-hatted nutjob conspiracy chaser.)
BluTx,
Audrey generally doesn't comment on the blog. If you'd like an answer to your question directly from her, you can email her at info@palindeception.com
Unless, of course, you are concerned about emailing from your true location...
I do find it curious that you put a question to everyone (your words). I assume you were addressing not just to Audrey but to those of us who are either readers or (like me) personally involved in this blog. And yet seem to ignore our answers.
You seem quite upset, and desperate for this to all go away. Why so rattled, dear?
Might I suggest a nice cup of tea? That always calms me down
BlueTx,
Audrey DID answer your question, and very succinctly and clearly.
Press conference with the CEO of the hospital & CBJ stating unequivocally that SHP gave birth to Trig on April 18 @ MatSu hospital.
Given that Palin demanded her mayoral opponent make his marriage license public(since his wife went by her maiden name) in her first mayoral campaign, why should asking her to produce a birth certificate, or other proof of biological maternity be seen as so out of line?
In this whole charade it has always been amazing to how much is NOT available.
Here is what isn't available:
1. Birth Certificate or any certified proof of birth of Trig Palin
2. Any eyewitnesses to the birth of Trigg or even an eyewitness to seeing Palin in the hospital getting ready to give birth.
3. Any pictures of Bristol at all from 1/2008 through Trig's (alleged) birthdate. (I realize there is a report she attended a AHA luncheon in February but no pictures of the event exist as far I have seen.)
4. Pictures of the happy family right after the birth. (Don't we all have that picture? Mom in bed looking tired, brand-new baby looking red and wrinkled and Dad looking shell-shocked - but everyone looking very happy!)
5 Pictures of Tripp
6 Any pictures at all that show Sarah Palin, the governor of the largest state in the Union, looking like every other pregnant woman in the world from 6 months out (except for the Gusty & the 3A's pics).
7. A doctor willing to stand up in front of the world and say, 'I delivered that baby and I can attest that Sarah Palin gave birth to Trig Palin."
What do we have?
1. Sarah Palin’s word.
2. A cryptic, carefully worded ambiguous statement from a doctor who no one has ever seen or heard speak publically about the matter
3. A serious of pictures that show the strangest looking pregnant woman any of us have ever seen in our lives who went from no belly to huge belly in less than three weeks.
I don’t think the question is why we thinking Sarah Palin in lying. The real question is why does anyone think she is telling the truth?
So that we don't leave questions put to us unanswered -- so that our doubters will be obliged to do the same -- many of us have stated again and again that release of medical records for her pre-natal care and/or hospital intake would be more than sufficient for us to accept that Trig is SP's biological son.
We don't need the gory medical details so they can redact (black out) anything to do with medical information. All we would want to see are the headers and enough to know that the visits were for the purpose of pre-natal care or delivery for Sarah Palin.
But then I and the rest of us would have to conclude that SP is one of the most reckless pregnant women in history, and willingly endangered her life and the life of her unborn child just so she could give a speech and give birth in her favorite place.
No wonder this investigation continues despite the missteps, insults and stonewalling.
Dangerous
P.S. Those seeking my analytical brief can contact Audrey, who has a draft version I'll clean up when I have more time. I do have a job and a life.
Blue TX--
Audrey DID answer you. She wrote:
If this news conference happened now, while I might still always harbor secret misgivings about some of the photo evidence that I believe to be compelling or the Wild Ride which I will never believe fully, I would drop the issue.
I think most of us would have to accept a clear official statement confirming that Trig was born at Mat-Su (as claimed) and that Cathy-Baldwin-J delivered (as implied).
Since Palin's church controls the hospital and since CBJ's reputation is being degraded by this issue-- surely someone could arrange this even if it's not true.
BlueTx -
I'm sorry that I misunderstood your question. At this point, I can't think of what Gov. Palin could give me that would convince me to drop it.
Maybe if she came to my house and breastfed Trig in front of me?
If I saw that I would drop this in a heartbeat.
A
Blue-TX - Why do you care? Why do you want the blog to come down? We can write about and post whatever we choose (as long as Audrey is willing to host us). Welcome to the internet. If you don't like what we're saying, don't read it.
First amendment rights. We can say whatever we want about political figures. But this blog has demonstrated a professional, civil tone looking at hard evidence.
Audrey, is it possible that a midwife delivered Trig at home? Could there be no record of his birth at all?
I believe that Patrick pointed us to a link that showed Palin on the board of the hospital. Have we discovered anything else about that?
Keep up the great work. The Palin camp is getting scared. It's almost been a month with no pictures or sightings of Tripp. Not that it matters, but Tripp was her "proof" that she had to be Trig's mom.
Why does Blue Tx want the owners "to take down this site"?
Hmmm......I know that if I wasn't personally invested in a "nutty" cause such as BlueTx believes this one to be, I would simply quit reading the blog. End of story. I certainly wouldn't post on it multiple times a day, trying to poll members on what it would take to shut it down.
Audrey - I misunderstood your response to BlueTx I guess? It read like you said if such news conference happened now, you would drop the issue even if you harbored your own misgivings.
If the Governor of Alaska and her physician attest to the birth then I wouldn't question their word and I'd certainly wish her well. It is the right thing to do, whether one would vote for SP or not.
It is up to SP to gratefully and publicly state that she is Trig Palin's birth mother. Heck, shout it from the nearest rooftop-it's good news! It is up to her to request CBJ confirm that. Perhaps then SP can take joy in her beautiful boy. I hope she'll not waste another moment by diminishing her son or taking her blessings for granted.
Wow that is the easiest adoption I have heard. I use to work at an adoption agency in So Cal.
It took at least a year maybe a little less if you were lucky.
The parents adopting and kids had to be checked out by social services. Their house baby proofed, physical exams, mental evaluations, all records reviewed financial....The last thing before an adoption is final in california or anywhere I believe is you have to appear in front of a judge to make it final. A judge not a lawyer has to make it offical!
BlueTx: You have hit the nail on the head. Yes, many of us want Sarah Palin's polital career to be derailed b/c she has proven herself to be a deceitful, unethical person whom I never want governing me.
Blue Tx said you are accusing a public figure of some serious wrong doing?
Blue tx why DID Sarah and DOES sarah get to accuse public figures of wrong doing (like Obama in the campaign) and NO ONE ELSE DOES?
We have every right to make sure our public servants are ACCOUNTABLE for their actions. sarah has proven more than once, twice 10 times that she is NOT accountable for her actions.
BlueTx says:
"You are accusing a public figure of some serious wrongdoing IMO, its not like your discussing recipes. So if you get those answers you demand, I wanted to know if you would be done with the accusations."
There are no accusations here, BluTx. There are simply questions and questions and more questions to which we're all awaiting answers.
So what will happen if we finally get the answers? Well, obviously the question will go away and it will be up to the American people to decide if those answers make them want Sarah Palin to serve as their representative on either the local, state or national level. If laws were broken it will be up to authorities decide how that will be dealt with.
As for the blogosphere, it's hard to imagine that those of us who have found this mystery so fascinating will not find the subsequent fallout to be equally worthy of dissection.
But that will all be secondary to the purpose of this blog, which has been to get the truth out to the American people. At least that's my opinion.
Trig's DOB should be in question.
The election eve medical letter released by the McCain camp states that Trig was born at 35 weeks. Elsewhere, the local news media reported that Trig weighed 6 lbs 2 oz (IIRC) at birth. Yet a typical 35-week fetus weighs significantly less... somewhere around 4 lbs 12 oz according to Pregnancy.About.Com.
Since all of the information we have (except the Gusty/Carpenter photos) indicates that Sarah was not showing very much between March and April, I find it difficult to believe that she had an uncommonly large 35-week baby.
This would certainly seem to indicate that the reported birth date is incorrect, and not by only a day or two... (Note that CBJ does not say what date the 35-week baby was born!)
Since Ms. Gusty did video the baby and his "parents" on April 21 or 22 at Sarah's office (for some time I thought that video was taken at the hospital but it wasn't), we know that the birth had occurred before then. The bundle being carried by the Dud could have been 6 lbs by then -- meaning that an early March or even late February date is much more realistic. In fact, the birth date could be roughly concurrent with Sarah's surprising announcement that she was 7 months pregnant.
In this scenario (which is by no means an accusation, just my own hypothesis), someone close to Sarah had a 35-week Down syndrome baby boy and for whatever reason, she sought to have the child as her own. She pretended to be pregnant and made up story about rushing home to have the baby on 4-18, perhaps thinking it would reinforce her super-mom cred. In the same vein, she also brought this supposed 2-3 day old jaundiced preemie to work with her to say she can work and handle children too.
She cannot release the birth certificate for obvious reasons, even if she is or has gone through the legal adoption routine. Her pretend pregnancy can only be supported by her announcement in March and her pillow-pics in April.
What evidence or information do we have that does not fit in this scenario?
Morgan, can I cross post my last post to this thread as well since others (ennealogic) are looking already in the same direction? Here it is again and you can decide whether to put it here as well.
This thought just occurred to me so I'm going to share it: I think that perhaps Trig could have been born at 28-29 weeks in late February as there is a photo of Palin looking not so healthy on Feb 19 (the one wearing the giant orange scarf where she looks either tired or not well). This was 3 weeks prior to her announcement on 3/6/2008 that she was expecting and was 7.5 months along. Perhaps the pregnancy announcement was ACTUALLY after the birth and she was no longer pregnant. She could have possibly hid a pregnancy through that time period without causing much speculation, with larger clothing, etc. There does seem to be a gap in the photo record of her from late February (the last one I’ve found is February 26 on the photos from the accompanying website)
http://www.palindeception.com/subpages/premarch.html
Then we have another photo pop up at the Iditarod start on March 1:
http://www.palindeception.com/subpages/march.html
That does leave 3 days, Feb 27, Feb 28 and Feb 29 without photo documentation, but that doesn’t mean that she was not at meetings or at work during those days.
The next photo from the March photo archives is March 4 at the Newsweek interview, a lengthy video interview in which she spent the entire time with her legs tightly crossed as most pregnant women could not do at that point in a pregnancy.
This theory would fit in that Trig would have been hospitalized in the NICU in Anchorage and Sarah would have then been free to finish out the remainder of the Legislative session, with her visiting him in hospital on a regular basis. This would also fit in with Palin spending so much time governing from Anchorage, instead of Juneau, so much time that some Legislators wore buttons stating “Where’s Sarah?” Could she have been spending time at her Anchorage office so that she was free to visit Trig at Providence NICU? Remember, Cathy Baldwin-Johnson’s main practice is at Providence in Anchorage, not at Mat-Su Regional.
Perhaps she announced the pregnancy FOLLOWING the birth but kept the birth secret until Trig was ready to leave the hospital in April. She went to Texas as planned and gave her speech and then picked up Trig the weekend of 4/19 and took him to work on Monday 4/21 to show him off to reporters (with the Gusty footage at Sarah's office occurring that day). That could be why she did her speech in Texas and flew home as planned, as no one has been able to find proof that she and Todd changed their plane tickets for the return home to Alaska from Texas. Perhaps the wild ride story was concocted to coincide with not the birth but the time at which Sarah’s political obligations were complete and she was free to announce Trig to the world and take him home.
(I don’t’ believe that a 1.5 to 2 month hospital stay would have been unreasonable for a special needs pre-term infant, especially if there were unknown health issues with him. My friend gave birth to a 28 week baby and he was in the hospital for 5 weeks and that was only due to his small size, no other complications.)
I think perhaps Sarah gave birth unexpectedly in late February and decided not to share that with the public so that she could continue her political agenda throughout the Spring. She then faked appearing pregnant throughout this time while visiting Trig at Providence. She could not afford politically for the child to have been born preterm as she had to continue until the end of the legislative session and complete her other political duties including the energy conference in late April in Texas, as that seems to be the last of the major political events on her agenda. The camouflaging scarves could have been as much to cover her large post partum chest as to cover the “bump”.
She had to complete the legislative session and make other appearances since she knew that she was being considered for the VP nod, thus would not want to spend any time "out of commission" during this period. Plus, she would have known that professionals were caring for Trig at the hospital, and she would not be able to take him home until they gave the “all clear” anyway.
This could explain the "convenient" birth story of Trig being born on 4/18 subsequent to the last pressing public appearance on the gov's schedule for Spring of 2008. Note, I am not privy to her schedule during that time, but it seems that not much was happening except gov. business as usual after 4/18 and the summer is a slow time for state government, so the timing would have been perfect for Trig to come home and for Sarah to begin caring for him and announce his arrival to the world. Could also explain why the baby shower happened after-the-fact, as Sarah was free to finally be a Mom.
As I type this I start to wonder if it all just seems too farfetched or if really this could be the answer. So much about the story seems so unbelievable that perhaps this could be the answer we've been looking for. I'm going to peruse some websites regarding pre-term infants and length of stay in hospital following pre-term births.
If any of you out there want to help with this feel free and let's see if what we come up with could possibly fit this timeline.
This could also explain part of the WHO, WHAT, WHY, WHERE and WHEN surrounding the birth certificate, as it would state a WHEN much earlier than we have been led to believe. I feel that some folks might not see Sarah in such a good light if she was continuing business as usual and pursuing her political pursuits after delivering a pre-term DS infant. On the other hand, if he was in the hospital for any length of time then I guess why not keep up business as usual until he could come home. This could also explain why she was so jaunty at his “debut” on Monday 4/21/08 and why many have stated here that Trig did not look like a newborn. He was 6.2 pounds when we first saw him but that could have been after spending time in the hospital after an early birth. Yes, there are the photos of the Heaths holding Trig at the Mat-Su Regional Hospital on the weekend of 4/19, however, barring any complications after his pre-term arrival he could have been moved to Mat-Su after spending time at Providence in Anchorage. With all of Sarah’s friends at Mat-Su, photo ops could have been arranged at any location in the hospital that they chose. There is also the account of the other mother giving birth that same day seeing Todd wandering the halls of Mat-Su. Perhaps he was just waiting for the hospital to hand over Trig so he could then go home.
Thanks for listening.
Blue Tx,
I will admit that I am here out of curiosity and political interest only. I am interested in Women's Studies and especially women in politics. Since we are all named you know I am not from anywhere near AK and I don't believe SP will make it to the nat'l political stage again. Have you seen Huckabee kicking the kneecaps of SP in his latest hit piece?
My life will go on without any interruption when the truth comes out, I don't have a vested interest in this. I can't tell you of any one item that will convince me, I will judge as things are revealed.
I do think this will doom her political future - whether she comes clean or not - and she might be beginning to understand that.
Audrey, Could the lack of a birth certificate for Trig combined with the birth announcement policy change at Mat=Su Regional all be connected in some strange way? Maybe baby Tripp's birth is sti;; pending, and for the dates to all add up, Tripp's birth couldn't possibly occur this late.
Remember, Mat-Su Regional Medical Center used,"the fear of infant abduction as their reason for policy change". To date Alaska has never had such an abduction. If Mat-Su Regional or the Palins' feared for Bristol and her child's safety why would they wait until January 1,2009 to implement the policy change?
Like so much involving this case, nothing really makes sense, yet it all seems so connected. Just wondering, is anyone else curious?
Blue-Tx,
We can "demand" whatever we want on the internet. I can "demand" that Sarah give me a million dollars and I will continue to post here until she does.
Sarah doesn't have to answer our requests. But why does she complain about anonymous bloggers? I don't have to obey her requests on the air to stop blogging any more than she has to obey my request to provide hard evidence.
Just FYI, the Palin supporters made conjectures that Obama was a secret Muslim born in Kenya. I totally support their right to blog about that even though I believe it to be false and have not seen compelling evidence for it. Was that not in an effort to derail his career?
I don't think I'll ever be able to believe Sarah Palin's birth story with the MULTIPLE sketchy pictures, stories, and disappearing evidence.
However, I personally would be willing to let it go if Palin made a public statement explaining the "wild ride" went as it did and then justifying her actions. She needs to explain her reasoning for why she endangered her life, the life of her son, and the life of all the passengers on the plane had they needed to make an unscheduled landing. She has yet to account for that incredible story and the thought process behind it.
BTW, Audrey was being facetious. Just as Palin was about the DNA test.
I think it was Dangerous who wrote a theory that rang true for me. That Sarah had planned the fake pregnancy with the April due date, but Trig was born a few days early -- and Sarah chose to hide the birth (Oh what difference will a few days make) to make her trip to Texas. She leaves Bristol locked up with a keeper, and takes off.
Yes, Dangerous, a birth certificate would explose that.
And yes, there is a reason Sarah has not produced Trig's birth certificate. We may have to wait until he gets his first passport.
Much as I think SP was never pregnant, I have sitting here beside me my wise husband, who has proved to be an excellent judge of truth and character over the years. (I don't even hate to admit it.) And I've just gotten him to read almost all of it.
Guess what: he disagrees! Thinks BlueTx raises some good points. Oh geez, is anyone else starting to have second thoughts?
Hi everyone,
New People Magazine shows SP and Bristol on the cover, announcing birth of Tripp, but no mention inside the issue in the "Births" column on page 82.
Audrey, another splendid post, many thanks.
agraegoose -
The new MatSu policy is odd and the timing is coincidental.
Maybe the plan was for "Tripp who" to be reported as kidnapped - that's a good excuse for not having any pictures! (Just kidding - I think!)
OK BlueTx,
I'm going to drop it, I just came to the conclusion that Sarah gave birth to Trig after her unsuccessful attempt to foster a "fundie" abortion.
"What would it take to put this to rest?"
Personally, a press conference with CBJ & SP wouldn't convince me. I'd still want to know why, if she really was pregnant, did Sarah Palin wear that weird fake pregnancy pillow for the Elan Frank video? (See Audrey's post on the Elan Frank Screenshots.) Because that is NOT a pregnant belly.
Some kind of hard evidence that Tripp was actually born in 2008 would convince me that Bristol is probably not Trigg's mom.
--Luke
Amy 1:
I fail to see what "good points" BlueTx has raised here.
And how your "wise husband" could detect any truth or character in the statements of BlueTx, I cannot understand. Especially since he has never met BlueTx.
Oops?
At this point, things I would need to give this a permanent rest are:
1. Birth Certificate issued by the State with confirmed delivery date.
2. Independent DNA evidence that Trigg is Sarah and Todd's child.
3. Same for Tripp - BC and DNA showing Bristol and Levi as the parents, as well as the date of his SUPPOSED birth.
I don't think a clear and concise statement from SP and CBJ is adequate. For a price, a person can be convinced to say just about anything. This could also mean that the price would be that SP wouldn't reveal CBJ as a fraud herself, for originally going along with this farce. SP is a known liar. Why would any statement from her be regarded as proof positive?
Too much time has now passed for medical records. An entirely false medical record could have easily been constructed at this point, including false ultrasound photos or ones of previous children. They've even had plenty of time to make sure there are no "holes" in the created medical record... checking and double checking dates against SP's appointment calendar (oh! she had a doctor's appointment at the very same time she was seen in her office with so and so!), the whole nine yards.
Photos of SP in the hospital holding a baby proves nothing... she's probably got an archive of four previous collections of such photos from the other kids. From a distance, swaddled babies can easily pass for each other. An exhausted new mommy can look vastly different from her "usual" self, so even comparing SP's "look" could be fruitless.
Plus, the DNA would certainly clear up the theories of Sadie, Levi's mom, Willow, Todd's "mistress" or anyone else parenting Trigg.
Anything short of DNA and True, Certified Birth Certificates can be manufactured or bought. For BOTH babies.
As for fraud, tax returns may or may not be telling. Has the IRS ever asked for more than an SSN for a claimed dependent? Publishing returns for both SP and BP might be compared, but those are just written forms, written by them. Not exactly 'proof positive' considering the lying nature of this family.
Abuse/neglect? While I am certainly no SP fan, I do not think Trigg or Tripp (if he exists) is in any such situation.
The worst "abuse" I could point to is dragging a DS baby into chaotic, loud arenas full of screaming extremist strangers, but I don't think that qualifies in the eyes of the law.
Well, that and the Wild Ride, which SHOULD qualify as abuse. At best, it was reckless endangerment.
Why - OH - WHY have we not seen Bristol or Tripp yet? Didn't SP say BP was now going to school to "finish her last semester"?
Is NO ONE camped out at Wasilla High (or whereever she supposedly is finishing her HS career)?
Doesn't an 18 year old girl get absolutely nutty, not having left her residence in almost a month?
Where is Levi NOW? Has he not been seen at ALL visiting this supposed Tripp?
Is Bristol living with Mom & Dad or her Aunt or at Levi's house? Where is she???
I hate to suggest it, but did on another thread... an old thread evidently not visited much... If Bristol hasn't given birth to Tripp yet...
WHAT IF: Something tragic happens and Bristol doesn't deliver a 'perfect and healthy' baby?
WHAT IF: (God forbid!) the baby doesn't live through delivery?
Are they prepared to throw together some haphazzard adoption of another baby to cover their tracks or would they come clean?
Where's the big PEOPLE spread? I read that they weren't offering the $300K, but they might throw a bone to Bristol and Levi for a few shots. Anything?
Sorry this is so long... I just have a ton of questions!
Linda in Michigan
PS: I wonder if SP is now satisfied that my comments are now made by "samper" which is EQUALLY anonymous as "Anonymous"? Does having some moniker give more credibility? What is her POINT on this? Samper is my KITTY! It gives me no more of a face or identity or credibility than Anonymous does!
Sarah like someone else said has USED alot of people for her personal interest. There has to be a number of people that could lose their jobs and careers when this breaks open.
People get defensive because they are SCARED!
The possibilities raised about a premature birth and SP then faking the pregnancy seem to make sense, except . . . why did she think she had to fake the pregnancy? She would have gotten lots of public concern for the infant's hospitilization. Would that have made her less likely to be a VP candidate than a 4/18 birth? It still doesn't seem right.
I was following (on the internet)some of her connections with the religion of Mutthey and others. It may be that she was "chosen" to have this child and cannot divulge the real details. I keep thinking of the scene in The Handmaiden's Tale where the illusion of conception had to be enacted. But this is just way out there. I will understand if it is not posted.
sandra in oregon
Here’s another bit of the story that I’ve been re-considering:
Perhaps Bristol was taken out of Wasilla High School and sent to Anchorage because Sarah wanted her away from Levi. (Sarah had to know that Levi's mother was dealing drugs, especially since Bristol is friends with Mercedes and dated Levi. Sarah would have made a point to know about any family that Bristol was spending so much time with. Small towns do have a gossip hotline and I'm sure that Sarah has the details on many more people than I do in Wasilla given her status).
So Bristol gets yanked from school in Wasilla and sent to Anchorage to live with her aunt but rebels and quits school. (Sarah then says she has Mono and explains the absence away) Can’t have a dropout in the family, no way, we know how sensitive Sarah is about using the dropout word…
Then either Sarah’s sister in Anchorage kicks Bristol back to Wasilla because she is not in school or for some reason Bristol then tries to make nice with Mom. OR, Perhaps Mom forces her to come back to Wasilla to live and Bristol acquiesces because Trig has been born early and Sarah needs for Bristol to come home and take care of him when he is released from the hospital until Sarah's political season duties are complete (on 4/18) Sarah promises to put Bristol’s behavior of the past year behind her if she will agree to come home and help out. (Bristol did have a reputation of being a bit of a party girl so that could have been why she was sent to Anchorage as well, not to remove her from just Levi, but to remove her from other bad influences in Wasilla as well) I don’t want to speculate on the personal behavior of Sarah’s children any more than I feel could be pertinent to the Trig matter, however.
Trig could have been born pre-term in late February and released from the hospital perhaps in late March, as he possibly only had to spend a month in the hospital. Bristol comes home to baby sit until Mom is done with her political duties for the year. She gets to renew her relationship with her Mother by being the dutiful daughter.
This could explain why Bristol seems so close to Trig in photos and so maternal towards him. Also could explain the quote from Sherry Johnston that Levi helped Bristol in caring for Trig, thus proving that he has some child rearing experience. Could also explain why Levi quit school last March. He was helping Bristol take care of Trig until Todd and Sarah were through politicking and they could come home and announce the baby and take care of him. Mercedes Johnston would have gotten to know Trig because she would have been hanging out with Bristol again once she came back to Wasilla to take care of Trig. Bristol would have agreed to move back home to take care of Trig provided she could go back to seeing Levi. Levi and Bristol were unsupervised for part of March and April playing house with Trig during Sarah and Todd’s absences and Bristol ended up getting pregnant with Tripp during that time. Sarah would not have had a leg to stand on regarding any discipline of Bristol because Bristol is the key player in hiding Trig’s early arrival and assisting her mother in caring for him. Bristol has ultimate power over this situation as she could spill the beans at any time. Sarah would have been willing to give Bristol ultimate freedom if she would agree to come home and help her out as Todd is usually accompanies Sarah on state functions and would not be able to care for a child full time.
This is just another thing to think about, or another way to consider this. I do not wish to speculate on the activities of the Palin children but Bristol could have been “called to duty” and willingly participated in this scenario.
AKPetMom,
And that *also* explains why Sarah was so quick to show off pictures of her grandson Tripp when he was born!
No, wait.....
As for fraud, tax returns may or may not be telling. Has the IRS ever asked for more than an SSN for a claimed dependent? Publishing returns for both SP and BP might be compared, but those are just written forms, written by them. Not exactly 'proof positive' considering the lying nature of this family.
People, please stop yapping about tax fraud. If Trig lives with Sarah, she can take him as a dependent regardless of whether he is her child or grandchild. It is a complete and utter dead end.
Plus, you're probably never going to see any more of her tax returns unless she runs for President.
Here's my 2cents on what I want out of this.
Raking muck, you don't know what you'll find. You know there's corruption, but you don't know the depth or details of it. You agitate, ask questions, piss people off, chase deadends, and if you work long enough, you uncover answers.
No investigative reporter ever finds what he/she expects. They usually find something larger.
This blog is about truth. What comes of it is what comes of it. I GUARANTEE it will be nothing we expect or even have theorized about.
But something will come of it. Sarah has been squirming this week.
Muckraking is one of the most noble branches of American journalism because it isn't pretty and it helps keep our country free.
Did it make me mad when righties challenged Obama's birthplace? Yep. Did they have that right? Yes, because it was a constitutional question. Did Obama answer the question with legal proof? Yes.
I must say, that for me, what is most suspicious about Sarah's story is what happened after anonymous bloggers in pajamas started questioning Trig's maternity at the very end of August. Remember all the different websites that were scrubbed and photos that were removed, or even more disturbingly, had their captions (dates) changed? I don't remember seeing a summary of those disturbing incidents, and if there isn't one, I may try to pull one together. Why would all of those things happen (and only as it related to the whereabouts and appearance of Bristol and Sarah during the crucial Trig gestation months)? Do any of the Sarah faithful find that unsettling?
I agree with you there Morgan, regarding Tripp. She hasn't even mentioned him except for a few times, and certainly no photos or birth announcement. Gosh darn it! I thought I might have been on to something, but perhaps not. Remember, though, Dougherty from Daily News said in one of his editorial comments that he knows that Trig is Sarah's baby...I guess that and LondonBridges comments and Ennealogics comments just got me started on this whole scenario of the early birth.
Anyway, I enjoy this dialogue and thoughtful process with all of you great folks on this website and blog. My dogs are now staring at me and telling me to "take my tinfoil hat off" and take them to the park so I'd better listen to them. I shouldn't let this crazy discourse take time away from what's really important in MY life!!
I have little confidence in the validity of SP as birth mother of Trig Palin, based on what has been provided thus far. I see, however, that the tone of this forum is changing - and I'm uncomfortable with the suggestions for intrusive measures to resolve this. That certainly will not happen, nor should it.
Try to remember that, although nobody here put SP's children in this position, they (and friends and others) still access the internet. They are children and in my view have no hand in any of this. Treat them as you would your own children and be thoughtful as you post.
Enough for me. I'll wait on a declarative, precise statement from SP + CBJ. If there is only silence
then that tells us she can't address the issue and make an outright false statement. Very sad for the baby.
If there is an declarative & precise statement, I accept her word and wish her well.
Best wishes to all of you.
Hear hear Alex,
That is a great post.
No, no AKPetMom, please don't think I was giving you the brush off. I read your theories with interest. Only two things stood out. The first was Sarah and family's refusal to give us even the tiniest glimpse of Tripp. The other is the implausibility of the governor's son staying over a month in the NICU of a major medical center without something leaking out to the press.
Yes, I know those HIPPA regs are tight, but someone somewhere would have said something. If nothing else, other parents visiting would have seen her there with Trig. I hope. Unless of course she just dumped him there and left him to languish until she took him home to use as a prop shortly after his "official" birthdate.
Morgan! I didn't think you were giving me the "brush off"...I was just reminding myself that perhaps I've been spending way to much time blogging today as opposed to going outdoors and enjoying the fact that it's 45 above zero today instead of the 25 below that it was this time last week. (sure the wind is blowing 40mph but who cares ITS 45 ABOVE!!!) That's it and you don't have to post this if you don't want as it was to you personally. I do really enjoy this little sleuthing opportunity though. Guess I should park outside of Wasilla High one afternoon and play real detective, huh?
More evidence, in my mind, of how this baby fiasco will be the doom of SP - directly or indirectly.
People in Bristol Bay are suffering from the latest cold... I don't know how to describe what they are going through. I don't want to say "snap" but that is all the cold weather we ever get.
From Mudflats latest thread.
So, what is the State of Alaska doing to help its citizens as they face these conditions of scarcity that are beyond what many of us can imagine? The answer is, nothing. According to Mr. Tucker the lack of heating oil and food and the resulting threat to life did not count as an emergency to the State of Alaska.
A question. Where is our Governor? What are her priorities? I have heard her concerns about anonymous bloggers, about media coverage, about the legislature, and the gas line. I have seen press releases come out saying “There you go again” to the Anchorage Daily News. I haves seen lots of time and energy focused on how Sarah Palin feels mistreated by the media. But I have not heard one, single, solitary word about Emmonak. I have seen no press releases about what my state’s government is doing to help its people in harm’s way. I have heard big talk about a Rural Subcabinet headed up by our Attorney General, Talis Colberg, and I’ve heard that they’re busy evaluating.
rpinME says, "Given that Palin demanded her mayoral opponent make his marriage license public(since his wife went by her maiden name) in her first mayoral campaign, why should asking her to produce a birth certificate, or other proof of biological maternity be seen as so out of line?"
I did not know this. You are SO right!!! She should understand and comply with a request for proof of marriage or family. (And if she thinks a different last name means you aren't married, she should stop calling herself a feminist.)
In most states, so probably Alaska, Sarah Heath could have changed her name to Palin without a marriage. I wish that mayoral opponent had demanded that she prove her marriage too.
"What would it take for you to let this go?"
BlueTX,
I can't imagine this being "let go" as long as Sarah Palin is a public servant or running for an office. Is there any indication Sarah Palin is willing to cooperate in a public way to resolve the mysteries she stirs up? The babiesgate could outlive Sarah Palin.
If the facts are revealed, inspite of the Palin's, this could be resolved.
The ball is in Palin's court. Has she asked "What would it take for you to let this go?" You asking seems mute.
Prehaps she should contact Audrey, I don't think it should be a secret unless she has something to hide. She needs more transparency. I wouldn't even believe breastfeeding Trig from a con like Sarah. She would love pulling that off.
The welfare of the children should be everyone's first priority.
Even if SP really is Trig's mom, I don't think she will respond with corroborating evidence unless the MSM picks the story up in a major way.
And I don't think the MSM will pick it up unless there is major, new information re possible hoax--like medical information or an eyewitness.
In other words, blogs like this won't directly cause SP to do anything, but they can INDIRECTLY force SP to act, by influencing the MSM.
Consider the arc of the MSM coverage since August:
Even though the Trig birth rumors had been kicking around since April, SP never directly responded to them. But once she was announced as VP, the story became viral and was about to enter the MSM. SP successfully killed the story (whether by luck or design) with the "Bristol is pregnant" story. The story then became radioactive for the MSM.
Only Andrew Sullivan carried the Trig birth torch through the election, but he was widely criticized from both the right and the left for doing so. This, from Media Matters, a liberal outfit (short version: "Hey, don't blame liberal bloggers for pushing 'Sarah's a grandma'! It was just that kook Andrew Sullivan--and he's actually a conservative!"):
http://tinyurl.com/axzbej
=====
Sullivan immediately felt pushback from the blogosphere. "I strongly believe Sullivan should have laid off this. I could have linked to it yesterday, but didn't, since at that point it was only fodder for a pseudonymous diarist at the Daily Kos," wrote Dan Kennedy at his site, Media Nation, just hours after Sullivan posted. "This is the sort of hurtful story that reputable news organizations should check out thoroughly before injecting into the debate. I mean, come on. Does anyone think Josh Marshall hasn't been following this? Or dozens of other liberal political blogs and Web sites, including Media Nation? None of us went there, and Sullivan shouldn't have, either. This is the definition of a story that shouldn't be hashed out publicly."
Kennedy wasn't alone in airing his reservations. That Sunday at The Huffington Post, blogger Lee Stranahan posted an essay that ridiculed the story: "It's the wackiest rumor about Sarah Palin or any other politician so far this election. It's making its way all through the internet. And of course it came from DailyKos."
That same day, Huffington Post writer Bart Motes also begged everyone to back off: "Guys, it's a loser. Can we not do this?"
=====
After the election, the Trig birth story was on a glide path to obscurity. Even Sullivan eventually threw in the towel, letting one of his substitute bloggers get the last word while he was on vacation, basically saying that Sullivan was wrong in pushing the story in the first place.
But something happened in December. For some reason, the ADN (unbeknownst to the Palins) got back on the story (maybe the ADN had been reading palindeception.com...), with ADN reporter Lisa Demer making calls to Bristol's school, the hospital, and even CBJ at her home.
When SP found out about this, she went ballistic and lashed out at the ADN's editor Pat Dougherty. Maybe she also tipped off Andrea Gusty to what had been posted on blogs ("Say, Andrea, did you know that 'anonymous bloggers' are calling you a liar and a hoax co-conspirator? Check THIS out!").
So Gusty does her video self-exoneration, and Dougherty crawls back into his cubicle ("Hey, don't blame me....I've ALWAYS thought the story was 'nutty nonsense!'")
And that's where we are today...
I can't seem to find it but someone asked what evidence points away from Trig arriving early.
MatSu posted Trig's birth announcement on 4/18 and then removed it. That could have been done by medical personnel conspiring with Sarah, but the simpler answer is that Trig was born then.
If one of the Palin women gave birth to Trig, they are said to have appeared together at an AHA luncheon in mid-February. If Trig came in March instead of April, you'd think the mom would have had to be showing too much to ignore.
Again, from Mudflats, if anyone wants to help the folks freezing and starving up there:
"To help, please call:
City of Emmonak, (907) 949-1227/1249 (They will take donations by credit card. Please specify the donation is for heating oil!)
Emmonak Tribal Council, (907) 949-1720
or send a check to:
Emmonak Tribal Council
P.O. Box 126
Emmonak, AK 99581
Attn: Christine Alexie"
Such a sad state of affairs, and Sarah doesn't seem to be doing anything other than whine about anonymous bloggers!
A little off topic but feel it imprtant.
I was married to a man whose mom was the chief appelate court judge of a state. This lady used her POWER to bail her kids out of henious crimes (won't list them but what most people would be in jail for). Did it do any good for the kids NO. They kept getting in more trouble and bailed out again and again and again.
As american citizens it is our RIGHT tomake sure our public SERVANTS are just that. Not public CRIMNALS! Held accountable for their actions. Their job is to LEAD and CREATE not WHINE and DESTROY!
Who knows how many people have taken part in this charade. But I am sure they are all on edge and scared. If you remember Sarah Palins face the night she lost the election that should be a VIVID moment. Sarah's facial ecpression and demeanor were of anger, malice, RAGE and utter bitterness. Sarah knew that loss would mean she might be challenged regarding the lies she has been telling.
We do not know the extent of this story yet. But it is obvious with Gusty coming out very defensive that they are SCARED. Blue Tx must be an insider.
Hey, BlueTx! Sarah, herself, couldn't have been more interested in what it would take to retire Palin's Deceptions! Intriguing!
BlueTx- I think it's been made pretty clear by now what it would take for Audrey and others to drop this blog. So maybe it's time for you to get back to your boss and ask her what she has to offer in return.
This would be the best way to keep the negotiation from stalling.
It occurred to me that one way to get the information we want is for a lawsuit to be filed. I am not a AK lawyer and have not done the research, but it seems to me that there may be a facially viable case against SP for fraud if filed by an Alaskan who voted for her - or, even better, someone who worked on her campaign (she made a knowingly false representation intending to induce people to like and vote for her and, in fact, the plaintiff did vote for her because of her representation...). The sticking point may be showing damage...
In any event, I am not advocating this approach, I just mention it as a possible option that would eventually require sworn statements, depositions and third party subpoenas.
Great job to Audrey and all the posters. I have been following for awhile now and am consistently impressed with the tone, curiosity and analysis of this blog.
Wait...this is OT and maybe I'm confused but Alex--aren't you one of the few SP supporters who believe she did birth Trig? Or do I have you confused with someone else? In reading your comments, albeit quickly, it seems that now you have doubts. Whazzup?
Reading what is happening in the village of Emmonak reminds me of what happened on Aug 29th 2005.
The thing that is being discussed widely as one of the disasters that shaped GB's legacy. Almost every pundit agrees that Katrina was the beginning of the tide turning against GB. On The Rachel Maddow Show I was so happy that she showed the two pictures that New Orleanians are familiar with: GB and McCain with the birthday cake dated Aug 29th and GB playing the guitar and having a grand old time on the 30th.
I pray that the people in that village will not have to suffer much longer and Mudflats seems to have opened the way for them to get help. This is much the same way we finally got relief, by the regular people on the ground doing tremendous things.
The farce continues..They "announced" the birth of Tripp in People mag this week,,no pictures, no birth certificate.
SP has Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Look it up. Just watching her latest "interview" corroborates the diagnosis. She cannot let things go -- blame and paranoia. Katie Couric is NOT a hard hitting journalist, and Olbermann is not evil.
Audrey is NOT anonymous, so keep up the good work. This web of lies has to unravel sooner or later.
Patrick --
We are arguing as I write this.
However, my husband is the one who told me Lillian Hellman was a liar after he read Pentimento. Of course I disagreed, but then some years later Mary McCarthy made her famous pronouncement about Lillian -- that "everything she writes is a lie, including "a," "and," and "the." " And so it turned out.
So Patrick, let's you and me sit over here, and let him and the BlueTx go waaaaay over there, okay?
It just occurred to me, but Sarah and Todd have both been active in the Alaskan Independence Party, the political party that is promoting the secession of Alaska.
Todd said it wouldn't do to have a fishpicker born in Texas. (I think that was the term he used.) Now, that's a pretty stupid thing to worry about, when you look at it. Anybody born of an American parent, or born within the United States, is a U.S. citizen, so why would you risk your baby's life trying to make sure he's born in a certain location?
It makes me wonder if the country of Alaska doesn't plan on extending citizenship to people born outside of Alaska. Maybe that played into the whole scenario.
And then I think: but that's amazingly stupid. She simply COULDN"T have made that trip pregnant.
"I think most of us would have to accept a clear official statement confirming that Trig was born at Mat-Su (as claimed) and that Cathy-Baldwin-J delivered (as implied)."
But not if Sarah released the statement. I would not accept her word. Maybe if the doctor released the statement. Or one of the nurses present.
"So if you get those answers you demand, I wanted to know if you would be done with the accusations."
Kind of depends on what the truth is, doesn't it? Why can't she put the rumors to rest- what is she getting out of this? I think I'd want to see if there was evidence of fraud anywhere, in the legal sense. I do think if there was any evidence of crime or misdemeanor, etc., then it should be prosecuted.
Sarah Palin seems kind of tone-deaf about how she comes across to others. I don't think much of her vaunted political instincts. I don't think there's anything that would be more endearing to a voter than pictures of her in a hospital bed, holding the new baby, surrounded by her family, and looking happy and exhausted. That would be a vote-getter. So why not provide it? Ans: because she can't.
"Her pretend pregnancy can only be supported by her announcement in March and her pillow-pics in April."
I just posted something about how pictures of her in the hospital would be a votes-getter. Evidently there are pictures and somehow, I haven't run across them. Sorry.
Here's something I'd like to follow up on:
Is it true, that there was whispering and gossip going on - in Alaska - that something was fishy or not true about Sarah Palin's story of being pregnant, and birthing Trig?
If I'm not mistaken, this gossip was going on WAY before Sarah Palin was even on the short-list for VP selection - and even if SHE knew she was on that short-list, Alaskan residents must have had no idea.
So here's why I bring this is up:
People don't - out of the blue - start whispering and gossiping about something like a woman "faking a birth" unless there was some kind of valid proof - no? I might be generalizing here, but Alaska is like a classic small-town - everyone kind of knows everyone else, including the minutia of gossip or rumors.
And from what I can gather - pre-VP-pick scrutiny - the folks in Alaska overwhelmingly supported Sarah Palin. So it wasn't like the gossip started maliciously or as something to taint her as the VP pick.
However, I also remember - after my jaw-dropping when McCain announced picking her - that the pregnancy rumors started up again, within days.
So how does a wild, practically INCREDULOUS, story of a woman (the Governor of your state, no less) faking a pregnancy even START?
The answer is: someone directly involved with this cover-up couldn't keep their mouth shut about it. Or, simply told one person in confidence - who clearly told someone else. And so on it goes...
So, do we know the exact time-frame of when this rumor first began?
I agree with many posters here, that the only valid proof to end all this speculation is:
1) On the record statements from SP herself, her doctor, and the hospital records OF Sarah Palin actually birthing Trig.
2) DNA evidence to back ALL of that up.
3) All of the above, in regards to Bristol and Tripp
BG--
Another Alex, perhaps?
I have been appalled by Sarah from the minute she hit the national stage. Every bit of my feminine instinct roars that she is a liar, fraud, bad mother, and an even worse governor. That she has mocked education, childbirth, working women, and American leadership -- well, don't get me started. . .
As Morgan says, I need a cup of tea.
John Stewart, commenting on Sarah Palin's media blitz where she's whining about the media, and doing it in the most brilliant 'um, DUH Sarah!' way! Gotta see it! Here:
http://tinyurl.com/aymftr
A couple of things fly on the wall said. Do your research of all members of the Palin and Johnston families then you will find the REAL connection.
That sounds like an ADULT. A Real connection!
Fly also said Sarah would speak out before or after reading blogs.
Remember how Sherry Johnston came out and stated she had a hysterectomy 8 yrs ago. That came after bloggers saying it could be Track and Sherry. Remember also in the enquirer they stated Track had a big oxy problem.
Now we have Gusty coming out and getting defensive. Her body language in the video was anger. Especially the first few seconds. At the end she had a quick smirk!
There is a great probability of two babies. These are the people I have as my final breakdown.
Sarah and Todd or someone else. Maybe Mr Johnston?
Todd and Sherry
Track and Sherry
Bristol and Levi
It seems like the likely choice Sarah would go out on a limb for would be Sherry. She stated she was in the middle of a divorce, no medical insurance and on disability. Very likey candidate that needed assistance.
You see the reason I think people are getting scared is that INSURANCE FRAUD could send people to prison! That is not a hoax but a SCANDAL!
Bristol was probably also preggo. She probably had to give up her baby for a couple of reasons.
One might have to do with insurance. Bristol probably had her baby at the native hospital in anchorage. She was still 17 covered under Todd's native ancestry.
The church fire is another thing that wakes me up. Sarah immediately went an apologized for causing them so much trouble. There definitely had to be records of Sarahs or someones there. Maybe the pastor at the church adopted the baby. That could be another person who would not want to be found out was a part of this scandal.
Wev Shea sent a letter to Sarah and talked about wolves. The wolves are out! Maybe a letter similar to Wev's could be sent to Sarah.
http://tiny.cc/8h5oQ
I posted this once before, but it disappeared into cyberspace. I'll try again.
Why doesn't Todd stand up for his wife in this? His silence is odd. I know if a rumor about my not giving birth was 'out there', my husband would vouch for me. Generally the fathers are in the delivery room too.
He isn't very vocal about being a new grandpa, either.
I seem to recall an ADN article from April 2008 listing "Trig Palin" as having been born on April 16 -- when Sarah was in Texas. A mistake?
Inducing labor at 35 weeks after preterm/ premature rupture of membranes (PPROM) is an area of great medical controversy, but the current consensus seems to be you don't do it because of likely lung/organ immaturity.
If membranes are not ruptured and labor has not started, inducing labor this early might constitute medical malpractice.
Did CBJ perform an L/S ratio test for lung maturity? Was a pediatrician present at delivery? If not, why not?
Why, if Sarah and Todd simply wanted Trig born on Alaskan soil, did they not go to the excellent high risk facilities in Anchorage where their flight landed? Instead, they drive for an extra hour to a low-risk facility in Wasilla?
Was this because Sarah and her church control the Wasilla hospital?
Is anything known about CBJ's political/religious affiliations? It might explain a lot.
This thread has gotten carried away with "what it would take for..." That is jumping the gun. We will know what we know when we know it. We take this one step at a time, slowly and carefully. We don't jump at what SP says,
claims, blurts out, because she is mentally unstable and delusional, thus unpredictable. As her wax facade melts,she'll make more and more mistakes covered by more and more lies. Time is on our side, not hers. Tick Tick Tick Tick. This baby thing is consuming her every moment,slowly,gnawing, gripping her SpongeBob gut.
Several people have posted that Mat-Su Hospital announced Trig's 4/18 birth on the internet, then took the announcement down.
Back in the early days of this blog, I remember a very tech savy person explaining that people searching for Trig Palin 4/18 Mat-Su Hospital would cause Google to create a memory for the search, even though the page had never existed.
I don't think I've explained this very well. Maybe Audrey or an associate could point us to where the actual explanation is.
I came away from the discussion with the understanding that what existed were multiple searches but no evidence that the page had ever existed.
On another note, I am beginning to wonder if BlueTx is another way of saying RedAk.
"If that is not enough what would it take? What do you need as proof that Trig is SP biological child?"
A birth certificate, records of her prenatal care, and statements of at least two medical personnel in attendance, as put forth by one of the commenters here (Cooky?). Pictures of Bristol in Jan, Feb, March of 2008. Oh, heck, and pictures of Willow as well.
I understand that the birth certificate would prove nothing more than the birthdate, but that is something in this case!
I'm leaning toward the possibility that Trig was born a little earlier, say 2-4 weeks or so, and that something happened to cause Sarah to decide to cover for the pregnancy late in the game. She may have needed to stall for time, and pretending to have the baby early was part of the tactic, because she needed to pretend to be as far along as she could get away with at the announcement, and then also pretend it came early to squeeze the time problem.
And by the way, a 6 lb 2 oz baby is much more normal for a very young mother than a 44-year-old multipara, meaning that a 6 pounder might be a term baby for a teen but small for Sarah. So this slightly small size made it easier to pretend that he was born early.
As if we need anymore proof that Sarah is vindictive and would take people down who would presume to cross her or her friends, well here is more proof that she seeks to control everyone in her realm (and beyond). I'm glad that I ran across this somewhere tonight in the great realm of the "interwebs" as it is another great story that I had personally forgotten about that just shows what a vindictive person she can be. I know this has no bearing on what we are talking about on the forum, BUT, it does speak volumes regarding her personality and vindictiveness and desire to have her way, anyone else BE DAMNED (or fired). Articles like this, while not on topic, should just serve to remind us all to what lengths she will go to get her way. Enough said.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122092043531812813.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Hi BlueTx,
I am wondering, what kind of proof would it take for you to acknowledge that SP did not birth Trig.
If you found out that she is not Trigs birth mother, how would that affect your thinking and actions?
I ask this very, very sincerely. The psychology truely confuses me.
Do patterns matter? Yes, they do! Who’s been KISSing this blog for awhile now with news and/or nonsense and who’s been sticking to their guns? After you determine that question ask yourself this one, “What happens in the media when certain people stick to their guns?”
As I see it SP dug this hole & she's the only one who can clear this mess up...every time that she
'refuses', the hole gets deeper...her rating sink…the fact that she did not appeal to enough Americans to win the election SHOULD give her pause about 2012.
Anyways…back to the digging…
I don't think a desire for privacy equals proof that there's something to hide. I wouldn't post my birth certificate on the internet...
Seems far more effective to keep focusing on the "wild ride story" and the pictures (flat belly at 7 months pregnant that quickly turned first into the smoking gun picture, then into the square belly video, and finally into the Gusty picture).
Or maybe Palin's "tight abs" have a not-tight square in the middle of them...
Three very good pieces of evidence why Trig was not born in Feb or March:
1) Willow and Bristol both attended the AHA luncheon on Feb 15 and the Iron Dog race finish on Feb 16, both in Fairbanks. If either was 7- or 8-months pregnant, an indoor event seems unlikely.
2) An early birth would require hospitalization for weeks on end, which I find hard to hide, and SP would not attempt to fake a pregnancy which could be blown out of the water by a single identification of Trig as anyone else's child.
3) If Trig was born so much earlier, SP would not have rushed back to Alaska to claim him without a much clearer story ready to go. The story is too improvised for her to have known that Trig had already been born.
The early-birth theory doesn't fit the facts, and the circumstantial evidence doesn't even remotely support it.
If SP faked the pregnancy, she had to have a reasonable expectation that they could hide the real mother until she could grow her belly until mid-May to make it look good.
Does anybody have SP's and the girls travel expense records they could send to me through Audrey? We know about the trip to Fairbanks mid-Fed. Did they expense any other trips for the girls? Can we track their movements at all?
This seems our most fruitful factual inquiry right now.
Dangerous
Dangerous
Amy1 said @ 3:46 PM today...
Much as I think SP was never pregnant, I have sitting here beside me my wise husband, who has proved to be an excellent judge of truth and character over the years. (I don't even hate to admit it.) And I've just gotten him to read almost all of it.
Guess what: he disagrees! Thinks BlueTx raises some good points. Oh geez, is anyone else starting to have second thoughts?
In words of one syllable:
No.
Great discussion tonight!
I just thought of another small clue. Isn't it odd that SP would have a baby shower for her FIFTH child? Etiquette says you only do this for your first. It is considered greedy to have a shower for subsequent births, especially for someone as well off as SP. However, if Bristol is the real mom, and possibly living with an aunt or Levi, she would have needed all the gifts from the shower. (at that point they didn't know they'd fall under a national spotlight and receive thousands of gifts.)
A small point, but weird.
Thank you for this post. It makes a lot of sense! I did have a question about how this would work with a home birth. Would the mid-wife, (or MD) be the one to record the date, time and place of birth? How would that work?
I have been revisiting some old evidence and some new questions have come up for me.
The announcement of Trigg's birth in the ADN on April 22,08, has audio of Sarah Palin's account of the 'wild ride'. I have to say, when she is first talking about it, it sounds very much like my son does when he is lying about something and is trying to get away with it. She says something to the effect of, "Well, I started to suspect that it might not go to the end of next month." It was very strange. Then she said something that drew me up short. She said, "She (Dr. Baldwin-Johnson)checked me out and said, 'You may have it tonight or in the morning.'" This would suggest to me that Palin would have been in active labor.
If she was in active labor, why would there be a need to 'induce' labor? And again, with leaking membranes at 35 weeks, you try to postpone labor, not induce it. If there had been an infection that caused the PPROM, antibiotics would be given at this point.
Palin's audio account of labor and delivery
See for yourselves.
As hard as I try to make this work, it just doesn't make any sense.
Personally I don't think there is any 'proof' possible to make this go away because I really believe the truth is Sarah Palin lied about giving birth to Trig.
The question I would ask is what proof would be necessary to convince people she lied?
Obviously pictures of a non-pregnant Palin at seven months, no public interview with her doctor, an incredibly suspect and ambiguous medical report, an absolutely ridiculous and unbelievable 'birth story', no pictures of Bristol from Feb-May of 2008,no witnesses to the birth, no witnesses to seeing Palin enter or leave the hospital, no signs by of a woman about to give birth noticed by a room full of people she was giving a speech to or by an airplane full of people, no pictures from the hospital, websites being scrubbed of pictures etc. etc. etc.
Obviously none of that is enough to convince anyone except a few diehards that Ms. Palin's story is a crock of beans.
So any of you waiting for 'proof' from Palin forget it. It's not coming. And it's not coming because she doesn't have it. If she had it, we would have seen it.
And we know we would have seen it because she went to a lot of trouble to squelch the rumor by throwing her young daughter to the wolves. And I believe she did that because she had to, not because she really wanted to sacrifice Bristol.
So this is sort of a standoff. Palin is watching these sites or her people are because they want to know what other surprises are going to turn up. They didn't like mkaiser looking clostely at those Gusty pictures. They probably freaked when they saw the 'nail in the coffin' picture.
There is a concerted effort by Palin and Company to discredit and diminish anonymous bloggers.
I have my proof. I don't need any more.
Trig's birth is recorded somewhere. I believe it's crime not to report a birth.
I don't know Alaskan birth certificate laws other than the 100 years to be made public record thing.
Back in the 1930s-40s, there was an adoption guru named Georgia Tann. She operated out of Memphis. Tann revolutionized adoption, mainly to cover up her crimes. These were mainly against the poor. Tann would steal kids off streets, get false court orders filed to take them away, and there are even tales of her stealing children off the birthing table and telling the mother their newborn was stillborn. Tann wasn't above changing kids' names, parents' names, birthdates, places of birth, religious background, and any other identifying information she could.
How does this affect Alaska? Since Alaska appears to be a closed records state in regards to adoption, the practice of changing identifying information may be perfectly legal there.
Dangerous and everyone else too--
I agree and always have that Willow cannot be ruled out, as well as agreeing that no one else but Bristol or Willow would present any plausible reason for SP to fake maternity. 13 or 14 is a marriageable age in some societies and in ours not so long ago.
People magazine, Jan 19, says she is 14, but the MSM said she was 15 months ago. What is her real age?
What surprises me, Dangerous, is that you seem to be giving a lot of credence to the notion that Bristol has had a baby recently. I find that oddly credulous of you. There are 3 main streams of evidence that SP was not pregnant: the pictures, the wild ride plus all the multiple inconsistent stories, and the utter absurdity of not producing the simple evidence that any parent could within months of a child's birth. (I give ZERO credence to BluTx comments on this-Sarah wants badly for this to go away!)
So the new situation of a reported birth with no pictures is surpassing strange. People magazine has done an entire spread, basically about the baby, and yet no picture of the baby! Have we all fallen down the rabbit hole into Wonderland? A timely picture of the baby is just what Sarah needs. What kind of an “in” can People mag really have if they can’t get any new pictures? This article is full of OLD pictures! I recognize every one except the one on page 96, of SP and BP, with BP behind some furniture and only being a bust shot, from breast level on up.
Even the house is an old picture from last August or September, with grass and trees green, just a hint of yellow. Were the People people at the house at all? Did they even drive by it?
What's this about Bristol enrolling in school? Why would she go NOW with a newborn when she didn't go to school for almost a year?
Poor Levi had to leave a nice job with the boys on the north slope because of enquirers like us, and yet when he went to a new year party, he cheerfully left early saying that he had "a couple of babies at home"! Why does Levi have a couple of babies at home??? Oh, it must be because, according to his mom, he has been helping out with Trig for a long time now.
OK, the picture of Bristol and her mom - it is just as odd as can be! We have Bristol standing behind an easy chair which Sarah is sitting in - just the perfect height to exactly hide her stomach if she should happen to need to hide it...there is absolutely no way that there is a new baby in that house and they didn't get a picture of it. The ONLY reason they told the world Bristol was pregnant was to imply that she could not be the mother of Trig. She has NOT had that baby.
I don’t think that Sarah is really all that bad with the baby. It looks like the DS is hard on her, but she is sincerely trying. Todd is OK with the baby, and Willow is mostly indifferent, but that can happen with a very young mother. What the pictures and videos do show me is two people who are really fond of that baby. And those two people are:
Bristol Palin and Piper Palin.
B said, in part, @ 5:39 PM: MatSu posted Trig's birth announcement on 4/18 and then removed it. That could have been done by medical personnel conspiring with Sarah, but the simpler answer is that Trig was born then.
Doesn't even take "medical personnel". Just someone in HR or public relations who's a devoted Sarah disciple who got the heads-up from the Palins that Trig was now ready to be discharged from wherever he was for a month, ready to meet the world and be photographed.
Don't forget, Sarah Palin's church managed to take over the management of that hospital by gradually ousting all the pro-choice board members and bring in their "pro-life" church patrons.
-------------------
I want to revisit something we haven't talked about in quite a long time -- the original "water broke" story came from Chuck Heath.
When he was put on the spot for a statement to the press, Chuck Heath apparently blurted out what he'd been told, assuming it was a legitimate event that called for dropping everything and heading for the hospital.
Only trouble is, maybe HE didn't think his daughter was going to go on the "wild ride". Is it possible the Heaths were not "in the loop"?
Gee, imagine their surprise 12 hours later when Sarah's back home instead of delivering in a hospital in Dallas.
But family is everything, as they -- the Palins, and I would assume the Heaths -- say, and this family sticks together.
James asked (@ 7:06 PM): Is it true, that there was whispering and gossip going on - in Alaska - that something was fishy or not true about Sarah Palin's story of being pregnant, and birthing Trig?
If I'm not mistaken, this gossip was going on WAY before Sarah Palin was even on the short-list for VP selection - and even if SHE knew she was on that short-list, Alaskan residents must have had no idea.
Someone named "jibegod", someone from Anchorage, Alaska (they rec'd the $1,200 in September) posted on reddit.com 9 months ago -- i.e., April 2008 -- acknowledging the rumor that Bristol was the one who was pregnant.
"jibegod" said the rumor "made the rounds in the upper echelon of the Alaska legislature, and is a closely guarded secret. As far as I know, this rumor has not been discussed by any media outlets, in Alaska or otherwise."
Read the original post on reddit:
http://tinyurl.com/83ympd
Off topic but point of interest OK - does anyone find it ironic that the person who edited SP Wiki page is named "Young Trigg"?
Yes.
http://tinyurl.com/62lqdq
I posted the question "What would it take to believe the Trig birth story?" also, a few days ago, and said there was really nothing that would convince me now (short of Audrey's comment about SP coming to her home to breastfeed).
And I still don't believe there's a Tripp yet. It's almost impossible that a newsworthy birth wouldn't warrant at least one reporter keeping an eye on the hospital for a departing Bristol. If this birth is important enough to garner tabloid photo bidding, it's important enough that local media would stake it out. What did she do, leave in a decoy caravan of cars with deeply tinted windows? That's way too far into Tom Cruise territory.
I was just thinking tonight how this could have all been avoided by SP: she set it into motion herself by offering up pregnant Bristol as proof that she, SP, was Trig's mother. Absent that, Bristol/Tripp/Levi would never have gotten any scrutiny. SP is too media savvy to NOT think that her announcement of BP's pregnancy wouldn't get people interested. At that time, all SP had to say was, "wow, this speculation about the parentage of my baby is really hurtful and baseless, and I won't dignify it with any further responses" and the issue would've been very close to dead.
The People mag piece, without pictures, even of a nursery or a birth announcement, is really problematic for me. I predict that this stalling on pictures will continue until there is a baby to photograph, and the shoot will occur when the baby is a few months old, old enough that you might not be able to tell if it's 3 or 4 months old. It wouldn't be the first time something like that has happened.
I'm also very suspicious about the church fire. The church is so connected to the hospital and to Sarah that I wonder if any records were destroyed in the fire.
The fact that SP won't let this issue go away is a huge red flag. I think it's really bugging her that people don't believe her at her word. She strikes me as the type who is not used to being backed into a corner, and can't summon up the grace to either put up or shut up, thereby extending this story's legs.
As far as the DNA goes, a simple paternity test of Levi not being Trig's father should suffice, DNA from baby need not be blood - don't they take swabs of saliva?
If blood was required from baby, a simple pin-prick should suffice. Obviously, the larger the sample, the more accurate the results.
If the child that we now know as Trig Paxson Van Palin was NOT born in Palmer Alaska on April 18th, 2008, his birth certificate would show us that, no matter who the parents are. Could this be the reason no birth certificate has ever been released? Not because they won't, but because they can't?
Or because he hasn't been adopted and his real parents names are still on there...
I know adoption can take a long time in some states. I wonder if they aren't releasing the birth certificate because the adoption is not final?
Concerning the Press release by Sarah Palin’s office on December 31, 2008, about the purported birth of Tripp: the statement "We are over the moon with the arrival of this healthy, beautiful baby" amounts to 13 words that can mean any number of things. Like Bush's 16 words, like Clinton's "I did not have sex with that woman," and so on and so forth. It is as plain as the nose on your face that this statement was carefully crafted to be spun and/or denied according to any eventual change in the winds of veracity. You see, if the baby is not born yet, but has been seen and checked up on ultrasound, it is "beautiful and healthy," and the temporally vague word "arrival" is consistent with a future arrival. I say evidently and slyly designed, because there are one million ways to make an objective statement about a birth, without its being amenable to a future reading as well, but somehow, and not by chance coincidence, they alighted on this one way which is. The newspapers who ran with the news were all careful to say "according to" or "People magazine reports" -- if you insist on being different, at least use a live link. Wikipedia once had a reputation for objectivity, but on this point it seems stubbornly willing to outrace the newspapers in establishing a statement as fact, while, turning a blind eye to the patently obvious craftiness of Sarah's 13 words to boot.
Sarah's own words are very ambiguous. And the entire press release is strange. Sarah knows full well that the rumors haven't died, so why didn't her press corps put the nail in the coffin by stating the hospital where the child was born? Sarah can always say that her own words did not mention the time, past or future, or even who the child was, and that someone in her press corps later titled the statement and added the header according to what was published in People magazine. In a 363-word release that rambles on about a number of issues, Sarah devotes one thirteen-word sentence to the birth of the baby, without saying if it has actually happened yet. What is the significance of this? Back in August Sarah tried to lay the rumors to rest by announcing that her daughter was five months pregnant. No evidence, just her word on that. Then, four months later, Sarah's aunt and Sarah herself announce to the world that a baby is born, and again, no evidence at all, just her word on it. If Bristol was less than 5 months pregnant at the original announcement, then the rumors stand without any sort of counter argument. And, if some time in the future some baby pics do show up of Tripp, how can the date of the birth be verified, except according to Sarah's and Sarah's aunt's words? Besides the word of Sarah's aunt by telephone to People magazine, and the statement issued by Sarah's own office, what evidence can you point to that would in any way tend to affirm that a child named Tripp was born to Bristol Palin in Alaska (or anywhere else in the world) on December 27?
If the rumors are true, Sarah had no choice in terms of the release from her press office. After her initial unwillingness to acknowledge what her aunt said to People magazine, her press office was barraged by all sorts of inquiries. They would have then talked to Sarah and she would have finally relented. In terms of actual information about the baby, the press release furnishes nothing more than the information in People magazine, meaning that the press corps may be basing their information solely on this. The vague statement by Sarah about being over the moon because of the past or future arrival of some unspecified baby is just what you'd expect, if the rumors are true; that would be the best she could do. Fcreid's second post above provides a succinct analysis of what might have happened, except that Fcreid stops short and just says "wow." But isn't it interesting that Sarah is acting in strict accordance to what would be expected, were the rumors true? If Bristol was less than five months pregnant in August, then you will expect to see the photos of the baby sometime in the future. You would expect that the official press release, prepared by Sarah's press office with no help from her, would contain only the info in People magazine. You would not expect to hear any mention of any hospital, for a birth that has not taken place yet. You would expect the only primary source of information concerning the baby to be a phone call by Sarah's aunt to People, stating only the name and the day of birth (which in the first reports shifted inexplicably between Sunday and Saturday). Now, on the other hand, you have all the "evidence" for the official version, which amounts to precisely three items: 1. Sarah herself said in August that her daughter was five months pregnant, and Sarah herself said she was over the moon about the arrival of a baby, and why doubt her? 2. It was published in People magazine, and in other news sources (which were all careful to cite People as the source), based on a phone call by Sarah's aunt, during which she apparently provided no more information than the name of the baby and the date it was born (was it a short phone call?), so why doubt it? and 3"Salacious," "Stinky," "Cesspool," "Fringe."
James:
Re genesis of "who is Trig's mom?" rumors:
I recently read a comment in a blog thread dated around early April that alluded to the rumors. Sorry, I can't recall exactly where or I'd supply a link, but I think I got there from material on Audrey's homepage, so you might start there.
The comment was posted by someone claiming to live in Alaska--Anchorage I think. They said that the rumors started for two reasons: 1) SP didn't look pregnant; 2) Bristol's mysterious absence. I didn't read any other bits of evidence.
As for the VP angle, I don't think that was very much in play in April. Remember, this was right after McCain had sealed up the nomination. I don't think SP emerged as a viable candidate until the weeks before the RNC. In fact, I recall reading things in the MSM at the time of Trig's birth to the effect that, since SP just had a baby, there's no way she be selected/accept a VP bid. How about that?
So, in the April time frame, the only person who may have thought SP was on a VP short list was SP herself.
Look up the definition of sociopath and see if the shoe fits.
When I try to convince myself that Sarah did give birth to Trig, several things come to mind.
a. How can you explain the flat belly in the "Nail in the Coffin" photo.
b. How could she risk laying in the aisle of a commercial flight to spread her legs wide open and push out a wet bloody baby with an umbilical cord and a huge blob of placenta?
c. Why as a proud mother, wouldn't she aggressively WANT to prove to the world that the little bundle of joy in question is her own offspring? If anyone doubted the parentage of my children, I'd immediately show them the birth video, and then I'd and to tell them to go to hell. All you moms & dads out there: how would you feel if someone claimed your child wasn't yours, and what would you do about it?
i am sure that you, my fellow bloggers, find it odd that someone whose blogger-name starts with BLUE, and her image is OBAMA's logo would be so sympathetic to SP, and so insistent about finding out what it would take for us to go away.
all the more odd since i read that the SECRET SERVICE became more alarmed for BO's safety due to SP's insinuations at her rallies that OBAMA was 'palling around' with terrorist.
i'm not accusing her/him of dubiousness, just find it CURIOUS and very odd.
an INTERESTING interview
which touches on a new kind of journalism.
Facebook Journalism
http://www.roryoconnor.org/blog/2009/01/14/facebook-journalism/
ROC: With slumping public approval, journalism is facing a crisis of trust. We’re looking at how people can find and share credible news and information in hopes of regaining this trust. Do you think Facebook plays a role in this process at all? If so, how?
RZ: The concept of “the trusted referral” is integral to the success of content sharing on Facebook. We’ve found that it is tremendously more powerful to get a piece of content – an article, a news clip, a video, etc – from a friend, and it makes you much more likely to watch, read, and engage with the content.
...
we are the CUTTING EDGE!
sg:
I don't think the VP angle should be downplayed. Sarah Palin very much coveted the VP nod. Reports have surfaced about her actively lobbying for the job long before she was picked. This was the reason her trip to Texas was do very important to her.
And she was on a short-list for a very specific reason. She was about the only semi-qualified pro-life Republican woman in the country.
But she was (and still is) a borderline choice due to her lack of experience and more importantly her lack of qualification past her skin-deep appeal.
If you wre casting a movie looking for the perfect VP candidate, Palin would fit the bill. If you were looking for someone who could actually do the job, well we know that answer.
But the point is, I truly belive it was not any small problem to Palin to have a unwed, teenage daughter last April. I believe it would have killed her chances for VP nod because she was so borderline and because she was only chosen to shore up the right-wing base - meaning she represented a very religious, pro-life, no sex-ed in schools, abstinence only platform.
So instead of trying to expalin an unwed teen daughter Palin instead presented a heroic story of giving birth to a special needs baby late in life.
When the rumors didn't go away AFTER SHE WAS PICKED, instead of doing what anyone who really was the birthmom would do, which would be provide irrefuatable proof she was the mother, she instead tried to deflect the rumors by sacrificing her teenage daughter.
I doubt that was her first choice, but it was her ONLY choice.
James asked about the origin of the Palin pregnancy rumors. Here's a quotation from an ADN article by Kyle Hopkins, cited on Audrey's home page under the link called Palin Pregnancy Rumors:
..."McAllister was an Anchorage TV reporter before working for Palin. He said Palin once approached him - before people knew she was pregnant - assuming he'd been hearing rumors.
"She said it's not true about Bristol," McAllister said.
At the time, the rumor would have been that Palin's daughter was pregnant."
Read the whole article here:
http://tinyurl.com/74qc6h
This situation (SP approaching a news reporter to ask if he'd heard rumors about Bristol) has always seemed very suspicious to me - and then a few weeks later SP makes the grand announcement that SHE is pregnant!! (Things that make you go Hmmm.....)
I'm with Dangerous--can we find out ANYTHING about the AHA luncheon that was reportedly attended by SP, Bristol and Trig? Someone had to see something. Although, let me take this moment to point out that quite a few photos of the daughters on the web have been mis-identified. Even the video of the family walking to the middle school after the church fire had a girl who many assumed was a Palin. I don't believe she was. Is it possible that SP attended the AHA luncheon with two girls, one of whom may NOT have been her daughter?
~BG
I have mentioned this before, but why wear scarves to hide a pregnancy AFTER you announced it to everyone?
the ONLY reason to hide a pg is if your company wouldn't like it and you were afraid for your job or something. That would not be her fear.
She takes her kids everywhere it seems, so she wouldn't hide a belly so she won't be seen as just a mom and not taken seriously at her job.
What reason do you continue to hide it?? Unless the belly is not real.
I have to agree that Sarah might have NPD, or is a sociopath. The deflection and lies (about a lot of things), answering questions about herself with questions about someone else (finger-pointing and blaming), comparing herself to others (Caroline Kennedy), the victim complex ("why didn't they believe me?").
This doesn't mean a disordered person can't run for office, if she manages herself and sees a therapist and actually acknowledges her disorder and tries to deal with it. This just means that most people probably wouldn't want her elected. There is no medication one can take for sociopathy or narcissistic personality disorder, and those afflicted are not usually willing to admit they have a problem, even if diagnosed. Or are interested in being diagnosed at all. And they tend to lie to therapists to prevent being diagnosed. They think the problem lies with everyone else.
This could be why she doesn't want anyone seeing her medical records and would explain an awful lot - except Trig's, or Tripp's, birth.
About "anonymous bloggers". If she says "anonymous" that means "people who refuse to divulge their identities". That is SP's way of diminishing the credibility of the bloggers who post here - "they are nobodies". If we are anonymous, we're afraid to say who we are and therefore aren't reliable or credible.
Again, she is blaming people who are blaming her. The way disordered people expect everyone to jump on board with the reality they've created for themselves can be astounding. We can now assume that Gusty is a part of it, whether she knows it or not.
I do NOT think the credibility of Audrey, Morgan, or Palin's Deceptions has been damaged. I think that was the intent, yes; but I don't think it's working. If anything, SP drew attention to these blogs.
I have my ideas of who Trig's mother might be, but am also willing to admit that I have seen things just as crazy in my hometown, and come from a family that has had secret births, and have been involved with PD people, so my perspective may be coloured by that. I have thought and said from the beginning that this hoax is very small-town, doesn't need to involve a lot of people, and is probably not as complex as it appears (but, if it appears complex, it can be deemed messy, and that could be a deterrent to the AP or the AMA to cover it. SP is still trying to make it so that it's so crazy, nobody wants to touch it).
People with NPD feel a sense of victory when they feel that they've duped people, and then their aspirations for duping usually become bigger and more daring. SP has hidden the truth for this long, so she thinks she can continue to, on a much larger scale.
Of course the first thing she does is find a way to label her detractors, so that they don't have a leg to stand on. Anyone who has been involved with someone with antisocial personality disorder knows the drill. Whatever you call them, whatever you say about them, whatever you ask them, they wil turn it all towards you. Projection. They take their feelings, ball them up, and throw them at you, accusing you of having those feelings. And they will call you crazy, and they will make you look as bad as they can. And they will use anything they can to accomplish that.
If someone is trying to make you look bad, and you're a good person, there is much evidence to prove you're a good person and that they're lying about you, so you can present it. Or you go about business as usual, happy in the fact that no matter what anyone says, you're a good person.
If someone is trying to make you look bad and you're NOT a good person, they aren't trying. They're just exposing the truth. If someone is trying to expose you and you are a narcissist, you will most likely:
deny accusations and dismiss allegations without providing proof (relying on words and not deeds)
do your best to make someone else look worse than you
bring up the most asinine ways to demonstrate that you're just as good or better than someone else (comparing yourself or your actions to that of someone more credible - say Caroline Kennedy?)
say the craziest things and ask the craziest questions
basically stop making any sense whatsoever
Sarah is doing all of these things and more, and it is textbook NPD behaviour. That's not a crime, as far as I know, but it would definitely be a determining factor in whether a person like that could hold political office. And would explain the fact that there are no medical records beyond CBJ's halfhearted statement. It would explain a lot for me.
But it would still not explain who Trig's biological mother is, and it still would not answer the question - where is Tripp?
SP didn't address the rumours when she disclosed Bristol's pregnancy. She just hoped they would die. And she didn't think anyone would remember or care about the pregnancy timelines. Because she invents her reality as she goes along.
Apparently she said in an interview "why didn't they believe me?".
Anyone else have their hackles raised by the fact that she used the word "didn't" and not the word "don't"?.
DIDN'T implies past tense. DON'T implies present tense. IF she IS Trig's mother, she surely would have said "why DON'T they believe me?".
You have to listen very carefully to what people aren't saying... as much as what they are.
She is not saying she wants these rumours to die once and for all and that she is willing to take steps to make that happen. She is just saying they should stop.
She knows who these bloggers are, and how to contact them. She could provide independent, undeniable proof to them and this would all go away.
The mirror that was reaffirming who SP was is very foggy right now, and she is losing her grip on the reality she's created as a result. The only way she can convince herself that the pregnancy was real and Trig is her son is to have everyone around her believe it. Right now, she is working very hard to keep them convinced. Who she is seems to depend on what people think of her. If anyone thinks poorly of her, she needs to change THEIR mind - NOT her behaviour.
Any reasonable person who visits this blog out of curiousity can see very simply that SP was not pregnant when she said she was. If SP can convince people that looking at this blog makes them crazy, or conspiratorial, she has succeeded in keeping them from the truth.
My question is - how can a reasonable person, after taking two minutes to look at some pictures and read the Wild Ride story and check out the timelines re: Bristol being out of school and the announcement of Bristol's pregnancy, still honestly believe that SP was really pregnant?
Most reasonable people, after seeing all the information amassed here, have no doubt. HOWEVER - they could feel almost crazy, obsessed, or guilty for caring or being interested.
NPD people are very good at making those around them feel guilty or crazy.
My interest just means I won't accept things at face value. Doesn't mean I'm crazy or looking for more. Just means I want answers to simple questions. In fact, that's what piqued my interest in the first place - UNANSWERED QUESTIONS!
And if the face value is a thin veneer that doesn't add up - you bet I have the right to ask questions about it! If it's being put across by an elected official, even better for everyone to be inquisitive.
*OT, I can't remember the name of the priest or pastor who visited the male prostitute and did meth with him, and was caught, lied, lied, lied, eventually confessed due to the mounting evidence against him, and then a few months later said he was miraculously "healed" of his homosexuality. I believe people in his hometown probably knew *something* was not right. I also believe most of his clergy members, when faced with the "rumour", said "you're crazy!" and refused to believe it. Isn't that what he said initially when he was caught? That the man whom he'd done meth and had sex with was "crazy" and "trying to destroy him" and "lying"?
SP is LOSING it, and when these people lose it, they lash out. Tina Fey, Katie Couric, the Alaska media, the media in general, "anonymous" internet bloggers, the Republican party... if we scrutinize THEIR behaviour, we'll be too busy to look at SP's.
I doubt she's even aware of the fact that she's doing it. She just started pointing away from herself. When anyone does that, it should raise questions.
She is combing these blogs for ideas, feeble answers, excuses, and diversions. And I am sure she has her own people visiting the blog and posting, just like she had Gusty do that report. And because NPDs NEVER do their own dirty work. Just as she used Bristol to make herself look clean, she will use anyone.
I'm not a psychologist. Just someone who's grown up in a very dysfunctional abusive family, who's had lots of therapy, read a lot of books, and who has been involved with some very destructive PD people. I speak from experience. If there are any psychologists on the blog, it'd be great to hear what you think. I know it isn't fair of me to pathologize someone's behaviour. I'm certainly not trying to be an armchair psychologist, nor am I trying to be judge, jury, and executioner. Just throwing around some ideas and thoughts based on what's been presented.
I am interested to see what happens next, and am very glad SP is not in my circle of friends, and that her behaviour doesn't directly affect me. And - I am very sad for her family, colleagues and friends to have had to adapt to her craziness. It's a very shaky reality she's created and for anyone to fall in line with that or pretend things are normal is a kind of insanity for anyone to be involved in. And I don't say that because of Babiesgate - I say that because of the way she lies and talks in circles about pretty much anything.
Even if she doesn't have a personality disorder, I don't trust her and I don't think she's a very good person, or a very good elected official. That's really all I need to know, and she's the one who's given me the information that I base that opinion on.
One need only rely on logic and history to know, without doubt, Sarah Palin was not pregnant with Trig.
to sg:
As for the VP angle, I don't think that was very much in play in April. Remember, this was right after McCain had sealed up the nomination. I don't think SP emerged as a viable candidate until the weeks before the RNC. In fact, I recall reading things in the MSM at the time of Trig's birth to the effect that, since SP just had a baby, there's no way she be selected/accept a VP bid. How about that?
---------------
Actually, that is not correct. High level Repubs were courting Sarah in the summer 2007. Sarah has been reported as having several conversations with Dick Cheney. In Feb, there was a serious push for her to be the VP nominee.
She had been a very viable candidate in their eyes for over a year before we heard of her.
I have followed all of this with interest but have vacillated on the birth. If SP gave birth to Trig then it is a wild story. And if she had her 17 year old daughter come home to help her care for him, well that is just around the time she would have become pregnant. (Where were you Mama?)
It is plausible. I have reservations though because if SP looked as pregnant on the flights home form TX as she did on April 13 there would be no mistaking this woman's pregnancy by the flight attendants.
I also have a thought about why she keeps bringing this up. It could be a smoke screen to cover up investigation into REAL bad stuff, ala Ted Stevens, that could be prosecuted. She now has the MSM painted as harassing her.
Look, I can't stand the woman. The venom she was spewing during the campaign sickened me. How low can one go? I do think there are more skeletons in her closet. So I continue to be fascinated with this story.
In response to OneThing's thoughtful comments, I would like to reiterate that, like many here, I am not convinced that Tripp has been born yet because I also think it's odd that evidence of his birth has not been presented.
I haven't read the People article, but if they say that Tripp was born in an editorial fashion, then it is probably true because they wouldn't report something as fact if it weren't true.
On the other hand, if they relay the news in a reporting fashion -- e.g., using terms such as 'according to reports' or 'so-and-so says', then anything is possible.
The surprise! announcement of Bristol's pregnancy on Sept 1 has set off a rabbit hunt that continues to this day. I suspect that was the intention, because they essentially said so in that announcement: to deflect the rumors surrounding Trig's birth.
I suspect they are loathe to let go of that rabbit hunt since it continues to deflect attention and muddy the waters regarding Trig's parentage. Once Tripp's birth is firmly established, the rabbit is dead -- pun intended -- and, from their perspective, attention might turn from Bristol to other potential mothers.
If they thought that showing Bristol and Tripp would kill it entirely, they would. So that means either they know it won't, or they can't because Tripp hasn't been born and Bristol is still pregnant. Either alternative is still in play.
However, if they do show Bristol and Tripp and the investigation has no other suspects for Trig's mother ...
So I suggest we just keep going with whatever we have to work on, slowly building our case until we get more conclusive evidence.
Dangerous
Here's a possible fraud angle:
if Tripp is taken as a tax credit for tax year 08 (as he would be if born in Dec 08), but he is not born until Jan 09, that would be tax fraud! (Though on Bristol or Sarah's part? )
onething says Levi left a New Year's party saying he had two babies at home. Very, very interesting. (What's the source?)
Maybe he does. Maybe Trig was born a little earlier and Tripp a little later and are both his spawn. Maybe Levi lives with the Palins now and helps with Trig, his future brother-in-law, as his mom suggested. Maybe he and Bristol married last spring.
Most likely Levi has been coached to be sure he refers to both Trig and Tripp as existing. Most likely Bristol couldn't go to the party with him because she is 8 months pregnant, not postpartum.
Blue Tx:
Your concern for SP's children is commendable, but please remember that the person who is hurting SP's children the most is SP.
When she decided that she was qualified to accept the VP nomination of this country (without blinking remember) she is the one who put every action of hers and every lie she told for whatever reason altruistic or not, open to public examination. And trust me, Sarah Palin knew that and still accepted WITHOUT BLINKING.
Let's not lose track of what SP is asserting and what she did to prove her assertion.
She has claimed that she gave birth to a special needs baby at the age of 44. Her story was so full of holes and inconsistencies to the point that she was forced to address those inconsistencies in public. HER RESPONSE TO ADDRESS THOSE INCONSISTENCIES WAS TO SAY THAT HER 17 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER WAS PREGNANT.
Let me repeat, her response to diffuse rumors as to whether or not she was the natural mother of her 4 month old baby was to throw her minor teenage daughter to the wolves. There were many other ways she could have legitmately proved her parentage but that is the odd way she chose.
What I take from your comments is that whether or not Sarah Palin has perpetuated a fraud on the American people in order to further her political ambition is of no consequence to you at all. You are okay if she lied and you are okay if she just keeps on lying because you don't want to 'hurt her children'.
I counter your argument by saying if Sarah Palin perpetuated this fraud on the American people she is the one who has hurt her children the most because she has USED her children to advance the fraud.
I admit that I don't like the woman, I don't trust the woman. Her politics are not my politics. I think she is shallow, uninformed, selfish, insecure, unqualified, vindicative and most of all someone who will lie for whatever reason whenever she feels she has to protect or promote HERSELF with little or no regard for those around her, including her own children.
Seriously, who is hurting who?
The point of this blog is to examine one particular matter which speaks volumes about Palin's integrity and decision-making capability. The goal being to enable Alaskans (and heaven-forbid it come to this again, but the rest of the country) to make informed choices about this political candidate.
It so refreshing to have technology that enables "Audrey the Blogger" to become a true journalist and create a forum that encourages creative thinking and scientific analysis so we don't have to sit back and swallow every pre-digested bite the media tries to feed us!
In fact, watching the kind of power that SP has wielded so far makes it especially important that we pajama-clad bloggers who have nothing to lose can really get to the bottom of things. Fortunately Pat Dougherty, at least, is not caving to her high-pressure tactics!
All the evidence I've seen so far shows that (most) posters here are more logical, analytical and intelligent in their pajamas than SP ever was in her designer clothes!
And as far as disrespecting her family - it's also quite clear that most of us have nothing but respect, sympathy, and frankly, a deep concern for SP's children/grandchildren.
onething, I disagree that "no one else but Bristol or Willow would present any plausible reason for SP to fake maternity."
I have disagreed about Willow with Dangerous for months. Unlike Bristol, she has consistently appeared happy and healthy. Very unlikely she is a young teen mom.
Bristol is most likely. Sarah's sister Molly is next most likely. I won't regurgitate what I've said before about why Molly Heath McCann Wooten McCann Hackett is my candidate #2 except to say that Sarah has already shown herself willing to risk her political career for Molly, with troopergate.
While the issue is whether Sarah was pregnant rather than who instead was pregnant, a motive helps prove the deception. Remember that Sarah is genuinely anti-abortion and might adopt a related baby to avoid an abortion, as well as a scandal. So here's a list of possible parents who I recall have been mentioned:
Bristol and Levi
Bristol
Willow
Track and girlfriend who babysat
Trig during the campaign
Track and Sherry
Sherry
Heather
Lauden
Molly
Todd & girlfriend (we know of none)
Sarah (last, and least!)
"I wouldn't post my birth certificate on the internet... "
I think that SP is in a different position than the average person, since she demanded that her mayoral opponent produce his marriage certificate during that race, and her party demanded that Obama produce HIS birth certificate during the presidential race. To me, she doesn't get to make any privacy claims at this point.
OK, FlyontheWall and others, what did you find when you reviewed blog comments? From what lines of inquiry did someone try to distract us? Which lines of inquiry caused Palin to speak out?
Thanks.
BTW, I think we should treat BlueTX as sincere. We don't need to waste time re-answering her concerns if we don't want to.
"I also believe that this witchhunt to find the truth is damaging to her children, and the lengths that some have taken, I feel are wrong. Especially people demanding to see pictures of her children to make sure they are not pregnant...its wrong.
People claim to want answers but in reality I feel that all they want is to damage a family,"
How is it wrong? What damage does it do? I can understand if someone finds it distasteful, but that's different from doing damage. As far as pictures go, Palin herself is using her children to shore up her right-wing cred. If she had made an effort to keep them out of the limelight, asked reporters not to photograph them, kept them home and going to school... that would be one thing. But we hear that she dragged her daughters to events to which they were not invited, surprising the hosts, and charging the state of Alaska for their room and board. If she felt Bristol's recent/current pregnancy had to be announced, there still was no reason to drag Levi out of the woods, clean him up, and shove him on stage. Given that Palin is so eager to have her children front and center with the cameras flashing, why are we the ones who are wrong for wanting to look at the photos? What damage do we do? Please be precise.
B:
I think if was Todd who left the party claiming two babies at home (not Levi.)
I believe it was in the People magaizine story about Tripp - that would be the story all about Tripp with no pictures of Tripp!
What happened in December to prompt Sarah's media frenzy attacking bloggers this month? What happened to prod the ADN to investigate the growing rumors?
mmmmm. . .
Audrey's Gusty and 3 amigo photo analysis?
I have a rather strange scenario that sorta works. Here it is:
1. Bristol is sent away from home to get her away from a bad crowd.
2. Menopausal Sarah thinks she's gaining weight and, with her eye to the VP nomination (it is well documented that there was already lobbying going on), starts running 10 miles a day and does her Diet Dr. Pepper and Slim Fast thing.
3. In early February, when she was supposed to be going to the Right WIng Convention, she suddenly starts to miscarry a baby she doesn't even know she's carrying. (This allows all three Palin women to appear non-pregnant at the AHA convention in mid-February) The very tiny baby is born premature and not in very good shape thanks to its mother's crazy regime, and it has DS. It is not expected to live. Having a baby she doesn't even know she's carrying makes Sarah look like an idiot, and she has other things she wants to be doing besides hanging around a neonatal ward. She decides to keep it quiet. Only, the child lives.
4. Sarah now has a awkward situation. People might say she was trying to have a fondie abortion. She may even worry people will say the baby was Bristol's since Bristol was sent away and Sarah never announced the pregnancy. I know this sounds out of character, since Sarah expects everyone to believe her lies. So perhaps she simply realizes she can capitalize on the situation and claim to have known she was pregnant with a DS child but chose not to abort it, thus reinforcing her pro-life credentials. She decides to don the scarves and fake a pregnancy until it's time for the child to come home from the hospital.Trig gains weight, and is moved from Anchorage to Wasilla.
5. Sarah being Sarah, she decides to "deliver" the child in a blaze of drama. She picks a convenient time--after the legislature ends and her important trip to Texas--then tells her Wild Ride story to make her look like a Frontier Woman. Remember, the initial press reports were actually very flattering and admiring.
6. A friend at the hospital obligingly posts the 18 April birthdate on the internet. Someone more aware of legalities pitches a fit over the potential fraud and immediately orders it taken down, leaving the "ghost" link on google.
7.Bristol, first in Anchorage and then at Wasilla, is the one who visits the child in the hospital. She becomes the child's surrogate mother and continues to care for it even after it comes home. Sarah, who never wanted this baby, has little to do with the child, which is why Trig startles when he is handed to Sarah and snuggles into Bristol like he belongs in her arms.
There are, of course, several things this scenario doesn't explain, mainly: Bristol's absence from school and her engorged breasts at the convention, Levi's tender kiss of the infant, and Dr. CBJ's statements. So consider these alterations:
1) Bristol is sent away and drops out of school because she is pregnant. At about the time she gives birth, her mom's surprise premature baby reaches the point it can suckle. Bristol gives up her own child (as planned before they even knew about Trig) and breastfeeds Trig. Because she has been given no sex education, she thinks she can't get pregnant while breastfeeding, and so gets pregnant again.
2) Perhaps Trig really was at 35 weeks, just like CBJ said, when Sarah in ignorance or denial of her pregnancy goes into labor and delivers a very small baby in February. CBJ could thus have said everything she has said without actually lying. This still does not explain the "induced" quote from the doctor in the newspaper, but reporters do get things wrong. That bit of info may have come from someone else and simply been attributed to the doctor. Without an audio, we don't know.
This still does not explain Levi's touching kiss of baby Trig in Bristol's arms, nor his statement that he has to leave the New Years Eve party because he has two babies at home.
I do not actually believe this scenario, but it does make as much sense as anything we've heard out of Sarah's mouth.
As for why it is important that we get to the truth: Anyone who can devise and perpetuate this kind of tangled lie has no place anywhere near public office. I am tired, tired, tired of public officials lying to the public and then getting indignant and/or insulting whenever anyone dares to question them or doubt them. Think about McAllister's quote, "We just need to say they're pursuing an outrageous story, and it ought to shame them for doing it." No!
There is not a good therapist or doctor on this planet who will say that secrets can be healthy for a family.
Not one.
Because they aren't.
Ask anyone who's come from a family where lies were the norm.
BlueTx
"Has anyone here actually contacted SP herself and asked her these questions, or have they simply spread all kinds of wild theories, hoping she responds in the media?"
Andrew Sullivan on repeated occasions contacted Palin via the McCain campaign, asking sincerely for answers and he received nothing in response. Here is but one instance where he asks for records; there were repeated requests across the course of the presidential campaign. DailyDish Sept 24,2008
Thanks for clarifying, Shelby. So Todd-the-Silent has been coached!
"if Tripp is taken as a tax credit for tax year 08 (as he would be if born in Dec 08), but he is not born until Jan 09, that would be tax fraud! (Though on Bristol or Sarah's part? )"
Grandchildren living with grandparents can be used for most child and child care credits (depending on the parents' income) but more importantly, in my view, is the fact that if they applied for a Permanent Fund Dividend for Tripp for 2009, and he was not born in 2008, that would be PFD fraud, which is very serious and can require that all previously received PFDs be paid BACK-- a hefty amount.
A quick word about that "deleted" birth announcement on the Mat-Su hospital website:
There's no evidence of that having happened. This "fact" is based on getting a link to the April 18th birth announcements page when a google search is done with the terms:
Trig Palin site:www.matsuregional.com
(Put all of that in one line in the search box, even if it is broken up into two lines in this post.)
Try it. You'll get a couple of links to April 18th birth announcements. However, no Trig listed there - leading some to the erroneous conclusion that google indexed the page while a a Trig birth announcement was posted there.
Here's the key to what really is happening: click on the "cached" link on one of those two results. Then, look at the info bar at the top of the cached page. You will see this statement:
"These terms only appear in links pointing to this page: trig palin"
Google indexes a page by collecting both words that actually appear on a page AND by collecting words that appear in links POINTING to a page. To see the difference, try the search again, but this time ADD a couple of word that do appear in on the page in question:
Isaiah Kayden Trig Palin site:www.matsuregional.com
(Put all of that in one line in the search box, even if it is broken up into two lines in this post.)
Look at the cached version.
You will see the words "Kayden" and "Isaiah" highlighted in different colors - these are words that ACTUALLY appear on the page.
You will see the disclaimer that "Trig" and "Palin" only appear in LINKS pointing to the page.
Now try throwing in the word "Flubber" along with the other names: the search now generates no hits.
Here's a page that explains a bit about what is going on with cached pages, and which contains an image with the relevant message (about search terms appearing only in links) circled:
Googleguide help on cached pages
Hope this was helpful,
Ghostbuster
I've been reading this blog since October, but this is the first time I've had anything vaguely worth contributing:
Sarah Palin is a Bill Kristol protege. He'd been touting Palin as to all the Republican Presidential candidates since at least the end of 2007. She was definitely aware that one of the most influential neo-Cons in the nation was backing her as VP in 2008, no matter who was at the top of the ticket.
I see a lot of talk about the possibility that the birth certificate is dated weeks earlier than previously thought. What if it's dated April 17? It would certainly explain the wild ride, as Palin would no doubt want to be present for the birth of her grandchild/son/nephew/cousin/grandfather or whatever relation Trig turns out to be. In addition, if she were planning on adopting the child, it would behoove her to actually be present in Alaska on the date in which Trig was supposedly born.
I had a thought about Sarah's recent interviews where she specifically brings up Obama and his quote about how his family is off limits.
Is it possible that Sarah inadvertently gave us some insight into her (or the campaign strategists) reasoning for announcing Bristol's pregnancy (with Tripp)?
She knew from the beginning of the campaign that Obama said "family is off limits". Perhaps this is why they decided to say "Bristol is 5 months pregnant" because if anyone questioned this they knew that they could call Obama a hypocrite.
Interesting that she has put so much focus on internet bloggers now rather than the past few months. Is this because there is no Tripp and she has to create a diversion? We still haven't seen photos or gotten any information about what hospital and doctor delivered him.
The governors office originally didn't even want to comment on Tripp's birth but did so reluctantly after the press hounded them.
http://www.adn.com/palin/story/636859.html
http://community.adn.com/adn/node/136120
Not wanting to comment is not really Sarah's usual style.
***MODERATION REMINDER***
Again, I know we have new people coming here all the time and some of you aren't aware of the rules, but NO comments speculating or even hinting at incest will be approved.
Sorry for posting twice in such rapid succession, but two things:
1) The scenario I outlined above also explains why Sarah can't come clean with the truth the way she could if Bristol were Trig's mother, when she could gain her base's sympathy with a "I did it for my daughter" line. In watching an interview of the Esquire editor who did her latest piece, I was outraged to hear the new spin being put on Bristol's pregnancy--basically, "See, more proof that Sarah is just like "us" since millions of us are having to cope with unwed children. People can relate to Sarah and her family with their problems so much more than (sneer) to Obama's "squeaky clean" family." Yes; they really said that! So now Obama is being made to look bad because he DOESN'T have a dysfunctional family?
2) you might want to check out this CNN story on Sarah and her babygate whine "Palin's media battle raises eyebrows" (Sorry, I tried to add the link but couldn't get it to work)
T in Canada
I loved your post and you just described about every evangelical "end ov daze" loonie that posts on the webs.
Usually I do not read long posts thoroughly but I am glad I did with yours - you brought up some good points.foricur
Good point, Alex (8:20 AM) - I'd been asking myself the same question. Why, all of a sudden starting in December, has there been this dramatic increase in the level of concern/apprehension/panic coming from Palin defenders? Why all the interviews, the emails and phone calls to certain media outlets, the heightened vigilance from SP supporters on these blogs, the rage and fury?
2 reasons come to mind: the clear revelations from the photo analyses (beginning with the "Nail in the Coffin" on 12/2/08) and Bristol's announced due date of 12/18-20
In other words, paranoia is setting in....see the excellent post from T in Canada (1/15 6:59AM) for some additional insights in this regard...
Ghostbuster, Thank you very much for the Google link and explanation. I have always wondered how that allegation of a deleted entry had largely disappeared from the daily discussions. Lends a lot of credence to considering April 18 as just a made-up date.
what is it with SP and People Mag?
Still no Tripp pics....? sure.
To 'B',
If SP is not Trig's mother, that pre-supposed that she faked her pregnancy. In order for a high-profile person closely watched and photgraphed often to do that requires an equally compelling motive. She didn't do it on a lark.
I can't see any motive to fake a pregnancy for anyone other than one of her daughters sufficient to explain the risk associated with the chance the ruse would be exposed.
What compelling motive would there be for SP do fake a pregnancy for her sister, Sherry Johnston, Track's girlfriend or any other scenario has no supporting evidence, either direct or circumstantial. Those parties would also have to hide their pregnancy for the term, tell nobody, then give their child to the Palin family to pass around like a prop. What motive would those parties have to participate in a risky scheme?
As I've pointed out at length in my brief, in a circumstantial case those circumstances have to align with the theory or the theory is certainly wrong.
I've postulated Willow because the direct evidence doesn't rule her out, and the circumstantial evidence aligns with either Bristol or Willow. The motives for all involved align better for Willow than Bristol. The number of parties involved align more closely toward Willow than Bristol.
And Bristol will have had to have two children in less than a year from either two different men or Levi would have had to father her first child -- then father another one almost immediately, as if he hadn't learned a lesson and they didn't already have their hands full. I can't imagine Levi remaining involved with Bristol if he weren't the father of her first child.
We all must consider all of the circumstances or we'll head in the wrong direction.
Dangerous
I haven't seen the People piece on the Palins but I understand there are no pix of "Tripp."
The PR upside of having a Palin family portrait, with all members incl the babies, Levi and Todd together and calm and smiling, is HUGE for Sarah. It says, I love my family despite its difficulties. I've accepted my teen daughter's new family with open arms, my DS child is thriving in the bosom of the family...I am what I've always professed to be!! I am superwoman: pro-life mother, grandmother, wife, governor, and your future pres!
So why no such picture...not even a solo shot of "Tripp"? Options:
1)SP actually said, no, I'm done exploiting my family for political gain...we're going private starting with "Tripp."
2) Bristol said, no, mom, you're not exploiting my baby just to prove I didn't have Trig.
3) Levi said, no Sarah, you're not exploiting my baby...etc.
4) Todd stepped up and said, no, you're not exploiting this family...etc.
5) There is no "Tripp" yet.
6) There is a "Tripp," born when reported, but something about him is too revealing of the truth--not something bad, just revealing.
7) There is a "Tripp" but he was born much more recently than claimed.
As each day goes by, I say it's #5. But with either #5 or #7, his picture is likely to appear (as many on this blog have suggested) at a point when establishing his age will be difficult. And this whole circus will keep going and going and going.
I am simply baffled by why SP would want to keep it going. I'm more and more swayed by the psychological motivations, which must be so strong that no family member has the power to stand up to them.
Why I'm interested in this issue:
The account Sarah Palin has given about her pregnancy and birth simply cannot be true; the events she has related from her own mouth simply cannot be all true. The "wild ride" story of course being Exhibit A here.
Possibilities I entertain:
1. Sarah really was never pregnant, and the ruse was conceived in order to cover up either fraud or embarrassment. (Hers or someone else's.)
2. Sarah really was pregnant, but lied about some key aspects of the pregnancy or birth in order to cover up fraud or embarrassment (hers or someone else's.)
3. Sarah really was pregnant and gave birth to Trig on April 18th at Mat-Su Regional, but either embellished - or made up out of whole cloth - the "wild ride" story, for any number of reasons. (Wanting to appear heroic, not wanting to publicly contradict her father, not wanting to appear reckless for not consulting with a doctor or not following the doctor's advice to seek care in Texas, wanting to call attention to her BIG speech, etc., etc.)
Most likely scenario in my mind has been number three, with her motive perhaps being something as simple as habitual, pathological, misrepresentation of reality.
I can allow for her wanting to downplay the pregnancy/motherhood aspects of her life so as to be taken seriously and seen as 100% focused on her role as Governor (and later VP candidate). Yes, I know that doesn't jibe with e.g. her parading her kids around the campaign trail, her red heels, and so on. But she's nothing if not inconsistent on any number of matters.
Still, her response to the rumors gave me pause: why use Bristol's pregnancy as an alibi, instead of simply leaking a couple of family group pics with the newborn? Why not let verifiable, early spring pic of a non-pregnant Bristol show up on some random website? (Something from the AHA luncheon - if Bristol did indeed attend - would be perfect for that purpose.)
Teenagers drop out, transfer, homeschool, or are taken out of school for any number of reasons: academic failure, disciplinary action, illness (physical or mental), alcohol or drug rehab, working to support family, travel, to remove from "bad influences" (friends or boyfriend), to care for younger siblings or their own baby.
We don't know why Bristol dropped out of sight, and really it doesn't matter much one way or another - except that her mother has so curiously used Bristol's purported situation as "evidence" to back what is in any case an impossible account of her pregnancy and the birth of Trig.
Sarah's version of events simply does not make sense. But that's her version, and she's sticking to it.
Sarah Palin lied, either about something big (like being Trig's birth mother) or something small (like her water breaking in Texas). Rather than admit she told an inaccurate version of events, she dug in her heels and escalated the situation, to the point of sending petty, paranoid demands to the editor of the Anchorage Daily News.
And this woman wants to be, at some future point in time, the President? Of the United States of America? With her finger on the button, as the saying goes?
God help us all.
Dangerous, I've given some thought to this lately and I can think of a few reasons why Sarah might cover for Sherry Johnston if Trig was a result of Sherry's dalliance with Track.
Track was said to have been using oxycontin, and we know Sherry was dealing. That could explain how a hook-up could have happened, and Sherry's in the high risk age range for DS, and a drug user to boot.
If my son were to get a woman like that pregnant, I know I'd have real reservations about a drug user/dealer raising my first grandchild.
Politically, it would have been quite the scandal for the governor's son to knock up his much older, married drug dealer.
So Sarah steps in, agrees to adopt the baby and ships Track off to the military so he can ruminate on his sins while making her look good politically.
Sherry Johnston was flying under the radar and I have no idea if anyone saw her very much during the time she could have potentially been carrying Trig, if she is indeed his mother.
It would certainly explain Mercedes very curious statement that Triggy Bear was her "little brother."
And then, a convenient marriage between Levi and Bristol would certainly keep another member of the Johnston family in the Palin camp.
Of course, it's just a theory. But who knows. We speculate about who Sarah might have been covering for but let's remember: Ultimately Sarah is always covering for the one person most important to her -Sarah.
I totally agree, Morgan. As a mother, I personally would be more ashamed by the scenario you describe than by a pregnant teenage daughter.
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Does anyone think it strange that ages and birth dates of Sarah's children fluctuate? Or that Willow and Bristol are misidentified constantly? It seems so sloppy for a Governor's office to allow such simple mistakes or not distribute facts on the Palin family. If there is this disregard for accuracy at the lowest level, what does it say accuracy on the larger issues?
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Fly on the Wall, I'm still thinking about your comments. Come back.
Recently occurred to me that the reason she did not tell the children she was pregnant is that they would have wanted to hear the heartbeat; feel it move; watch it grown. Hard to do when the "baby" is a pillow!
For all who think this damages the family....Bristol is an ADULT now and she could put an end to rumors if she wanted to. The rumors involve her as well.
If these rumors are true, the family is damaging itself because they are living a lie.
If none of this is true, why doesn't Bristol or Willow crack at some point and call the media to prove it and stop the wondering?
sg said (@ 4:26 AM)... So, in the April time frame, the only person who may have thought SP was on a VP short list was SP herself.
Dang, now I can't remember if I read it here, or Mudflats, or Immoral Minority, or Progressive Alaska, or, or....
But anyway, I read somewhere just recently that, since mid-2007 Bill Kristol, a Washington DC-based magazine editor, had been pumping up Sarah Palin's resume as a potential VP candidate.
In digging through a Google search just now...
It seems someone pre-dated Kristol, though. Adam Brickley -- a BLOGGER! -- had ferretted out Sarah Palin's name as a potential VP candidate in early 2007, and his blog, palinforvp.blogspot.com attracted the attention of conservative Republicans.
See this article in The New Yorker, October 27, 2008.
Ghostbuster: in regards to your 3rd scenario- what's your take on the "Nail in the Coffin" photo that was undoubtedly taken 3 weeks prior to the birth?
Why couldn't Palin admit the Wild Ride seems reckless, but in the end Trig is fine (DS not affected by wild ride) so in the end, she was correct to go home??
Since there was no adverse outcome for Trig, why not just admit it looks careless but everyone is fine?
What if Todd is not the father, but Sarah is Trig's birthmother?
It might explain why Sarah didn't tell her family and was pushing herself so hard with exercise and didn't show much so probably wasn't eating much so it appears as if she was hoping to miscarry.
Wasn't there some speculation that she had affair at some point?
As manipulative as Sarah is, I'm sure she could convince Todd to not make a fuss so he can continue to enjoy all the perks of being First Dude.
Blue-Tx are you writing comments to the ADN editor's blog?
http://community.adn.com/adn/node/136646
Audrey and co, I think our new strategy should be to focus on the wild ride. That story indisputably came from Palin (we've got audio proof) and, if it were true, she has never publicly apologized for her recklessness or advised others not to fly while pregnant.
We want her to comment publicly that it do go this way and what her thinking was. The only reason we have is that "you can't have a fish picker in Texas".
Then why drive from Anchorage (where your physician has privileges and it has a state of the art neonatal ICU) for another 2 hours? If any governor was having chest pain and there was the slightest risk that his/her health was in jeopardy they would immediately go to the nearest emergency room. We expect the people in office not to take needless risks with their health without providing a suitable justification.
I'm frustrated with the editors response. Lisa Demers was the interviewer from after the birth who sounds suspicious of Palin's, correct? She could not believe that story and repeatedly asked for clarification. Palin continued to deflect the questions saying she didn't want to go into specifics until Todd ends with the infamous "Fish Picker" line.
On a slightly different note, I previously never gave credence to the Sherry Johnston rumors. But after her specific mention of the hysterectomy in People it did seem suspicious. It is quite possible that Sarah was being blackmailed into taking the baby as well as her word that she would keep her out of trouble with the law. It quite possibly could be Track or even Todd's baby with Sherry.
Interesting theory, Morgan. That would explain why she called Triggy Bear her little brother. But then Sarah wouldn't be "mommyinlaw." She'd be "baby daddy mama" or "gramma."
Watching the video of Sarah, Trig and Todd Sarah NEVER holds Trig.
She touches him but not with motherly or grandmotherly Love.
She speaks one thing but her actions right there in front of the camera are another. Like she is mad and disgusted. Putting on a front.
Todd looks and acts like it is his child. That is why sarah could not be holding the baby. If it was Todd and Sherry's, Sarah could be a little pissed off. Her future plans in chaos because of her husbands mistake.
That is why Track sent the message about a baby brother. That is why Mercedes talks about a baby brother.
It is highly probably that Bristol was preggo also. They kept her in Anchorage. They could not have two people on the Palin Insurance under the state. So with her native heritage through Todd she went to the Native Hospital.
It was enough for Sarah to handle with Trig so another baby had to be adopted. I think the pastor from the church or some other influential person from the church adopted the baby. That is the reason for the church fire.
But any adoption has to go before a court of law. A JUDGE makes the final saying in an adoption. there has to be court records not just a lawyer.
Seems like many hands in a pot of boiling water.
Dangerous said:
I haven't read the People article, but if they say that Tripp was born in an editorial fashion, then it is probably true because they wouldn't report something as fact if it weren't true.
On the other hand, if they relay the news in a reporting fashion -- e.g., using terms such as 'according to reports' or 'so-and-so says', then anything is possible.
Dangerous, I agree and the article that I read in the January 12, 2009 issue of People on page 132, is more like relaying the news. Here is a quote from the first paragraph:
"I'm a proud great-grandpa!" cheered Jim Palin, as the family broke the news to People that his granddaughter Bristol and her fiance, Levi Johnston, had welcomed a son, Tripp.
The article goes on to say 'Bristol, 18 and finishing school in Wasilla by correspondence courses, and Levi, 18, an apprentice electrician, may wed this year.' (Yes, it said 'may' not will.)
Also, I agree with one of our other blogger friends who commented that it was rather strange that People did not include Tripp's birth in it's Passages section (on page 127 of this issue) along with other celebrity birth announcements.
This makes me think that People has no real confirmation of the birth either. At least not at the time of this publication.
I would bet that Tripp has not yet been born.
Glenn Beck's 5pmET Fox News program premieres on Monday, and Politico's Michael Calderone reports his first guest is already set: Gov. Sarah Palin.
Palin has been in the news recently for her scathing critique of the media in an upcoming conservative documentary.
FNC tells us the interview will be live, and Palin will appear via satellite from Alaska.
Although it will be Beck's first FNC interview, Palin has appeared on his Headline News program before — in June 2008.
http://tinyurl.com/7pxplq
Palin Pregnancy Truth, that does seem highly suspect, doesn't it?
BluTx spends all that time asking us what it would take to believe Palin's story and stop looking into it and after we all weigh in the ADN's editor pops up today to say he won't write a story because no one would believe him if he did.
I'm not sure how many journalists only write the stories they think readers will believe. If you find and print the facts it shouldn't matter to the whether the public believes him. To the journalist, the important thing is that he's done his job to get the truth out.
But I haven't worked in Alaska and don't know what kind of pressure Dougherty is under. I've known some brave journalist and I've also known some easily frightened ones. I don't know much about Dougherty's reputation or if he scares easily, but he certainly seems afraid of something.
His fears may be economic. Newspapers are declining in revenue. Many are struggling. Maybe he's afraid of alienating advertisers or readers by pursuing such a controversial story. In an ideal world we don't want to think that newspapers are impacted by politics but they really are.
If Pat Dougherty ever wants to put the story out there and let the readers make up their mind rather than deciding what their reactions will or won't be, all he really has to do is ask Sarah point blank for the very kind of proof we all told BluTx we'd find acceptable.
Even Audrey weighed in, and it would be quite simple for- Sarah and the ADN - to put this whole matter to rest by producing a birth certificate, her medical records and a statement by CBJ that she assisted Sarah Palin in delivering a son, Trig Paxson Van Palin on April 18, 2008.
If Sarah refuses to supply that information to the ADN then perhaps the ADN can take that next courageous step and ask "Why?"
There might be a rational explanation for this, even if it is embarrassing. But as long as questions remain, so will questioners. The truth may be embarrassing to Sarah, but can it really be any more embarrassing than living in the shadow of her lies?
And how embarrassing will it be for the ADN if someone else blows open a story that unfolded right under their own noses?
Really, Dougherty is in a precarious place. And while his comments frustrate me, as someone who has worked in journalism I do kind of feel bad for the guy. His is a very tough position.
Dangerous,
I don't understand a motive for most of those people I listed, but they are the possible parents who have been mentioned by others here. True, Bristol and Willow are the only two that Sarah has control over.
Sarah is impulsive and would don the belly pads without thinking it through. If she knew of the DS when she did it, she may have seen a political upside with her base. Her looks have helped her get what she wants all her life (and her logic is shaky) so her expectations of pulling off a fake pregnancy were not necessarily realistic.
While Molly Heath...Hackett's divorce from the trooper was final, child custody and support were still issues. Thus troopergate. Wooten might have used an unwed pregnancy against Molly in the dispute over their children.
Molly already had a bunch of (well, we heard six) children she needed to support at least in part, yet the family law judge chided her for being under-employed. If she is 42 and doesn't have a good, regular, salaried job, she probably wouldn't have health insurance for herself or a DS child either. (Her other kids may have insurance through their dads.)
So Molly could have wanted Sarah to adopt her DS child to give him a better chance of lifetime care, and to keep her pregnancy secret from Wooten lest she lose more of her partial custody of their kids. Sarah would protect her. Sarah had two teenage girls who could help with a baby, while Molly's sister Heather already had an autistic child to care for.
As for why the fake pregnancy rather than an announced adoption, many possibilities. It brought in Todd's free lifetime native American healthcare for Trig (only as a last resort). It avoided Wooten using a pregnancy against Molly. Sarah as an inexperienced governor would have faced political criticism for taking on a time-consuming DS infant, but not for giving birth to one.
I have read that Molly looks like Sarah, not Heather, but I have never seen her picture. Heather spoke out during the VP run, as did the papa Heath and Sherry J., thus calling some attention to themselves, but Molly was neither seen nor heard of (except in troopergate testimony where her speech patterns were convoluted like Sarah's).
Molly is a mystery woman to me. She is my #2. Willow is yours, and you've documented why. I appreciate your doing that.
Every passing day without corroboration of Tripp makes me even more certain that Bristol gave birth to Trig. (Or that we are supposed to think that???)
Again, the point is that Sarah did not give birth to Trig. She faked it and continues to lie about it.
If Sherry is going to make such a bold-faced lie about having a hysterectomy, that would seem ill-advised. One very obvious discreditor would be her soon-to-be ex-husband, who could easily use the leverage of being able to contest that information.
Divorce proceedings can bring out the ugliness in people, and the National Enquirer or People magazine would be just a phone call away (either to dispute the hysterectomy story or to give credence to Sherry's "secret child").
At some point, the idea that the Palin's can simply intimidate anyone and everyone into silence isn't going to hold.
The Sherry angle just seems too far-fetched to me.
Morgan, I think you hit the nail on the head. You said about Pat Doughtery (ADN's Editor):
His fears may be economic. Newspapers are declining in revenue. Many are struggling. Maybe he's afraid of alienating advertisers or readers by pursuing such a controversial story. In an ideal world we don't want to think that newspapers are impacted by politics but they really are.
If you can recall, in Gov. Palin's last e-mail to Doughtery, her last comment was:
Thank you for your patience in awaiting my response. I do hope for nothing but the best for our local newspaper in these trying economic times that have hit your parent company.
I found her wording in this sentence to be somewhat threatening in an indirect but meaningful way. Why did she have to remind him that economic hard times had hit his company? She could have left it at 'trying economic times'.
Gov. Palin and First Dude are both revengeful type people and Pat Dougherty knows this. We know this from her record as mayor of Wasilla and the Troopergate scandal.
Pat Dougherty's fear of the Palins is what will keep him from pursuing Babygate and nothing else.
Morgan et. al.,
Sherry Johnston & Track Palin???
Apart from no direct evidence for that conjecture, wasn't Track already headed to Iraq by then?
I appreciate your efforts to align into a theory three pieces of evidence:
1) Sadie called Trig her 'brother' in a photo caption
2) Both Sherry and Track were allegedly associated with drugs
3) Trig's DS suggests, but has no cause-effect force, to indicate that an older woman might be his mother.
Although I've dismissed this theory without much comment up to now, I suppose I'll have to point out its large flaws vis-a-vis the circumstantial evidence.
If SJ is Trig's birth mother, then SP must have faked her pregnancy. The only reason to fake a pregnancy is to disguise the source of an infant. The only motives a woman would have to give up her child are if she didn't want it or couldn't keep it.
The SJ & Track theory does address both motivations, but the problem is that those motivations are like opposing magnets. The Palins would have to cooperate in the scheme, whether coerced or not. Otherwise, if SJ doesn't want the child, but won't have an abortion, she could just put it up for adoption.
So it would be logical to suggest that the Palins wanted Trig if SJ were willing to give him up to the Palins, Trig also being Track's child.
So far, the theory is OK without logical flaws.
If the Palins also want to disguise the source of the child, they have a simple explanation for his arrival: adoption. They don't have to tell anyone that it was SJ's and Track's baby.
Once SJ decides to give up the baby, to the Palins or anyone else, she has to make a choice:
1) If she wants nobody to know she's going to have a baby, she has to hide.
2) If she's going to tell people that she gave the baby up for adoption -- to explain the missing infant -- she just does that.
I recognize the problems with choice #2. Tongues would wag, particularly if the Palins turn up with a new infant at the same time SJ puts her child up for adoption.
Therefore, SJ would probably chose option #1. If she's successful, then a quiet private adoption completes the effort and nobody's tongues would wag. The Palins adopted an anonymous child.
Suppose SJ and the Palins decide to execute option #1, but it fails because people discover SJ is pregnant and she will have to explain what happened to the infant after all. There is no advantage to SJ of having SP fake a pregnancy to hide the source of the child!! That may help the Palins, but it does nothing to help SJ. And tongues would wag nonetheless.
But SP faking the pregnancy probably wouldn't help the Palins either. Apart from all the things that could go wrong and blow up the scheme and multiply the scandal, now the parties have to explain what happened to TWO BABIES!!
Of course, there's no evidence SJ was pregnant and by now whoever might know and not be part of the original scheme (thus foiling option #1) would have made that fact abundantly clear.
In short, the Palins don't have to hide the source of the child with a faked pregnancy since SJ is already hiding the source of the child. If SJ isn't going to keep the child, she just tells everyone that she put it up for adoption.
You see?
I don't know. This theory seems like crazy-talk to me. It falls in the category of zebras, not horses, and it's Alaska not Africa.
Whether the Palin's participation in the SJ baby scheme was either
voluntary or coerced doesn't matter. If you want to pawn off the baby on the mother of the child's young father, you execute option #1. Adding the kludge of having a high-profile individual also fake a pregnancy to disguise the source of the child just multiplies the chances that you won't be able to do just that.
Adoption yes, faked pregnancy no.
Until someone can come up with a logical series of events related to SJ selecting option #1 or option #2 and SP also faking a pregnancy to hide the source of the child, the SJ & Track theory doesn't hold water.
Nice try, though.
I'll add this analysis to my brief in its next draft.
Dangerous
"The surprise! announcement of Bristol's pregnancy on Sept 1 has set off a rabbit hunt that continues to this day."
I suspect the reasoning at the time was that before Bristol gave or didn't give birth:
a) McCain wins the presidency and thus disaster (in the form of scandal bringing down the VP candidate was averted)
OR
b) McCain doesn't win, SP goes back to (sort of) governing Alaska and her family and all of its members (or lack thereof) go back into relative anonymity
What SP doesn't quite get is the outrage that some of us feel that someone so unqualified, lacking in integrity, manipulative, etc. came so close to running our country. It is a frightening wake-up call to those of us who are paying attention. It makes us want to take action - which for most of us working folks means blogging in our pajamas. (I say the pajama thing entirely tongue-in-cheek - I'm extremely impressed and frankly relieved that there are so many intelligent, inquisitive people posting on here.)
By working to get to the bottom of this scandal, we can at least feel like we are doing our part to make sure this particular candidate doesn't come so close to power again!
Wooten might have used an unwed pregnancy against Molly in the dispute over their children.
Especially if the father was the First Dude. Todd's role in Troopergate has always seemed wildly inappropriate. I'm fond of my brothers-in-law, and they of me, but I really can't imagine any of them going on 100-mile snowmobile treks to photograph someone who'd allegedly wronged me, or ratting on them for dropping a kid off at school whilst in the company car.
Stalkerish, much?
re: Todd holding the baby in the clip when the "parents" are "introducing" him.
I have wanted to comment on this and I see it was mentioned again this morning.
People, it is common, so common for the father to hold the child in this scenario. There are many pictures of public figures documenting this - think Prince Charles and Princess Diana.
This effort to identify what would constitute proof for SP, what would make us lay off, has bothered me for awhile.
This is not our problem.
This blog is discussing all the ways the SP preg is not credible. These are not made-up complaints. We are not picking on her. It is the situation that is the problem. It is the major non-fitting-together nature of SP's words and actions. Which seem so obviously to point to some gross ethical violations, which matter to us only because she ran for VP with an aging cancer survivor, and as the ethics queen to boot.
How does SP establish trust and credibility after all that has transpired? It's up to her. She might succeed, or she might fail. This is true for each and every one of us in our dealings with others. There are no short cuts, express lanes, no-fail recipes, or guarantees.
Contributors to this blog have suggested a variety of things. I don't really know why: it is not our task to do so. It is SP's.
If 27 people on this blog say "Do A, B, and C," and SP does them, and the pieces still don't fit (in the opinion of significant numbers of the electorate), then SP will not have re-established trust and someone will continue to search -- perhaps joined by others, perhaps not.
This is how it has always been: you do unbelieveable things, people don't believe you. Duu-uuh! You want that credibility back? It's hard. Some succeed; some don't. I am thinking of the lying of "The Boy Who Cried 'Wolf.' " I think he got eaten up in the end.
Just for a start, I'd like to know how this is possible? I'm trying unsussessfully to keep an open mind -- that there IS some explanation besides hoax. I seek zero information about anyone else, esp not about ANYONE in SP's family.
The Bloggers on Pat Doughtery's most recent editor's blog post are really letting him have it. Their comments are worth reading.
Would be an excellent read for BlueTx and Craig. :-)
http://community.adn.com/adn/node/136646?pageNum=1&&mi_pluck_action=page_nav#Comments_Container
everyone, i've just thought of a reason sherry johnston most likely can't be the mom (assuming, of course that SP really isn't) and it has nothing to do with whether or not she truly had a hysterectomy either.
i've never thought sarah would cover for anyone but her own daughter. i only thought of this now seeing people like morgan give SJ consideration, i'd never given real thought to her as a possibility. so here it is:
it is very unlikely sherry j. could have hidden a prego belly for 8 months if she had one, because she was meeting with lots of people, on a very regular basis. all the people who were buying oxy from her.
an oxy addict is essentially a heroin addict. i've known a few of each. i will grant you that someone who is dope sick and just wants to make the transaction and get the drugs in their system may not be the most observant person on earth. but they would be be observing and interacting with SJ very frequently, and are often driven around by other, sober enabling people who would've seen her too. i find it hard to believe that no one would have ever noticed her growing belly, if pregnant.
this is the other part, even if one of her clients noticed and thought nothing of it at the time, i think that at this point, with the recent sarah-induced media buzz, they'd recall it and think "hmm, sherry did look kinda pregnant those few months. and track was hanging around a lot." (people in a small town using drugs tend to know who else is using through the same dealer, and what other users might have a bit to be begged from them when another junkie is dope sick and broke.)
i don't know if you've ever known any kind of addict, but they have NO qualms about doing almost anything to get money to pay for their next fix of their drug of choice. i truly think that if any of her clients could now recall sherry looking pregnant they would have sold their story to the enquirer. and although the enquirer is they only source (as far as i know) that speculated track ever even used oxy, it hasn't tied him or trig to sherry. i think if this scenario had any legs at all someone would talked about it -for a little cash- by now.
Hi Blur Tx.
Yes, The Palin children are precious, and beautiful, and need to be protected.
So are mine, and yours.
When I heard that wild ride story, I said a prayer: Please Dear God, do not let that dangerous woman be in a position where she is able to make decisions that affect my children.
Would that Sarah cared as much about her lovely daughter, Bristol, as you, and the people on this blog do, and had not fed her to the wolves..
Most mothers would consider their daughter a much more valuable treasure than any political position.
But on a personal note, I love kids too, and maybe some day we can blog about fun things, like our children, and our gardens. Right now were just trying to keep the world safe for them. .
Blessings, Pat (PS, its 80 degrees today in So Cal)
To 'B':
I've just posted an analysis of why Sherry Johnston and Track as Trig's parents does make sense.
The same analysis can apply, whoever the father is, for any of SP's sisters, friends, acquaintances, or complete strangers who was pregnant and gave birth to Trig.
If the participants in the scheme want to disguise the source of the child, they have to hide the birth mother. Period. Otherwise, if SP or anyone fakes a pregnancy, they have to explain what happened to TWO BABIES.
Does anyone remember the famous scene from the movie In the Heat of the Night with Rod Steiger and Sidney Poitier? The police chief played by Steiger has just arrested Sam, one of his deputies, for murdering an industrialist opening a factory in the small town. He famously says "I have the motive which is money and the body which is dead!"
The Philadelphia police detective played by Sidney Poitier, passing through that town by coincidence, reminds the Chief that the man was murdered elsewhere then driven in his own car to the spot his body was dropped near that car.
"Sam was on patrol in his police car," Poitier says.
"So what?" responds the Chief.
"Sam can't drive TWO CARS!!"
This is why nobody ever fakes a pregnancy for anyone outside the immediate family. You don't have to do it if the pregnant woman is giving up the baby. If nobody knows she's pregnant, you're in the clear with an adoption. If someone outside learns about her pregnancy, it's too late to fake it because then you have to produce TWO BABIES.
To anyone out there: I challenge you to defeat this logic.
Dangerous
The rumor that Palin was faking is discussed Sept 2, 2008 on PBS NewsHour between host Ray Suarez and Michael Carey, a reporter from the Anchorage Daily News.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/insider/politics/july-dec08/carey_09-02.html
MICHAEL CAREY:"....none of us knew that Bristol Palin was pregnant. We didn't know anything.
I mean, I think there have been in the daily news and some other reporting sort of the thought that, oh, yeah, this was common knowledge among certain people in Wasilla. People have said that, that being the governor's hometown. But I don't think that -- in a newsroom, as interested and gossip and good stories as ours, I did not hear this. I
heard the other story, which is the fake pregnancy story. And maybe you want to go on to that at some point.
RAY SUAREZ: Well, that --
MICHAEL CAREY: The other part of the soap opera.
RAY SUAREZ: Well, that seems to have been what smoked out the Bristol Palin story, the attempt to put the first story to rest that came. Tell us more about the first one, which I guess was highlighted on the Daily Kos website.
MICHAEL CAREY: Yeah, that's been -- that story has been around for quite a while. I first heard it when a lawyer who I like very much and is a very smart guy presented this to me as the absolute truth.
RAY SUAREZ: That is, that Governor Palin was not pregnant?
MICHAEL CAREY: No, and that the whole thing was faked because she was covering up for her daughter who was pregnant. And the daughter was having the child and Sarah claimed it was her child and faked the pregnancy so as not to embarrass the daughter and not to create I guess political backlash for some kind of conservative values concern.
This pregnancy story is now sort of up against the numbers of her real pregnancy, how she could have two pregnancies in X number of months is not answered."
Also, T in Canada- You are laser clear with your analysis of Palin.
I would add that she very unlikely has any real friends. It is so tiresome to be around people who are so shallow and phony.
Perhaps we can agree that the old saying "There's a lie in here somewhere" applies in this situation.
I wonder if the poster called Dangerous would apply the "method" and matrix to the list of possible lies(big and small) and be able to ascertain which ones are most supported. From there perhaps we could see a scenario we hadn't seen before.
Secondly, the "over the moon...healthy, happy" comment set off a bell. Is it possible the baby (Tripp) is not healthy and cannot be presented and photographed?
Finally, perhaps we need to consider the various events happening in Alaska right now. Following the news there, just for instance, I see that the FBI agent who was the source in the Stevens case is now publicly identified. There are many things going on in the state right now, all seemingly unrelated when taken in isolation, but does anyone else wonder if there are issues that could come up in any of those matters that could have direct bearing on this discussion?
While I ponder I'm still waiting on SP & CBJ to declare publicly that SP is Trig's birth mother.
Paula, in response to your question about how to reconcile the "Nail in the Coffin" pic to my Scenario Three (in which Palin gave birth to Trig at Mat-Su Regional on April 18, but significantly embellished, or even made up, the "wild ride" story):
Personally, I think she doesn't look pregnant, certainly not "pregnant enough" in that photo. However, I can't rule out there being some bizarre explanation for her, well, let's call it her wardrobe malfunction. Maybe there was some weird combination of lighting, posture, and long winter underwear that created an illusion of fake-pregnancy padding there.
Not likely, but not entirely impossible, and without at least one other unambiguously corroborating image I wouldn't stake the farm on that one picture, as persuasive as it is.
The thing is, speaking for myself, I can't conclude definitively, at least based on evidence that's come to light so far, that Palin faked a pregnancy. Granted, the circumstantial evidence certainly weighs heavily toward that scenario. But in any case I am certain of this: that she has, in one way or another, lied publicly about the circumstances of Trig's birth.
Luna, we don't know that Sherry was allegedly dealing in the time period before Trig was born, do we? The fact that her husband filed for divorce last spring is also suspicious.
Dangerous, isn't it possible, however unlikely, that Sarah faked a pregnancy, rather than openly adopted, totally for her own purposes, having nothing to do with the birth mom?
Once she decided to take, say, Track and Sherry's baby to avoid an abortion or grandson raised by drug-dealer or whatever, then she could have thought giving birth (not her fault) endangered her political career and seemed less like she was choosing to encroach on the time available to Alaska (or the VP nod), than did something "optional" like adoption. Or she wanted Todd's bloodline health coverage available. Or maybe the Amazonian-complex people are right about her needing to prove she can do it all -- give a speech, fly 12 hours, drop a baby, return to the office...
I don't think we should focus much on who Trig's biological mom is -- though Sarah invited us to think about Bristol by her statement in September -- but when we do, I don't think we should totally rule out every one but Bristol and Willow. That's my whole point.
Besides, I'm not convinced that thinking about rational behavior helps us figure out Sarah (or Wasilly)!
The reason the discussion heated back up in December -- to deflect from the fact that there is no Tripp!
And also....way go to Sarah. Did y'all see the Today Show this morning? They did a big segment on how Sarah is obsessed with discrediting bloggers, and has been vocally complaining to any reporters who will listen. They even interviewed Dougherty.
Now THAT is MSM!! When the Today Show covers the story (albeit in a slightly off topic kind of way), you know that there are producers behind the scenes who are itnerested, and just waiting for the story to bust wide open.
I'm sure it's on you tube or maybe even the Today Show site.
Dangerous says, "If nobody knows she's pregnant, you're in the clear with an adoption. If someone outside learns about her pregnancy, it's too late to fake it because then you have to produce TWO BABIES."
I'm confused? Why wouldn't this have been true as well if someone learned about Bristol's or Willow's pregnancy?
T in Canada -- thx for an excellent post.
In addition to her daughters, would she not have covered for her husband? Is that why SP would have such a difficult time appearing to bond with Trig, andallowing Bristol to step in more than what would be usual?
Would they not need the insurance coverage?
Craig mentioned that the truthfulness/falseness of Sherry's hysterectomy claim might be brought up by her soon-to-be-ex husband.
Also, if/when Sherry goes to trial, the fact of her hysterectomy most likely will be entered into evidence, as she claims in the People article that her physician's prescribing oxycontin post-hysterectomy is what got her addicted. Maybe that's part of an "I was physically/mentally impaired, through no fault of my own" defense.
Of course, if she pleads out before going to trial, we may never know for sure.
What teed off SP to lash out at the ADN in December was her learning that ADN's Lisa Demer was digging around for a story.
Bill McAllister, SP's spokesman, said as much on Anchorage talk radio, 1/9/09.
The more interesting question is what got the ADN going in the first place.
palindeception.com might very well have been the cause.
After reading all the comments about various birth mother scenarios-- I've changed my mind.
I admit. Track/Sherry was my personal fave. (I'm a drama queen, and it just seemed so um-- sorted.)
But Dangerous raises some good points. Tongues might have wagged if people connected a Sherry birth with an (outright,open) Palin adoption, BUT it also would have seemed honorable, somehow. I believe the talk would have died eventually.
And what we know (and feel) is that poor Bristol has been thrown under the bus more than once. The Sept. pregnancy announcement conveniently put the fake birth rumors to rest for a while.
Even Sarah isn't Machiavellian enough to think up a fake birth involving a Sherry baby, then toss out Bristol as her alibi. Much too complicated.
Nope. When I ponder what I know about the Palin household, it only seems plausible that Sarah can keep a daughter out of sight and safely manipulated. Trusting someone else like Sherry to go along with a crazy plan is just plain dangerous.
Sherry's dropping the info about her hysterectomy could be used to quell the Sherry/Track rumors, even if it did nothing to the Bristol rumors.
Sarah has tons of leverage already on Sherry if Sherry wants to be able to see her grandson(s).
Nope. I've changed my mind. The simplest scenario is the Bristol one. Otherwise why would the pregnancy announcement in Sept be so very important to all this?
Everything hinged on that announcement.
Shall we all buy PEOPLE, then flood their offices with emails and letters asking for proof of Tripp's birth?
The longer we wait, the more chance for more shenanigans.
I think the simplest answer is usually the one that makes the most sense.
Until anyone can prove conclusively that Bristol Palin was NOT pregnant last spring - for example a picture sort of like the one we have of Palin at 7 months pregnant - well then I'm going with the simplest explanation.
I believe that Bristol Palin became pregnant. Sarah Palin in order to not jeopardize her chances to be seen as a viable Republican VP nomination who if she was picked would be picked for the sole purpose of energizing the far right base - a base which consists almost entirely of very conservative, Christian fundamentalists who espouse pro-life, abstinence instead of birth control, no sex-ed taught in the schools and most importantly "Family Values" (with a capital F). For this reason Sarah decided to claim the baby as her own. Whether or not anyone knew the baby had DS I don't know. I can't fathom why an amniocentesis was done on a teenager. I don't think the baby was necessarily premature although he may have come a few days earlier thus resulting in the mad return from Texas.
I also think the absence of Baby Tripp is beyond odd now, especially when one remembers he was the whole reason Sarah Palin 'proved' to the world Trig had to be hers.
I would think a picture of baby Tripp in Bristol's arms with proud daddy Levi at her side would have been a prerequisite by the Palin camp by now to prove once and for all that we are a bunch of tin-foil hats wearers and women really can have babies at 44 and not look even a tiny bit pregnant until their last 3 weeks (at which time they swell up like a hot-air balloon.)
In my opinion ALL evidence points to the scenario that Palin covered for Bristol by faking a pregnancy for a couple of months. Can anyone point to any evidence that disputes that scenario? I personally can’t find any evidence that counters that scenario. I also believe her reasons were far less altruistic as some might claim. I think Palin’s political ambitions far outweigh anything else in her life including her children and their well-being.
BlueTx,
Those photos HAVE been commented on on this blog, much earlier & they ARE included on the main site that Audrey has put together Family Photos Discussion
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