The Rogue
I’m Traveling This Week
April 18, 2011
Probably no new posts until Friday. Thanks for all the comments.
–Joe
Cold Water Thrown on Simmering Trig Hoax Allegations?
April 15, 2011
UK’s Daily Mail posts a photo of Sarah at her Dallas speech that shows her with “not only a pregnant stomach but a visibly fuller face and breasts, all signs of late pregnancy.” Case closed, say they.
Hey, none of the pictures of Sarah pregnant-or-not with Trig is the Zapruder film. None of them proves anything. At most, people can use them to support the opinion they already have. I just learned today, for example, that a couple of Brits spotted about-to-be princess Kate Middleton’s face on a mango jelly bean. Truth is as the eye of the beholder sees it.
But a mainstream backlash is developing against impudent suggestions that questions about Trig’s birth are legitimate. MSM news and opinion site Slate (owned by Washington Post Co.) posts an article headlined “Occam’s Razor Says Sarah Palin Is Trig’s Mother.”
Who doesn’t like Occam’s Razor? This is a philosophical principle posited by a 14th Century Franciscan friar called William of Ockham. It says, bottom line, that when there are varying explanations of an occurrence, the simplest is most likely to be true. In this instance, Sarah Palin gave birth to Trig. Period. End of story. That’s the simplest explanation. Occam says, “No story here, move along now.”
But as I just mentioned in a Twitter post, Occam never got to Wasilla. If he had, he might have thrown away his razor and grown a beard.
Sarah Palin’s Fantasy Life: UPDATE
April 14, 2011
When nothing else seems to be working, Sarah can be relied upon to conjure fantasies of older men coveting her daughters.
Palingates asks, “Why are sexual and other threats against her daughters such a recurring theme in Sarah Palin’s life? Why does she repeatedly paint an image where her daughters are the objects of men’s fantasies?…Who is sexualizing Sarah Palin’s underage daughters? Who’s conjuring up images involving sexual violence against her daughters again and again and again?”
Well, we all know that answer to that one: Chuck Heath’s middle daughter, that’s who.
And Papa Chuck makes sure to say, “we armed ourselves.” Just as they did against Trooper Mike Wooten.
As the father of two daughters, I can’t help but feel sorry for Sarah’s. What an atmosphere in which to grow up.
UPDATE: Jesse Griffin at Immoral Minority has spoken to Shawn Christy, the young man against whom Sarah obtained the restraining order.
Posted in Chuck Heath, Joe McGinniss, Mike Wooten, Palin children, Sarah Palin, The Rogue | 
Tags: chuck heath, fantasy, palin children, palin daughters, Sarah Palin, sexualize, wooten | 
32 Comments »
Blodget Pokes a Stick at the Sleeping Bear
April 14, 2011
Henry Blodget, CEO and editor-in-chief of Business Insider, writes that Northern Kentucky University professor Brad Scharlott alleges Sarah Palin “probably staged a gigantic hoax about being Trig’s mother,” but “our media has been too wimpy and pathetic to investigate.”
The sleeping bear is awake now and starting to growl.
To be clear: I am not at this point accusing Sarah of staging a hoax in regard to Trig.
I am, however, like Andrew Sullivan at The Daily Beast and Jesse Griffin at The Immoral Minority, saying that mainstream media, as well as Alaskan media and some otherwise progressive Alaska bloggers, gave Sarah a free pass re Trig in 2008, and have continued to denigrate anyone who suggests that the issue–a cornerstone of her political identity–is worth exploring.
The question now is whether the mainstreamers will revoke the pass, given that they’ve written Sarah off for 2012.
“Ultimate Makeover” for Sarah Palin on Friday?
April 13, 2011
Sarah’s next speech will be at a Women of Joy gathering in Oklahoma City on Friday. Women of Joy is an evangelical organization that’s part of Phil Waldrep Ministries. In its mission statement, the Phil Waldrep Evangelistic Association says it seeks “to spread the gospel to all of the world.”
Sarah spoke to a Women of Joy conference in Louisville in spring of 2010, urging her audience not to “let anyone try to convince you that God should be separated from the State.” Transcript of her speech available here.
It seems to me that Sarah has been badly wounded by her precipitous drop in popularity and relevance. Seeking solace, and trying to rebuild her self-confidence, which has always been far more fragile than her public appearances would suggest, she’s returning to her evangelical–Christian Dominionist roots.
The degree to which she’s wedded to Dominionist beliefs is something into which I delve deepy in The Rogue.
What better place for Sarah to lick her recent wounds than at a “Women of Joy” gathering in Oklahoma City? There’s no indication that Phil Waldrep will be there himself–he’s busy building his own evangelical radio network–but no doubt someone will be there, like Thomas Muthee was in Wasilla, to pray that Sarah remains impervious to infiltration by devils.
And if she’s really lucky, she might get nominated–if not by the GOP for president–at least by the Women of Joy for the “Girls Night Out Ultimate Makeover,” offered by Phil Waldrep’s organization.
Posted in evangelical, Joe McGinniss, Sarah Palin, The Rogue | Tags: christian, dominionist, evangelical, phil waldrep, Sarah Palin, the rogue, women of joy | 16 Comments »
Sarah Palin hearts Trump: she once yearned for Ivana
April 11, 2011
As I mention in The Rogue, Sarah once drove from Wasilla to J.C. Penney in Anchorage to get a glimpse of Ivana Trump as she promoted a new line of perfumes. She told Todd she was going to Costco to buy groceries. But she was really going to J.C. Penney to see Ivana because, as she told the Anchorage Daily News, she was “so starved for any semblance of glamor and culture.”
Now that she’s toeing his birther line, maybe The Donald will let her sit on his lap.
Posted in Anchorage Daily News, Sarah Palin, The Rogue, Todd Palin | Tags: anchorage, costco, culture, donald trump, glamor, ivana trump, j.c. penney, Sarah Palin, the donald, wasilla | 32 Comments »
Amazon.com
April 10, 2011
Amazon now has a Joe McGinniss page
Posted in Joe McGinniss, Sarah Palin, The Rogue | Tags: amazon.com, joe mcginniss, joemcginniss, new book, rogue, Sarah Palin, the rogue | 1 Comment »
Professor asks: Trig hoax? Sarah Palin spokesman enraged
April 8, 2011
A journalism professor at Northern Kentucky University has written a research paper titled, “Palin, the Press, and the Fake Pregnancy Rumor.” The professor, Brad Scharlott, asserts that there was enough evidence of a possible hoax to have warranted closer scrutiny by mainstream media during the 2008 presidential campaign.
Sarah’s former spokesman, Bill McAllister, has gone ballistic in response, threatening to commit assault and battery on the professor and writing that he’d like to challenge him to a duel. Calling Scharlott “despicable” and “a scoundrel,” McAllister forwarded his response to faculty colleagues, saying, “he should be fired.”
Rest assured, the question of whether Sarah is really Trig’s mother, or whether she faked the pregnancy and lied about the birth is not an issue I ignore in The Rogue.
Posted in Sarah Palin, The Rogue, Trig Palin | Tags: Andrew Sullivan, fake pregnancy, hoax, journalism, mcallister, Northern Kentucky University, Sarah Palin, Sarah pregnancy hoax, Scharlott, the rogue, Trig Palin | 49 Comments »
Is Sarah Palin at the Tipping Point?
April 8, 2011
Chris Cilizza, who writes The Fix at the Washington Post, is one of the most reliable purveyors of the political conventional wisdom of the moment. He writes today that Sarah “may have peaked, politically speaking.” He cites recent polls as evidence of “Palin fatigue” among Republicans and says the most likely reason for the dimming of Sarah’s star was her churlish and ill-advised response to the Tuscon shootings in January.
Even my friend Geoffrey Dunn (his book, The Lies of Sarah Palin, will be published next month) now puts the likelihood of Sarah running for president at only fifty-fifty.
I disagree. There is a natural ebb and flow in the tides of politics, and not even Sarah (or maybe especially not Sarah) can always be at high tide. The primaries are still almost a year away. She stumbled badly with her needless–did I mention that it was also churlish and ill-advised?–response to the Gifford assassination attempt, and at the end of January another CW spinner, Dana Milbank of the Washington Post, declared February a “Palin-free” month. Even Sarah could tell she was over-exposed.
So she’s retreated to the high grass temporarily. But let’s remember that it was only two months ago that her hiring of Michael Glassman to head Sarah PAC was seen as a strong indication that she was preparing to challenge Pres. Obama next year.
Then she went to India and Israel when she could have made just as much money closer to home.
So, no, I don’t think we can yet write her off as a fallen star. If nothing else, her old Wasilla High point guard instinct will not allow her to stay on the bench as Michelle Bachman becomes the Tea Party’s new darling.
One thing about tides: whatever direction they’re flowing in, they’ll soon move in the opposite direction.
Posted in Sarah Palin, The Rogue | Tags: 2012 campaign, Cilizza, Geoffrey Dunn, Glassman, GOP, Milbank, Palin fatigue, presidential campaign, Republican primary, Sarah PAC, Tea Party, The Fix, tipping pointl campaign, Washington Post | 24 Comments »
Todd’s Love Child?
April 6, 2011
National Enquirer out with a story about Todd’s “love child.” http://bit.ly/e1j9km
I heard the story from a number of people last summer. Basic version is that it’s a boy now in his late teens and that the mother is an old flame of Todd’s from his hometown of Dillingham. I haven’t yet been able to confirm this, but I won’t be delivering my final chapter until June.
