One important reason why this is relevant is that the Republicans and Palin are exploiting this baby as proof that "Palin not only talks the talk but she walks the walk." Translated, "she not only says she is 'pro-life' she has lived it."

Check out the videos of her acceptance where the child is bounced around getting full exposure and he is only 4 months old!

There are other reasons why this is relevant but this is the most deplorable one.

Too many people are involved in this cover-up for it to stay quiet.

I think everyone commenting here misses the essential point in that, with a list of "choices" a proverbial mile long (not withstanding how she made them), Ms Palin clearly qualifies as PRO-CHOICE. Judging by the pants-pissing exultation for this unknown national neophyte exibited by the demented denizens of the country's lunatic leper colony, I'd say that they don't get it either.

How nice for a women to have reproductive choices, even if she takes advantage of none of them. And how nice to live in a country that guarantees these choices to all women as a matter of law. So, why then does the reactionary republican party celebrate an unknown woman for vice president of the country who claims she wants none of these choices available for any woman but herself? Orwellian Doublethink? Typical rank republican-party hypocrisy? Utter and boundless republican-party cynicism? Just asking ...

By the way Dr.Cathy Baldwin-Johnson works at the Providence Matanuska-Susitna Valley health care facility, which has an NICU facility.

This post would fit really well at No Quarter.

And one other thing....

As a tactical campaign matter, a significant number of American voters qualify as "low information" types; and the reactionary repugnant party has made much electoral hay over the decades distracting, misleading, and confusing this demographic with virulent, viral vituperation repeated ad nauseum in sub-rational sound-byte slander. Democrats at the presidential level have become famous for losing because they do not undersand the primitive appeal that lurid scandal -- no matter how fictitious -- has for too many Americans. Someone once told Democrat Adlai Stevenson that "every thinking American is for you!" Replied the eventual loser Stevenson: "Yes, but I need a majority." No successful candidate for the Presidency of the United States ever succeeds by appealing solely to rational, articulate people. In America, "inquiring minds want to know ..."

Therefore, assisting a tabloid story like this to go viral for at least a week or two might do all the damage necessary -- from a Democratic Party point of view. Those "high information" American voters who care about modernity and rational government policy will vote Democratic in any event. Such people do not constitute a majority, however. Somehow, the low-information types must get their fear-and-loathing fix one way or another; and as a Democratic Party partisan, I would much rather that the shit-stories revolve around irresponsible, reckless republicans than anyone else. I can always take a shower later and wash the stink away -- after President Barack Obama takes his oath of office.

As the Irish always sing: "You take the High Road and I'll take the Low Road and we'll get to the White House instead of THEM."

I am, am I. Here's the link again

Here is a question that came to my mind. Does the baby really have Downs syndrome? Or is this meant to foreclose speculation that about why he may look different enough from his brother and sisters to not be a sibling?

They fly women from all over Alaska to have their premature babies in Anchorage at either Alaska Regional or Providence - Providence is the only one that can offer advanced neonatal care.

For the record I really don't think she was covering up for an alleged teenage pregnancy.

I do see the judgement question about driving past hospitals more prepared to handle a sick newborn.

The question was never asked here in Alaska because:

(A) bad form to criticize the method/circumstance of any birth, it's a private family decision (as abortion should be also).

(B) the baby was born with Down's, a devastating diagnosis to anyone.

The only REAL question should be asked of Sarah Palin is:

Would she support laws that ban abortion, especially when there is a confirmed diagnosis of severe mental or physical disability?

The abortion debate goes much further than simple 'abortion on demand'. Banning abortion removes the choice of couples (even married ones) to plan their family - especially in light of devastating prenatal diagnosis.

My husband had an interesting point on this:

In these economic times, with the costs of raising a family (and educating them) skyrocketing - would the GOP/RNC really try to force anyone to have a disabled child and care for it after birth?

It's a massive financial burden that can pull resources from other siblings and financially devastate anyone.

No one said it was easy, but what always seems to be missing from the debate is the right married couples have to determine their family's advantages or to limit their disadvantages.

The reason it isn't talked about is because people who face this decision to terminate an unhealthy child or pregnancy want to do so in private without all the political scrutiny.

What is disturbing is that this kind of misogynistic smear campaign is allowed on this website.

Nothing happened. The baby is fine. End of story. This non-story is BOGUS.

John Nail proves himself to be a troll.

Are you kidding? This calls in to count her overall judgment. Get your head out of your ass if you think this is a smear. SHE is the one who flew after her water broke or was leaking or whatever. If that is her judgment, it sucks. She is as reckless as McCain.

Great...server errors and double/triple posts.

Sorry!

Please, please, please drop the Palin baby attack. I have no clue if it's true (the going into labor in Texas, then flying home to Alaska, then driving out of Anchorage to a small village to deliver is fishy). But if something seems too good to be true, then more likely than not it's a Rove plant. You can just imagine the McCain team, after the buzz around this purported scandal has risen to a crescendo, holding a press conference with tens of millions of viewers, where Palin shows the blood test results proving she is actually the mother, and giving a heartfelt speech against the smear politics that are out to destroy her because she's a working mother. Please, please do not follow the story.

If there's even a shred of credibility to it, it's been confirmed that there's an experienced team of love-child experts on the case right now. We'll hear about it soon enough without dirtying our own hands.

OMG. Calling it "Water Breakgate" is seriously hilarious.

I appreciate the good intentions of the people who are saying "don't go there."

But friends, we're not going there. Obama is not going there. The media is headed there. In buses and vans and planes. We're just tuning in.

For instance, Andrew Sullivan is giving the story oxygen.

It's also interesting that the McCain campaign is alleged to have just sent a team of eight people to Wasilla to do some after-the-fact vetting -- aka "clean up squad." Hat tip via John Cole's Balloon Juice.

I think there might -- just might -- actually be a story here somewhere. It'll be sad. I'd rather win on the issues. On the other hand, John McCain's tendency to make crazy impulsive decisions is one of the issues.

It's also possible -- via gawker, so take with grains of salt -- that the baby is really Sarah's but that Bristol is also with child. She's wearing an engagement ring, and this would explain the rather suspicious quote McCain's people gave to the NYT apologizing for not having time to vet the *rest* of the Palin family.

Hey folks, couldn't these "rumors" be stuff planted by Rove?

Remember Dan Rather and memogate??

False documents were floated, picked up by CBS, and then "revealed" to be fakes. This was a good distraction from Bush's very real AWOL from the military.

Stupid rumors about her baby seem like a distraction from her fringe rightwing views and ethical misconduct.

blockquote>Paw, Paw, where's my Maw?????

Without having heard any of this before, what first struck me was that Mrs. "I'm all about family and wholesome Christian values" is ready to run for Vice President a few months after giving birth to a Downs Syndrome baby.

Take parenting seriously, do ya, Sarah?

Take the fate of the world seriously, do ya, Sarah?

So, while you're busy getting caught up on all that stuff that's been going on outside of Alaska (Iraq War, economy in the shitter, etc.), learning at the feet of the master, who's taking care of the special needs baby?

I don't take any of what I've read in this post for granted, but the one thing I'm convinced of is that there needs to be a thorough investigation. If she's not completely open about this, she deserves to be the subject of any and all of the rumors that are flying around.

http://www.andrewhalcro.com/vetting_the_veep_post_announcement

Team of Republicans goes to Wasilla. A little late . . .

John, you said that the March 2008 Airport photo link had no mention of pregnancy, but I found this sentence: 'Of course I had to check out the “Hottest Governor in the US” and quickly turned to see her pregnant (she has since had her baby) with bags and daughter in tote.'

Do you have a cached version of the page without that sentence? Now that would be interesting indeed!

There's no question in my mind that Palin faked her pregnancy but then, I'm a woman. I've been pregnant. I've paid attention when my women friends have become pregnant.

I know, as most mothers would know, that a women who has given birth FOUR TIMES before, and looked like this during a previous pregnancy:
http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/slideshow/photo/080831/480/529a19dfc6774f308117d4be16d30c8d/

... doesn't have washboard abs like THIS five weeks before she gives birth to her 5th child:
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/345168.html

The uterus lose more elasticity with each pregnancy. Ask any woman who's been there (especially any one who's been there several times).

I have no idea whether this is an issue that will matter to the type of voter who likes Palin. Maybe not.

But please -- enough with the complaints about raising this issue at all. Palin and McCain made the baby an issue, part of her pro-life resume. Anyone who claims the story is far-fetched after looking at ALL the evidence is either clueless or a McCain troll.

"Even if it were true"... Raising a special needs child is commendable, whether or not it is your own. But this misses the point. Raising a daughter and her son as sister and brother is what would be happening -- and this creeps people out. I know it was done in the old days on occasion (and there is one guy around my small town whose fortune it was).

But even if it's not true, and the reckless travel from Texas actually happened (rather than being a cover story) does not reflect well on her.

Picture of Sarah Paline pregnant with another child, not the child born in April.
http://members.aol.com/gregindel/pregnantpalin.jpg

I'm sure Sarah Palin attended many events during her pregnancy. I wonder if (a) she drinks alchohol, and (b) if there are any photographs of her drinking a toast. Think about it: she must have known she was pregnant about 2 months in, but the story is that she didn't share the news until much later with her staff (7 months?). If a "story" was concocted somewhere along the way, she may not have known she would need a cover and might be seen toasting at fundraisers etc. I can just see the right wing wonder why a good mother would be drinking at 3, 4 or 5 months along...

I just did a CTRL-F search for "Schiavo" and was surprised to find no hits.

You remember Terri Schiavo... the woman in a persistent vegetative state that Bill Frist, a cardiologist, diagnosed via edited videotape as being five minutes from waking up and turning cartwheels. Remember how much fun we had at Frist's expense over that? And he at least had a videotape and knew for certain the basic facts and the documented medical history. He was just being disingenuous, which is almost cute by comparison.

This kind of shit is so radioactive and so WRONG that it's got me praying that this is just bush-league Rove dirty tricks, and we'll wake up tomorrow and find that all these accounts were set up yesterday, and all the IP addresses can be traced back to the RNC, etc. But I'm less and less optimistic.

Obama doesn't need a bunch of crazed conspiracy theorists pounding tables and waving grainy photos of Palin's uterus to win. Boy, that'll play well on Good Morning America and NBC Nightly News. Thanks ever so much, but sit down and let the adults handle things before you do ten times the damage the PUMAs ever could.

And,like semiotix says: it is so WRONG that we are facilitating this. Come on, we are better than this.

She clearly looks preg here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30076181@N02/2814199887/in/photostream/

The equivalent to the Muslim-rumour for Obama. Really, do we need to go that low? There is enough bad stuff about Palin without digging around in her private life.

Don't get mad - this topic just reminded me of something.

My son worked on a shrimp boat in Alaska right after high school. He was the only crew member under 50.

He told me that the crew members told him that the Inuits have an extra chromosone.

Now, I had never heard this, and I didn't believe that if there were homo sapiens who were genetically different from the rest of us, that I had never heard it.

I told him he must have encountered people who were misinformed, and went into a diatribe about Down's syndrome having once been called Mongoloidism because of the Mongol features, and the land bridge over the Bering Strait were the Mongols came from and the similar features to Down Syndrome people who do have an extra chromosome, or that he had encountered people who were prejudiced against the indigenous population, but it was pretty clear I was less convincing than the crew members.

Was I right?

I do not like this particular story, but it is relevant because it questions Palin's integrity, honesty and judgment.

If the Rovian mean-machine attacks us for questioning the veracity of this story, don't cower. We have every right to question the candidate. After all Palin may be President one day. If she is prone to fabricating stories we need to know ergo bridgegate, troopergate. These are not frivioulous matters.

IF true, babygate means she will lose the majority of voters trust. I cannot blame Palin for wanting to protect her daughter. That in and by itself is noble. However if she fabricated a story about waiting 12 hours to give birth in Alaska, Palin will have will totally discredited herself. It matters a lot on the national level because no one likes to be taken for a fool.

I hope it is not true because it will be her daughter who suffers. Her daughter will be put in the spotlight and embarrassed terribly. That is not fair!

It has been said that neither McCain's campaign officials nor the RNC have been to Alaska to dive into past news reports -- their news paper evidently is not online. They are just now putting together a team to fly to Alaska.

For McCain not to vet the woman he will also have lost the confidence of the America public. The media plays it like taking a gamble is a "good" thing. Well its not!

Furthermore it insults our intelligence. This also highlights McCain's lack of concern for the nation and our security as well as his poor judgment!

Lastly instead of Sarah Palin, McCain and his surrogates hit the Sunday talk shows which gives credence to the idea Palin is simply not ready for PrimeTime.

Did they think we would not notice!

The point made in the post above is that 99% of people would not have acted as she did. This shows poor and risky judgment that does not have much in common with parents everywhere. If you were an expecting 44-year-old mother leaking amniotic fluid, would you do what she did? What if you were her husband? I’m betting that “risk the baby’s health by getting on a plane and flying for 12 hours” is not the first idea that would come to mind. 99% of people in her situation — i.e. affluent and with good health insurance — would have done the sane thing, which is go to the hospital in Texas and deliver the baby there. So it’s not about whether it’s plausible that she returned to Alaska while leaking fluid. Sure, it’s plausible. But it’s about what she did do: the illogical, risky and stupid thing. And for what? To have the baby born in Alaska, the state she wasn’t even born in herself? Thus, she is harder to believe because no one, especially no lover of “life,” would have acted that way. Cue the suspicion.

Either she acted rationally in covering up her daughter’s pregnancy, or she acted irrationally and inexplicably in returning to Alaska and then driving past the better facilities. Most of me is hoping that at least she did the former, which is terrifying but logical. If she did the latter, then we have some irrational lady as a VP candidate, which is a scarier thought.

Wow. Just wow. You people are a bunch of fucking idiots.

I don't know what to say about a reporter who genuinely appears not to know the difference between "leaking amniotic fluid" and "her water broke."

Without going into clinical detail, you're essentially attempting to conflate a slow leak in a tire with a high-speed blowout. They are not the same. The slow leak is of concern, and the appropriate response is the one she took -- consult with the doctor.

Please do your damned homework next time before you completely discredit yourself.

Thank you, Athena. I agree that it is important to discover the truth of this story. If women of child-bearing age are going to be in the political arena, there pregnancies and births will inevitably be scrutinized and the correct way to handle the information has yet to be discovered.

On the other hand, her decisions to travel and where best to deliver might not seem sensible but I think the charge of negligence is a bit strong given that we don't have all the facts and because, as advocates of choice, we have to tolerate that she might have picked one hospital over another for her own reasons.

Let the story go. If it has legs, it will walk. Governor Palin can dispell the doubt quite simply by proving the maternity of her child with a simple test. If she declines, we are left to wonder. Her choice.

I am also a mother of five, having my last child at 40 years old. I did NOT have great healthcare, as a gov. would have.
I had to go to a state funded clinic.
My M.D. made me have a test, an amnio., which tests the water.
He said it is routine on every pregnancy when the mother is in her late 30's and up.
This women is either a real cold bi*&h or ignorent as hell.
Kinda puts some logic to the rumors, does'nt it?
Hey, I gotta couple of semesters in. Majored in Poli/Sci. I've traveled a whole lot more than Palin.
Maybe I could be V.P?

A good investigative reporter might want to question the OTHER driver of the Feb 8 accident as to the appearance of a pregnancy. An even better source is the array of students at Wasilla. As a retired teacher, I can tell you "Loose lips sink ships" was never truer. They can give you details, some good, some stretched, but in the main, one has the grain of truth you need. Go for it!

As a 20+ year labor and delivery nurse she was woefully negligent in her choice to fly that or any distance with leaking amniotic fluid. Even if her child was full term and healthy she was wrong, wrong, wrong to do what she did.
Not only did she risk having a premature, high risk baby on an airplane with the increased chance of infection but she also risked having a prolapsed umbilical cord which sometimes comes out first after the bag of water breaks,is squeezed by the presenting part of the baby and cuts off the baby's oxygen supply quickly resulting in brain damage or death.

This article is pure idiocy! Shame on you and I hope they sue your pants off for libel...concerning who carried this baby.

You ABORTIONISTS who are willing to kill a late-term perfect baby, are either bitching that she's pro-life one minute, or now, claiming she took risky behavior during her pregnancy in another!

Which is it? Take your pick... is Sarah and right wing pro-life monster or left-wing careless embryo abuser?

You can't have it both ways.

This article stoops so low, I can't believe TPM would print it.

Having a baby is NOT AN ILLNESS and if it came out in a taxicab, chances are all would be fine. Women gave birth on the prairie this way for years and I doubt they laid in bed until just before it happened.

Sarah is da bomb! Obama is toast!!!!!!!!!!!!

I saw this same plot on Desperate Housewives a while back. That doesn't mean that it is true, or that it is not true. It could be that life imitates art, if you consider Desperate Housewives to be art. It is entirely possible that the family watched the episodes of DH and got the idea. Or not. But it did play out on TV well a couple of years ago. Same exact plot. Mom pretended to be pregnant. Daughter disappeared for a while. FWIW.

Another issue we might want to consider...

If Palin is truly against corruption as she claims she is, then she will understand the need to be as transparent as possible.

Americans understand faults and are generally willing to forgive them.

All they ask is that you be straight with them.

If this is a non-issue, then fine. Be open and honest with us, with FACTS, not just open-ended denials and attacks.

The longer she delays, the more this thing will fester...

Probably the first and last time I ever link to Free Republic, but can you all just give it a rest?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2072180/posts?page=1

She looks pretty pregnant here, dontcha think?

I think people should focus on more relevant public issues, such as Palin's opposition to sex education in the schools.

The Anchorage Daily News, Alaska's main newspaper, has posted "Rumor Patrol--Baby Drama" at http://community.adn.com/adn/node/130178?page=1 so the story is getting into the newspapers, at least up there. I think this makes it more "legitimate" to talk about here.

A few new things on the web--I noticed and others have as well that Bristol Palin is wearing a ring on her left hand now (the picture of her holding the baby at her mother's recent rally.) Scuttlebutt from the web--she recently got married. And a kid named Chris Ray who lives in the town where the hospital is says he loves Bristol on his website.

My biggest problem with Palin, and the reason this story is of such interest to so many people, is that we really know nothing about her views on anything because there's no record. She's "pro-life" and has a Down's syndrome child in her family. Does that mean that she would support laws that would force my family to make the same choice she did? If so, and if she holds herself out as a role model, we all need to know exactly how one handles such a situation. If, say, I am a working mother of 4, pregnant with a Down's syndrome child that I have to carry to term, does she believe that I have to take risks with my own health and the fetus's in order to keep my job? Or does she support ample health care and maternity leave, and social support so that when I have this child, someone's going to help me care for it? Because, unlike Palin, I don't know how I could jump on a plane at the last minute and go back to work three days after the birth of my special needs child. If she would want me to do that, I certainly wouldn't vote for her. (Not that I will anyway.) But we have very little of her words to tell us what she thinks one way or the other about this issue or any other issue. (Sorry that I placed this post on the wrong thread earlier.)