Sarah Palin, governor, journalist...

"Being a voracious reader, I read a lot today and have read a lot growing up. And having that journalism degree, all of that, will be a great assistance for me in writing this book, talking about the challenges and the joys, balancing the work and parenting, and, in my case, work means running the state." (Fox News)

Sarah Palin wrote an op-ed explaining her reasons for rejecting nearly $30 million in stimulus money for energy projects. I'm going to comment on some passages:

The feds required me to certify these codes "will be implemented" or pushed on local communities... But conditions here required more "big brother" government involvement.

These are the words of a state governor and journalist. Unprofessional and disrespectful in either capacity.

Alaskans have a strong history of independence and opposition to Washington, D.C., meddling in local issues.

A journalist would know that one doesn't separate the subject from the verb by placing a comma between them. Sarah Palin sounds like a mouthpiece for the AIP.

I've served as a city councilman and city mayor/manager.

No, she hired a manager to run the city.

My community went through a battle over building codes when our booming city desired more growth opportunities to allow job creation.

Sarah Palin as mayor went through battle over building codes when her house was built by Todd and his buddies at the same time as the sports complex.

The last thing we needed was a bureaucrat from Washington, D.C., telling us what the best policy was to adopt.

Subject, comma, verb is a no-no. Word salad. AIP?

I asked the feds to clarify their position.

More disrespect from the governor.

Beware of Washington, D.C., trying to cajole local community leaders to eliminate the choices Alaskans have when building or renovating homes and businesses.

Word salad. AIP.

The governor uses Washington D.C. and feds as interchangeable terms in a very derogatory tone throughtout her piece. The journalist separates the subject from the verb at least three times, not to mention the usual word salad.

I haven't discussed the contents of her op-ed because we know very well that there are no strings attached to the money for energy projects.

The tone and the language used by the journalist/governor proves that she's not qualified for either position.



Sarah Palin's unprofessional and misguided op-eds, speeches, press releases and twits together with inappropriate choice of clothing on various occasions lead me to the conclusion that she would be more successful in a very different occupation.
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Sarah Palin's fan John Ziegler, an example of total malpractice

John Ziegler went to Alaska to promote his media malpractice film. It was much trumpeted by the likes of Eddie Burke (the crotch grabber) and Bob & Mark (of Lyda Green is fat and a cancer while Sarah Palin giggled). Out of the 1000 tickets available, less than 300 were sold. Considering that quite a number of liberals attended out of curiosity or the opportunity for a few laughs, there weren't many supporters of the most popular governor at the screening...

The screening of the film and the subsequent interview of John Ziegler by Phil Munger are being discussed on various progressive blogs, which is why I chose to focus on Ziegler's dating video.

The guy is a jerk, to put it mildly. The date gets really interesting from the 3:24 point. He says that after the age of 40 men get more distinguished and women lose their power in the relationship. I suppose he means women lose their looks. If that's the only power he believes women have in a relationship, he's a bigger jerk than I first thought. Then he proceeds to say that women are irrational. OK, that's his opinion. Ziegler's date ran a mile after a few minutes with him, not irrational at all!

John Ziegler worships Sarah Palin, who's nearer to 50 years old and definitely not rational. Did he change his views or is he simply the worst kind of opportunist? It looks like he jumped on the Sarah Palin bandwagon for personal gain, but it's not paying off as he expected. Less than 300 hundred fans in Sarah's own turf?

Oh dear!

Ziegler posts on Mudflats, Progressive Alaska, Celtic Diva and Immoral Minority.
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Sarah Palin, guns, knives and misplaced worship

It looks like some Sarah Palin supporters manage to alienate other supporters with their hero worship. I received another gem from The Messenger, our Team Sarah insider.

In order to have some background, this is from an NRA related blog:

Recently, NRA has released some of the names of top invited speakers for the Celebration of American Values Leadership Forum scheduled for the afternoon of Friday, May 15.

(Photos of 12 likely speakers, NOT including Sarah Palin)

Comments:

1) Posts spamming this page in support of Sarah Palin are being flagged as spam. One comment was fine, but when you use this event planning page to advance your personal political agenda, I will remove your comments.

And for the guy who believes Sarah Palin is a deity, please seek help.

2) I have no idea why the Sarah people are spamming you. The NRA is going to present her with a commemorative “Alaska Statehood” M-16 (iirc), according to reports that I’ve heard, at an upcoming NRA confab. Apparently, this particular appearance by Palin is already set up.

3) That is true. In fact, this very website has a specific page dedicated to the fact that Palin is receiving the highest ILA award. However, her followers from one website in particular keep trying to use this comments section to bitch and moan about why she isn’t included in the list of generic speeches. Apparently all context is lost on them, and they keep tying it back to advancing their own personal political causes which is why they haven’t been approved.

However, they keep emailing the link around so I still can’t put up a poll with her name on it. The folks who started the mess created some kind of a system to keep choosing her name, casting two votes a minute for about an hour before I put a stop to it. (It’s not grassroots power when the IP is identical. A whopping 10 IP addresses cast about 250 votes after they started promoting it.)

Sarah Palin didn't attend the NRA banquet, but around that time, Team Sarah had an NRA themed thread with a charming photo of the governor. One of the comments:

wow, David, who know Sarah was so Buff???



Meanwhile, on a knife enthusiast blog, I found this:

Governor Palin is amazing.

Gov. Palin was in Austin Tx to give a speech. Her Labor pains began just as was introduced to speak, She spoke for and hour and half and then took a Limo to the airport. Just after take-off her water broke !!!

The pilot flew fast back to Juneau and when Governor Palin arrived in Alaska 6 hours later, she got into her car to drive home.

On the way home she saw a Moose, she pulled over, hunted it down and shot the Moose stone dead. Then she pulled out a 9 inch hunting knife, gutted the Moose and made Mooseburgers for dinner.

Then she got back into her car, stopped to chat with the Postman and the FINALLY - she got to the hospital and had the Baby !!!

I just love Governor Sarah Palin !!!

Not even a knife fanatic GUY manages to buy the wild ride story...
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Sarah Palin can't do anything wrong... ever

Oct 2008 Palin office defends charging state for children's travel

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is allowed to charge taxpayers for her children's commercial airline tickets because they represent the state wherever they go with her, the governor's aides said Wednesday.

"There's an expectation that the First Family participates in community activities," said Sharon Leighow, the governor's spokeswoman. "They are representing the First Family and the state of Alaska."

The AP reported that often the children were not invited to the events the governor attended, but she brought them anyway and charged the government.

The AP also reported that Palin ordered the children's travel expense forms changed in August to add language claiming that they performed official state business on the trips.

Leighow also defended other state-paid trips the girls made. She provided to the AP on Wednesday an e-mail that the governor's office received that invited Bristol to a five-hour New York conference in October 2007 that she attended with her mother. Palin charged the state $1,385.11 for her daughter's flight. They shared a room for four nights in a luxury hotel on Central Park.

But the conference organizer said Bristol was only invited after the governor said she was bringing her.

Feb 2009 Palin to reimburse state for family travel

Gov. Sarah Palin has agreed to reimburse the state nearly $10,000 to cover assorted costs related to various trips taken by her children in 2007 and 2008, but she's not admitting that she did anything wrong.

The charges at issue include the cost of airfare and one meal when daughter Bristol to accompanied Palin to New York City in 2007 for a women's leadership conference, according to the settlement agreement. State travel forms put that cost at about $1,400.

Other questioned trips were in Alaska, including one last year to the start of the Tesoro Iron Dog snowmachine race, in which Palin's husband, Todd, was one of the contenders.

The settlement was signed Monday by Palin and Anchorage lawyer Tim Petumenos, who was hired by the state Personnel Board to investigate the complaint.

"Nothing in this agreement constitutes an admission of wrongdoing, and none has been found," the document said.

Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, took it a step further.

"The governor has been exonerated of all wrongdoing in this ethics act complaint. There is no finding of wrongdoing and there is no ethics violation," Van Flein said in a news conference.

So was she exonerated?

"To be exonerated suggests a hearing on the merits and a conclusion. That was not what happened here," Petumenos said.

As Petumenos described it, the governor agreed not to contest certain charges. He agreed not to file a formal accusation or take the case to a hearing.

Governor's website:

"I am gratified that this settlement explicitly recognizes and establishes that I broke no laws or ethics rules.

It is troubling that this complaint was such an obvious political weapon, with an associate of a political adversary filing this and making it public – against state law – just before the election. Beyond objecting to the obvious gamesmanship that serves the public so terribly, I think it is important to prevent the ethics act from being used as a tool to ensure that only the wealthy can seek higher office in Alaska.

This is a big state, and I am obligated to – and intend to – keep Alaskans informed and meet with them as much as I can, from Barrow to Marshall to Ketchikan. At the same time, I am blessed to have a large and loving family, and the discharge of my duties should not prevent me from spending time with them."

Considering that the Personnel Board, the Attorney General and various "independent" investigators always provide cover for Sarah Palin's misdeeds, it's impossible for her to violate any statutes or break any laws.

A few bloggers are covering the latest ethics complaints that have been dismissed. I went back to Travelgate because there was clear evidence of wrongdoing, which in the eyes of the Personnel Board and other Palin minions means completely innocent, of course.

The fact that she paid back $10,000 to the state doesn't seem to indicate innocence. They made a deal before the matter could come before the courts. Giving money back and making deals doesn't mean she's innocent. They twist and spin the facts, make big statements to the press, Sarah Palin appears to be making a grand gesture, but the facts say otherwise.

Two things stand out:

“This is a big state, and I am obligated to – and intend to – keep Alaskans informed and meet with them as much as I can, from Barrow to Marshall to Ketchikan. At the same time, I am blessed to have a large and loving family, and the discharge of my duties should not prevent me from spending time with them."

The AP also reported that Palin ordered the children's travel expense forms changed in August to add language claiming that they performed official state business on the trips.

If Sarah Palin charged the state to be able to spend time with her children then deliberately ordered her staff to alter expense forms so the travel appeared to be connected to official state business, how is it not wrongdoing?

This was reported at the same time as the reimbursent:

It's the latest development related to Palin's expenses and perks. State officials announced Monday that Palin had turned in her state Chevy Suburban after learning she would owe income taxes on any personal use of it, and last week they said she also would have to pay taxes on expense money she received while living in her Wasilla home.

It seems to me that the IRS was closing in on her and with help from her "independent" associates she managed to wriggle out of some bigger trouble.

Last week I wrote about Cheryl Metiva: "Sarah Palin's Valley friends". The Mat-Su Frontiersman has since published an editorial:

Suspending executive director Cheryl Metiva until the audit is complete was the right move.

She comes under scrutiny because former misunderstandings regarding chamber credit card purchases indicates she did not understand the card was not for personal use — which seems unlikely — or she deliberately hoped those purchases wouldn’t come up under examination of the books.

In response, via a press release, Metiva said those issues have been cleared up. Which, reading between the lines, probably means she reimbursed the chamber for the purchases and her wrist was slapped. She should have been fired.

In the press release, she intimates, those charges are all that have occurred.

Does anybody notice certain similarities in the style of the two Valley women?

That's Valley ethics in a nutshell. Now Sarah Palin has spread her wings and turned it into Alaska ethics. If she makes it to Washington, the whole of the US would go into an ethics freefall.

Where's the IRS in all this?

Latest ethics complaints: Mudflats, Celtic Diva, Immoral Minority.
RECALL Sarah Palin
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Sarah Palin, baby, fluids, risks and the doctor

Let's take a closer look at the interview of April 21, 2008 and examine some known medical facts.

Reporter: I was hoping you could walk us through a little bit about kind of what happened because he came earlier that you thought and not when and where.

Palin: And, uh, he wasn’t due for 4 or 5 weeks later and um, while I was at energy conference I felt perfectly fine but uh, had thought maybe a few things were starting to progress a little bit that perhaps there was an idea there that he might come early. So I called my doctor at about uh four in the morning in Texas and um I said ya know I’m gonna stay for the day here at the energy conference - have a speech that I was determined to give at one o’clock that afternoon and, um, had Todd check on a couple of flights that were earlier than we had scheduled.

Reporter: So did your water break?

Palin: Well, if you must know more of those type of details, but, um…

Reporter: Well, your dad said that and I saw him say it so that’s why I asked.

Palin: Well that was again if, if I must get personal, technical about this at the same time, um, it was one, it was a sign that I knew, um, could lead to uh, labor being uh kind of kicked in there was any kind of, um, amniotic leaking, amniotic fluid leaking, so when, when that happened we decided OK let’s call her.

There are times when the amniotic sac may develop a tear or may rupture causing the amniotic fluid to leak before term. When this occurs before 37 weeks, it is referred to as ‘Premature Rupture Of Membrane’ or PROM.

When the premature rupture of amniotic sac occurs, it is necessary to determine the cause of the leaking amniotic fluid. Normally, the leaking is caused by a bacterial infection or by a defect in the structure of the amniotic sac or the uterus or the cervix.

This leakage may lead to further complications for the growth of the fetus, as it may hamper the growth of the fetus and may cause bacterial infection to spread from the vagina to the uterus and consequently to the fetus.

Premature rupture of the membranes can present serious risks to mother and baby

* To the mother - the risk of infections and early delivery
* To the baby – the risk of infection, blindness, cerebral palsy, deafness, cognitive impairment and death

Other complications that could occur include compression of the umbilical cord, postpartum infection, early detachment of the placenta from the uterus.

I very much doubt that her doctor could have performed any examinations over the phone. I can't believe her doctor would have risked a major lawsuit for malpractice because Sarah Palin was determined to give a speech. Either the whole thing is a fabrication or Palin didn't take a blind bit of notice of the doctor's advice. If Sarah Palin's account is taken at face value, I'm afraid her doctor comes accross as an utterly incompetent medical practitioner.

Reporter: In the family statement that was issued by… it said through early testing you knew you would have some special needs.

Palin: Right…

Reporter: Can you explain?

Palin: Right, yeah, well, He’s got that extra chromosome, he has Down’s Syndrome.

Sarah Palin gave an interview to Christian Living recently and repeated the assertion that she learned about Trig having Down's Syndrome at 13 weeks: "But at age 43, pregnant and at 13 weeks along learning that the baby would be born with Down syndrome..."

Children with Down syndrome often have medical problems, such as chronic pulmonary hypertension, frequent infections, and pulmonary vascular overperfusion and injury due to previous or current cardiac defects. These problems all may be viewed as risk factors for high-altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE) and for the rapid development of HAPE at low altitudes. Care should be taken when children with Down syndrome travel to even moderate altitudes.

Sarah Palin clocked at least 18,000 miles in the third trimester of her pregnancy. I expect her doctor knew about Trig having Down's Syndrome before the birth and knew about the risks of high altitude for such babies...

Palin: ... and um she’s delivered how many babies over the year did she say?

Todd: Lots

Palin: A lot. It’s been a couple of decades of her delivering babies.

I don't know which is worse: either she lied about being pregnant and has since spun several further lies, giving details about her doubts, breast pumps and other little stories in an attempt to make the pregnancy believable, or she is the most reckless, stupid, clueless, callous mother imaginable.

If she was indeed pregnant and we believe her story, it doesn't look good for her or her doctor. One risks her own life and that of her unborn baby , the other risks her whole medical career.

The fact that Trig is now a healthy baby, taking Down's Syndrome into account, doesn't cancel all the risks taken.

When we put everything together, the tight abs and flat belly, this ludicrous story in the face of medical facts, the fact that the hospital used doesn't have the facilities to cope with high risk deliveries, all the inconcistencies... no, um, uh, ah, Sarah Palin can't possibly be Trig's birth mother.

Here's a video of Sarah Palin at the energy conference. Does she look like an expectant mother who had some signs that "a few things were starting to progress a little bit that perhaps there was an idea there that he might come early."? Does she look like she's leaking amniotic fluid?



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Back to normal

Thanks everybody for the kind words regarding the technical hiccup a couple of days ago. Our computer guy turned up first thing this morning as promised, which was totally out of character, so we were still drinking tea and coffee in bed!

It took him 10 minutes to replace the network card and 40 minutes of animated conversation in "Franglais" and voilà, I'm back in business! I gave him a cheque, au revoir and all that, but I forgot to sign it... he'll be back sometime this afternoon.

It's great to be able to access all my files and blog to my heart's content once more. My husband is a happy bunny, with the laptop all to himself again.

As we're already off-topic, I'll use this post to answer a few questions.

I'm not American and I'm not French. We're British ex-pats living in France.

We caught the election bug last year and followed the campaigns the best we could, on TV, youtube and on the blogosphere.

My husband became a youtube addict, watching all Obama's speeches. I became very interested in the desperate housewife from Wasilla and didn't buy the story about Bristol's pregnancy. I lost a bit of interest after the election, but by December my curiosity got the better of me and I started following Palin Deceptions.

Other Trig truth blogs appeared and I followed them as well. In February, one of these blogs was intimidated into shutting down. I was furious and decided to start my own blog. As Babygate is not the only "gate" in Sarah Palin's repertoire, I called it palingates and proceeded to learn about the governor's shenanigans in more detail.

I'm not fussy and try to keep all the gates fresh in people's memories. Occasionally Sarah Palin provides us with a shiny new one, so there's no shortage of material!

In the past four months I've learned a lot about Alaska and American politics, made several wonderful friends and became part of a privileged community of intelligent, thinking people.

The comments went from zero to quite respectable. The discussions are animated, humorous and there are the occasional fisticuffs, which I think is normal. We're not sheep and don't follow one single line of thought in the same blind fashion as on some other blogs and sites. Hopefully the people who fell out with each other in one thread will kiss and make up at some point, in future threads...

As you've probably noticed, I'm dead against censorship and REALLY believe in free speech. Things may get a bit heated sometimes, but I trust my readers to be able to work things out without my interference.

We have sporadic trolls, but they don't last very long. I don't think they can follow the conversations very well.

So there you have it, a potted history of palingates.

Your warmth, respect and support is invaluable and I'm very lucky to be in this virtual room with caring, passionate and consciencious people, bound together in the effort to prevent a certain person from "progressing" in the political scene.

What galls me is that I owe HER a debt of gratitude for bringing you here!

Ah, c'est la vie...
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Sarah Palin and the Nobel prize winner

Sarah Palin has kindly provided a link to a very interesting article, albeit in a snarky tone:

In the meantime, read this: Energy Secretary Chu wants to REGULATE roof, road color to slow global warming... http://tinyurl.com/q5ad59 (twit)

We all know that Sarah Palin is the foremost energy expert in the country, while Professor Chu is a mere Nobel prize recipient, so the governor's rejection of Prof Chu's ideas could generate a very exciting debate... the second runner-up in the Miss Alaska pageant takes on the Nobel laureate!

Times online reports:

Steven Chu, the Nobel prize-winning physicist appointed by President Obama as Energy Secretary, wants to paint the world white. A global initiative to change the colour of roofs, roads and pavements so that they reflect more sunlight and heat could play a big part in containing global warming, he said yesterday.

Professor Chu said that this approach could have a vast impact. By lightening paved surfaces and roofs to the colour of cement, it would be possible to cut carbon emissions by as much as taking all the world’s cars off the roads for 11 years, he said.

Pale surfaces reflect up to 80 per cent of the sunlight that falls on them, compared with about 20 per cent for dark ones, which is why roofs and walls in hot countries are often whitewashed. An increase in pale surfaces would help to contain climate change both by reflecting more solar radiation into space and by reducing the amount of energy needed to keep buildings cool by air-conditioning.

Professor Chu said that his thinking had been influenced by Art Rosenfeld, a member of the California Energy Commission, who drove through tough new building rules in the state.

Dr Rosenfeld is also a physicist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, of which Professor Chu was director. Last year Dr Rosenfeld and two colleagues from the laboratory, Hashem Akbari and Surabi Menon, calculated that changing surface colours in 100 of the world’s largest cities could save the equivalent of 44 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide — about as much as global carbon emissions are expected to rise by over the next decade.

Sarah Palin doesn't believe global warming is caused by man, so she won't go with the idea that man can do anything to improve matters, specially if it involves REGULATION.

Sarah Palin only approves of more regulation when it concerns what women can and cannot do with their own bodies.

Full article: Times online
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Open thread

I found some nice photos in the laptop files to illustrate this thread. It's Collonges-la-Rouge, a charming and peaceful village. There are virtually no cars around. These photos were taken on my birthday last year. We thought it would be nice to go and see a place a bit further away from home, as a treat. What a treat it was! Fantastic weather, a fairytale village and a lot of ice cream!

Now that you have paused to take in some of the beauty of the place, discussions about the first, unique family of Alaska may continue with renewed enthusiasm...

Have fun. I'm going to bed because the computer man promised he would be here early tomorrow morning. Fingers crossed!

Click on images to enlarge.
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How appropriate, Sarah Palin!

Detail from a photo of Sarah Palin taken at a Memorial Day ceremony. This woman wants to be the president of the United States of America.

Need I say more?

Full photo, click to enlarge.



Shannyn Moore has more details about this story.
Another nice choice of shoes here.
Looking smart in shiny "something" and jeans for Juneteenth book dedication.
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Technical hiccup

Hi! I wasn't able to post anything because my modem blew-up during a thunderstorm last night. My husband said he saw a flash right next to me... I saw nothing! But the crack of thunder above my head made me jump and pull all leads from the power sockets very quickly!

We bought a new modem today but it wouldn't work. After a lot of faffing about, I decided the network card on the PC is toast... I connected the modem to the laptop and it works. The only snag is that the laptop is slooooow, so I won't be able to follow up on some suggestions made in the comments on my last post just yet. All my files are on the PC, to complicate things further.

Until my computer man comes over to fix the PC, I'll have to slow down a bit. He promised to come the day after tomorrow, but he's unreliable, etc etc...

I hope to be back to normal very soon. Blogging is highly addictive!
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Sarah Palin's wild ride in her own words

An fervent admirer of Sarah Palin describes his idol:

"Sarah is unique. She doesn't fit a pattern nor any particular role. She is Ambitious, Beautiful and Brilliant, Considerate, Dedicated, Exciting, Faithful, Godly, Hard-working, Inspiring, Jubilant, Kind, Loving, Magnanimous, Noble, Optimistic, Prudent, Quick, Respectable, Strong, Tenacious, Unfaltering, Valiant, Winsome, and she has Zeal.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, she is so much more."

People see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear. When I listen to Sarah Palin describing events in her own words, none of the adjectives above spring to my mind.

The only word I could relate to was "iceberg"...

Listen to this superwoman giving her very own account of the famous wild ride.

Transcript of Palin Interview

Reporter: I was hoping you could walk us through a little bit about kind of what happened because he came earlier that you thought and not when and where.

Palin: And, uh, he wasn’t due for 4 or 5 weeks later and um, while I was at energy conference I felt perfectly fine but uh, had thought maybe a few things were starting to progress a little bit that perhaps there was an idea there that he might come early. So I called my doctor at about uh four in the morning in Texas and um I said ya know I’m gonna stay for the day here at the energy conference - have a speech that I was determined to give at one o’clock that afternoon and, um, had Todd check on a couple of flights that were earlier than we had scheduled. I decided it would be ok to, um, skip the reception that night that we’d already by that time have taken care of our meetings and my speech. So Todd checked on flights. A flight allowed us to get out a little earlier than we had planned. Skipped the reception and, um, called my doctor before I got on the plane to say, ‘Yea, we think that we will come home a few hours early,’ and, uh, she said ‘OK call when you land and I’ll check you out.’ But none of my babies had been early and being my fifth child I know what labor feels like (laughing) and if I had felt at all that I was really engaged in uh, labor activities I would not have desired to fly and, um, get back uh, to deliver in Alaska. But anyway, so no real huge labor signs. Landed in, uh, in Anchorage at about10:30. Got out to the valley at 11:30 and she met us at the hospital, checked me out and said, ‘Um, Yea you look, you may have it um tonight or in the morning.’ And it was smooth, it was relatively easy, in fact it was very easy, the easiest of all of them because he was so tiny. And, um, it’s just been absolutely wonderful. It was all, it just all seemed meant to be… the logistics and everything else just worked out so perfectly and to us he’s absolutely perfect, too.

Reporter: Of course you’re back to work already today and actually signed a bill that day, right?

Palin: That day, yeah, staff came out to the hospital and I signed a bill there so I could uh make sure we transmitted that in time and then uh here today also yeah, we have some energy updates I didn’t want to miss so that was good look and at him he’s just doing so well and it’s been easy and relaxing and again all it seems just meant to be this way.

Reporter: You said you felt some signs of labor, what were those signs?

Palin: Well not contractions so much because I had Braxton Hicks contractions for months as every pregnant woman does, and nothing real painful but just knowing that, um, it was feeling like, I may not um, be able to be pregnant a whole another four or five weeks knowing that it would be not a bother to call our doctor and let her know. And um she’s delivered how many babies over the year did she say?

Todd: Lots

Palin: A lot. It’s been a couple of decades of her delivering babies. We knew to call her and just get her advice and, um, from there we again decided to skip the energy conference reception and come on home and get checked out.

Reporter: So did your water break?

Palin: Well, if you must know more of those type of details, but, um…

Reporter: Well, your dad said that and I saw him say it so that’s why I asked.

Palin: Well that was again if, if I must get personal, technical about this at the same time, um, it was one, it was a sign that I knew, um, could lead to uh, labor being uh kind of kicked in there was any kind of, um, amniotic leaking, amniotic fluid leaking, so when, when that happened we decided OK let’s call her.

Todd: There’s a lot of new doctors out there on the streets in the last couple of days.

Palin: Yeah, that’s significant too. Todd said, uh, after getting a couple of comments he said that he said wow everybody’s a doctor, Everybody’s going to tell us what we could have should have done and even though these folks - especially the critics- they’re not doctors. They didn’t know the situation. They don’t know the situation. They, they certainly don’t know our doctor and the consultations that we’ve had with her. So we did nothing to put our child nor anyone else in danger, uh, going through this five times I know what labor is and, uh, I am not a glutton for pain and punishment. I would have never, um, wanted to travel if I had been fully engaged in labor.

Reporter: In the family statement that was issued by… it said through early testing you knew you would have some special needs.

Palin: Right…

Reporter: Can you explain?

Palin: Right, yeah, well, He’s got that extra chromosome, he has Down’s Syndrome. And, um, ya can’t tell at this stage by looking ya know but, um, there are some characteristics there that I think will become more apparent, but just absolutely perfect in our eyes and we’re just very, very, very blessed and, um it’s, its a perfect situation for us when we first heard it was, ya know, kind of confusing and, and at first blush hearing the news it was you know, I… it was received by me for a couple of hours there after hearing the news as, uh, very, very challenging… even sad… that day but just knowing that there’s purpose in every situation… there’s certainly good purpose in every child. Just knowing that, um, we should feel blessed that, uh god would choose us...

Todd: Yeah..

Palin: …to bring this child into the world. And we have hopes and dreams for him as we have with all of our children. We look forward to seeing the hopes and the dreams for Trig fulfilled.

Reporter: What does it mean for you as parents, um, and your role as parents?

Palin: Um, well, the, you know I think very significant here is the role that family and our extended family will be playing in raising Trig. Our older kids are absolutely in love with him right off the bat, um, I was so proud of the way that the kids reacted and um, our son, especially, uh, receiving a text message from him right away when he found out that the baby was born he says ‘Ya know despite, or in spite of any kind of challenge..’ He goes ‘This is just so cool. I finally got my brother. You know, eighteen years later I finally got a brother.’ So with the kids just being very much in love with him and adoring him and already very protective of him, it seems, ah, I think the family’s role here is going to be real important in the way that, uh, Trig is raised and treated and, um, again, you know I just, it just feels like he fits perfectly. He is supposed to be here with us.

Reporter: Will he need more time, you know, um, from you all, than your other babies did, do you think?

Palin: We’ll see.

Todd: We’ll see.

Palin: Yeah…

Reporter: And you’ve got… you’ve mentioned extended family your parents, siblings…

Sarah: Yeah.

Reporter: …you’ve got a lot of people, a lot of support?

Sarah: Yeah, we sure do, um..

Todd: A lot of support and that..we’re getting tons of emails today, uh, from families with special needs children. It’s very encouraging when they give us, you know, some of their life experiences dealing with this special need children (sic) so, uh, all across the nation actually today so it’s uh been pretty fun reading those emails.

Palin: In fact Todd was reading emails from, yeah, from people throughout the United States with, with their own encouragement and encouraging stories that they have about either a child that they have or that they know with Down’s Syndrome and what a blessing the child is and Todd says, ‘OK I’m determined I’m going to read these emails instead of the blog from here on out,’ and I said, ‘Please do!’ Because the emails have been very, very nice.

Reporter: Obviously it’s hard to, you know, be in this position where you have to take care of the whole state and also take care of your family. How are you going to balance that with, you know, a new baby now?

Palin: Again with that help from the extended family and having, um, you know, big siblings for this child.. that makes kind of the practical aspects of having a new one in the house much easier, much more convenient and thankfully, you know, I have a husband who loves being a dad as much as I love being a mom and Todd really goes above and beyond with, um, all the help with the kids he always has, so I’m not worried about it at all.. not having enough hours in a day or enough energy or enough, um, motivation to do both jobs. I’m a hundred percent confident that everything is going to be taking care of.

Reporter: For Todd how does it feel to be a new daddy again?

Todd: Ah, it’s just, uh, it’s amazing. It’s a huge blessing to our family. I’m excited about having another boy. You know, our oldest turned 19 yesterday. I was trying to have her hang in there for a couple days so we could have both our boys have the same birthday so we could knock it all out in one day.

Palin: Yeah. Right, right. Yeah.

Reporter: Track’s in the service now and he texted you?

Palin: He is. He is.

Reporter: Where is he right now?

Palin: Um, in Fort Wainwright. So early yesterday morning? Two mornings ago. Yeah. He got to drive down real quick and spent a couple of hours getting to see his baby brother. He brought a couple of soldier friends with him, a couple who had never held a newborn before so that was kind of fun, seeing these big tough soldiers holding this itty bitty baby in their arms and they just thought it was really special, really neat. So it was really neat to have the whole family there.

Reporter: Are you going to take a maternity leave?

Palin: No, mm,mm. I’ll, I’ll…

Reporter: You’re gonna be…you’re obviously back today..

Palin: I’ll be able to bring Trig with me, um, to many of the, um, meetings and, and events and um, parts of the job here that I’m engaged in and just working it around Trig either being here with me in the early days as I did… the last one, with Piper, when I was mayor of Wasilla, she was with me so often. And um, between that and then, um, having help with the three different sets of grandparents and all the aunts and uncles, everything is going to be taken care of.

Reporter: I know the other kids are named after Alaskan things. How did you come up with this name?

Palin: Trig is a family name on Todd’s side, um, a Bristol Bay relative named Trig and I’ve always loved the name and it’s a Norwegian name that means true and brave victory so you know I had that name in my heart for… especially once hearing about challenges that Trig probably will be facing I knew the name would fit. And then Paxson is his middle name cause that’s an awesome..

Todd: … a good place to go riding and excellent hunting.

Palin: Yeah, it is. It’s great hunting area. It is. It’s God’s country out there. And Paxson…and then we always liked the name Van Palin.

Reporters laughing.

Palin: So we just combined it all, yeah. And the kids voted and had their own ideas and we got so many cool suggestions from across the state of course lots of Alaskata names and uh, we got an email from an official in the NRA today saying ‘Oh, they’re going to love the name Trig,’ but you know they’re interpretation of what Trig meant was, you know, it’s them, anyway…

Reporter: Just a clarification – you flew commercial Alaska Airlines?

Palin: Yeah, yeah.

Reporter: And did -- This was something else I think I heard your father say I just wanted to clarify. Did you have to hide your pregnancy because you were so far along?

Palin: Well, you know I never felt nor do some people say I ever looked like I was that far along, um, so no purposeful way or need to hide that I was pregnant. Um, some, I know that some airlines would have uh, some hesitancy on letting maybe a nine month pregnant person get on board but it wasn’t nine months so, um, it was…

Reporter: And you didn’t tell them you were feeling something when you came back on the plane?

Palin: No need to because I wasn’t feeling at all like I was in labor in fact, you know I wasn’t one or maybe two contractions an hour that felt just like Braxton Hicks which I’d been having for months. That doesn’t constitute labor, so…

Aide: And guys we got to wrap it up so that he’s got to take a quick picture so we can go…

Reporter: Was it important to you to have the baby in Alaska?

Palin: It was very important that we have…it was more important that, that Trig arrive safely and healthy and um, and that is exactly what happened. The extra blessing was that Trig was able to be born into this great state, you know, kind of like, I feel like this extended Alaskan family, that he was here, for that.

Todd: Can’t have a fish-picker from Texas.

Laughter from reporters, Palin.

I find it almost impossible to wade through all the BS...

A lot of people on other blogs have been referring to this interview and asking for links to it and I thought it would be good to take a trip down memory lane. Some of the stories around the birth of Trig have been scrubbed from the ADN site, so I don't know how long the link to the audio of the interview will be active. The transcript is valuable, but her tone of voice tells us a lot more about this ludicrous story.

Enjoy!
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Sarah Palin and some definitions of redneck

Wikipedia:

Redneck refers to a person who is stereotypically Caucasian (i.e. white) and is of lower socio-economic status in the United States and Canada. Originally limited to the Southern United States, and then to Appalachia, the term has become widely used throughout North America.

... exclaves can be found throughout the oil-producing areas of Alaska. In the second half of the 20th-Century, concurrent with the development of the oil industry and pipeline, large numbers of Gulf Coast petroleum workers moved to Alaska for high pay and adventure — and many stayed. The Matanuska-Susitna Valley, home of Governor Sarah Palin, is considered to be redneck country. Mat-Su residents are pejoratively referred to locally as "Valley trash". Rednecks had relocated to the Pacific Northwest, the Rockies, and North-Central states in fairly large numbers.

Urban dictionary:

Rednecks tend to be socially conservative. They are extremely defensive against outsiders and anyone different from them. They have learned to avoid those who do not adopt their culture. Many rednecks may also be Evangelical Christians. They will not hesitate upon meeting you to tell you that you "are going to hell" if you are not also Baptist or a similar denomination.

They are very stubborn about their conservative beliefs. They believe that all liberals have lesser moral values. Part of this stubbornness also stems from their idea that their culture is under attack since they tend to associate morality with social conservativeness. This stubbornness can have many negative effects -- it can contribute to false knowledge of the world and the culture within and outside of the Southeast. For this reason, most rednecks will to this day deny that the Civil War was about slavery.

Finally, most rednecks are closet racists. They will vehemently deny this but racist remarks are often made among white groups. They are outwardly friendly towards minorities but they certainly have very large reservations about hiring or becoming close friends with them.

Sarah Palin, in a 2005 interview:

Q: I noticed there was a new business license acquired in the Mat-Su under your name.

SP: Rouge Cou, it's a classy way of saying redneck. It's a French word, rouge is red, cou is neck. It's for marketing and consulting, in case I wanted to go that route, I'd have my ducks all lined up and have a business license. I just was granted that business license.

Picture: Redneck map of USA
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Sarah Palin breaks with tradition. Well, nearly...

From Sarah Palin's twitter:

At Juneteenth book dedication ceremony @ Anchorage's Loussac Library. Happy to attend event celebrating freedom for ALL.

Wow, Sarah Palin broke with tradition and actually attended a Juneteenth event! She may have misinterpreted the meaning of the holiday, though. In the twit, she emphasized the word ALL.

From Juneteenth.com:

Juneteenth is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States.

From its Galveston, Texas origin in 1865, the observance of June 19th as the African American Emancipation Day has spread across the United States and beyond.

Juneteenth commemorates African American freedom and emphasizes education and achievement.

Why couldn't she say she was happy to attend and event celebrating freedom for African Americans? As far as I know, no other ethnic group was enslaved in America.

Why did she have to put that little twist at the end of her twit?

Previous post about Juneteenth
Juneteenth Alaska home page
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Bristol, babies, photos...

Some readers have been asking for a comparison between these photos because Tripp looks too small in the photo on the People cover.

I looked at the pictures very carefully and I think it's the same baby. His legs are flexed and he's leaning forward on the magazine cover while he's almost horizontal on the Matt Lauer interview screenshot. Flat out, so to speak...

I don't have a very sophisticated image editing program, but I flipped one of them and tried to have all pictures more or less the same size for comparison.

Over to you, my friends...

Click on each photo to enlarge.
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Sarah Palin's expensive transparency

On July 11, 2008, Fox News published an article in praise of Sarah Palin:

... they've overlooked the one shining victory in which a Republican star was born.

The triumph came in Alaska where Sarah Palin, a politician of eye-popping integrity, was elected governor.

Her rise is a great (and rare) story of how adherence to principle--especially to transparency and accountability in government.

What the article doesn't say is that Sarah Palin's transparency and accountability come with an eye-popping price tag.

AS 40.25.110 From the Alaska Statutes:

(a) Unless specifically provided otherwise, the public records of all public agencies are open to inspection by the public under reasonable rules during regular office hours. The public officer having the custody of public records shall give on request and payment of the fee established under this section or AS 40.25.115 a certified copy of the public record.

AS 40.25.115 refers to Electronic Services and Products.

(a) Notwithstanding AS 40.25.110 (b) - (d) to the contrary, upon request and payment of a fee established under (b) of this section, a public agency may provide electronic services and products involving public records to members of the public. A public agency is encouraged to make information available in usable electronic formats to the greatest extent feasible. The activities authorized under this section may not take priority over the primary responsibilities of a public agency.

(b) The fee for electronic services and products must be based on recovery of the actual incremental costs of providing the electronic services and products, and a reasonable portion of the costs associated with building and maintaining the information system of the public agency. The fee may be reduced or waived by the public agency if the electronic services and products are to be used for a public purpose, including public agency program support, nonprofit activities, journalism, and academic research. Fee reductions and waivers shall be uniformly applied among persons who are similarly situated.


The cost of searching ONE e-mail account is $925.44!

Linda Kellen Biegel, of Celtic Diva Blue Oasis, requested copies of some e-mails to and from the governor's office, together with other information. Linda was seeking clarification about communications between the governor's office and some members of the media in an effort to find out how they had obtained information they used to ridicule and discredit Republican activist Andree McLeod.

Linda received a quote for the service:

To provide complete responses to the e-mail portions of your request, we will need to electronically search the email accounts of the 71 current and former employees who have worked in the Governor's Executive Offices since December 2006. For that electronic search, we will need the assistance of the State Security Office in the Department of Administration, Division of Enterprise Technology Services (ETS). ETS estimates that each e-mail account retrieval, search, and record production will require 16 hours to complete. The ETS hourly rate is $54.84, so ETS estimates its costs per e-mail account will be $925.44. Based on that estimate, ETS's estimated costs for obtaining records from 71 employee e-mail accounts total $65,706.

Why should a division within a government department be paid TWICE to do their job? The people who work in that division are state employees, the 16 hours quoted are already included in their salaries.

Whenever I requested copies of documents from government agencies or private companies, I was charged the cost of printing and mailing the documents, plus a nominal administrative fee, not for the salaries of their personnel.

The convoluted logic of the governor's office and their creative accounting procedures leave citizens of Alaska without access to public records, unless they're very rich or use the information to write articles or broadcast radio shows that favour the governor...

RECALL Sarah Palin
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Sarah Palin's Valley friends

Five members of the Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce's board of directors abruptly resigned Wednesday and at least three, including the former board president, are now calling for an outside audit to investigate how money has been spent by the group's executive director.

Former board president Cheryl Combs, in a written statement about her resignation, cited concerns that Executive Director Cheryl Metiva may have "inappropriately spent" money for personal expenses and without board approval.

Two board members said they decided to resign in part because of threats from Metiva's husband, Marty Metiva.

Susan Crowder said Metiva left a message Tuesday on her voice mail at work. In the call, which she played back for a reporter, Metiva demands the board give back $1,000 he gave to the chamber from the Polar Plunge charity event in February.

"Since you do not want the money that this was uh, uh and to use it for the purpose it was designated, I demand my check back..." he states. "And if you don't give you my money back, it will not be very nice for the Chamber of Commerce board of directors."

Crowder said the board decided to give the money to charity, including the United Way of Mat-Su and the Wasilla senior center, because the event was advertised as raising money for charity.

Marty Metiva, the event organizer, wanted the money to go to the chamber.

Crowder said she considered it inappropriate for Marty Metiva to give the money from the event to the chamber, which pays his wife's salary. But Metiva said the money was actually from his own pocket.

From the Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce website:

Cheryl Metiva is the Executive Director of the Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce. Her leadership has grown membership and community relationships during this exciting stage in Wasilla’s development. Metiva has a strong background in the tourism industry, retail sales and community activities. In addition to being Executive Director of the GWCC, Metiva also serves on the Board of the Mat-Su Convention & Visitor Bureau, and Mat-Su Resource, Conservation & Development, Inc.

Some quotes by Cheryl Metiva when Sarah Palin was tapped by John McCain:

"She's more woman than Hillary and she's more man than Hillary," said Cheryl Metiva, who attends Wasilla Bible Church with Palin. "She's a feminist on a mission. She's very much in touch with being a wife and a mother and a girlfriend to the women in her life." Boston.com

"This is her hometown," said Cheryl Metiva, executive director of the Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce, which coordinated the so-called "Rally at the Valley." KTVA

"We like to call this the Bible Belt of Alaska," says Cheryl Metiva, head of the local chamber of commerce. Churches proliferate in Wasilla today, and among the largest and most influential is the Wasilla Bible Church, where the Palins worship. TIME

Cheryl and her husband Marty are the couple in the center of the photo, taken at Sarah Palin's Inaugural Ball.

Marty Metiva ran for mayor of Wasilla last year, but lost to Verne Rupright. The couple are on the Iditarod Trail committee, which has just lost sponsorship money from Wasilla as it was omitted from the city's budget at the direction of Mayor Verne Rupright. Iron Dog also lost Wasilla's sponsorship.

I found a couple of quaint videos as well. Please note Sarah's elaborate hairstyle...

Joe Schmidt and a few other known faces appears in the second one.





Unauthorized expenditure... it reminds me of Sarah Palin when she spent $50,000 redecorating her mayor's office without council approval: "I'm the mayor, I can do whatever I want until the courts tell me I can't."

Birds of a feather flock together. Sarah Palin has been palling around with unethical people...

Article on ADN
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