Vanity Fair Offers 'Trig Palin Conspiracy Timeline'

In the magazine world, Vanity Fair may be known as a glossy, trendy magazine for the rich and the aspiring rich. But conservatives know it as a hopeless, scandalous, left-wing Democratic rag with no journalistic principles -- it's Vanity Unfair. Exhibit A: Vanity Fair's website now hosts a supposedly "Authoritative Trig Palin Conspiracy Timeline," complete with "research" thanks to the Daily Kosmonauts at the bottom. What a triumph for the noble "Fight the Smears" Obama campaign! Or it's simply a Vanity Fart. The blog post with graphics, authored corporately by "Vanity Fair," playfully offered:

The McCain campaign won’t countenance it, and Barack Obama has even declared it off-limits, but the question of Trig Palin’s parentage—whether his real mom is Sarah Palin or her five-months pregnant, 17-year-old daughter Bristol—has transfixed the blogosphere. To settle the matter once and for all, VF.com presents this handy timeline juxtaposing both the official narrative and the wingnut conspiracy theories. Vote for the most likely scenario after the jump.

At posting time, with 7,000 votes logged, 69 percent checked the tinfoil-hat box and said Sarah Palin faked her pregnancy.

What follows isn't journalism, just catty gossip and snide insults, with lines like this one at the bottom: "Levi Johnston stares into the barrel of a shotgun wedding, and down the cleavage of his comely sister-in-law." 

It sounds a lot like Vanity Fair "attack poodle" James Wolcott. Who has no pride of "authorship" on this chart? On his Vanity Fair blog, he says this is nothing compared to the smears on the Clintons (like that lie about Clinton having sex with the intern):

What's happened this week is a thin patch on those rabid hostilities, and if the Palin leggo-my-preggo saga has "legs," it's because it's the perfect tabloid story and tabloids aren't stupid -- they recognize a gusher when they see it, just as the late-night comics do.

(Hat tip: Dan Gainor)