Having recently secured Politifact's ‘Lie of the Year', in which one is seemingly bestowed the honor of liar simply for pointing out obvious questions involving a so-called ‘death panel' known as the Independent Medicare Advisory Board - (In other words, ‘Lie of the Year' translates to ‘Questions We'd Rather You Didn't Ask') - Palin finds herself with little time to celebrate.
So, in a quick turnaround from the high that is winning a prestigious award from a non-fact-checking fact-checking Web site, Palin finds herself having to hastily accept the honor of Worst Celebrity Parent.
And what does the New York Daily News base this label on? A quote from the attention deprived Levi Johnston, who once claimed in a Vanity Fair interview that Palin referred to her baby Trig as being ‘the retarded baby'.
The Daily News recalls Johnston's remarks...
"Sarah would call Trig 'my little Down's baby ...,'" Johnston said. "She would come over and sometimes say, playing around, 'No, I don't want the retarded baby - I want the other one,' and pick up Tripp [Bristol and Johnston's son]."
Palin denied the claim, saying, "We ... are appalled at the inflammatory statements being made or implied."
Ignore for a moment the credibility factor covered by the Anchorage Daily News.
Ignore for a moment that Maggie Rodriguez, who's CBS Early Show had a month's long fascination with Johnston this past fall, found herself very skeptical of these claims. In her interview (emphasis mine), she asked him if he can ‘understand why that's really hard to believe that a mother would say that?'
Ignore for a moment her co-host Harry Smith asking, "Because you've met him, you've interviewed him. Does he seem like - seem credible to you?" To which Rodriguez simply replied, "I don't know. How could I possibly answer that?"
Okay, on second thought, don't ignore those at all...
What is difficult to ignore from the Vanity Fair article are some statements from Johnston which are, shall we say, lies of the year.
In the aforementioned Daily News excerpt, there is mention that the Palin's didn't do much in the way of cooking.
"Johnston also claimed that neither Palin nor her husband, Todd, did much cooking, and that the kids cooked, cleaned and did the laundry."
Levi had apparently forgotten an Esquire article in which he receives a marinating lesson from Palin:
Sarah "pulls a roast out of the refrigerator and calls Levi over and starts showing him how to marinate it. "Now, Levi, look, I'm gonna put this stuff in here..."
And
Sarah turns and looks back over her shoulder at Levi, who's peering uncertainly into the oven. "Is it cooking, Levi?" she asks.
Not to mention the interview with Greta Van Susteren which aired nationally, showing Palin's penchant for cooking.
Daniel Terrapin of the Web site Conservatives4Palin has a fantastic piece debunking several of the tall tales coming from the gaping black hole of misinformation known as Levi Johnston's mouth. Among the Levi lies uncovered are:
- An alleged scheme in which Palin made statements about potentially adopting Bristol's baby.
- An interview with Larry King in which he claims to have voted for Sarah Palin, but was never registered in time.
- Claims that Sarah Plain isn't the outdoorswoman she'd like people to believe, accompanied by several pictures and videos of the former Alaska governor hunting and fishing.
There's much more to dissect in the Terrapin article.
So what we have here is Ricky Hollywood, model for Playgirl, begging for a few extra minutes of fame like a desperate reality TV star, and fabricating blatant lies about Sarah Palin at every turn. All of which was apparently enough for the Daily News to smear Palin with another PDA.
Oh, and by the way, Levi is a parent.
Worst celebrity parent indeed. The Daily News just happened to pick the wrong one.
Photo Credit: Vanity Fair
Video Credit: Seth Adam Smith
