Afterbirth: Examining the other end of Sarah Palin's inexplicable pregnancy.

So we all know that Sarah Palin simply did NOT look pregnant even weeks before supposedly giving birth on April 18, 2008, as indicated by this picture taken on March 26, 2008.

And we also know that she somehow managed to balloon up to a much more acceptable size for a woman claiming to be almost eight months pregnant only two weeks later, as indicated by this picture from April 13, 2008.

And of course we have NO earthly idea how such a dramatic weight gain can be explained.

Okay well maybe we do.

However what I have never really explored is the dramatic weight LOSS that Sarah Palin seems to have experienced AFTER the "birth" of Trig. Yes, believe it or not, Sarah Palin is SUCH an amazing woman that not only did her pregnancy not show until right around the time that Trig was ready for solid foods, but she also managed to get right back down to her canned food throwing weight even faster!

At least that is what I had been told.  Finding pictures to prove it has been a little more challenging.

I did have this one from May 3rd, of Sarah and our good friend Mercede. But people kept saying that even though her legs look skinny, and she is bending over in a way that women who just gave birth fifteen days earlier simply should NOT be able to bend over, that you could not really tell anything definitive because the loose fitting sweatshirt kept you from seeing her postpartum. Oookay.

So I am assuming that if I had a picture from earlier that same day in which you COULD see her stomach that it might prove to the naysayers that she lost her "pregnancy" weight much too fast to be explained by 21st century science, right?

Will this do? This is from earlier the same day at the VFW Post in Mountain View.

Does that look two weeks postpartum to you?

What?  Too hard to see?  Here let me help.

Is that better?

You know she looks pretty darn slim to me, how about all of you?

But that is just one picture, hardly concrete evidence right?

So here is Palin only twelve days later, on May 15, 2008.

Right about here is where all of the Palin-bots come rushing over to say things like "Aw c'mon Gryphen!  Aren't you reaching a little? Why I had a girlfriend/wife/ co-worker/pet basset hound who lost all of THEIR baby weight in just a matter of days!  Perhaps Sarah Palin is just somebody who, due to her tight abs and dedication to running that nobody ever sees her do, is able to snap right back into shape. I am really a fan but THIS time I think you are barking up the wrong tree. Now if you will excuse me I have to call SarahPAC and get my check."

Well I am not an expert on pregnancy, but I do know that people don't usually "snap back into shape" faster with their fifth pregnancy than they did with their fourth pregnancy. (So you know what's coming right?)

The above is a picture of Sarah Palin from April 15, 2001, almost exactly one month after giving birth to future Palin family bodyguard, Piper Palin. Gee I guess her abdomen took a little bit longer to "snap back" in those days.

So let me see if I have this straight.

Sarah Palin suddenly announces to the world that she is pregnant on March 5, 2008 to the surprise of every single one of her co-workers, the journalists who constantly follow her around, her security staff, her entire family, and (if my sources are accurate) Todd Palin himself.

Then she starts wearing heavy jackets and long scarves making it hard to tell, if I may borrow a quote from Alaska Airlines spokeswoman Caroline Boren, "the stage of her pregnancy by observation."

However she seems to remain relatively thin until April 13th, when she suddenly balloons up just five days before "giving birth," which occurs only after she has been leaking amniotic fluid for almost eighteen hours and flown on a commercial airline from Texas all the way to Alaska.

Afterwards she simply leaves the hospital and resumes wearing her pre-pregnancy wardrobe as if nothing ever happened.

As if NOTHING ever happened.

So essentially Sarah Palin's ENTIRE pregnancy is encapsulated in this one GIF.

If GIF does not work, try clicking on it.

Have you EVER seen a pregnancy that even remotely compares to the Sarah Palin pregnancy?

And if you haven't (And believe me I KNOW you haven't) then what is the ONLY possible explanation?

Karl Rove double dog dares Sarah Palin to get into the Presidential race.

Courtesy of Mediaite:

“I’m mystified,” he admitted, “that she’s all upset about this, that I’m somehow trying to sabotage her campaign, sabotage her in some way, and how dare I speculate on her future.” Rove also responded angrily that “if she doesn’t want to be speculated about as a potential presidential candidate, there’s an easy way to end the speculation,” yet whenever the issue comes up, “she says ‘I haven’t made a decision.” Rove concluded adding a jab at Palin’s lust for attention, calling it a “sign of enormous thin skin that if we speculate about her, she gets upset, and I suspect that if we didn’t speculate about her, she’d be upset about it and trying to find a way to get us to speculate about her.” 

Van Susteren tried to bring Rove back from that precipice, asking him to instead “reflect on the media” and the fact that they continue covering her. Rove admitted that she was “a potentially big factor in the presidential election,” and that “if she were to get in, she’d be a contender.” That said, Rove concluded by calling Palin thin-skinned another two times before the segment ended– abruptly, without a goodbye, cut into by a “news break” that likely could’ve waited the extra three seconds. 

I cannot believe I am digging on Rove for ANYTHING, but I love watching him call Palin's bluff!

I also love watching Greta scrambling like crazy to make sure that nobody thinks she actually believes that Snowdrift Snooki is behind the response to Rove, even though, as Rove himself points out, it is obvious that she was.

One has to wonder how Palin will respond to this constant poking from Rove?

She can't really just ignore Rove, as it appears that he is just getting started.  But the only way she can REALLY respond is to jump in or completely bow out, neither of which I think she is willing to do yet.

However according to this article Palin's support for even a fake run at the nomination may have already dried up.

(H/T to Sarah Jones at Politicususa.)

Did Palin fake her visit to the World War One museum in Kansas City?

Well this is rather interesting.Courtesy of The Kansas City Star:News flash: Sarah Palin was in town Monday. You didn’t know that? I didn’t know it until the next day. Turns out, nobody knew it. Not the police. Not GOP insiders. Not the high-dollar money folks. Not the Vitae Foundation that brought her to Kansas City last September. Nobody. “Holy cow!” said Annie Presley, a fundraising consultant. “How did we not know about that?” Because the Palin crowd never whispered a word about her plans — and they still won’t talk. Does that strike you as a little too mysterious for a woman eyeballing a White House run? “Mysterious” goes a long way with Palin these days. I did see her off in the distance eight days ago at the Iowa State Fair, where she was coyly stating — for the umpteenth time — that she wasn’t a candidate for president, although she hadn’t ruled it out. Not a candidate. Not running. But flirting, flirting, flirting with the crowds and reporters and the idea of it all. And she did all this while a huge crowd of fairgoers was lining up to see Michele Bachmann, who is supplanting Palin as this cycle’s GOP sensation. Still, lots of media time and handshakes in Iowa. But nothing here in Kansas City. It’s a mystery all right. My source on her Monday appearance here is none other than Palin herself. She wrote on her SarahPAC Facebook page — that’s her big political action committee — that she spent a “very moving day” in Kansas City, “where it’s easy to remember what really matters, because here we have the National World War I Museum.” But no one at the museum saw her inside. And word would have spread like wildfire if they had, a spokesman said. And no one I could find at the hotel — and I talked to doormen and front-desk types — saw her. You know at this point in time I would not put ANYTHING past her. But even for her, this is bizarre!And by the way did ANYBODY see Piper with Palin while she was in Iowa?Why is it that NOTHING with Sarah Palin is ever what it appears?

Are you as pissed off as I am about the fact that Marcus and Michele Bachmann charge YOUR government to provide Reparative therapy for gay men? Well now you can do something about it.

"Here's Shelly!"

From Credo Action:

It's bad enough that Bachmann and Associates, after denying for years they practiced ex-gay therapy, clearly encourages patients to pray the gay away. Our taxpayer dollars shouldn't be funding it. 

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which oversees Medicaid, and the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS), which distributes the funds within the state, should immediately pull public funds from Bachmann's clinic. 

Going to the Bachmann family for counseling is like attending a peace rally hosted by Dick Cheney. 

Their views are extreme, hateful and crazy. Michele Bachmann has called homosexuality "a part of Satan," and "a real issue of sexual dysfunction" while her husband Marcus has called gays "barbarians." 

And even as Michele Bachmann's family was collecting over $160,000 in Medicaid and other public funds, she was leading Tea Party calls for drastic cuts to the social safety net - especially to Medicaid which she has said swell the "welfare rolls" - and even voted to shut down the government rather than continue funding Planned Parenthood and the Health Care Reform Act.3Tell Secretary Sebelius and DHS Commissioner Lucinda Jesson: Stop funding Bachmann's anti-gay clinic.

If you click the link provided at the top it will immediately take you to the Credo Action website where you can add your name to a petition demanding the following:

"Public money shouldn't fund a discriminatory, hateful religious agenda and medically-unsound ex-gay therapy. In light of recent investigations, please take action to immediately stop funding Bachmann and Associates."

I did it yesterday and, I have to say, it kind of gave me a good feeling.

Michele Bachmann does NOT want to talk about the anti-gay "reparative" therapy sessions conducted at her husband's clinic.

I LOVE the look on her face when she realizes that this Iowa  television reporter has her cornered.

"But I want to talk about job creation, NOT my husband's Voodoo mental health practices!"

Yes she is so proud to be a job creator that defrauds Medicaid by charging it for therapies that are not considered viable by the mental health community. So not only do they pay their employees with money that comes from the government, but it is money that may have to be paid back to Medicaid if they are found to be charging for therapeutic services that the program does not cover.

Oh, PLEASE let Medicaid demand their money back!

(Think Progress has more on this topic.)