Welcome to Girls On The Bus, a series of short, but shrewd, analyses of Mrs. Todd Palin on her latest narcissist odyssey. Or history field trip. Or just-get-me-the-hell-away-from-home-tour.

My partner in satirical and boldly biased analysis is wonder woman writer, feminist, and managing editor and columnist for Politicususa, Sarah Jones. 

LN:  So listen, Sarah, and you will hear, about the newest ride of Paul Revere. No kidding, guns blazin’, bells ringin’.  I grew up in Massachusetts and somehow missed that chapter in all our history and learnin’ books.

SJ: What disturbs me about this is the Right’s willingness to distort reality in order to cover for Sarah Palin. When basic history is brought into question, it’s as maddening as saying “black is white” and having the press begin to repeat it because it was said by someone famous.

This is a dangerous slope of managing reality, and given the press’ propensity to merely report what is said, I think it has an exceptionally negative impact on our culture. The Palin revisionists were arguing with Wikipedia that since Palin said it, she was a source. That’s some rather frightening circular logic.

In many ways, the modern day press has no time to debunk basic things, and so we find ourselves too often settling for cutting down the middle of two statements (no matter how untrue one of those statements may be) instead of finding the facts. “Fairness” is a dangerous game to play.

LN:  To what do you attribute this dire need to “cover for” a political figure or potential candidate? It almost says more about the folks rushing to her rescue than it does about the woman herself.

SJ: I don’t think the press has an agenda, but as far as the conservative operatives who are pushing the meme in papers that Palin was right about Paul Revere warning the British, how can they do anything but defend her? How can they start defending the truth when much of their platform is a lie, meant to bilk the people for the sake of corporations? If they start telling the truth about Palin, it might awaken the masses, and they can’t have that.

LN:  Edwards, Arnold, Weiner…it all seems so implausible - until it isn’t. The press, it appears, tiptoes at first, and then goes all relentless on these guys. But Mrs. Palin:  Snafu after FUBAR Snafu…and she just smiles and says she knows her American history. Just like she smiled for the cameras and said she was glad that the Branchflower investigation found her innocent of any abuse of power. Explain this to me, cause I’m all ears.

SJ: I wish I could. I’ll distinguish the sex scandals from Palin’s mishaps because there was hard evidence of them (pardon the pun). Palin is being elevated by some very moneyed interests. The problem for Palin is that she sells, so when she descends,  the press will hound her with the same devotion they do now. It will be relentless and inescapable. That’s the downside of being a celebrity who is disliked by the majority of Americans. They love to hate her.

LN:  Any predictions on when we’re likely to see the wheels on the family RV with paint all over it go round and round again?

SJ: I’m looking for a July 4 surprise because if there’s one thing Palin knows how to do, it’s play the holiday slow news cycle for all it’s worth. But this is Sarah Palin we’re talking about. Anything could happen.

LN:  Well, what ever historic sites Mrs. Palin sets her sights on, you and I will be right there to cut through the noise. And I know that you are already all over the Emails dump, including those critical of Palin.  Thank you so much, Sarah Jones. 

A reader writes me the following:  This shot of Palin holding a baby is from the end of the 2008 legislative session, immediately before she left for Dallas on April 15th. The woman is legislator Mary Sattler-Nelson with new baby, born on March 19th. Mary planned to take two weeks away from work after the baby was born and essentially never really was back at work at the end of the session. She went in for several things, including showing the baby. At one time there were many news items and references on the Internet - legislative newsletters (where this photo came from) that were dated. This file name had the date 4.18.2008. That was the date of Mary Nelson's final legislative session newsletter from whence it came. 

Those things have since disappeared.

If you'll examine the photo carefully in context, you'll see that she's NOT holding that baby around or over an awkward pregnant abdomen. Certainly not anything like that April 13th photo that may be staged, which would have been taken the same week. The jacket and scarf are hanging straight down. There's no fullness there. 

Thank you kind reader for sending me this. Personally, I do think Palin looks thick through the waist here. But since this photo is new to me, I'm happy to have others see it as well, especially in contrast to the Gusty photo. 

BS:  The most consequential pregnancy photo of Palin ever to appear is what has come to be known as the Gusty photo, because it shows Palin being interviewed by Andrea Gusty of KTVA-TV on April 13, 2008, five days before Palin allegedly gave birth to Trig.

The picture shows Palin in profile so that her very large belly is obvious. What made the photo so significant is that it appeared online in late August 2008 just in time to help quash rumors that had blazed across the Internet saying Palin had faked the birth of Trig.

The problem is, the photo appeared under mysterious circumstances. It was posted to Flickr on August 31 by “Erik99559”, who has never been identified, and key questions about it, and a second photo taken immediately afterward, have never been answered.

So, Laura, in light of what we have been talking about the past few weeks – how Palin sometimes did not look or act pregnant in the early spring of 2008 – this photo looms large. One major question: Is that large protruding belly real? And as our last few conversations have shown, there is good reason to suspect she was wearing a fake pregnancy belly.

Just as important: Was this picture, and the related one taken a few minutes later, staged to show Palin looking pregnant? Or were the two photos just a result of happenstance, of people taking pictures for reasons unrelated to Palin’s pregnancy?

Laura, you recently began trying to explore this subject with the people involved. To no avail, it appears.

LN: As I wrote in the previous post, I tried to contact everyone involved in these photos with the exception of the unidentified cameraman in the white shirt, and Mrs. Palin herself. Dan Carpenter and Gusty didn’t respond to my multiple and repeated requests. Bill McAllister and I went back and forth on four sets of emails until he outlined requirements for me that I would not meet. So, here we are.

BS:  Can you tell us what those requirements were?

LN:  I cannot. I assured him that our emails were private and confidential, and I have to honor that.

BS: Okay, so let’s get down to facts. The Gusty photo, which the McCain campaign people pointed to as definitive evidence that Palin had truly been pregnant, did a marvelous job of silencing most critics who claimed Palin faked the birth.

When questions about its authenticity arose, two “investigators” (graduate students, I imagine) of FactCheck.org, an offshoot of the Annenberg School of Communication, looked into the matter by calling Andrea Gusty. And Gusty told them that the picture was real, not “Photoshopped”, that she thought she had the only copy of it (implying it was taken with her camera), that she was surprised to see it on the Internet and that she had no idea how it got there. What do you think of the investigation conducted by FactCheck, Laura?

LN:  If this is fact checking, then tell me anything you want, Brad, and I’ll tell the world that you told me and therefore, it is true. Apparently they did not ask why the picture was taken in the first place, whether anyone else had access to her camera, or whether Palin’s pregnancy had advanced dramatically in the previous month, as publicly available photos would suggest.

Gusty did say she saw the baby a week later, which she said she took as proof that Mrs. Palin gave birth to it. And perhaps at the time, it was enough proof. But I wonder how they all feel now in retrospect.

BS: The FackCheck report, which ridiculed people who questioned Palin’s pregnancy, did not convince everyone – a couple of blogs continued to question the authenticity of the two photos. One blogger even paid a Photoshop expert to analyze the photos.

Apparently in reaction to those blog sites, Gusty did a report for her TV station on January 12, 2009. She showed that the picture of her and Palin was taken during an interview she conducted on April 13. She said that Dan Carpenter, a cameraman for KTUU, took that picture as a favor to her. And she said that immediately afterwards she took this picture of Palin standing next to Carpenter and Bill McAllister (on the right), chief political reporter for KTUU:

BS: Before we analyze these photos, it’s important to note the following: Palin’s own calendar for this date had two entries:

“2:45pm-3pm GOV Press Availability (JNU – 2nd Fl Capitol)”

[at 5pm] “Gov Live Shot w/Channel 2 Andrea Gusty re: Session (JNU-Governor’s Office)”

BS: What do you make of these pictures, Laura?

LN:  Let’s start with the first photo. The calendar indicated that only Gusty would interview Palin. But it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine KTUU might be added after the calendar entry was made.

But if KTUU was added, where is the other camera - the other video camera? Typically, cameraman also travel with their “sticks”, meaning their tripods. They set them up, put the camera on for a steady shot, and shoot the interview. Okay, so the one cameraman shot this on his shoulder. A little odd to me, but let’s say they were in a hurry and he had to grab and go.

But if there were two reporters or more present, the cameramen usually if not always put their tripods right next to each other. I mean they stand cheek-to-jowl. Why? So that the governor, in this case, is looking in one direction. The reporters, then, stand out of the camera’s way, and extend their microphones. That’s why you often see the station call letters on the microphone boxes in front of the talking head.

What I see here is one reporter and one camera. But…Gusty and the governor are looking somewhere else. At another camera? Okay, then where is it?

BS:  Off to the right somewhere? Maybe we just can’t see it.

LN:  But then who is the cameraman? I take it that it’s Dan Carpenter, the man above here in the grey suit. Excuse me, did I just say grey suit? That’s another thing…in all my years I have never, and I do mean never, seen a cameraman – either in still or video – wear a suit! Unless it was to a private function. I mean, what was that all about?  See the guy in the first shot? That’s what they usually look like. Rumpled. They often wear actual flack jackets and battery belts, etc. So, are we to believe that the photographer/cameraman for KTUU wore a suit to cover a regular story – one among many he might have been sent out on that day?

And what, did they wait their turn to interview the governor separately? I’ve never seen it done that way. Never.

If a cameraman has to shoot with the camera on his shoulder, it means they are in a hurry. If they are in a hurry, the governor wouldn’t do two different interviews. If they did one joint interview, where was the other camera?  If there wasn’t one, why were Bill McAllister and Dan Carpenter there?

And if there was a “reasonable explanation” for this, then why not just tell me and stop the speculation.

BS: Gusty did say that she asked Carpenter to take the still picture of her interviewing Palin. I assume when you were a TV reporter, you never asked a cameraman from a different station to take a still picture of you and your subject. Does this picture make any sense to you professionally? Especially if it was Gusty’s personal camera?

LN: I never asked the cameramen from my own station to take my photo with an official. It’s highly unprofessional. It implies some sort of hero worship. It crosses a line. Look, I’ve seen examples of her work online. I understand she’s young and she was even younger then. I get that. And I get that this photo was probably for posterity’s sake, you know, to show her grandmother. But ethics keeps reporters, usually, from mixing it up like that.

BS:  Well, it might have been for Gusty’s grandmother if it wasn’t staged to show Palin looking very pregnant. Let me point something out about the location of that photo: it’s where one hallway ends at another hallway, forming a T-shape. If I wanted to shoot a live interview of Palin from the front and simultaneously get a side shot showing her very pregnant-looking belly in profile, that’s exactly where I would place her.

And if I wanted to get a still shot that I could use in the future to prove that Palin looked very pregnant on April 13, then photographing a live interview would be an ingenious way to do it – because you could always dig up the video to prove the date. Which is exactly what happened. But it would take someone pretty smart and media savvy to work all that out in advance. I’m not sure Palin is that smart herself. But Bill McAllister is apparently a shrewd guy – he became a top political reporter in both Minnesota and Alaska – and has many years of media experience.

As you know, Laura, I wrote a paper in which this sentence appeared, referring to the second picture: “Palin is shown standing to the left of KTUU-TV newsman Bill McAllister, who coincidentally would become her director of communications in July.” And I sent a copy of the paper to McAllister to see if he had any comments.

He certainly did. He emailed me, and copied to many of my colleagues, the following: “If we ever meet, I'll slap you. In a different era, I'd challenge you to a duel. … The italicized word ‘coincidentally’ makes you a scoundrel …” He thus clearly tried to give the impression, if not saying so explicitly, that he played no role in staging the pictures.

What I did not know then was that McAllister had already given notice to KTUU that he was leaving – and probably had already negotiated his contract with the state to become Palin’s press secretary. Alaskan political blogger Andrew Halco, after reviewing state emails, raised serious questions along those lines in August 2008, writing:

“It appears clear that McAllister was negotiating a job with the administration while he was still covering them as a reporter during the legislative session. In fact, McAllister continued to cover the Palin administration for another three months after the email exchange.”

Well, Laura, I guess it’s not surprising, if McAllister gave notice of leaving to KTUU in early April, that he would have his next job lined up. But are you troubled by the ethical implications of McAllister’s arrangement, given he was KTUU’s chief political reporter?

LN: A longtime Alaskan journalist told me that there is an alarming cross-cultivation of reporters and government officials in Alaska. They seem to float seamlessly between the two estates and yes, one would find that troubling in any situation. Naturally, one wants to have a job lined up before one quits a current job.

But what’s not clear still is that photo: Were the two men in suits working the story at 5 p.m. that day along with Gusty (Where is their on-air version of it? Have we ever seen it?) or were they there on other business? Again, there may be a simple explanation. I just can’t see what it is on my own.

BS: So, Laura, I think it’s time to summarize what we know as to whether the two photos were likely staged. If they were not staged, then we have to surmise (since the folks in the photos won’t talk to us):

1)    That, for some reason, Bill McAllister and Dan Carpenter showed up for what Palin’s calendar indicated was to be an exclusive interview with Andrea Gusty.

2)    That, by chance, Bill McAllister happened to give notice to KTUU the week before of his intention to resign and, by coincidence, the job he had lined up was to be Palin’s press secretary.

3)    That, for some reason, Palin and Gusty chose not to have their interview in the governor’s office, as scheduled.

4)    That, for some reason, the KTVA cameraman did not bother to use a tripod as one would normally expect.

5)    That, for some reason, Gusty asked Carpenter to take a side-angle picture that showed Palin’s big belly in profile – and that also managed to get the KTVA cameraman in the shot with the camera on his shoulder, making it absolutely clear Gusty was interviewing Palin for a TV news segment.

6)    That Palin was indeed pregnant and showing mightily and, for some reason, had decided not to wear her usual scarf “disguise”.

7)    That, for some reason, Gusty decided it would be nice to get a picture of McAllister and Carpenter standing next to Palin right after the first picture was shot.

8)    That, for some reason, Carpenter was not in his normal work clothes and we don’t see his camera or gear anywhere.

9)    That, in some inexplicable way, the above two photos got out of Gusty’s camera and were posted to Flickr by a stranger, Erik99559, several months later, at exactly the right the right moment to squelch rumors of a pregnancy hoax – and, by coincidence, 99559 just happens to be the zip code of Gusty’s hometown, Bethel, Alaska.

Am I forgetting anything, Laura?

LN:  Just that again, in all my years of reporting, I’ve never seen anything like this. Never.

BS:  What can we propose as an alternative explanation if the pictures were staged? Keep in mind that this is just speculation.

1)       That Palin was not pregnant that day but instead put on a large fake belly and deliberately did not wear her usual scarf so the belly could be seen in profile.

2)       That Bill McAllister showed up to direct the taking of still pictures showing Palin looking very pregnant, just in case they might be needed later.

3)       That the interview was held in a hallway specifically so that Carpenter would be able to get a side shot of Palin’s fake belly protruding.

4)       That the tableau was organized for the benefit of the still shot: the location was where two hallways came together, allowing a video camera to the front and still camera to the side; and the KTKA cameraman did not use his tripod (which seems visible on the far right side of the picture) because the director, presumably McAllister, wanted the cameraman entirely in the frame along with Gusty and Palin, to make clear exactly what was taking place, should questions arise in the future.

5)       That McAllister decided to get two pictures, and hence posed in one himself, on the belief that the appearance of just one picture of Palin looking so pregnant might seem suspicious.

6)       That Carpenter was wearing a suit so that he could be in the second picture with McAllister and not seem out of place standing next to the governor in his normal scruffy work attire.

7)       That Gusty posted the two pictures to Flickr and put her hometown zip code in the name so she would not forget it.

Writing this has made me very sad because, if the pictures were staged to help Palin hide a hoax, that means a young woman was put in a very difficult position by older, more powerful people, and may forever have a stain on her reputation. Nonetheless, I must say the evidence strikes me as overwhelming that these pictures were taken for the express purpose of showing Palin looking very pregnant.

Your thoughts, Laura?

LN:  I think that if this were all that was questionable about this pregnancy, then I would say we are looking too closely at it. But I’d like to think that if there was nothing to this, that one of these people would have agreed to talk to me, or even returned my messages.

But the curious events around this baby’s beginnings just compound the controversy. I would like to presume doubt that anyone was in on anything here. That this was a green girl reporter who wanted a couple of photos for posterity. But then why does none of the rest of the tableau seem normal? I don’t know. And it’s not for lack of trying.

Thank you again, Prof. Brad Scharlott, for your diligence and hard work on this story.

While preparing to converse with Brad Scharlott about the so-called “Gusty photos” I did what any reporter would do. I attempted to reach the subjects of the photo and ask their side of the story. I was not keen to draw any conclusions from the two pictures, though I did have some questions about them - things that just did not add up in my mind. Still, I remained open to all possible explanations.

My efforts proved futile. Dan Carpenter, once a cameraman at KTUU in Anchorage, and seen on the governor’s right, no longer works at the station. His Twitter account @dcarpenter101 indicates he now lives in Mexico (you can’t make this stuff up). I was given his cell phone and I made two attempts to reach him:  5/26 at 11:14am and 6/1 at 3:17pm. I never heard back.

Andrea Gusty who appears in this photo, still works for KTVA. I sent her emails on 5/25 at 4:50pm and on 5/29 at 1:08pm. I also phoned and left voice mail messages on 5/26 at 2:30pm and 6/2 at 11:22am. She did not respond to any of my messages.

The third person I contacted was Bill McAllister, a KTUU reporter at the time these photos were taken, who had also reportedly been approached to work in media relations for the governor, a position he assumed two months later.

Mr. McAllister returned my email promptly. My intent was clear: to hear the people involved describe the event because I was open to the idea there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for the photos.

I said I had some questions of my own, beyond any Internet noise, about what I see in them. But I really wanted to hear what Mr. McAllister had to say about the moments surrounding the pictures.

We corresponded four times. Each time, I tried to reassure Mr. McAllister that I would send him a Word.doc with my questions. He would type in his answers and upload the doc to me. I would then add more questions as they arose. He would see the final copy before I would publish it to my site.

This is unheard of in the world of journalism. I was bending over backwards to be fair and tried to reassure him that he could tell his story in this document.

In each email, Bill McAllister expressed multiple feelings on the matter, and the people involved, though our correspondence is off-the-record and I cannot divulge more.

The last time, I offered to take his final email and use it, in place of an interview, as a self-contained statement. I would copy and paste it exactly as he wrote it.

The stipulations he returned to me were unacceptable.

I look forward then, to publishing my subsequent conversation with Brad Scharlott.

In my last conversation with the neonatologist, we learned why it is possible, through specific calculations, to medically question the age of the baby presented as Trig Palin, 12-hours old. And for what it’s worth, three other doctors independently told me they agreed with the assessment that the “newborn” was actually days, if not weeks or months older.

But the photo of Trig Palin in the family’s kitchen, weeks later, on May 3rd, troubles many readers, also because of his size. The baby, held by Mercede Johnston, appears smaller than the Trig held by Sarah Palin’s mother on April 18, 2008. 

And of course, there is the ear. But for the uninitiated who don’t know the entire story, let’s just begin with size and coloring.

LN:  Doc, do you think this baby on the right can be the same as on the left, only a few weeks older?

DOC: Objectively, these two pictures pose a problem, I have no way to measure the babies, no single point of reference like the ICD (inter-canthal distance) of an adult or something else of known length. Both babies also have a similar face structure: Both have down-turned lips and a flattened nasal bridge typical of Down syndrome.

The 12-hour-old picture shows very little of him other than his face and not even his ears. He is wearing a standard-issue hospital hat and as I mentioned before, he looks chubby and pale which is not consistent with a typical premature newborn. The picture with Mercede shows a baby who very well could have been a preemie, much less chubby and somewhat ruddy. Of course, babies generally lose weight after birth and this is especially if they are poor feeders which is common with Down syndrome. My opinion is that the baby on the right is younger than the one on the left. As for them being different babies, I can’t really conclude anything.

LN:  He’s also unwrapped. That could account for some of the disconnect here.

DOC: Sure, you can see more of the baby on the right. His leg position suggests hypotonia, also consistent with Down’s syndrome. My opinion still is that they could be the same baby, but the one on the right looks younger.

LN: I think a lot of people have speculated the same thing. The baby on the right does look younger. But how can that be? That photo was supposedly taken on May 3rd, for Levi’s birthday.

DOC:  The only other possible explanation is that Down syndrome babies can be poor feeders, so it’s possible the May 3rd picture shows a baby who is calorically deficient. However, he’d probably have a feeding tube if that was the case.

LN:  People have said they don’t believe the baby in Sadie’s arms has Down syndrome. I have always thought it appears to have the features. Here is another comparison with Trig, presented by his parents at reportedly 3-days old, and Trig, at the baby shower a few weeks later:

DOC: They both almost certainly have Downs. The epicanthal folds, the down turned mouth, recessed nasal bridge and broad forehead. The nose is not upturned.

While we’re on this picture, look at the lips. Notice that the baby on the left has less rosy lips (either pale or dusky, hard to tell from the picture) than the one on the right. Generally, babies become less ruddy over time, so unless there was an issue with oxygenation (congenital heart disease) the baby on the right looks younger. Also look at the hands. A newborn will have wrinkled hands from the amniotic fluid. An older baby’s hand will have smoother, more full looking hands. The hands on the baby on the left, though blurry, seem to be more full than the ones on the right.

LN:  I thought the same thing but purposely didn’t point it out to you. His skin is more veinous too, on the right. And the eyelids more red. Could it be a rash? It’s almost as if there’s a blue mask around his nose and mouth area.

DOC: Yes, the baby on the right does look a little cyanotic (blue) but don’t think there’s any rash over the eyelids.  Both findings go along with a higher red blood cell count, usually seen in a younger baby.

LN:  Another possible diagnosis readers have raised is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, or FAS. What is your response to that?

DOC: FAS kids often (but not always) have a distinctive appearance, but there are differences from Down’s. I’m not sure why anyone thinks of FAS in this case and I certainly don’t want to speculate on Bristol’s drinking habits. Sure the babies both have flat nasal bridges and epicanthal folds, but they don’t have a smooth philtrum or a thin upper lip. Look at this diagram with common facial features of FAS from this excellent AAFP article. 

LN:  But you think they both look like they have Downs?

DOC:  Yes. I think most people can make the diagnosis of Down syndrome without the need to go to medical school. When a baby is born with Down’s syndrome, not prenatally diagnosed, the parents (and all the staff) usually come up with diagnosis themselves rather quickly in the delivery room.

LN:  You mentioned the “ear.” Perhaps nothing rocked the Palin-watching blogosphere quite like Gryphen’s Tale of Two Babiespost in February of last year. 

His discovery of Trig as a newborn with a deformed ear was stunning.  I believe this is a tight shot from this photo at the baby shower (same occasion as the right hand photo above.) 

And as Gryphen pointed out, the deformed ear is also visible close-up on the Sadie-in-the-kitchen photo. 

But the discovery but it led to further speculation that the infant with a cauliflower ear could not possibly be the same baby presented to the world at the Republican National Convention and then later at the presidential debate.

In fact, following that amazing post, the Internet began collectively calling the baby, Ruffles. What’s your initial response?

DOC:  I'm not sure what I can add to that excellent Gryphen post other than agree with the general principle that the “ruffled ear” is unlikely to ever look normal.

At first glance, I thought the hole in front of the ear was a preauricular pit which occurs in up to 1% of newborns. It's not particularly associated with Down syndrome and usually doesn't cause any serious problems, besides getting infected.

But then I looked at a close-up of the ear and thought that the hole in front of the ear may actually be the ear canal itself, because it's way too big to be a preauricular pit, which are tiny. What I don’t see is any evidence of a “tragus”. That’s the piece of cartilage that sits in front of the ear canal opening, partially covering it.

I think the ears on baby #1 look a lot like this picture (without the abnormal opening)

LN: I know that you and I both want to delve further into this, but for now, you agree with the assessment of the doctors Gryphen interviewed? 

DOC: Yes. There's no way that these small, low set, posteriorly rotated and deformed ears in picture #1 could look relatively normal several months later. But I’m not an ENT and I’d really like to hear what one would say before I’d definitively call these different babies.

LN:  For what it’s worth I ran this same series of photos by another doctor. This was his response:

Photo #1 (THE CLOSE SHOT OF RUFFLED EAR) is an ear with a deformity that I have never seen. Not only is the cartilage misshapen, but the shadow in front of the ear makes it appear that there is a second abnormality.

On the three photos, from the left: the first one looks like the same photo as #1. The last 2 show the bottom of the ear lobe for the first time, so I can't compare that. The upper portion is very different, and appears to be of a different baby, not just an older baby. I would want to know what kind of plastic surgery can be performed on a deformed ear before I would call it a different baby.

LN:  The same reader who has provided me with some of these composites, also made this one:

These are a chronology of Trig's ears.  She also provided some interesting photos from Frank Bailey’s book that show the deformed ear, but I wasn’t keen on using those for copyright purposes. You had a brief thought about these?

DOC: Just that the pinnae looks too “normal” in the three pictures on the right. Those three could be the same ear, but not the original “ruffled” ear. That one’s got to be different.

LN:  And then there is this composite:

DOC:  The only really interesting thing here is that both Sarah and the baby have what looks like two ridges (concha) in the middle of the pinna. It doesn’t look like Bristol has that. Otherwise the ear of the baby is typical of Down syndrome, low set and posteriorly rotated. The helix is abnormal, but not as abnormal as “ruffles”.

LN:  What I find so glaring about this set of photos is how similar Bristol and Trig’s ears are in terms of having a “bat wing” shape to them. Can these sorts of things be inherited?

DOC: I don't think anyone knows how ear shape is inherited. It's one of those things that is too complicated and not important enough to study. Many traits, however, can skip generations. They tend to be recessive traits. It looked like Sarah and Trig both had two anti-helices and two conchae. Bristol only had one.  

Thank you again, Doc. I know we left some questions on the table, but I am working on finding out some more information on these ears from other pediatric specialists. Because I know readers have more questions about it.

DOC:  I’d love to hear an ENT doc’s opinion on this. I also have one more question about that excellent Gryphen post. Why in the hell is Levi Johnson holding Trig if he's not the father? Would you let your daughter's boyfriend hold your baby? Or, put another way, why would your daughter's boyfriend want to hold your baby?

LN:  Ah, therein lies the rub. Sometimes in life there are some things that are never fully explained. 

LN:  Mr. McCain?  Mr. Schmidt? Ms. Wallace? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?

Thank you again, Dr. Neonatologist, for all your time and energy.  And H/T to the amazing commenter who put these photos together.  Thank you!

Sarah Palin’s Big Shoulders and Bendable Belly Pregnancy, a Conversation with Prof. Brad Scharlott

When people comment on the incredible shape-shifting, one-month-miracle pregnancy of Sarah Palin, they often allude to the various video clips of her being interviewed by Newsweek magazine. The interview was conducted on March 4, 2008 in Los Angeles, and next to Mrs. Palin is then-governor of Arizona, Janet Napolitano.

This link will take you the most interesting clip, where Mrs. Palin talks about “huntin’ and fishin’” and her big family. The interviewer at one point interjects: “And you have four?” meaning, children. And Palin replies, “I have a bunch of kids” before rapidly changing the subject. Was this because she wasn’t sure how many she would have in the following days, or because she wasn’t yet prepared to tell the world about a fifth? “A bunch of kids.”  How maternal.

It’s not just that Palin was supposedly 7 months pregnant during this interview. It’s her behavior, posture, and her stunning announcement the next day that still mystify, dumbfound and disturb so many followers of this fairy tale.

Brad Scharlott, correct me if I am wrong, but the lady doth lean over a lot and doth have crosseth-legs-eth?

BS: Unquestionably-eth. Here we see a screen capture (lightened a bit to show detail) from that March 4 interview with Newsweek:

Throughout her entire Newsweek interview, which was at least 10 minutes (judging from several YouTube clips), she remained in that forward-leaning position with her legs crossed. 

LN:  What an amazing woman.

BS:  Amazing indeed. How late into your own pregnancy, Laura, could you comfortably assume that position and hold it several minutes?

LN: Are you kidding? I still can’t, and my baby’s now 16 and rides a BMX bike.

BS: As you noted, Laura, this interview took place on March 4, which was Super Tuesday, the day McCain wrapped up the Republican nomination. And it was also one day before Palin announced that she was seven months pregnant. So, at this point, if a hoax had been planned but not yet started, Palin perhaps was not yet very mindful of how a seven months pregnant woman should sit.

LN: Yes, but she already had her disguise on – big scarf, black dress. So maybe she really was pregnant and a miracle of biomedical engineering. Or, that was just a serious suit for sitting next to the future head of Homeland Security.

BS: Or maybe she’s planning on being an undertaker. In any event, even though that black jacket she has on clearly has padded shoulders, they do not make the shoulders of her physique look unnaturally large, just well-proportioned. And seeing that made me think of how in some later pictures, her shoulders do look quite large. With that in mind, I put together the following montage:

The first picture is the one we just looked at. The next one came from Elan Frank’s home page – he’s the Israeli filmmaker we talked about earlier – so we can assume he shot it on April 8 or 9, when he did his video shoot of Palin. The April 13 picture is a cropped version of a photo taken immediately after the famous Gusty photo we viewed last time. More on this picture later. And finally the April 17 picture was taken by a Texas photographer just before Palin gave a speech at the Republican Governors Conference. This was, according to Palin, after her contractions had started and shortly before her “wild ride” trip back to Alaska, which ended the next day with Palin purportedly giving birth to Trig.

Does anything strike you as noteworthy about these photos, Laura?

LN: Well, clearly in the second set of photos, she is wearing the same jacket, but it’s different from the first. Notice the cuffs. But the jacket also sports massively large shoulder pads. The kind we all threw out when 1989 was over. But there is a correlation between big shoulders/big belly. Maybe she just needed a big jacket to cover her girth?

BS: I’m inclined to think it’s the same jacket throughout, and that she simply turned up the cuffs to make sure her now very large belly bump is not obscured by the sleeves. Perhaps your eagle-eyed readers can weigh in on that question.

But I agree that something got a lot bigger. Look how wide she appears in the bottom two photos. Either she had a phenomenal growth spurt from April 8 to April 13 or she’s wearing something very large under that jacket … something much larger, it would seem, than the apparent square pillow we discussed recently. In addition, something about the “very pregnant” Palin pictures does not seem quite right. Consider the following:

We viewed this eBay fake pregnancy belly last time and saw how similar in shape it seemed to Palin’s belly in the Gusty photo. Even though the shape of her belly isn’t quite as obvious in the two middle pictures above, the basic shape still reminds me of that eBay belly – and that shape strikes me as too symmetrical. By contrast, look at the shape of Natalie Portman’s belly (far right) from earlier this year. You can see the effect of gravity. Her belly is more like a pear than a beach ball. At least to my eyes. All of which gives weight, in my view, to the idea that Palin was not actually pregnant on April 17.

LN: All women carry in different ways. But I’d bet that Natalie Portman wasn’t miraculously “not pregnant” looking at 7 months. I mean, we all saw her at the Oscars. It was evident. You waddle, you sway, you lean back, and burp. I simply don’t know where a baby was scrunched during that Newsweek interview. Though a belly full of foam would have neatly folded and cooperated. Either way, Palin looks like she had to pee through the entire session.

Look, I am neither Palin’s family practitioner, who seems unable to speak, nor her friendly foam purveyor on Ebay. I’d be willing to give her the benefit of the doubt on this pregnancy. Problem is, the immaculate maternity tale has more holes in it than my kitchen colander. I really think Mrs. Palin needs to refudiate the story for once and for all. By the time the Family Circus Vacation Paid With Political Money But Not A Campaign Bus progresses to Fanueil Hall, Palin should see this as a mandation of liberties to tell the truth about Trig. After all, she is campaigning “on the Constitution.”  And stuff.