Sorry, friends, but I have to address DU directly one last time. Mods, I promise this will be my last act of self-indulgence.
Dear DU:
You started a rumor that Sarah Palin's daughter had a baby, and Gov. Palin is merely calling it her own. You propagated it in your sandbox, and it appeared on Kos, so you reference the Kos posting as evidence that it must be true. Certain of you also insist that the baby is the product of incest. You continue to post new threads on this alleged topic, and most of the original posts now assert the rumor as fact. Interestingly, the most damning aspect of the rumor in your minds seems to be that this might be an example of insurance fraud. Insurance fraud? That reveals a lot about the content of your characters. Thank heavens that your rumor is laughable, and not worth comment. I'm not going to comment on your rumor; instead, I'm going to comment about you.
By their utter silence, David Allen and the DU moderators are encouraging this rumor-mongering, which emboldens you all. You believe you are justified, that the end justifies the means, simply because you think that the Republicans would do the same thing if the opportunity arose. But I ask you: when have the Republicans propagated a rumor like this? Can you point me to an actual example? Not something that you believe Karl Rove did, but something that actually came from the Republican camp? I don't think you can.
Your standard of proof seems to rest upon the physiology of a 15-year-old girl, as shown in a single picture. You are focusing on her midsection in your insistence that the girl is pregnant. I believe that those of you who are so ignorant and tasteless as to claim that a 15-year-old is pregnant based on one picture are fundamentally unserious people. Maybe you don't live in your parents' basement, but you certainly lack taste, tact, class, and critical thinking skills. I assume that none of you are fathers of girls, since no one with even a passing acquaintance with the delicate self-esteem of a teenage girl could possibly write such things. If none of that moves you, then what do you make of the pictures that Ava posts in your picture threads? Is she pregnant, too?
I assume that you believe that Democrat luminaries and news outlets will pick up this story and run with it. I can assure you that no such thing will happen. Even the leftmost pundits would leave this rumor on the table, because it's ridiculous on its face, and extraordinarily risky. There is no "win" to pursuing this fabrication. Forget for a moment how the average voter will get the information that Palin "might be hiding her daughter's baby:" do you honestly believe that the average voter will entertain this thought for the briefest of moments? You all claim that voters are stupid: are you relying on that alleged stupidity? I think you are, and you will be disappointed. Do you harbor visions of Keith Olbermann silkily suggesting on air that DNA tests be performed? I don't rule that out, because Olbermann is a craven fool, but the political costs of that tactic are enormous. Do you have visions of your "babygate" making an appearance on The Daily Show, or the Colbert Report? If so, you are delusional: jokes about infants with Downs may get you a few "ROFL"s on DU, and maybe even some recs, but in the real world they are comedy killers and cost people their careers. Dan Rather lost his career because he could not prove something that he passed off as fact. Can you imagine the career suicide it would be for someone to take up this issue, which can be quickly and conclusively proven to be unquestionably false?
You don't have to bother with these issues, and you don't have to bear these costs, because you are nameless, faceless, impotent, and unimportant. It costs you nothing to be wrong, so you are not only wrong, but abusive as well. That's the Internet for you, and that's why there is a place like Conservative Cave. Even so, you people occasionally drop the snarky facades and show off your moon-eyed, sappy, mawkish devotion to someone who has transfixed you with two empty words: HOPE and CHANGE. Not 72 hours ago, the one who calls himself The One gave a speech that was supposed to energize and motivate the entire world. Instead of carving the text of that speech on pieces of balsa and tossing them into the ocean, and having SETI code it into binary so that the entire universe will know that Change Has Arrived, you're so paralyzed with fear about a new player on the scene that you're tossed Obama aside in favor of rumors that you can't prove and that no one will touch. Oh, you're believers, all right.
