Breaking news: Dave Weigel called Mat-Su Regional Hospital and a clerk confirmed that Trig was born there. Weigel asks:
[I]s anything preventing Andrew, or one of the Daily Dish's assistants, from making that call? During the 2008 campaign, he definitely demanded answers from the McCain campaign on what it would reveal about Palin, and when, but the current tone of his Trig-blogging is horribly meta — "just asking questions," without asking questions of the people who can answer all of this stuff.
The Dish did call Mat-Su Hospital in 2008 and were told that Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) privacy rules prevent them from talking about individual patients. But we confirmed, like Wiegel, that the list of newborns is voluntary.
In 2008, in fact, Patrick made the point Weigel makes in his post. I noted it from the get-go. But why, one wonders, would the governor of the state decide not to include her new-born son in the registry of births in her local hospital? Privacy? She's the governor. The reason why my Trig coverage got meta is that once someone decides to protect every piece of independent evidence that would confirm the maternity of Trig, there is no other option. But I'm glad low-information reporter, Dave, has begun reporting on this and hope he does some more, especially if he comes up with something actually new.
We also interviewed ten OB/GYNs to check whether the story Palin tells, of her water breaking in Texas and flying back to Alaska, was plausible. None would say it was impossible, but all of them agreed that Palin should have gone to the hospital in Texas and that a woman getting on a plane after her water breaks is extremely dangerous. Neither Dave nor Salon really want to touch the wild ride, for good reasons. Because any sane person would immediately ask questions.
By the way, what "state documents" is Weigel referring to that prove that Sarah Palin gave birth to Trig? I'm eager to publish them. Even the state of Alaska had trouble verifying the birth certificate a month after Palin had gone briskly back to work two days after she gave birth. The premature delivery of a child with DS no more interrupted her schedule than a mild cold might, to which David Gregory would undoubtedly say, "that's cool!" A reader notes
More than a month after the announced April birth, the state's Benefits division emailed Gov Palin reminding her "we have not received the dependent verification documents for your new child" and "please submit a copy of the child's Birth Certificate to us within 60 days of the date of birth." Her staff was sufficiently concerned to forward this as an urgent email to her husband's personal account. Her husband's email reply does not confirm that he has sent the certificate; he merely responds, "I called, thanks."
For some reason, verification of his birth even for insurance purposes required special handling.
The Dish 