During the 2008 campaign, then Senator Barack Obama rushed to Sarah Palin's defense in reaction to the media frenzy over her 17 year old daughter's pregnancy. "Let me be as clear as possible," Obama said, adding:

"I think people's families are off-limits, and people's children are especially off-limits. This shouldn't be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Gov. Palin's performance as governor or her potential performance as a vice president."

As it turns out, at least one American - Sarah Palin - now thinks Barack Obama was wrong.
Palin apparently reached that conclusion yesterday as she endorsed the Birther movement questioning whether or not the President was in fact born in the United States. Appearing on the Rusty Humphries radio show, Palin announced that legions of delusional Tea Baggers were right to drag Obama's birth through the mud. As Politico recounted the exchange:

"I think it's a fair question, just like I think past association and past voting records -- all of that is fair game," Palin said. "The McCain-Palin campaign didn't do a good enough job in that area."
McCain's campaign counsel has said the campaign did look into the birth certificate question and, like every other serious examination, dismissed it.
Palin suggested that the questions were fair play because of "the weird conspiracy theory freaky thing that people talk about that Trig isn't my real son -- 'You need to produce his birth certificate, you need to prove that he's your kid,' which we have done."

On Thursday night, Palin took to her Facebook page to clarify what she meant when she declared that the Birthers had a "fair question":

Voters have every right to ask candidates for information if they so choose. I've pointed out that it was seemingly fair game during the 2008 election for many on the left to badger my doctor and lawyer for proof that Trig is in fact my child. Conspiracy-minded reporters and voters had a right to ask... which they have repeatedly. But at no point - not during the campaign, and not during recent interviews - have I asked the president to produce his birth certificate or suggested that he was not born in the United States.

That "conspiracy-minded reporters and voters had a right to ask" about the most personal details of her family life should come as a surprise to anyone who's followed Sarah Palin.
In her book Going Rogue, Palin singled out the Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan for his over-the-top insistence that she confirm she is in fact her son's mother:

"Formerly reputable outlets like the Atlantic ran with the loony conspiracy theory that I was not Trig's mother--perhaps it was Bristol or Willow, they suggested."

Even as she abandoned her post as Governor in July, Palin took a parting shot at the press as she stepped down:

"So, how 'bout in honor of the American soldier, ya quite makin' things up. And don't underestimate the wisdom of the people, and one other thing for the media, our new governor has a very nice family too, so leave his kids alone."

But when the target is Barack Obama, Sarah Palin gives comfort to those "makin' things up." Ironically, her refusal to refute and disown the Obama Birther crowd comes just months after she threatened legal action against media outlets reporting rumors that she faced possible criminal charges in action in Alaska, the latest episode in Palin's ongoing confusion regarding the First Amendment. As she put it just days before the November 2008 vote:

"If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin told host Chris Plante, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

As for candidate Obama, he defended Governor Palin regarding the rumors about her son and himself from the McCain campaign's charges he was behind them:

"I am offended by that statement," the Illinois senator retorted, not letting the reporter finish his question. "There is no evidence at all that any of this involved us.
"We don't go after people's families; we don't get them involved in the politics. It's not appropriate, and it's not relevant," he added. "Our people were not involved in any way in this, and they will not be. And if I ever thought that there was somebody in my campaign that was involved in something like that, they'd be fired."

On this as on so many other matters, Sarah Palin would do well to follow Barack Obama's example. In the mean time, as her aide Jason Recher summed up her current book tour, "There's a lot of people who come through the line to see Trig instead of to see her."