Ahead, on my right, I saw the Alaska Right to Life (RTL) booth, where a poster caught my eye, taking my breath away. It featured the sweetest baby girl swathed in pink, pretend angel wings fastened to her soft shoulders.

“That’s you, baby,” I whispered to Piper, as I have every year since she smiled for the picture as an infant. She popped another cloud of cotton candy into her mouth and looked nonchalant: Still the pro-life poster child at the State Fair. Ho-hum.

Well, I still thought it was a nice shot, as I did every time I saw it on its advertisements and fund-raiser tickets. It reminded me of the preciousness of life.

It also reminded me of how impatient I am with politics.

A staunch advocate of every child’s right to be born, I was pro-life enough for the grassroots RTL folks to adopt Piper as their poster child, but I wasn’t politically connected enough for the state GOP machine to allow the organization to endorse me in early campaigns.

Time and again, Palin uses her large family for political purposes, and then complains that they’re “off limits” when she decides they’re under attack. We’ve seen it with the use of her son Trig–Palin put him on national TV at the 2008 Republican National Convention, and has occasionally accused liberals of wanting to kill him. We’ve seen it with Bristol Palin, whose pregnancy became a national story, and with Track Palin, whose military service Palin has referred to again and again. But it seems like Piper Palin’s star turn for Alaska Right to Life was the first political deployment of a Palin family member.

When I was in college, I studied Southern Long Fist Kung Fu for more than a year and my teacher told me something that I never forgot.

I’d like to think that the F. Scott Fitzgerald rip is intentional. Sadly, the rest of the column is a call for conservative bloggers to “do opposition research on the journalists endlessly running stories about Bristol Palin and Joe the Plumber,” as if Palin and Wurzelbacher were shrinking violets who did not embrace their statuses as public figures.

Ask yourself what we have to do here to follow the money. As Ron points out, if we can nail down the source of the money, the motive will be apparent. We may even discover the shadowy figure who first sent down the marching orders to “Get Palin!”

I found out about this through a random oddball former Michigan Republican Party Chairman Saul Anuzis, who tweeted about it.

McCain, who seemed in high spirits, seemed to spend extra time offering counsel to the two youngsters, whose underage pregnancy has eclipsed the fictional Juno McGuff and Paulie Bleeker in the popular imagination. But, this being real life and not reel life, their story was not accompanied by a kick-ass soundtrack featuring Kimya Dawson and Belle & Sebastian.

3. Will you support funding for abstinence-until-marriage education instead of for explicit sex-education programs, school-based clinics, and the distribution of contraceptives in schools?

[Sarah Palin]: Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.

Last year, a comprehensive federal study debunked the effectiveness of abstinence-only education programs. One can only wonder how many girls would find themselves in Bristol’s situation if Alaska, or the United States, enacted the policies favored by her mother.

The news clears up rumors that have been swirling on the Web — and in Anchorage bars — these last few days that Palin’s fifth child wasn’t her own, but her daughter’s. The theory was that Palin, a staunch pro-life conservative, faked giving birth to her 4-month-old son, Trig, to cover up the scandal. It seems the rumor, which we didn’t report here as there was no evidence to substantiate it, prompted the decision to release the news of the younger Palin’s pregnancy. One official told Reuters that the campaign was tired of the “mud-slinging and lies.”

Palin’s views on abortion have energized the evangelical wing of the Republican Party, who were wary of McCain’s stance on the issue, though he has said publicly he does not support abortion rights. Palin has told the media she doesn’t support elective abortions, even in the case of rape or incest. When she gave birth to her fifth child with Down syndrome, the pro-life movement considered her a true believer in the cause.

It will be interesting now to see how her support of her daughter will play with that group.