Pots and kettles, motes and beams

I read through the pages of Jornolist posts about the rumor that Trig Palin is actually Bristol Palin’s child rather than Sarah Palin’s. I may have more to say about this later but on first reading there was one post that made me laugh (emphasis mine):

John Blevins
Sept 1, 2008, 8:35am

I don’t think anyone here is talking about running with it. We’re privately airing out curiosities.

I think Mark S wrote it earlier — it matters b/c if this is true, she’s off the ticket and the election is probably over. That’s not b/c people will be outraged, but b/c (1) it discredits McCain and his vetting; (2) it makes her look like a weirdo; (3) it will become an object of national ridicule (e.g., Letterman, Leno, SNL, etc.).

Maybe this is all unjustified normatively, but this will be an enormous story if true — it’s just the type of tabloidy story that the public will eat up, low-information voters especially.

Based on my quick and dirty count, Blevins entry was around the 100th post in this thread. Apparently it’s not just low-information voters who eat up this type of tabloidy story.