Palin Target of Email Smear Campaign

clipped from www.politico.com The candidate is new, a different face on the national scene, with roots outside the continental United States and sudden, massive popularity. With good reason, Sarah Palin has been touted as the right’s answer to Barack Obama. And in one especially important way, her abrupt rise from obscurity has given her something else in common with the Democratic nominee: she has catalyzed a fevered subculture of forwarded emails and viral conspiracy theories. Now the race is on, as it was with Obama, for Palin to define herself against an onslaught of negative portrayals. Emery has been frantically sorting Palin fact from fiction on his Urban Legends website for the last week – “It’s been crazy,” he said — as has David Mikkelson, the co-creator of the urban legend clearinghouse Snopes.com. “When we compile the top 25 things people are looking for, Barack Obama’s been at the top of that list for months and months. In the last couple of days, Palin’s displaced him,” Mikkelson said.

Emery is internet folklorist David Emery.

Don't you just love the irony here? Sooner or later, someone's going to get everything all screwed up and people will start believing that Palin's a secret Muslim and Obama pretended to give birth to Bristol Palin's baby.

Just stick to the stuff in the newspapers, people. Everything else is probably crap. There are enough real problems with Sarah Palin; there's no reason to make stuff up.