So here’s where we’re at. Yesterday the piece dropped, and immediately even left-leaning reporters like Ben Smith and Dave Weigel started challenging it. Today Smith came back with another reason to question its accuracy; meanwhile, lefty feminists (including KP, whose criticism of Vanity Fair almost but not quite atones for her recent “Republicans are racist” op-ed) are unloading on VF for attacking Palin over alleged behavior that’s par for the course for male politicians. And now, as a coup de grace, here’s renowned Palin-hater Shannyn Moore telling Weigel that she’s filled with heart-ache at what a supposedly unethical hack the VF author has turned out to be.

I don’t give a rip what you said about me – though it was so completely wrong, and put me in such a completely inaccurate and unfavorable light people are mad on my behalf.

Fine thanks for Alaskan hospitality. I have extended the Alaska Spirit to dozens of journalists and visitors, and I will continue to do so. It’s on YOU, not me, as you are the only one who has broken agreements with sources you promised complete anonymity.

I’m sure you’re thrilled to be on TV now. Just know, like Sarah, Alaskans paid a price for it. Specifically, a 79-year old woman, with failing health, who spoke to you under anonymity who hopes her adult children will speak to her again.

Not enough to move the skepticism meter? Well, Conservatives4Palin talked to another source alleged by VF to have left Palin’s team on bad terms who now insists it’s not true, and Peter Hamby at CNN tweets, “I was w/ Palin for entire VP bid. never got a hint that she ‘lashed out at the slightest provocation'”. All of which brings me to a question: If, like Vanity Fair, you’re in the business of churning out occasional hit pieces on Palin to take her down and/or convince your readers that she’s every bit the demon they believe she is, wouldn’t you want to make extra, extra sure that the details are perfectly accurate? You know her supporters will allege media bias; the only counterargument is to present an airtight factual case. As it is, they’ve managed to turn this into Exhibit A in her argument for just how lame the “lamestream media” is. Amazing.

Via the Right Scoop, here she is yesterday on Hannity’s show taking the lay-up after Vanity Fair passed her the ball. Skip ahead to 4:10 or so.