US election furore as Palin critics say she has tattooed lip-liner

She is the self-styled ‘Pitbull in Lipstick’ – but vice presidential candidate Sarah PalinSarah Palin has become the subject of a fierce debate about whether her lip-liner is really a tattoo. The discussion was started by Left-wing pundit Arianna HuffingtonArianna Huffington, who claimed in a blog that the 44-year-old governor of Alaska had had her lip-liner permanently tattooed on. The claim has prompted huge speculation on the internet and within the mainstream media about Palin’s beauty habits. One detractor said: ‘She’s so vain and this is just another example of that.’ A pro-Palin supporter shot back: ‘She’s a busy working mother and her make-up always looks impeccable. People love to attack her.’ In Palin’s hometown of Wasilla, Alaska, population 8,700, Jessica Steele, owner of the town’s Beehive Beauty Shop, said she had not noticed if Palin had tattooed lip-liner but added: ‘She was very concerned about her sexy image. 'We talked a lot about how, if she looked too pretty or too sexy, people wouldn’t listen to her.’ Dr Laura Reed, who runs Artistic Cosmetic Solutions in Garden Grove, California, said: ‘I think she may well have had it done.’ And Lisa Sims, a make-up tattoo artist from Anchorage, Alaska, said: ‘I believe it is tattooed on. One hundred per cent.’ Permanent lip-liner saves wearers the time and trouble of having to constantly apply lipstick and liner. Last night a Palin spokesman said: ‘We’re not going to comment.’ Palin became embroiled in another furore last night after she was found guilty of abuse of power. An inquiry into a long-running scandal – dubbed Troopergate – in Alaska found that she had acted improperly by trying to get her former brother-in-law fired from his job as a state trooper while he was in the middle of a bitter divorce from her sister in 2006. A Democratic Party spokesman said: ‘Governor Palin has violated the trust of people in Alaska.’