I’m as disappointed as anyone in Sarah Palin resigning. She was the one bright spot in the GOP for 2012. As much as I like Palin, I have to agree with you.
Palin has been a popular politician who struck a positive cord with many conservatives and traditionalists. Her resignation, however, ends her career in elective politics. Short term anyway. After all, Nixon came back. ;^)
Palin is putting the needs of the state and Alaskan taxpayers ahead of her personal ambitions. She's accomplished much in the 2.5 years when she was Governor (please remember that Palin has 17 years of both elective and appointed experience in government, so she's not a neophyte), and if she was good enough to be chosen for VP, then she's good enough to run for President.
You know as well as I do that if she would have remained as Governor, she would have been dragged down with more BS ethics complaints that would have prevented her from doing her job and campaigning on behalf of other conservative candidates in 2010. She can't do that as Governor of a state thousands of miles away anyway. Still, I think she should have resigned right at the end of the year but she probably didn't want the Lt Gov to go through an election without having some time under his belt, IMO.
So I think Palin made the right decision here. She's the only Republican who has the guts to criticize Obama and the Dems, and we need to take out the RINOs too.