If Sarah Palin runs “as is” (ie as she is now) she will be lucky to get 40% against Obama. She needs to drop the Minnie Pearl schtick now if she wants to win anywhere outside of the usual states we carry.
I don’t think that she can throw away what makes her natural. Maybe she can go to an Ivy League school in these four years, adopt more Liberal positions, and placate the Media more and more. I am sorry but nobody can help the Media. When Gas Prices rise to 4 dollars a gallon because of the stupidity of the Democrats, and our economy tanks and we have a new crisis in the Middle East bungled by Obama, I am sure that a few will break the spell.
And even if she was a cosmopolitan socialite it wouldn’t matter. They would call her a whore, and anything else to make her sound like the devil. She doesn’t have a shtick because it is her and it can be very effective. Unlike Obama pretending to be somebody who is not.
Unfortunately, many of her advocates don't seem very good at math and electoral politics.
I'd love to see Sarah Palin win, but she can't just energize "the red states"...as you realize, she could double the number of votes in every red state and it won't do a bit of good, since we already have those states.
We need her to be able to impress others, and to be able to handle the rough-and-tumble national scene with her message coming across intact.