[only1percent]

Considering the mixed bag that was her 2008 campaign, and her resignation, I think that we have to conclude that Palin still has a bright political future but it is going to be her version of the present careers of Newt Gingrich and Karl Rove: important contributions but no serious aspirations (or prospects) to return to public office.

I can see why her exit from the conventional political path is disappointing. She was (at least when on a script) a powerful exponent of traditional conservatism, and she was willing to speak truths about Obama that McCain was not, and had the nation not been spiraling into an economic crisis, truths that would have found an attentive audience.

It's an important measure of the seriousness of grass-roots conservatism that it accept that Palin is not going to be the GOP nominee for President in 2008. Being a bitter-ender won't change that reality, and will lead to a repeat of the 2007-2008 season, where grass-roots conservatives of various flavors frittered away their energy on the hopeless (Hunter, Tancredo) and the reluctant and ill-disposed (Thompson), tore themselves apart over the contradictions (conservative-ideology-wise) of Romney, and permitted McCain to emerge the nominee.

[SeekAndFind]

Palin still has a bright political future but it is going to be her version of the present careers of Newt Gingrich and Karl Rove: important contributions but no serious aspirations (or prospects) to return to public office.

You said it. Her future is now as a PRIVATE CITIZEN, not in GOVERNMENT. She said so herself in her speech yesterday. The problem is most of her admirers do not want to believe this.