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Don't Run Sarah!
The Daily Beast ^

Posted on 11/25/2010 9:10:56 AM PST by roses of sharon

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To: Virginia Ridgerunner
Power in the RNC is NOT centralized as it is in the DNC. The RNC is run like a corporation, with the chair serving as CEO, and the beltway GOP poo-bahs serving as a Board of Directors. Hence, the RNC chair does NOT have the same level of power as his or her counterpart in the DNC, and the collective Board can effectively veto any changes that an incoming chairwoman such as Palin would try to implement. She would find herself locked in a cage again, as she was as governor in Alaska.
I grant the difference in the structure, but consider this: It isn't impossible that a sweepout of Michael Steele (I think I noted earlier that there's rumbling to move him out, has been for awhile, I think) would provoke a concurrent sweep out from among the poobahs to whom you refer. Enough, perhaps, to make room enough for Mrs. Palin to be a prospect for the chair and to be an effective one if she were to get it. And I have seen where she has the capability of turning one or two poobahs' heads in a different direction because she is, after all, persuasive enough when she needs to be.

She also has something Michael Steele didn't have when he took the chair (and still doesn't)---Mr. Steele isn't exactly the inspiring type, and he isn't even close to being all that popular. Mrs. Palin is, and is again. She has the gravitas Mr. Steele merely fantasises having. That by itself could prove a big piece of leverage.

I was impressed with the political skill she showed during the 2010 campaign, as I noted earlier, notwithstanding one or two mis- or mal-endorsements. She showed me an enormous organisational skill, she stayed on message and did enough (even if it wasn't always overt, even if it wasn't always heeded) to keep most of the candidates for whom she campaigned or endorsed likewise.

It was a showing I didn't exactly expect, since I thought of her, prior to the '10 campaigns, as a former officeholder and a prospective candidate pretty strictly. Then the campaigns began in earnest. Mrs. Palin's overall, non-officeholding, non-officeseeking political skill, campaigning for other officeseekers, was a refreshing surprise to me.

141 posted on 11/25/2010 2:52:10 PM PST by BluesDuke (Another brief interlude from the small apartment halfway up in the middle of nowhere in particular)
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To: Virginia Ridgerunner

Basically it boils down to this.

If Sarah doesn’t run THEY win and WE lose.

Now, if Sarah runs WE win and They lose. For me I like this option the best.


142 posted on 11/25/2010 3:05:07 PM PST by Clyde5445 (Gov. Sarah Palin: :"You have to sacrifice to win. That's my philosophy in 6 words.")
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To: Clyde5445

Damned straight!!!


143 posted on 11/25/2010 3:09:10 PM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner (Sarah Palin has crossed the Rubicon!)
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To: nwrep

Our goal should be to save the Republic, we can’t do that with a slowdown place holder, we need a revolutionary leader. Show me a better option then come back and complain all you want.


144 posted on 11/25/2010 3:38:00 PM PST by itsahoot (We the people allowed Republican leadership to get us here, only God's Grace can get us out.)
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To: BluesDuke

More likely you think as you do because, because you are paid to.


145 posted on 11/25/2010 4:12:54 PM PST by itsahoot (We the people allowed Republican leadership to get us here, only God's Grace can get us out.)
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To: editor-surveyor
All these comments prove my point. No one on FR is anywhere near ready to have a serious debate about whether or not Palin is the best candidate for president. Immediately there is the guilt-by-association with Romney, when I only point out---COMPLETELY CORRECTLY AND ACCURATELY---that there is significant support for him among rank and file Republicans. Maybe not the ideological wing, but I go to enough Ohio central committee meetings that it is pretty noticeable.

Second, you can say DeMint sounds like whomever, but Palin with her twang doesn't? Two can play that game. If you asked any ten conservative intellectuals who has a better grasp of what conservatism means, DeMint or Palin, I think it would be no contest. He gives detailed answers as to why conservative positions work.

And she does have advisers and she does have staff, and part of her "mystique" has been to hide them well. Indeed, every single time there is a gaffe, or a booking to which she doesn't appear, it's ALWAYS blamed on the staff.

And I'm still waiting for the polls that show her the overwhelming front runner among Republicans. Every poll that shows otherwise is dismissed as being from the "left-wing media."

It does a disservice to Palin not to hold her to at least the same critical demands that we would place on Mitt. And as for Huckabee, he will never be a GOP nominee, much less president. He is the only guy (or gal) we have who could lose in 2012.

146 posted on 11/25/2010 4:47:19 PM PST by LS ("Castles made of sand, fall in the sea . . . eventually." (Hendrix))
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To: LS

You have a thing about Mitt Romney. Are you aware of the reasons that make him unacceptable to conservatives?


147 posted on 11/25/2010 5:12:26 PM PST by ansel12
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To: ansel12
Of course---for the same reasons he's unacceptable to ME. You don't get it. I'm not arguing for Romney. I'm trying to get you to understand that he is VERY popular and that simply chanting "Palin, Palin, Palin" doesn't convince a large swath of the voting public that she is qualified.

To repeat, since you can't seem to really get this through your skull, I like her and would certainly take her over any Democrat. But the public as a whole does NOT have a low opinion of Mitt nor nearly as high an opinion of Palin. It might change, but that's where things are now.

148 posted on 11/25/2010 6:06:39 PM PST by LS ("Castles made of sand, fall in the sea . . . eventually." (Hendrix))
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To: convertedtoreason
McKinnon works for Meagan McCain, he hopes to one day work for the Huffington Post. Once there you have arrived
149 posted on 11/25/2010 6:11:33 PM PST by Friendofgeorge (SARAH 2012 OR BUST)
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To: LS
The public as a whole does NOT have a low opinion of Mitt nor nearly as high an opinion of Palin. It might change, but that's where things are now.

True. However since Palin and Romney arguably represent polar opposites of the GOP (Grass Roots vs. Establishment), it should be assumed Republican Party energy will be sapped of much needed juice should Romney win in a showdown between the two.

The Establishment GOP and RINOs demand loyalty, but seem to believe it's a one-way street (see Rove, Murkowski, Castle, Crist.)

Many MANY of us are tired of the Elites and RINOs calling ALL the shots for the GOP since 1988.

150 posted on 11/25/2010 6:20:11 PM PST by Conservative Tsunami
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To: LS

That’s funny, because I am into your posting history right now, so far I have gone back to September of 2009.

So far it is a constant drum beat of what you keep posting here, Palin is bad, and then constantly remarking positively about Romney, and pointing out that everyone hates Palin, but doesn’t hate Romney.

Over, and over, and over, and over, and over.

You are full of it LS.


151 posted on 11/25/2010 6:20:53 PM PST by ansel12
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To: LS
She does have advisers and she does have staff, and part of her "mystique" has been to hide them well. Indeed, every single time there is a gaffe, or a booking to which she doesn't appear, it's ALWAYS blamed on the staff.

Which "gaffs" are you speaking of? The Couric interview? Gibson's?

For a woman who's cutting it loose on the fly nearly every single day in one public venue or another (and without the safety net of a teleprompter), Palin's "gaffs" are surprisingly minimal.

152 posted on 11/25/2010 6:26:03 PM PST by Conservative Tsunami
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To: ansel12
That is one of the stupidest excuses for promoting a liberal agenda that I have heard.

The excuse for waiting for the perfect incarnation of a "Conservative" Presidential candidate, while losing an election riding the back of an unelectable conservative like Goldwater is more stupid. Even a RINO Mitch Daniels would be better than ZERO. For example, there is a 50-50 chance a RINO would nominate a conservative SC justice. There is 0% chance ZERO would do the same.

153 posted on 11/25/2010 7:37:47 PM PST by nwrep
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To: Virginia Ridgerunner
WRONG!!!

Is this a papal edict? :-)

154 posted on 11/25/2010 7:41:12 PM PST by nwrep
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To: nwrep

Your problem is that the conservative also has the highest approval among the primary voters, and Mitch Daniels, the rino, has only a handful of people that have even heard of him.

You can’t win with a nobody, and conservatives don’t like the surrender monkey anyway, Daniels is not in the running.


155 posted on 11/25/2010 7:42:27 PM PST by ansel12
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To: nwrep

We are 2 years out, why is your political energy being devoted to trying to get a rino into the primary, isn’t Mitt Romney enough rino for you?


156 posted on 11/25/2010 7:56:44 PM PST by ansel12
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To: LS
Show me two national polls that have her at the top of the GOP presidential hopefuls. Quite the contrary, most of the head-to-head polls I've seen (I don't believe 'em, but I've seen 'em) show her doing poorly if not the worst of all the big candidates against Obama.

I've seen national polls showing that Sarah Palin is the favorite, but my search skills aren't all that honed, so I can't quickly produce them for you. However, after some searching on FR and some Palin-related sites, I found the following, which support my contention that she's the leader for the nomination:

Palin’s Search Traffic 6x Greater than Top 4 2012 Hopefuls Combined
http://us4palin.com/palins-search-traffic-6x-greater-than-top-4-2012-hopefuls-combined/comment-page-1/

Ms. Palin’s search traffic, since the start of 2010, is roughly 16 times that of Mitt Romney, 14 times that of Newt Gingrich, 38 times that of Mike Huckabee, and 87 times that of Mr. Pawlenty. (It is about six times greater than these other four candidates combined.)

Ms. Palin, in fact, draws almost as much search traffic worldwide as the man she would face if she wins the Republican nomination: Barack Obama. And her name is searched for about 30 percent more often than the President’s among Google users in the United States.

RASMUSSEN'S POLL: 52% of Voters Say Their Views Are More Like Palin’s Than Obama’s

Whose views are closer to your own? Palin/Obama

Overall: 52/40

Male: 55/37
Female: 48/43
White: 58/35
Black: 5/87
GOP: 84/9
DEM: 14/81
INDY: 59/27
Conservative: 80/12
Moderate: 28/61
Liberal: 14/85

Confirmation of Rasmussen poll on Sarah Palin's F/UF released one month ago
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2611514/posts

…today in a poll of 1501 ADULTS, including 846 LIKELY VOTERS by AP-GfK Sarah Palin's F/UF were found to be 49/50. (Obama's F/UF 52/48).

Poll: Nation’s Top Conservative Bloggers Choose Sarah Palin As Favorite For 2012
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2606359/posts

1 posted on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 7:24:56 PM by curth

Right Wing News, one of the top Conservative websites recently invited the nation’s top Conservative bloggers to participate in a straw poll asking who they would likely support in 2012.

Seventy-two bloggers responded and are listed below in alphabetical order:

101 Dead Armadillos, Ace of Spades HQ, Alexa Shrugged, All That Is Necessary, The American Princess, And Rightly So, The Anchoress, Argghhhh!, Bad Example, Basil’s Blog, Blonde Sagacity, Betsy’s Page, Black and Right, Bookworm Room, Classical Values, Conservative Compendium, Melissa Clouthier, Dodgeblogium, Doubleplusundead, Ed Driscoll, Drumwaster’s Rants, Eckernet, The EM Network, Election Projection, Exurban League, Eternity Road, Cassy Fiano, GayPatriot, GOPUSA Northeast, Guardian Watchblog, Hoosier Access, Infidels Are Cool, IMAO, The Jawa Report, Jenn Q. Public, The Liberal Heretics, Liberty’s Heart, Likelihood of Confusion, Fingers Malloy, Mean Ol’ Meany , Moe Lane, Mount Virtus, Midnight Blue, Moonbattery, No Oil For Pacifists, The New Ledger, Nice Deb, The Other McCain, Palousitics, Pundit Boy, Pursuing Holiness.com, QandO, Rightosphere, Right View from the Left Coast, Samizdata, Say Anything, Don Singleton, Sister Toldjah, The Smallest Minority, Snark and Boobs, Solomonia, Stop The ACLU, The Sundries Shack, Sunshine State Sarah, This Ain’t Hell, The Underground Conservative, Weapons of Mass Discussion, Viral Footage, Wintery knight, YidwithLid, WyBlog

Several questions were asked of respondents:

If you had to choose from this list, which of the following candidates would you be most likely to support for President in 2012?

The results:

1) Sarah Palin: 30.6% (22 votes)

2) Mitch Daniels: 18.1% (13 votes)

3) Mike Pence: 15.3% (11 votes)

4) Haley Barbour: 11.1% (8 votes)

5) Tim Pawlenty: 8.3% (6 votes)

6) Mitt Romney: 6.9% (5 votes)

7) John Thune: 5.6% (4 votes)

8 ) Newt Gingrich: 4.2% (3 votes)

9) Mike Huckabee: 0.0% (0 votes)

Frankly I don’t get the Mitch Daniels thing. He’s about as establishment, and squishy as they come. Daniels recently said we should, for the lack of a better word ….surrender …. on social issues, so we can concentrate on the fiscal. That’s all well and good, for a squish, but in most cases, social issues directly effect fiscal stability. They are intertwined.

It’s interesting to note the usual suspects: Romney, Gingrich, and especially Huckabee find little or no love among Conservatives.

Another question asked was this:

Now, let’s change direction: which of the following candidates would you be LEAST LIKELY to support for President in 2012?

The results:

1) Mike Huckabee: 44.4% (32 votes)

2) Mitt Romney: 20.8% (15 votes)

3) Newt Gingrich: 19.4% (14 votes)

4) Sarah Palin: 9.7% (7 votes)

5) John Thune: 2.8% (2 votes)

5) Haley Barbour: 2.8% (2 votes)

7) Mike Pence: 0.0% (0 votes)

7) Tim Pawlenty: 0.0% (0 votes)

7) Mitch Daniels: 0.0% (0 votes)

This one kinda speaks for it self. Again, the usual suspects, the establishment elites the GOP will be pushing come 2012, get no love.

We can tell you that a run by Huckabee or Romney will be met with great resistance throughout the blogosphere. To put it as nicely as possible, both are phonies, and both had horrendous records during their time as Governors.

Romney will have an especially rough go of it, because his RomneyCare in Massachusetts, was the blue print for ObamaCare, and is serving as the canary in the coal mine for what the entire nation is about to endure with Obama’s great boondoggle.

Obviously this poll isn’t a great predictor of what will happen in 2012, but it shows where Conservative opinion makers stand. How they are reading the Tea leaves, so to speak.

_______________________________________________________________

Finally, a very good take on the 2012 race and Sarah Palin’s chances, by Brices Crossroads:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2628831/posts?page=197#197

Can Palin win? Of course.

See the following post:

Worse than it seems (2012 census favors GOP nominee)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2622707/posts

For those who doubt Palin can win the 2012 Presidential elections, the census is about to change the landscape. and the change is going to massively benefit the GOP nominee, which will in all likelihood be Palin.

Take the States McCain won and add just six more (in each of which Obama’s numbers are in the toilet) and in each of which the GOP will have sitting governors: Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Indiana, Virginia and Nevada. The GOP cleaned up, as did her endorsees, in all six states with the partial exception of Nevada where Harry Reid won narrowly but where the Dems lost the governorship badly.

That is 271 electoral votes and with them, Palin is President.

To the PDSers and the “Palin is unelectable” crowd, read ‘em and weep. At this point Palin has a clearer, less obstructed, path to the White House than Ronald Reagan had at this point in 1978.

197 posted on Wednesday, November 17, 2010 6:30:13 PM by Brices Crossroads

157 posted on 11/25/2010 7:59:14 PM PST by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: Brices Crossroads; curth

Courtesy ping to post #157 for attribution...


158 posted on 11/25/2010 8:01:27 PM PST by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: itsahoot
More likely you think as you do because, because you are paid to.
Wrong. I think strictly for myself. I always have, and I always will. My current paid employment (free-lance writer, blues guitarist) has nothing to do with politics at this time, and my work has had nothing to do with politics for a very long time. About which I am satisfied enough that it wouldn't trouble me in the slightest if it had nothing whatsoever to do with politics for the rest of my working life, either.
159 posted on 11/25/2010 8:08:50 PM PST by BluesDuke (Another brief interlude from the small apartment halfway up in the middle of nowhere in particular)
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To: itsahoot

p.s. I have only ever been employed by any politically-oriented organisation once in my life, when I spent a year working as a researcher for the Heritage Foundation a couple of decades ago.


160 posted on 11/25/2010 8:18:25 PM PST by BluesDuke (Another brief interlude from the small apartment halfway up in the middle of nowhere in particular)
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