Had a 70% approval as Governor and would have been a lock for the Senate later.
My dislike for McCain was intense, but that being said, there is no way I preferred Obama over him, at least McCain would have had some good people in his Cabinet.
My opinion is that there were a lot of Democrats who would have pulled the lever for McCain over Obama, especially those hard-core Hillary supporters, who were still bitter with the way the nomination process went in 2008. But Palin, basically made them leap into the arms of Obama in the end, although she did fire up the hard-core conservatives.
Considering the way that McCain and his cast of goons treated her, you are right, she should have refused it