When Palin did resign she promised to spend he3r time in the lower 48 working to elect conservatives wherever she could. The she endorsed McCain. As far as I'm concerned all bets are now off.
Picking Schweiker was an uncharacterically bone headed move. Nobody's perfect.
Campaigning for Chuck Percy in 1978 wasn't real bright, either, particularly in light of Percy's support of the Panama Canal Treaty which Reagan detested.
You're right. Nobody's perfect.
How many Governors from Alaska or Hawaii have confronted and fought the worst media attacks that we have ever seen and managed to maintain a top position for leadership of the party and the Presidential nomination, from the isolation and distance of those states?
Palin took a shattered and demoralized conservative movement and inspired and led it to the dominant political force in America in a single year.
Let's not forget that Reagan also picked the establishment, Eastern blue-blood Republican, GHW Bush to be his VP in 1980. He then erred by trusting the Democrats when he signed the '86 amnesty bill (they stabbed him in the back).
He had to make tough, politically pragmatic choices just like any other politician.
The thing about Reagan that most of us love and appreciate isn't that he was "perfect", but that he never vacillated or swerved from aiming toward his conservative goals for the country.
Sarah Palin shares that excellent character trait with Ronaldus Magnus.