Gov. Sarah Palin's time in the white hot center of American politics isn't exactly the fairy tale her earliest supporters imagined during the heady days of the Republican convention. Remember when she was marketed as a card-carrying member of the lumpen proletariat -- only hotter? In the mythology that accompanied her rise from obscurity, the Alaska governor was portrayed as someone who, despite her political success, hovered only half a notch above her working-class constituents. She was real. Ms. Palin may have come straight out of Wasilla, but she was the closest thing the Republicans had to Cinderella. Like that...