In response to the 127,500 people asking about Palin...
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No, I have no idea what's going on. We (meaning Alaskans in general) don't have any more information than you do, and her resignation probably took all of us by more surprise than it did you.
I will say it doesn't make sense. If she's shooting for Prez in 2012, she just shot herself in the foot. With a bazooka.
The rumors going around (mostly online, and mostly by lower-forty-eighters) are...
1) She's quitting to devote more time to the 2012 Presidential runup.
2) There's an as-yet-unrevealed/undiscovered scandal, something that would have to be fairly big, more than just a few questionable campaign donations or something.
3) She decided the constant media attacks were too much, and folded.
4) She decided the constant media spotlight/attacks/press was too much for her family, and decided the bow out to save them from more of the same.
5) She got some offer she couldn't refuse for a book, to be a FOX talking head, to be a consultant, etc, ad nauseum.
6) She's essentially being blackmailed, either by oil companies unhappy with her somewhat adversarial stance, by members of "The GOP" that don't want her drawing media attention from some other potentially electable 2012 candidate, or whatever.
Or 7) She's pregnant again.
Personally, I'm hoping it's #4. That's the only one that makes a lick of sense. They're a close family, with young kids, and the media has in general pretty well savaged them. And the only even remotely plausible one that explains why she's quitting now, halfway through her first and only term.
#1 is ludicrous. I really hope she's not so dumb as to think that resigning now, to use the next year-and-a-half to help fundraise for a possible run 3-1/2 years from now, is even remotely a proper move.
To say nothing of that fact that I don't think she'd be a good candidate anyway. For the job of Prez, she'd most likely be at least adequate. Not particularly great, not particularly bad. But as a candidate... No, sorry.
For 2012 we need a good, solid candidate. In a few more years, Obama won't be Captain SuperCandidate anymore, the way he's racking up mountains of broken campaign promises, backtracks, bad legislation and outright lies. He'll be beatable by a good 'Pub candidate, but "good" doesn't just mean name recognition.
#2 is at least vaguely plausible, though I strongly doubt it. And I can't imagine what sort of "scandal" there might be, that the legions of reporters that vetted her last year didn't uncover. Hell, they found video of her playing high school basketball 25 years ago, and an email from a librarian made it around the world. They went through her taxes, checked who paid for her house and cars, poked through Todd's sponsorship money, and check hospital records for all the kids. What could there be that they didn't find?
Number 3 is somewhat more plausible, and different from #4 only in that 3 assumes she couldn't hack it. I'm not sure I believe that one either, but eight or nine months of constant, almost always negative media coverage can wear down anyone.
Five is almost as ludicrous as one. She already had a million-dollar book deal, and what sort of deal couldn't wait another year and a half?
6 is a surprisingly prevalent lefty rumor. While I admit Palin's presser raised more questions than it answered, only a Sullivan-level conspiracy fan would even believe anyone would try and blackmail a person with such a public profile in the first place.
I could see some of the Republican people meeting with her privately and asking that she tone down the media coverage a bit, so as to not draw attention away from some other candidate- a request, not a threat- but the fact is, no other candidate yet exists, and besides, she'd be far more useful as a sitting governor, or at least one that had completed a full term.
7 is entirely possible, and could be the kicker driving #4.
I don't know. I'm not too worried about it personally, and to be perfectly blunt, I'll be kind of relieved if she has, in fact, dropped out of politics. Not that she was a bad politician or would be a poor prez, it's just that, as noted above, I don't think she could be elected- in part because I think the electorate will be well and truly tired of a "novelty president", and just as they were tired of Bush and swung heavily the other way, they'll swing back toward the "plain white guy" in 2012.
