Bruce Reed discusses Sarah Palin's surprise resignation. He discusses it from the standpoint of how it's a bad move if her goal is to win the presidency. I suspect that she's already resigned herself to the idea that any higher office is out of her reach and that what she wants to do is to ostensibly run for president and — like Pat Buchanan, Ralph Nader and others we could name — derive the benefits of a candidacy without ever getting within a hundred miles of victory.
Palin's resignation speech itself demonstrated why she's a bad candidate. The whole point of it was to try and assert she was not taking "the quitter's way out" — a point she somehow thought she could score in a speech to announce that she was quitting and getting out. One gets the feeling that Ms. Palin's small band of fervent supporters has convinced her that she can say anything and get people to believe it. Or maybe she's just decided that all she cares about is that small band. And of course, she made her usual gaffes, like attributing to Douglas MacArthur a quote from someone else.
The thing that fascinates me about all this is that a lot of folks seem to confuse the candidate with the message. If he or she says the things they want to hear…well then, that person would unquestionably make a great president and will win in a walk if only he or she runs on that platform. I see lotsa folks whose political views mirror mine…but who I think are such clumsy orators, or who have so much baggage, that they could never win. Or they seem to lack the governing skills to turn those views into a working agenda.
If I believed in what Sarah Palin seems to believe in, she's just about the last public figure I'd want to throw my support behind. She makes those views seem kinda stupid and shallow. I'd be rallying for someone like Mike Huckabee. I personally don't buy his worldview or goals but he articulates them well and seems to know how to play the political game and get results. What he doesn't do, and this may be why more Conservatives aren't lining up behind him, is make Liberals froth. Palin does, and that seems to be the main thing that a lot of people like about her. But if that's all you want, you might as well nominate Michael Savage.