‘Rogue' Palin Eyeing 2012 White House Campaign

Alaska governor and VP candidate is said to
blame McCain's handlers for her negative image

SIRI AGRELL / Globe and Mail  (Canada) 26oct2008

Amid reports that Sarah Palin has “gone rogue” — ignoring advisers and slamming her party's campaign tactics — some have begun to discuss her as a political contender after Nov. 4.

“She's no longer playing for 2008; she's playing 2012,” Democratic pollster Peter Hart told CNN yesterday.

Debate about the Alaska governor's future came over the weekend, as the largest newspaper in her home state, the Anchorage Daily News, endorsed Democratic candidate Barack Obama and not the Republican ticket of John McCain and Ms. Palin, despite the home connection.

“The election, after all is said and done, is not about Sarah Palin, and our sober view is that her running mate, Senator John McCain, is the wrong choice for president at this critical time for our nation,” the paper said. It added of Ms. Palin that “putting her one 72-year-old heartbeat from the leadership of the free world is just too risky at this time.”

But where Ms. Palin will be four years from now is another matter.

She has recently been painted as a liability for Mr. McCain, with a poll finding that 47 per cent of voters have a negative view of her, and a report revealing that $150,000 was spent outfitting her in a new designer wardrobe.

But others suggest Ms. Palin is now attempting to separate herself from Mr. McCain's doomed campaign to avoid being blamed for a Republican loss next Tuesday.

“These people are going to try and shred her after the campaign to divert blame from themselves,” a campaign insider told the website Politico on Saturday.

To counter that possibility, she is presenting herself to the public with an eye to her own long-term political career and a possible presidential bid in four years.

On The Chris Matthews Show yesterday, four pundits predicted Ms. Palin will run in 2012.

An unnamed source told CNN that “she is playing for her own future and sees herself as the next leader of the party.”

And on Saturday, Politico's Ben Smith wrote of an emerging “Palin insurgency,” quoting four unnamed Republican insiders who said Ms. Palin blames McCain handlers for her negative image and has “gone rogue.”

“Recently, she's gone from relying on McCain advisers who were assigned to her to relying on her own instincts,” one said.

Ms. Palin has increasingly been sticking to her own script in public events, even contradicting positions held by Mr. McCain.

She publicly disagreed with the campaign's decision to pull its resources out of Michigan, and defended her ongoing allusions to Mr. Obama's tenuous connection with former Weatherman member William Ayers, even after Mr. McCain said he does not care about “washed-up old terrorists.”

She has described the Republican Party's automated calls robocalls to voters as irritating and outdated, although the campaign has defended their use; and she has disagreed with the decision not to raise the issue of Mr. Obama's controversial pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Last Sunday, she continued to give an impromptu interview to a Colorado TV crew even as her staff tried repeatedly to cut it off.

source: 26oct2008