Immediately after Governor Palin's speech at SRLC, my good friend and fellow 2012 Draft Sarah Committee Organizer (Missouri), Kristi King, and I were stopped and interviewed by AFP.
Writer Allen Johnson first highlighted the governor's speech:
Sarah Palin, one of nine presidential hopefuls on the weekend straw ballot at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, brought cheering delegates to their feet as she advanced conservative policies for energy, nuclear weapons, and other issues for the congressional mid-term elections in November.
"The election is only seven months away," Palin said, then in a clear dig at Obama's signature theme, added: "Now, when they say - 'yes, we can', we stand up and say - 'oh, no you don't.'"
Palin advocated for stronger national security and economy by increasing domestic oil and gas production.
He also discussed Newt Gingrich's speech from the previous night:
Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House of Representatives and another candidate on the Republican straw poll for president, called Obama "the most radical president in American history."
In an address to the conference Thursday night, Gingrich accused Obama and his fellow Democrats of building a "secular, socialist machine" to expand government at the expense of taxpayers.
Gingrich also said Republicans who win congressional seats in November should refuse to fund the Obama administration's health care reforms. A Republican Party icon, Gingrich says he has not yet decided whether to run for president.
He introduced his interview with Kristi and me by piggy-backing off those two speeches:
Meanwhile, Palin's 27-minute address on Friday to Southern Republicans, seemed to energize her supporters at the conference, especially women.
"Newt Gingrich is a very smart man," Kristi King, 36, a retail manager at an optical company in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, said moments after Palin's address.
"But he's not Sarah," said her fellow delegate Adrienne Ross, 39, a 7th grade English teacher at Hudson, New York.
"She doesn't talk over people; her appeal is common sense conservatism," said Ross, one of the few African-American delegates at the conference. Part of Palin's appeal is her unequivocal support for Israel, said Ross, adding: "Our president is sort of flip-flopping on Israel right now - that makes me nervous."
Allen Johnson certainly captured my approval of Governor Palin's substantive, passionate, and energetic speech.
My one beef with the way he wrote up the article is the manner in which he quoted Kristi. It comes off like she was talking up Newt Gingrich and I was interrupting to state that Governor Palin was better. Actually, when asked about Gingrich, Kristi made it clear that his intelligence was to be respected, but that he did not have the appeal, energy, or support of Governor Palin. She made it clear that although Gingrich was definitely deserving of admiration, Governor Palin was the clear leader. The night before, in fact, during his speech, Kristi tweeted:
Is listening to Newt Gingrich...he's a smart man but he ain't no Sarah Palin!
Of course Kristi was right, and I agreed wholeheartedly with her. Governor Palin espouses common sense conservative principles and articulates them in such a way that has caused multitudes to stand up and take notice.
Read Johnson's full article here.
*** Check back to read more on SRLC and see pictures of Governor Palin and others.
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