Sarah Palin, Allen West, And Jesse Kelly Bring The Awesome To America’s Nightly Scoreboard

By Gary P Jackson

David Asman is on of our favorite anchors at Fox Business News (and all of Fox for that matter) He is a superb analyst and interviewer. His show, America’s Nightly Scoreboard, is must see TV.

Wednesday night he had on Sarah Palin and the two talked about a wide range of topics, including the stunning victory in progress of Joe Miller’s over Lisa "Daddy’s Girl" Murkowski.

Also joining in are Lt Col Allen West, who Sarah endorsed this spring, and won big in Florida last night, as well as Arizona’s Jesse Kelly.

All three of these outstanding leaders shine here and show why we need them in D.C.

We like Asman’s style. He asks questions, then actually allows his guests to answer them. In this format, Sarah gets a chance to really elaborate on what she’s thinking. She also gives us an insight into her management style.

Video courtesy of PalinTV and The Right Scoop.

Former General Electric CEO Jack Welch: Alaska Elections Show Sarah Palin A Bigger Force Than Commentators Suggest

By Gary P Jackson

Tuesday night was wild to say the least. Your humble blogger is still trying to catch up. One quote that caught my eye, via Twitter is noteworthy though.

Jack Welch, the well respected former CEO of General Electric, took time away from talking baseball to weighed in on Sarah Palin and the phenomenal night she and Joe Miller had in Alaska:

Alaska elections show Palin a bigger force than commentators suggest...Tough being an incumbent so far

After wading through all of the media on Wednesday, suffice it to say that a whole lot of folks share Mr Welch’s opinion!

"Sarah Palin Kicked The Door Open, And A Lot Of Women Started Going Through"

There's an unsettling of the political apple cart. Sarah Palin kicked the door open, and a lot of women started going through.

~ Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List

An interesting piece from Yahoo News:

NEW YORK – The suffragists who 90 years ago won voting rights for women would likely shake their heads in wonder at this election, with its "mama grizzly" candidates and high-stakes woman-vs.-woman showdowns.

The women in key races include a rancher and three multimillionaire former CEOs, one a pro wrestling magnate. Two frontier states — Oklahoma and New Mexico — seem assured of electing their first female governor after both major parties nominated women.

Note: Susanna Martinez, the Republican nominee for New Mexico Governor is endorsed by Sarah Palin, as is Carly Fiorina, the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, the Republican Senate candidate in California, who is about to clean Barbara Boxer’s clock.

Yet in spite of celebrations planned Thursday for Women's Equality Day, marking the adoption of the 19th Amendment in 1920, American women's share of high-level political power still lags behind scores of other nations.

Women hold only 17 percent of the seats in Congress — well below Europe's 22 percent and far behind the Nordic countries' 42 percent — and the major parties have yet to nominate a woman for president. Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign for the Democratic nomination in 2008 collected 18 million votes but still fell short of victory.

"The handful of women that you see near the top is just that a handful," said Erin Vilardi of the White House Project, which seeks to expand women's role in politics.

"At the congressional level, both parties have a hell of a lot of work to do," Vilardi said. "The culture is still very dominantly male."

Among the notable developments in this year's campaign is the emergence of numerous charismatic, conservative women running as Republicans.

In California, wealthy businesswomen Meg Whitman, the ex-CEO of eBay, and Carly Fiorina, ex-CEO of Hewlett-Packard, are the GOP nominees for governor and Senate.

Fiorina is the first Republican woman to take on the Democratic incumbent, Barbara Boxer, since Boxer entered the Senate in 1992, and the race has captured national attention.

In South Dakota, the race for the state's lone House seat pits the incumbent Democrat, Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin, against Republican legislator Kristi Noem — both of them working moms who grew up on farms. Noem, who helps her husband run a ranch, is one of several GOP woman candidates dubbed "mama grizzlies" because of traits shared with Sarah Palin, the party's 2008 vice presidential nominee and a political star who's been doling out endorsements this year.

In Minnesota's 6th District, the conservative Republican incumbent, outspoken Tea Party favorite Michele Bachmann, is being challenged by Democratic State Sen. Tarryl Clark in what could be one of the nation's most expensive House races.

Michelle Bachmann will see an easy win here. She will be one of the leaders in the new Congress for sure. She also has Sarah’s support.

In New Mexico, Democrat Diane Denish, the lieutenant governor since 2003, is competing for governor against the GOP's Susana Martinez, a Latina district attorney who has drawn attention for her tough stance on illegal immigration.

In Oklahoma, Republican U.S. Rep. Mary Fallin, who's been endorsed by Palin, is favored in the governor's race over Democratic Lt. Gov. Jari Askins.

According to the Center for American Women in Politics at Rutgers University, there have been only two other woman-vs.-woman gubernatorial contests in U.S. history — in Nebraska in 1986 and Hawaii in 2002.

Florida could join New Mexico and Oklahoma is electing its first woman governor — if Democratic nominee Alex Sink can win in November.

One of the most distinctive female candidates is the GOP nominee for U.S. Senate in Connecticut, Linda McMahon, former CEO of the World Wrestling Entertainment empire that she and her husband developed. McMahon, who says she'll spend up to $50 million of her own money on the race, was nicknamed "Crotch-kicker" in a statement from the Democratic National Committee.

In Colorado, the issue of male chauvinism surfaced in the campaign for the GOP Senate nomination. Ken Buck — a prosecutor with a strong Tea Party following — prevailed despite criticism for saying he should be backed over rival Jane Norton "because I do not wear high heels."

Sarah had endorsed Norton. It’s obvious to see why she backed Norton over Buck, despite the Tea Party. Sadly, Buck will just be another "good old boy" establishment hack.

Worldwide, women hold 19 percent of the seats in national legislatures, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Its rankings of 186 nations — based on percentage of women in the single or lower chamber of the legislature — has the U.S. tied for 90th with Turkmenistan.

Women have held the top government post in dozens of countries — including Germany, Britain, Australia, Argentina, Israel, India and Turkey.

Several Women's Equality Day events are planned across the country Thursday.

In California, a great, great, great granddaughter of suffragist leader Elizabeth Cady Stanton will address a rally near the statehouse in Sacramento. In New York, the Susan B. Anthony List — it backs female candidates opposed to abortion — will host a forum on "pro-life feminism."

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, said the surge of women running as anti-abortion conservatives reflected a "war over who gets to define what feminism means."

"There's an unsettling of the political apple cart," Dannenfelser said. "Sarah Palin kicked the door open, and a lot of women started going through."

Elsewhere in New York, several women's rights leaders and liberal members of Congress will be speaking at a ceremony renaming a U.S. post office in Queens after Geraldine Ferraro, who in 1984 became the first woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket.

Read more here.

Sarah Palin has has been the driving force behind getting more women involved. Sarah has inspired women all over the country to stand up and be heard. Men too. While Sarah gets a lot of ink for her endorsement of strong Mama Grizzlies, she has endorsed some strong independent, Conservative men as well.

Clint Didier: Sarah Palin Is Working Her Tail Off For This Country

By Gary P Jackson

Let me tell you what, don’t you take anything away from Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin is working her tail off for this country. She’s been all over this country to different states. She’s going where she thinks she can do the most good, I just thank her for her efforts.

~ Clint Didier

From an interview with Clint Didier by Anna King in OPB News, via Palin TV:

The Senate candidate that had backing from the Tea Party, Clint Didier garnered about 12 percent of the vote on Tuesday’s primary election.

Didier relied heavily on his endorsement from Sarah Palin for his bid against Republican Dino Rossi.

Didier says although Palin didn’t come to Washington, her backing still helped his campaign.

Clint Didier: "Let me tell you what, don’t you take anything away from Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin is working her tail off for this country. She’s been all over this country to different states. She’s going where she thinks she can do the most good, I just thank her for her efforts."

He’s best known for his NFL football career. Late Tuesday night Didier said he hasn’t decided yet if he will run for elected office again.

Clint is a class act.

We also agree with Clint. Sarah Palin’s love of this great nation shows in how hard she is working to defeat the evil that has gripped this nation. She is the one leader who is working tirelessly to stop the Obama regime in it’s tracks and restore Freedom and Liberty.

Like George Washington before her, she may not win every battle, but you can bet she’ll lead us to the ultimate victory.

Sarah Palin's Approval Continues To Soar Above Other 2012 Contenders

By Gary P Jackson

The latest from Public Policy Polling (PPP) shows a tie between the top Republican contenders for the 2012 nomination. At this early stage, that sounds about right. We are two years away from the actual election, and 16-18 months from the primaries. These polls are mostly entertainment for us political junkies, and damned near meaningless in real life, however, we do see trends that do matter.

Past the horse race, these trends are quite telling. From the internals of the polling:

Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Sarah Palin?

Favorable….. 76%
Unfavorable .. 17%
Not sure …… 7%

Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Newt Gingrich?

Favorable…… 65%
Unfavorable…. 19%
Not sure …… 16%

Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Mike Huckabee?

Favorable…. .62%
Unfavorable . .14%
Not sure….. .25%

Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Mitt Romney?

Favorable…… 57%
Unfavorable … 21%
Not sure ….. 22%

Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Ron Paul?

Favorable…… 36%
Unfavorable … 25%
Not sure …… 40%

Now these are Republican voters, so this is important. Sarah has consistently had the highest approval among Republicans going back to the first polling on this. Always in the 70's. What has happened though, is her unfavorables have dropped significantly. And when you look at the "not sures", they have been reduced to almost nothing.

On the other hand, Mitt Romney, the establishment's show pony has taken a big hit. His favorables have dropped below 60 percent. He is 19 points behind Sarah. Romney's unfavorables have climbed to the highest among the group of serious contenders. (Ron Paul was included in the poll, presumably for comic relief.)

It looks like Romney's loss is Newt Gingrich's gain. Newt, like Sarah, has been out there and actually engaging in the public discourse, while Romney has been silent on the topics of the day. People today want real leaders, and Romney simply doesn't know how.

The interesting part in all of this is the fact that Newt, Huckabee, and especially Romney are all salivating at the thought of sitting in the Oval Office, while Sarah Palin has remained quite uncommitted, choosing instead to focus entirely on November 2010. In our mind, this is WHY Sarah has the highest favorability rating, and why she has always been perceived as a true leader.

She has her priorities right.

She's also right on the issues, which certainly doesn't hurt.

In contrast, latest polling show that Obama is continuing to crash and burn. At this point anyone with a pulse, and an R beside their name, will beat Obama in 2012.

Today's Gallup Daily Tracking Poll, which is based on a three day averaging of data, has Obama's approval at only 42 percent, with his disapproval at a whopping 51 percent. This is the lowest of his presidency.

Palin 76 Obama 42.

You tell me how this ends.

Sarah Palin: Hey Democrats, What's The Plan, Man?

By Gary P Jackson

One of the reasons we absolutely love Sarah Palin, and support her so strongly, is the fact she simply doesn't suffer fools well. She also doesn't take crap from anyone. Sarah is a street fighter who loves the sting of battle, and when she is on a mission, the last thing anyone with a lick of sense would want to do, is try and stop her from completing that mission.

Sarah has been hammering the Obama regime and his Congress over the upcoming $3.8 TRILLION tax increase, the largest in history. She was attacked by the far left, "Journolist approved" PolitiFact, an outfit known for carrying the water for Obama and the Marxist-progressives. They claimed she was "pants on fire lying." Sarah took PolitiFact to school, showing them what real fact checking looked like, as you can read here.

Obviously undetered by attacks from the left, Sarah took time from her commercial fishing gig to again ask Obama and his crew: "What’s the plan, man?"

Pants on Fire, Still

A $3.8 trillion tax increase is coming down the pike, folks. America’s tax cuts which can incentivize small businesses to expand and hire more people (thus fulfilling the mission to grow more private sector jobs), or even just to keep our doors open, will expire in four months. That expiration equates to an increase on your tax bill, starting at midnight, December 31.

I’ll keep calling out President Obama and the Democrats until they tell the American people what the plan is to save the incentives – to not allow the mom and pops’ tax cuts to expire. Granted, liberals (including stubborn “fact-checkers” who claim I’m lying about the soon-to-be tax cut expiration) are trying to clobber me for holding them accountable and prodding them toward revealing their intentions (because they’ve had 18 months to publicly propose a plan to stave off the $3.8 trillion tax increase that will soon slam us, but have revealed no plan). If they have a bill to extend the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, let’s see it. Time for them to put up or shut up.

But you don’t have to take my word for it. Take the word of the “fact-checkers” at PolitiFact, who, before moving the goal posts in their second dissembling “fact-check” on the Democrats’ tax hikes, wrote in their original “fact-check”:

There are no formal congressional proposals yet to keep the Bush tax cuts in place, so we don’t have precise estimates from official sources like the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Still, there’s a good bit of consensus on what the tax increases would look like, both if lower rates expired only for high earners and also for all incomes.

As Ed Morrissey noted:

And there’s a big problem with this argument, which is that “consensus” means nothing without passing a bill, and especially not without proposing one first. Thanks to Democrats in 2001 and 2003, those bills cutting the tax rates have hard-and-fast sunset provisions that create an expiration date absent of any other action.

We are now less than four months away from that expiration date after seven years of seeing it coming, after more than 3 years of Democratic control of Congress, and after eighteen months of the Obama administration. Democrats don’t even have a proposal on the table yet, and the legislative calendar is rapidly shrinking to take action before the expiration date hits. Without action, we will see a $3.8 trillion tax hike across the entire spectrum of earners.

So much for “consensus” without action. PolitiFact is curiously stating that in his 2011 budget, the President mentioned some “plan” to do something about not raising taxes on all Americans. Um, don’t know about you, but I don’t find this general, vague promise of some “plan” all that reassuring.

The Left also “plans” to do something about our out of control deficits and high unemployment, and the President “planned” for his nearly trillion dollar stimulus to keep unemployment under 8%. We’ve seen how successful that “plan” worked out.

The President’s budget “plan” hasn’t worked out so well either. As the economist Bruce Bartlett explained at the time, the President’s budget – including the tax promise – was never much more than a vague statement of intent. Practically speaking, it was dead on arrival. Even Bartlett couldn’t have known how dead, though, because in the end Congress didn’t even succeed in passing a budget, let alone in taking a decision on the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts.

Bottom line: until we see a formal proposal – an actual bill before Congress – then get ready for that $3.8 trillion hit.

(By the way, the Left sure gets wee-wee’d up when they’re called on something like this, eh? And here I am, thousands of miles away from DC out on a commercial fishing boat, working my butt off for my own business, merely asking the Democrat politicos and their liberal friends in the media: “What’s the plan, man?”, and they seem to feel threatened by my question. So, I’ll go back to setting my hooks and watching the halibut take the bait, and when I come back into the boat’s cabin in a few hours, I’ll log back on here to read their reply. I’ll have succeeded if they’re forced to finally reveal to Americans how they plan to increase taxes, and what they intend to do with our money. In the meantime, I’m catching fish.)

- Sarah Palin, in Homer, Alaska

As Sarah points out, while these idiot "fact checkers" as talking noise and claiming she is wrong, their position is unsustainable, because there is NO PLAN. Nothing is written down, and most certainly nothing is waiting in Congress for passage.

Much like Obama did regularly as a Senator in both the Illinois Senate, as well as the U.S. Senate, Congress voted "present" when it came time to pass a budget, thus there is no mechanism to stop this $3.8 TRILLION monster tax increase coming your way. Nothing to stop it at all. The Obama regime was hoping you wouldn't notice.

Just like the so-called "fact checkers", Obama and his party are just making it up as they go!

The radical left wants you to just trust them. They say it will all be OK. We all kinda know what happens to those who trust the Marxist-democrats, don't we! These are people who will lie to you when the truth would work better!

On a side note, one wonders where all of the GOP show ponies are. You know, those "profiles in courage" like Mitt Romney. They've all been quite conspicuous by their absence on this, and many other serious issues.

All I can tell you for sure is Victory in November is essential if our Republic is to survive. This is no time to sit around and fret. This is a time to stand up and be counted. Time to get off the couch and into the game!

Sarah Palin is the one who is standing up for us, so in turn, I am standing with Sarah Palin and asking Obama and his Congress: What's the plan, man?

Sarah Palin To Obama: Happy Birthday You Predictable, Tiring, Ineffective Hypocrite!

By Gary P Jackson

Sarah Palin sent Barack Obama a nice little birthday present today:

Obama’s Predictable, Tiring, Ineffective Lecture; Would Someone Call Him on the Hypocrisy, Please?

Congress’ approval rating is at 11% because politicians thwart the will of the people, explode our national debt, and practice reckless deficit spending while hoping we’ll sit down and shut up about their nonsensical agenda. President Obama just made the AFL-CIO suffer through another “Blame Bush” lecture today as he, as usual, put the car in reverse and looked backward to find someone else to blame for problems he helped cause and now aggressively perpetuates.

Okay, Mr. President, you tell us we have to keep looking backward (as we’re steered toward the cliff), so let’s go:

Barack Obama was part of the problem while in Congress. Senator Obama pushed the fiscally irresponsible measures that Democrats, who held the majority, advanced while holding the government’s purse strings. And now, as President, he’s not just one of the pack anymore as a mere contributor to the problem – he now leads the problem. We are sick and tired of President Obama pointing his finger and screeching through his blame game about what he “inherited.”

Up until 18 months ago he was fully engaged in that Congressional herd mentality of the Left as he just went with the flow, adding to the debt and deficit, instead of bucking his party’s leadership to stop the recklessness. (Did you ever hear him as an independent voice standing up and speaking out against his Democrat party’s overspending and over reach?

Come to think of it, did you ever hear of his congressional record at all? For the life of me I can’t think of any time he used his bully pulpit as a sitting U.S. Senator to lead free market, equality-respecting pro-private sector efforts, nor to change up actions he now conveniently condemns. He could have refudiated them all.)

His lecture today must have been tough for our good union brothers and sisters to sit through, though it may have resonated with some union bosses who desire their members to adopt a herd mentality, too, so as to not dare speak up against what Washington is doing to us.

Surely the good, hard working Americans who happen to be union members know, too, that Obama’s blame game is getting old. It’s obviously ineffective, it’s the antithesis of good leadership, and it reeks of hypocrisy. A complicit media won’t call President Obama out on this, so let’s do it ourselves, friends. It helps put his criticisms and fiscal problems in context.

In contrast to President Obama’s lack of leadership in getting our country on a responsible fiscal path, there are some who have a positive agenda, including Rep. Paul Ryan who has shared ideas that deserve a fair hearing. He knows why we need to rein in the government’s reckless spending and how it can be done.

Please read this excerpt of an article by Rep. Ryan and be thankful there are some who remember why they were hired to serve us in Congress – it sure wasn’t to merely vote “present” as the powers-that-be jam the car in reverse while hoping we won’t remember who dug the ditch we’re headed toward.

Reducing deficits should begin with a budget plan to cut spending, yet incredibly Congress abandoned its legal obligation to write a budget this year, which means the leadership has abandoned even the pretense of limiting government’s insatiable spending appetite. I hope the Debt Commission, of which I am a member, will identify potential major spending reductions when we publish our report in December. But waiting for somebody else to suggest cuts was no excuse for Congress to dismiss its mandate to write America’s budget.

There’s no shortage of ideas for cuts we could make immediately. Last year I identified $4.8 trillion we could cut. Right now we could easily reduce spending by $1.3 trillion by: rescinding $266 billion in unused stimulus funds and another $16 billion in leftover TARP money; saving $925 billion by cutting and capping discretionary spending at 2008 levels; imposing a hiring and pay freeze on government employees, saving $65 billion; and reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the proximate originators of the home mortgage meltdown, to save $30 billion. I would also give the President line-item veto authority to realize further savings.

The American people and both parties see the need to get federal spending under control. Any time congressional leaders want, we can start by cutting unnecessary expenditures. Let’s not punish business and workers by raising their taxes at a time when the economy is struggling to return to a growth path—that would only make a desperate situation worse.

Rep. Ryan is right about not raising taxes.

Lest we forget, the Obama-Pelosi-Reid Democrats have a special New Years gift in store for American taxpayers. On January 1, 2011, they are going to hit us with the largest tax increase in U.S. history. By allowing the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire on New Years Eve, the Democrats are going to impose a $3.8 trillion tax increase on Americans over the next decade.

Instead of admitting that this massive tax hike is just an attempt to get hardworking taxpayers to continue to fund their reckless spending, the Democrats are selling it is as a tax on “the rich” to increase revenues to pay down the debt. However, history shows that raising the top tax rate doesn’t lead to increased revenues. It’s what Arthur Laffer describes as a tax the rich Catch-22: the highest earners, who are expected to bear most of the tax burden, generally also have the best tax advisers to help them get around it.

Regardless of what the Democrats want you to believe, this is a tax increase on every American who pays taxes. Families will suffer because the Democrats’ tax hike will reinstate the marriage penalty, cut the child tax credit in half, abolish various personal exemptions, and impose limits on itemized deductions like home mortgage interest and charitable contributions. Investors and savers would suffer through increases in the top rates in long-term capital gains and qualified dividends. And the Alternative Minimum Tax would end up hitting 15 million taxpayers – up from 4 million in 2009.

We’ll all be feeling the pinch, but the ones who will be hit hardest by this massive tax hike will be America’s small business owners – the businesses that create up to 70% of all jobs in this country. According to a recent report by the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, small business owners will pay over half the taxes raised when the Democrats increase the top two tax brackets. In an already anemic jobless recovery, the last thing government should do is to impose even higher tax burdens on job creators. Instead of hurting “the rich,” such measures would end up hurting the unemployed.

To burden American families and small businesses with the largest tax hike in history while the economy is teetering on the brink of a potential double-dip recession is madness. It’s another reason why we must elect commonsense fiscal conservatives in the upcoming midterm elections this November. We simply cannot afford the Obama-Pelosi-Reid Democrats. We need people in Congress who know that the best way to get our economy moving again is to cut taxes, not raise them by unprecedented amounts.

You might have noticed that the Democrats have been throwing around the phrase “common sense” more often these days, but actions speak louder than words. We need real leadership in Washington across the board. We need common sense solutions, not finger-pointing, buck-passing, and lecturing.

- Sarah Palin

It's amazing that Obama is still on the "blame Bush" and "blame the evil Republicans" for everything program, especially since the Marxist-democrats have been in control of Congress for almost four years. This strategy is not working among the voters though.

America is in dire need of leadership, and Obama, as Sarah has pointed out, doesn't have cojones to look out for all Americans. Seemingly all Obama knows how to do is party, play golf, and campaign. That's what a "community organizer" is: a rabble rouser, a campaigner. They are used to raising hell for whatever cause they are shilling for. Organizers like Obama are good at ginning up the rent-a-mobs, and making up catchy chants, as they attack good and decent people all in the name of "social justice", but like a dog that finally catches the car, once in charge, they are totatally clueless about what to do with it. Just worthless.

This is why November is so important. We must have strong, experienced leadership elected to Congress, to put a check on Dear Leader and his crew. We need the steady leadership of sober, responsible adults.

In honor of Obama's birthday, and Sarah's gift, here's a nice little palette cleanser.

Sarah Palin Hammers Obama: Has Time To Go On The View, But No Time To Secure Our Border

By Gary P Jackson

Sarah Palin didn't mince words with Dear Leader Obama over his visit to see the yentas on The View while Rome burns. Arizona Governor Jan Brewer has also asked Obama to come to the border on numerous occasions, a plea she repeated last night. So far, she's been turned down.

Obama is seemingly too busy feeding his oversized ego, vacationing, and playing golf to care about the needs of the American people. I mean really, why should Dear Leader care about mere peasants? He's got his. Got it made livin' the Thug Life!

Let 'em eat cake, right!

I'm thinking Sarah Palin is the one who will force Obama's hand on this deal. Mama Grizzly ain't happy, and when Mama ain't happy ....

Meanwhile, Scott Rasmussen reports:

Support for Mexican Border Fence Up to 68%

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Support for the building of a fence along the Mexican border has reached a new high, and voters are more confident than ever that illegal immigration can be stopped.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 68% of U.S. voters now believe the United States should continue to build a fence on the Mexican border. That’s up nine points from March when the Obama administration halted funding for the fence and the highest level of support ever.

Just 21% oppose the continued building of the border fence.

Support for the fence is strong across all demographic groups. But while 76% of Mainstream voters think the United States should continue to build the fence, 67% of the Political Class are opposed to it.

Forty-seven percent (47%) of all voters believe it is possible to end illegal immigration. That’s up slightly from April of last year.

Now only 36% do not think it is possible for the United States to prevent illegal immigrants from getting into the country. That’s down sixteen points since October 2008.

Read more here.

Dick Morris: Sarah Palin Is Still The Clear Front Runner For 2012

Dick Morris offers that Sarah Palin is the clear front runner for the 2012 Republican nomination, and always has been. Morris, who was Bill Clinton's political guru, is a best selling author, political commentator, as well as a consultant to leaders world wide.

From the Newsmax interview:

By: David A. Patten

Fox News commentator and best-selling author Dick Morris says former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is the clear front-runner for the Republican nomination for president.

Morris says that, despite his respect for the political and intellectual talents of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who expressed keen interest Monday in running for the nomination, Palin remains the favorite.

"Oh, I think she always had front-runner status," Morris tells Newsmax.TV in an exclusive interview. "The person who is the vice-presidential nominee last time almost automatically has front-runner status if they did a good job, which she did. And I think that she was a fabulous candidate for vice president."

The problem Palin will face, Morris says, is that the media treated her so badly "with sexist and biased coverage" that it "built up this huge pile of negatives against her."

Adds Morris: "I'm just worried that that might be too heavy a burden to carry in the 2012 election against Obama. But I think she's fabulous. I think she's wonderful."

Morris also notes that candidates Palin has endorsed have a very good track record of winning their races.

"The reason the people she endorses win is not only that her endorsement is significant, but she has good taste," Morris tells Newsmax.

Obviously we agree with Morris that Sarah is the front runner, and has been since, oh .... around November 4, 2008. You knew Sarah had struck a cord with the American people when you saw groups like Our Country Deserves Better running national television advertisements like this one, and the one below, at Thanksgiving, just a few weeks after the election, simply thanking her for being her. America knew Sarah Palin was someone very special.



Since then Sarah has only raised her profile, and had more sucess. Besides going nationwide supporting Common Sense Conservative candidates, patriots who are solid winners, Sarah has been the one strong, clear, consistent voice speaking up for Liberty and Freedom. Sarah has been leading the fight to stop the Obama regime and the tyranny and oppression that comes with it.

Throw in a best selling book, over 2.5 million sold and counting, with a new one on the way, a sold out speaking tour, and a high profile gig that finds her talents as a political analyst in big demand at both Fox News, and the Fox Business Channel, and it's easy to understand why Sarah Palin has become such a powerhouse in the political arena.

I do take issue with Dick a little though. The idea that somehow the corrupt "lamestream media" has damaged Sarah Palin's reputation one bit is just wrong. Remember, this is the same corrupt media that fawned over Obama, called him the "Lightworker" and other such nonsense. They built him up as a "Messiah" and "The One." Half the country already knew you couldn't believe anything the media told you, or at best you needed independent verification of everything said. Now the other half is waking up to that fact, as well.

Americans realize the same people that lied to them about Obama, also lied to them about Sarah Palin. They no longer trust the dinosaur media when they spew their nonsense. Couple that with the new media, and the ability to find the truth at the touch of a button, and everything one once thought about how this thing called politics worked is out the window.

Past that, Sarah is incredibly media savvy in her own right. No one uses the new media, and social networking, as effectively. One strong Facebook post, or even a pithy tweet, can start a firestorm of activity. She's like the E.F. Hutton of politics. When she speaks, everyone listens. No one else commands that sort of attention.

It's really this simple. Every single bit of "news" the left wing media has put out there about Sarah Palin has proven to be a lie. I mean all of it. None of it was based on anything substantional. It never is.  It was all petty nonsense. The left can't compete in the marketplace of ideas, so it's all about the smears. In Sarah's case, this all has backfired magnificently.

The results from the two year (and counting) smear-fest aimed at Sarah have actually been positive, for her. For one thing it turns out Sarah Palin is one of the most vetted human beings in history, and will certainly be the most vetted presidential candidate ever.

After sending platoons of "journalists" to Alaska to dig up dirt, and all of the other nonsense, it turns out that Sarah is just a normal person, and has nothing to hide. No scandals, nothing. What all of this craziness ended up doing was prompt people to do a little reserch on their own about Sarah. Unfortunately, for the left, people discovered a solid public servant with a record of great success and accomplishment, instead of who ever it was the corrupt media was talking about.

The second result of the left's intense panic, is a real case study in the law of unintended consequences. They hoped all of the nasty attacks would scare her off. The vile sexist, racist stuff, most too nasty to print, only did one thing. All of this proved that Sarah Palin can stand up to anything and everything the Marxist left has, and not only survive, but flourish, and fight back. This is a quality absolutely none of the other GOP hopefuls possess. It's something few people anywhere possess.

Sarah Palin is a person of such strong character, who has such deep faith, that she cannot be intimidated by these people. That's a quality that Americans love and respect about her. No one can picture any of the other potential Republican candidates withstanding a tenth of what Sarah has, let alone have a career after the fact.

As we are already seeing, with all of the hateful rhetoric coming from the left, 2012 will be the nastiest election any of us have every witnessed. We need someone who isn't phased by it. Someone who looks evil right in the eye, smiles, and says "bring it!" Sarah Palin is the only one who fits that description.

Morris mentions Newt Gingrich by name.

Newt has recently been talking 2012. Personally, I think he's just getting a buzz going for his new book, but who knows. Gingrich has a LOT of baggage, both personal and professional. I'll let someone else go into the personal. The professional is big stuff.

The two things that make him a non-starter with Conservatives, the base of the party, are his embrace of Al Gore, and DeDe Scozzafava. When Newt teamed up with Nancy Pelosi to shill for Al Gore's global warming scam, and sat canoodling with her on a bench for a TV commercial pushing it all, that ruined his street cred with Conservatives. However, the real kicker, the last straw, was his stuborn backing of DeDe Scozzafava over Doug Hoffman in the New York special election.

Even after Sarah Palin, and every Conservative worth mentioning, endorsed Hoffman, Newt clung on to Scozzafava. When it was pointed out that Scozzafava, a "Margret Sanger Award" winner, was to the left of the Marxist-democrat in the race, Newt started badmouthing Conservatives, and claimed she was "conservative enough." Newt went through some serious verbal gymnastics trying to justify his pick. In the end, Scozzafava dropped out while Hoffman surged. To pay back Newt and the rest of the GOP establishment elite for their loyalty, she promptly endorsed the Marxist-democrat, who won in a squeaker.

Newt ain't happenin'.

Same can be said for Mitt Romney. Oh, he'll run, but between his less than stellar record as Governor of the Bay State and his lifelong record of flip-flopping on every single issue, depending on who he needed to be to what group, it seems like the supreme exercise in futility. Oh, and do we even need to mention RomneyCare?

No one, but Sarah Palin knows what her plans are for 2012. Right now she is focused on November, like we all must be. She knows if we don't take back Congress, and stop Obama, there won't be anything left to be President of. It's our gut feeling though that once she helps place some strong leaders in Congress, and takes a short breather to promote her new book, she will indeed announce her run, most likely on Ronald Reagan's 100th birthday. This will be the time to celebrate.

Obama and the rest of the Marxist-progressive movement will never know what hit them.

Whittington: Sarah Palin Has Offered One Of The Most Sophisticated Analysis Of Obama's Defense & Foreign Policy Ever Published

One gets the feeling that American national security would be in far better hands if they belonged to the hockey mom from Wasilla than they are now in the hands of the Harvard Law graduate.

~ Mark Whittington

I know lot of people think Sarah Palin would be our "Energy President," which is almost a given, and/or our "Fiscally Adept President" which again, is kind of given. The thing people forget is Sarah Palin would also be our National Security President.

While everyone, even her harshest critics, will tell you Sarah is the go to person on energy issues, and her record of fiscal responsibility in government is above reproach, many still fail to realize that Sarah Palin has a keen intellectual understanding of foreign policy, and national security.

I blame whoever was in charge of introducing her to the nation on the McCain team. I’ve followed Sarah Palin since her earliest days as Governor, and even I was going what the ....?

With that said, Sarah has a solid understanding of foreign policy, and most certainly understands the urgency of national security. One of the very first speeches Sarah gave, after leaving office, was in Hong Kong, where she spoke extensively about foreign policy and national security. You’ll never hear her speak about energy policy, without tying it to foreign policy and national security. She understands how all of these complex issues intertwine better than most.

Sarah speaks a lot about her son Track, who is in the Army, and has served in Iraq, but there is more to it than that. Sarah was the Commander-In-Chief of the Alaska National Guard, a very active Guard, and one that is permanently deployed.

Her job was not just ceremonial. Sarah Palin was an active C-I-C.

She was also Commander-In-Chief of the Alaska Defense Force, and went to battle with the Obama regime when Obama unilaterally decided to cut off the pensions of the remaining ADF veterans of WW II, who fought the Japanese on Alaskan soil, not long after taking office. 

Sarah took swift and decisive action over Obama’s slap to the face of these American heroes, signing legislation to make sure these brave men still got paid, and worked with the Alaska delegation to Congress to eventually overturn Obama’s slight.

All of this points to a solid, dependable Commander-In-Chief, as does the rest of her record, but the event that has really started gaining steam was her recent speech in Norfolk, Virginia where she absolutely ripped Obama to shreds over his foreign policy and national security stances.

You can read our take here.

In this speech she laid out a bold and aggressive agenda of her own.

Sarah also released a transcript of the highlights of her speech on her Facebook blog. It’s that detailed Facebook entry that has everyone sitting up and taking notice.. It’s a powerful indictment of the Obama regime, but also serves to remind people (and wake some up to the fact) that Sarah Palin has a keen strategic mind, and not just for politics, but for policy.

Sarah is not a boring policy wonk. She is not one of those folks that walk around sounding like an encyclopedia, and thank God for that! Sarah’s skill lies in being able to take all of the pertinent information, lay it out, and see the big picture. She is able to see cause and effect. There are precious few people in our world who are really capable of this.

Anyhow, we’ve known this all along. The big story here is all of the chattering class, the pundits, are starting to realize this as well, and her Facebook blog is receiving rave reviews.

One such pundit is Mark Whittington:

Sarah Palin usually uses her Facebook page to offer brief, pithy comments on issues of the day, or to respond to the latest attacks. But, Palin has now offered one of the most sophisticated analyses of Obama's defense and foreign policy ever published.

The post, based upon a recent speech in Virginia, covers a variety of points about what passes for Obama's defense and foreign policy.

On defense spending and the budget deficit, Palin suggests that Obama is practicing fiscal discipline on defense alone, and is being profligate everywhere else: "This administration may be willing to cut defense spending, but it's increasing it everywhere else. I think we should do it the other way round: cut spending in other departments - apart from defense. We should not be cutting corners on our national security."

Sarah Palin zeroes in on the Navy as especially important to American national security: "Our Navy has global responsibilities. It patrols sea lanes and safeguards the freedoms of our allies - and ourselves. The Navy right now only has 286 ships, and that number may decrease. That will limit our options, extend tours for Navy personnel, lessen our ability to secure our allies and deter our adversaries. The Obama administration seems strangely unconcerned about this prospect."

Palin also attacks the Obama administration for its somewhat weaselly language concerning the War On Terror, refusing to use the term "Islamic" to describe terrorists. She strikes at the proposal to close Guantanamo, imposing an end date on the Afghan Campaign, and the plan to try terrorists like Khalid Sheik Mohammed in civilian courts.

But, the most damning part of Sarah Palin's polemic against Obama defense and foreign policy is the President's tendency to coddle enemies and spurn allies, which she quotes a Czech official as being "enemy centric."

On coddling enemies, "Meanwhile, the Obama Administration reaches out to some of the world's worst regimes. They shake hands with dictators like Hugo Chavez, send letters to the Iranian mullahs and envoys to North Korea, ease sanctions on Cuba and talk about doing the same with Burma. That's when they're not on one of their worldwide apology tour."

And, on the Obama tendency to slam allies: "They escalated a minor zoning issue in Jerusalem into a major dispute with our most important ally in the Middle East, Israel. They treated the Israeli Prime Minister shabbily in Washington. When a Turkish sponsored flotilla threatened to violate a legal Israeli blockade of Hamas-run Gaza, the Obama Administration was silent. When Israeli commandos were assaulted as they sought to prevent unmonitored cargoes from being delivered to Hamas terrorists, the Obama Administration sent signals it might allow a UN investigation into the matter - an investigation that would be sure to condemn our ally Israel and bemoan the plight of Hamas. Loyal NATO allies in central Europe were undermined by the cancellation of a missile defense program with virtually no warning."

Why is President Obama making these mistakes? Sarah Palin has an explanation:

"When asked whether he believed in American exceptionalism, President Obama answered, 'I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.' Amazing. Amazing."

"I think this statement speaks volumes about his world view. He sees nothing unique in the American experience? Really? Our founding, and our founding mothers and fathers? Really? And our history over the past two and half centuries?"

This has caused President Obama to be reluctant to embrace America's role as the dominant super power in the world, to perhaps even think that America as a great power is something pernicious.

One thing that Palin's analysis of Obama defense and foreign policy should lay to rest forever is the notion of Sarah Palin as brainless bimbo, the caricature first performed by Saturday Night Live's Tina Fey and used by political comedians like John Stewart and Bill Maher. The analysis shows a depth of understanding of the problems with the Obama administration's foreign and defense policies that far exceed most people's understanding.

And, yet, it is Obama who is considered the smart one. One gets the feeling that American national security would be in far better hands if they belonged to the hockey mom from Wasilla than they are now in the hands of the Harvard Law graduate.

We most certainly agree. It’s interesting to note that the other so-called leaders, in the GOP 2012 presidential derby, are all quite conspicuous by their absence on these issues. No one is holding Obama’s feet to the fire but Sarah Palin.

In case you missed her speech:







Obviously Sarah has her own style of delivery, and her own vocabulary, but when I see her give speeches like this .... I am reminded of another great leader: Ronald Reagan.

Like Reagan, Sarah is able to see the big picture, see threats to Liberty and Freedom, take these complex issues and then distill them all down to a simple, but effective and coherent vision of a workable plan.

America needs leadership. Solid, dependable, intelligent leadership. For this, we must look to the North Star. It will be the daughter of our 49th state, the moose hunter, hockey mom, and former Governor of the last frontier, who will lead this nation back to it greatness. It will be Sarah Palin who will make sure that America is always that shining city on a hill.

Sarah Palin: This Will Be The Year Women Get Things Done For Our Country

Mama Grizzlies


Support SarahPAC www.sarahpac.com

Republican "Good Old Boys": Hey, Let’s Make Sarah Palin RNC Chairman!

By Gary P Jackson

You really have to laugh at these Republican establishment types. These "good old boy" characters couldn’t be more pathetic if they tried.

As you know, Michael Steele has once again opened mouth and inserted foot. Full disclosure, I like Michael Steele. I don’t have bad feelings for the guy. But he’s proven that being the Chairman of the RNC isn’t the best use of his talents. This latest flap is way overblown, however. He’s said worse.

Anyhow, this isn’t about bashing Michael Steele. Nope, this is all about exposing the pathetic milquetoast moderates and their silly notions.


With all of the calls for Steele to step down, the establishment seems to think they have an idea: Replace Steele with Sarah Palin. No, I’m serious here. Kevin D. Williams writing for National Review Online came up with this:

Re: Steele and the RNC: Allow me to chime in with my usual observation on this subject: This is a job for Sarah Palin. Palin would be a much better RNC chairman than presidential candidate or freelance kingmaker. She'd raise tons of money and help recruit good candidates, i.e., she'd excel at doing the things Steele should have been doing instead of appointing himself Republican pundit-at-large.

A Chairman Palin would help set the right tone for the Republican party without having to get herself entangled in the minutiae of policy-development, which has not been her forte. Sure, she'd be polarizing, but so is Barack Obama, and these are polarized times. And it's one thing to have a polarizing party chairman, another to have a polarizing candidate.

Anybody disagree?

Kevin, I think if you take time to look around, you'll see that pretty much EVERYONE disagrees with you pal. And not just with your idea of making Sarah Palin RNC chair, but your entire condescending, factually incorrect, backhanded complement filled drivel.

To take the anniversary of day that Sarah Palin literally changed history forever to insult our intelligence, and Sarah Palin, is simply breathtaking.

First of all, could you BE more obvious with your intentions here?

We all know what this little "suggestion" is all about. You beltway, establishment Republicans are looking for any way possible to get Sarah Palin out of the running for 2012, so as to pave the way for one of your show ponies, who have zero chance if (when) Sarah runs for President. Gotta keep the Big Government Republicans in power, even if it means running a show pony who can’t win against Obama.

All of you cats know exactly what Sarah Palin is capable of. You know good and well what she did to the corrupt establishment Republicans in Alaska, and you know what she would do once she was in the White House. Business as usual would come to a loud, grinding halt.

Now you are right about one thing, Sarah Palin can raise money like no one out there. That will come in handy for her in 2012, now won’t it? And you can bet there wouldn’t be any of your establishment type buddies out there on her watch, if she was RNC chair. She’s not perfect, but she’s got a rock solid record of picking winners, good solid Common Sense Conservatives, who actually believe in the Constitution and the Rule of Law. An unknown concept in D.C.

The thing is, neither she, nor the candidates she chooses to endorse, need the RNC as bad as the RNC needs them. The RNC has become so undependable, so establishment driven, and so timid, they are becoming an afterthought. Conservatives, the people that make up the bulk of the Republican base, now research candidates on their own, and send them money directly. Far less likely to see their money wasted on loser show ponies, or after hours parties.

Now you say that:

A Chairman Palin would help set the right tone for the Republican party without having to get herself entangled in the minutiae of policy-development, which has not been her forte

Could you make a bigger clown out of yourself?

I guess you’ve been too busy dreaming of mediocrity to go over to Facebook, Twitter, or check out her appearances on Fox News and Fox Business News, or listen to her speeches, most of which are readily available online at either Palin TV or The Right Scoop.

Maybe you should start with her latest red meat offering from her appearance in Norfolk, Virginia. This was a serious policy speech on national security and foreign policy. In it, Sarah lays out an aggressive agenda for not only national security and foreign policy, but Liberty, Freedom, and the American way. It’s not her first.







You can read the transcript and commentary here.

Next you embarrass yourself further:

Sure, she'd be polarizing, but so is Barack Obama, and these are polarized times. And it's one thing to have a polarizing party chairman, another to have a polarizing candidate.

You know who else was polarizing? Ronald Wilson Reagan.

Reagan was incredibly polarizing, especially to the country club, Rockefeller, establishment wing of the party. In fact, it’s quite telling that you guys are now using the same tired old play book you used on Reagan, to no avail, on Sarah Palin.

"Oh we like Reagan, but he’s kinda dumb, an ‘amiable dunce.’ He didn’t go to the right schools, you know."  ~ Country Club Republicans circa 1976-1988

It’s awfully big of you to note that Barack Obama is polarizing as well. This gives us a chance to point out that there are two kinds of polarizing. Barack Obama is the negative kind. He polarizes people against him and his Marxist agenda. In less than two short years, he’s managed to turn most of the Republic against him and his out of control Congress.

Barack Obama has polarized the nation in a way few could. He has Americans picking up the history books, and reading the Constitution again. He has people engaged in the political process like no time in recent history. The Republic is polarized against him, and working to defeat him and his radical agenda.

Ronald Reagan and Sarah Palin are cut from the same cloth. For the lack of a better term, they are "Field of Dreams" kind of leaders. They know if you stand for something, believe in something, and are a person of good character and virtue, people will beat a path to your door.


Like Reagan before her, Sarah knows you don’t moderate your message, or "move to the middle" in search of mythical "moderates" that don’t really exist. Instead, you build a solid agenda based on time honored principles. You build it, and the people will come.

When Ronald Reagan ran for President in 1980, he ran as an unabashed Conservative. He had strong positions on everything, and was thought of as incredibly polarizing. The thing is, people aren’t looking for someone who will tell them what they want to hear. They want a leader. They want someone that not only matches their values, but someone who will take a stand for those values, and never, ever backdown.

This really isn't polarizing, in the end, it's galvanizing. 

This is something you squishy country clubbers aren’t capable of grasping.

Reagan won back to back landslide victories running as an unabashed Conservative, with a proven record. He was able to galvanize the people, and turn the nation around by sticking to these principles,and leading with conviction.

Currently Sarah Palin is leading as an unapologetic Conservative. She’s a real fighter who never backs down, never gives any quarter. Never compromises on her principles just to curry favor from some here today, gone tomorrow faction.She too is galvanizing the nation, in her effort to save it.

Sarah Palin, like Regan,  has a proven record of not just talking the talk, but walking the walk. Her record is unmatched by anyone currently on the scene.

At the end of the day, after reading your incredibly insulting piece, I have to ask you this. You seem to think Sarah Palin isn’t smart enough to develop national policy, though for some reason you think she could develop a political strategy to win elections and raise money. (This is where you gave away your real intent BTW)

If Sarah is so bad, why haven’t you called for ... oh, I don’t know .... Mitt Romney ....  to come in and save the RNC?

I mean he’s supposed to be the big businessman, isn't he? He actually did turn around the Salt Lake City Olympics, saving them from disaster.

Why NOT Mitt Romney?.

As Romney is currently disengaged from the fight against tyranny and oppression, and unlike Sarah Palin, who is LEADING the battle, finds himself totally unencumbered by the responsibilities of saving our Republic, you’d think the guy would be the perfect choice.

Oh, I know he wasn’t all that impressive as Governor, and his endorsements aren’t worth much, especially when he waits until after they win their primary, and well, maybe we shouldn’t mention RomneyCare at all, but hey, the guy can raise money!

Much better to pick someone like Romney, and make him a clerk, than take the Commander-in-Chief off the battlefield and give Her the job, eh?

You know what? I have a much better idea. How about we just call up Ken Blackwell and ask him to take over? He’s the one who should have had the job all along.


**Check out Stacy Drake’s take on all of this nonsense here.

Happy Anniversary Sarah Palin: Celebrating The Day That Changed History

By Gary P Jackson

There are some events that you will always remember where you were when they happened. The events of July 3, 2009 is one of those times. It was an average Friday, the day before our nation’s 233rd birthday. It would have been a slow news day, normally, and on this weekend, the 24 hour news channels had coverage of Michael Jackson’s death playing on an endless loop.

What would happen that Friday afternoon would knock Michael Jackson right off the TV and send the political world reeling.

We got word "something" was about to happen in Alaska. Now as a long time supporter of Sarah Palin’s, and someone who had been following her as well as writing about her for some time, I was very well versed in the continual harassment she had been the target of since she became the Republican candidate for Vice President.

We’ve written exhaustively, documenting the unprecedented attacks on the Governor by hand picked thugs who work under the direction of one of Barack Obama’s top White House advisers, Pete Rouse. You can read our latest summary here.

Rouse, who has strong ties to Alaska, as well as elements of the Alaska Marxist-democrat party, was the point man for all of the disgusting attacks on Sarah Palin and her Family.

While serving as Obama’s Senate Chief-of-Staff, and later as the top campaign adviser, Rouse started recruiting his closest friends, like Alaska Senator Kim Elton who headed the totally discredited "Troopergate" witch hunt, and was later paid off with a make-work job at the Department of Interior, by Obama, for a "job well done." The first of what we now know were many attempts to pay people off with government jobs for performing various favors for the White House and the Obama regime.

We also know that Rouse, through Marxist operatives like Phil Munger, recruited a network of hate bloggers, thugs, and malcontents, who were charged with doing whatever they could to make Sarah Palin and her family’s life a living hell.

One of the things this bunch of thugs, who were given complete access to national news outlets to spew their hatred and lies, would go on to do was recruit people to continually file bogus "ethics" complaints against Sarah, in an attempt to harass, personally bankrupt her(Alaska doesn’t protect the state’s CEO from this kind of BS like most other states do) and create the narrative that Sarah Palin, one of the biggest corruption busting politicians in the nation was, herself, corrupt.

I first learned of Sarah Palin not long after she became Governor of the Great State of Alaska. It was just the odd story here or there, the sort of stuff only a serious news and political junkie would have noticed.

Articles like this one from Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard, in which he pointed out she was the most popular Governor in America caught my eye.

Her rise is a great (and rare) story of how adherence to principle--especially to transparency and accountability in government--can produce political success. And by the way, Palin is a conservative who only last month vetoed 13 percent of the state's proposed budget for capital projects. The cuts, the Anchorage Daily News said, "may be the biggest single-year line-item veto total in state history."

As recently as last year, Palin (pronounced pale-in) was a political outcast. She resigned in January 2004 as head of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission after complaining to the office of Governor Frank Murkowski and to state Attorney General Gregg Renkes about ethical violations by another commissioner, Randy Ruedrich, who was also Republican state chairman.

State law barred Palin from speaking out publicly about ethical violations and corruption. But she was vindicated later in 2004 when Ruedrich, who'd been reconfirmed as state chairman, agreed to pay a $12,000 fine for breaking state ethics laws. She became a hero in the eyes of the public and the press, and the bane of Republican leaders.

In 2005, she continued to take on the Republican establishment by joining Eric Croft, a Democrat, in lodging an ethics complaint against Renkes, who was not only attorney general but also a long-time adviser and campaign manager for Murkowski. The governor reprimanded Renkes and said the case was closed. It wasn't. Renkes resigned a few weeks later, and Palin was again hailed as a hero.

Palin, 43, the mother of four, passed up a chance to challenge Republican senator Lisa Murkowski, the then-governor's daughter, in 2004. She endorsed another candidate in the primary, but Murkowski won and was reelected. Palin said then that her 14-year-old son talked her out of running, though it's doubtful that was the sole reason.

In 2006, she didn't hesitate. She ran against Gov. Murkowski, who was seeking a second term despite sagging poll ratings, in the Republican primary. In a three-way race, Palin captured 51 percent and won in a landslide. She defeated former Democratic governor Tony Knowles in the general election, 49 percent to 41 percent. She was one of the few Republicans anywhere in the country to perform above expectations in 2006, an overwhelmingly Democratic year. Palin is unabashedly pro life.

[ .... ]

In the roughly three years since she quit as the state's chief regulator of the oil industry, Palin has crushed the Republican hierarchy (virtually all male) and nearly every other foe or critic. Political analysts in Alaska refer to the "body count" of Palin's rivals. "The landscape is littered with the bodies of those who crossed Sarah," says pollster Dave Dittman, who worked for her gubernatorial campaign. It includes Ruedrich, Renkes, Murkowski, gubernatorial contenders John Binkley and Andrew Halcro, the three big oil companies in Alaska, and a section of the Daily News called "Voice of the Times," which was highly critical of Palin and is now defunct.

One of her first acts as governor was to fire the Alaska Board of Agriculture. Her ultimate target was the state Creamery Board, which has been marketing the products of Alaska dairy farmers for 71 years and wanted to close down after receiving $600,000 from the state. "You don't just close your doors and walk away," Palin told me. She discovered she lacked the power to fire the Creamery Board. Only the board of agriculture had that authority. So Palin replaced the agriculture board, which appointed a new creamery board, which has rescinded the plan to shut down.

In preserving support for dairy farmers, Palin exhibited a kind of Alaskan chauvinism. She came to the state as an infant, making her practically a native. And she is eager to keep Alaska free from domination by oil companies or from reliance on cruise lines whose ships bring thousands of tourists to the state.

"She's as Alaskan as you can get," says Dan Fagan, an Anchorage radio talk show host. "She's a hockey mom, she lives on a lake, she ice fishes, she snowmobiles, she hunts, she's an NRA member, she has a float plane, and her husband works for BP on the North Slope," Fagan says. Todd Palin, her high school sweetheart, is a three-time winner of the 2,000-mile Iron Dog snowmobile race from Wasilla to Nome to Fairbanks. It's the world's longest snowmobile race.

Gov. Palin grew up in Wasilla, where as star of her high school basketball team she got the nickname "Sarah Barracuda" for her fierce competitiveness. She led her underdog team to the state basketball championship. Palin also won the Miss Wasilla beauty contest, in which she was named Miss Congeniality, and went on to compete in the Miss Alaska pageant.

[ .... }

In 2002, Palin entered statewide politics, running for lieutenant governor. She finished a strong second in the Republican primary. That fall, she dutifully campaigned for Murkowski, who'd given up his Senate seat to run for governor. Afterwards, she turned down several job offers from Murkowski, finally accepting the oil and gas post. When she quit 11 months later, "that was her defining moment" in politics, says Fagan.

The biggest issue in the campaign was the proposed natural gas pipeline from the North Slope that's crucial to the state's economy. Murkowski had made a deal with the three big oil companies--Exxon, BP, ConocoPhillips--which own the gas reserves to build the pipeline. But the legislature turned it down and Palin promised to create competition for the pipeline contract.

She made three other promises: to end corruption in state government, cut spending, and provide accountability. She's now redeeming those promises.

Palin describes herself as "pro-business and pro-development." She doesn't want the oil companies to sit on their energy reserves or environmental groups to block development of the state's resources. "I get frustrated with folks from outside Alaska who come up and say you shouldn't develop your resources," she says. Alaska needs to be self-sufficient, she says, instead of relying heavily on "federal dollars," as the state does today.

Her first major achievement as governor was lopsided passage by the legislature of the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act, which is designed to attract pipeline proposals this summer.

[ .... ]

Palin's tough spending cuts drew criticism from Republican legislators whose pet projects were vetoed. But her popularity doesn't appear threatened. "It's not just that she's pretty and young," says Dittman. "She's really smart. And there's no guile. She says her favorite meal is moose stew or mooseburgers. It wouldn't shock people if that were true."

You can read more here.

As someone who has been sick and tired of corrupt politicians, in both parties, losers whose only purpose in life is to get elected and stay in power, to hell with principles and ethics, you can see how I found this woman from the Alaskan wilderness incredibly appealing.

The more I read about her, the more I wanted to read about her. It wasn’t like I went chasing all over the place looking for stuff, but anytime something popped up, I was sure to read it. Unlike now, you couldn’t find a negative story on her. She was hailed as a real leader. Even the usual suspects, the notoriously biased "women’s magazines" were even handed and quite complementary. Sarah Palin was considered one of the true rising stars and a role model for women.

The more I learned, the more I was convinced Sarah Palin was going to be a leader on the national stage, and sooner, rather than later.

When the 2008 presidential election season came around, things went crazy. The establishment Republicans were pushing their usual set of candidates destined to lose by a landslide and the democrats were pushing their largest ever field of neo-communists.

The two people from the Republican Party that had any appeal, Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson, both of whom I’m convinced would have made great Presidents, turned out to be the worst campaigners in human history.

Even worse, the two front runners on the Marxist-democrat side were both hard core graduates from the Saul Alinsky school of radicalism. Hillary Clinton was a big fan of Alinsky, and wrote about him in college.

Barack Obama, one of the most radical communists in the country, and now our beloved Dear Leader, not only worshiped at the alter of Alinsky, but taught it to the ACORN rent-a-thugs when he worked for them, and then funded "Alinsky Academy" when he served on the board of the Woods Foundation, which was founded by unrepentant, murdering domestic terrorist, William Ayers.

2008 was incredibly depressing, to say the least, and obviously, even our worst fears about Obama are not only being met, but often greatly exceeded.

While the Republicans were busy sorting out which candidate they wanted to lose big to the Marxist-democrats, a handful of folks were thinking about a simply amazing woman in Alaska who sure would make a hell of a Vice President, and might, just might, excite an otherwise totally demoralized Conservative base.

The "Draft Sarah Palin" movement popped up, and I found myself dropping her name to anyone who would listen, anytime the conversation turned to a possible V.P. choice.

Once John McCain became the nominee, thus deflating the spirits of Conservatives even more, conventional wisdom dictated that McCain would pick one of two possible co-disasters, either Mike Huckabee, who came in second, or Mitt Romney who bought his way into third, and has good hair, thus looking "presidential." It was shaping up to be a 40 plus state blowout, for Obama.

One of the most irritating things about John McCain, bless his heart, is his desire to be a maverick. He has never, ever been a favorite of Conservatives. Now John is a good man, and a genuine war hero. He’s got a great family, and has done good things, but his tendency to reach across the aisle and team up with some of the worse the Marxist-democrats have to offer, and create incredibly unpopular legislation, is legendary.

Then John McCain did something absolutely no one expected, and only small group of dedicated supporters had envisioned: John McCain chose Governor Sarah Palin to be his running mate.

With one brilliant and inspired move, John McCain managed to erase a whole lot of anxiety among the party’s base. Rush Limbaugh, who has always been nothing less than delighted to wear McCain out, immediately dubbed him "John McBrilliant"!

Personally, I was excited to no end. I still remember the night before the announcement. I couldn’t sleep. We still had no idea, and the big money was on Mitt Romney, though by now, the name Sarah Palin was floating around.

Somewhere during the night, I was killing time on the interwebs, and came across a little tidbit that a plane, from Anchorage, Alaska, had landed in Ohio. Word was the passenger was an attractive woman with young children. Further word was the blogger who had discovered this was the same one who got it right on Joe Biden being Obama’s pick. This ended any chance of me going to sleep for the rest of the night.

When morning dawned, it was wild. All sorts of misdirection to keep things secret. Even calls to Alaska by the news agencies, yielded no information. BTW, if you have never seen it, there is a great video of former Reagan adviser and respected D.C. attorney, A.B. Culvahouse, at the National Press Club speaking about the circumstances of Sarah’s being chosen as McCain’s running mate. This is a must see, as Culvahouse was in charge of vetting possible candidates, and there were a couple dozen of them. Anyhow, this answers a lot of questions, ande dispels a whole lot of lies, including some that would later come from traitors within the McCain camp, itself. You can see the video here. Sarah also has some great stories in her book, Going Rogue.

As we all know, Sarah was a huge hit, and quite frankly, John McCain will always be loved by Conservatives for this one great moment of brilliance, choosing Sarah Palin and introducing this great leader to the nation.

I’m reminded of her brilliant acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention. She was spot on about Barack Obama. Had his number then, has his number now.







This speech reminded me so much of Ronald Reagan’s iconic 1964 convention speech in support of Barry Goldwater. This much quoted speech cemented Reagan’s place as the leader of the Conservative movement, just as Sarah’s speech that night has done for her.

No less than Ronald Reagan’s son, Michael, thought so as well, and wrote:

Welcome Back Dad

I’ve been trying to convince my fellow conservatives that they have been wasting their time in a fruitless quest for a new Ronald Reagan to emerge and lead our party and our nation. I insisted that we’d never see his like again because he was one of a kind.

I was wrong!

Wednesday night I watched the Republican National Convention on television and there, before my very eyes, I saw my Dad reborn; only this time he's a she.

And what a she!

In one blockbuster of a speech, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin resurrected my Dad’s indomitable spirit and sent it soaring above the convention center, shooting shock waves through the cynical media’s assigned spaces and electrifying the huge audience with the kind of inspiring rhetoric we haven’t heard since my Dad left the scene.

This was Ronald Reagan at his best -- the same Ronald Reagan who made the address known now solely as "The Speech," which during the Goldwater campaign set the tone and the agenda for the rebirth of the traditional conservative movement that later sent him to the White House for eight years and revived the moribund GOP.

Last night was an extraordinary event. Widely seen beforehand as a make-or-break effort -- either an opportunity for Sarah Palin to show that she was the happy warrior that John McCain assured us she was, or a disaster that would dash McCain’s presidential hopes and send her back to Alaska, sadder but wiser.

Obviously un-intimidated by either the savage onslaught to which the left-leaning media had subjected her, or the incredible challenge she faced -- and oozing with confidence -- she strode defiantly to the podium and proved she was everything and even more than John McCain told us.

Much has been made of the fact that she is a woman. What we saw last night, however, was something much more than a just a woman accomplishing something no Republican woman has ever achieved. What we saw was a red-blooded American with that rare, God-given ability to rally her dispirited fellow Republicans and take up the daunting task of leading them -- and all her fellow Americans -- on a pilgrimage to that shining city on the hill my father envisioned as our nation’s real destination.

In a few words she managed to rip the mask from the faces of her Democratic rivals and reveal them for what they are -- a pair of old-fashioned liberals making promises that cannot be kept without bankrupting the nation and reducing most Americans to the status of mendicants begging for their daily bread at the feet of an all-powerful government.

Most important, by comparing her own stunning record of achievement with his, she showed Barack Obama for the sham that he is, a man without any solid accomplishments beyond conspicuous self-aggrandizement.

Like Ronald Reagan, Sarah Palin is one of us. She knows how most of us live because that’s the way she lives. She shares our homespun values and our beliefs, and she glories in her status as a small-town woman who put her shoulder to the wheel and made life better for her neighbors.

Her astonishing rise up from the grass-roots, her total lack of self-importance, and her ordinary American values and modest lifestyle reveal her to be the kind of hard-working, optimistic, ordinary American who made this country the greatest, most powerful nation on the face of the earth.

As hard as you might try, you won’t find that kind of plain-spoken, down-to-earth, self-reliant American in the upper ranks of the liberal-infested, elitist Democratic Party, or in the Obama campaign.

Read more of this great piece here.

History will show that John McCain would take the lead in the polls, with a strong bounce. That once dead GOP phone lines starting ringing off the walls. Empty campaign headquarters were soon filled with eager volunteers, and most importantly, cold hard cash started flowing in.

I imagine people will debate the ultimate loss by the team into eternity. The finger pointed started early by campaign turncoats like Steve Schmidt, and many lies were told by him and others, in an attempt to absolve themselves for running one of the worst campaigns in history. Water under the bridge.

History will also note that as soon as Sarah Palin was named McCain’s running mate, Team Obama went into an incredible panic. They did two things. They formed the Alaska Mafia, and embarked on the most incredible smear campaign ever seen, one they continue in earnest to this day.

The second thing they did was all but forget about McCain, and start running against Sarah. They elevated her to the presidential level, a position she still enjoys today.

History will indeed show the unprecedented attacks not only continued after the election, but intensified. Team Obama had gotten a really good look at Sarah Palin, and it scared them to death. They knew the McCain campaign was poorly run, and that left in charge of her own destiny, this woman would be powerful, and unstoppable. They knew that had to use everything at their disposal to destroy her, before she destroyed them. Sarah Palin had become their bête noire.

I’m not sure who called who on that once calm Friday afternoon last July 3rd, but I found myself on the phone with good friend and fellow blogger Ron Devito. As both of us strongly support Sarah Palin, and have written extensively about Obama’s thugs, the hate bloggers, and so forth, we had plenty of knowledge about the details.

We knew exactly what the constant bombardment from Obama’s hand picked thugs were doing not only to Sarah, and her family, who were also under constant and often intense attack, but to her administration, the Alaskan government as a whole, and ultimately the tax payers of the state.

As has been noted by Sarah, and others, this was not an easy thing Sarah was doing. One could see as she spoke that she was uncomfortable. I wouldn’t say she was shaken, but this was certainly not her best on camera performance.

The media has spun her speech, and outright lied about it since, but folks who were listening knew what she was talking about, and understood exactly why she was doing the right thing.

People have focused on the fact that Sarah and Todd were personally on the hook for over a half million dollars in legal fees fighting against all of the bogus, and ultimately thrown out "ethics" complaints. But there was more to it than that, a lot more.

By continually harassing her office with bogus "ethics" complaints, and an insane amount of Freedom of Information Act requests, Obama’s thugs managed to paralyze her office, as all of it’s efforts were spent dealing with this nonsense. However, the worst thing, and the absolute tipping point, was the fact all of these Chicago thug tactics had cost the Alaskan tax payers over $2 million, and there was no end to any of this in sight.

Sarah was a championship ball player, and she understood all too well that sometimes, in order to score, you must hand the ball off to someone else, in stepping down, and turning over her government to Sean Parnell, she knew the state was in capable hands, and her agenda would still be carried out, which it has.

Naysayers, and people who have no actual clue about the details, say Sarah should have "stuck it out" and that she let folks down. Nonsense. This was a brilliant move. In fact, it’s proven to be one of the more brilliant moves in political history.

The "quitter" folks, truly ignorant and childish people, neither know or understand Sarah Palin's position. This is a woman who famously put the jet Frank Murkowski bought on eBay, not long after taking office. Now Alaskans fly, a lot. It’s one of the only ways to get to some places in the state efficiently, including the state capitol of Juneau. The problem was, this was a jet, and simply couldn’t land on many of the local airstrips that tend to be a little rugged. It was a totally impractical toy.

Sarah also famously fired the executive chef at the Governor’s mansion, and also drove herself, in her own car, to work. How many Governors do you know that would dispense with those little, but costly, perks of holding their state’s top job? Not many.

Sarah Palin is a budget hawk, and the expenses to operate the office of the Governor were a cool $1 million less during her tenure, than during the same time frame of either of the previous two Governors.

As you can imagine, seeing $2 million being pissed away, stolen actually, dealing with the lowlife thugs, money that couldn’t be used to fund roads, schools, hospitals, police, or firemen, upset Sarah deeply.

At the time, we did an estimate based on the rate of nonsense and the money it was costing, and figured, conservatively, that had Sarah stayed in office, Obama’s thugs would have cost the Alaska taxpayers between $6 and $10 million total.

A less ethical person, the typical power hungry politician, would have stayed and not cared. They would have had to have dragged most politicians out kicking and screaming all of the way. Sarah Palin isn’t built that way, and thank God for that! She knew it was her moral obligation to take one for the team. To "reload" as she puts it, and come back to fight another day.

After all, this was a woman who less than a month earlier had said: "Politically, if I die, I die, but I won’t sit down, and I won’t shut up!"(and she certainly hasn't!)

There has been a lot of comparisons to great leaders who relinquished power peaceably, and a lot of words said, but I think Claude Sandroff in an article titled "Virtue and Sarah Palin" said it best:

However we define Palin, as frontier feminist, movement conservative or middle class populist this will always stand as her finest hour.

It might not have been her finest performance, but it crystallized in a moment the very essence of virtue. It was Sir Thomas More resigning as Lord Chancellor and George Washington returning to Mount Vernon. It showed how rare virtue has become in our politics. It shows why we adore Sarah Palin and why we need her. And it explains why, even without office, she has become the most important political figure in America.

The lamestream media put forth one of their best efforts at misdirection in sometime, fretting over Sarah’s obviously tough moment, and the shaky delivery. They tried to work their "magic" so no one would hear the words that came from this magnificent leader’s lips.

Sarah Palin, this leader among men, told us exactly what she was going to do. She laid out the case that she had made up her mind not to run for a second term. She explained she didn’t care for lame duck politicians who spent their days wasting tax payer money going off on junkets and such. Sarah went into great detail about the damage Obama’s thugs had done, and the obscene amount of money they had stolen from the Alaskan people.

Lastly though, Sarah spoke to the future. Sarah told the Alaskan people that she would never stop fighting for them. She also said that she would go around the nation aiding Conservative causes, and help Conservative candidates who sought elected office.

This was an aggressive agenda, for sure.

Sarah saw what we saw though. She saw a very dangerous man in the White House whose agenda will destroy the Republic and the lives of all of us who live in this great nation. Though she’s never said it, I imagine she felt it was her duty to personally take this tyrant on. Damned good thing too, as so far, she is one of the very few who have had the spine to do it, and most certainly the only high profile leader to do so.

The phone was rather quiet at first. Neither Ron nor I knew exactly what to say. Stunned is the right word. We knew what she had been going through, better than most, and certainly understood that she did the right thing for the Alaskan people. But we wondered if the people at large would get it. We wondered if decent Americans would understand just how dirty Chicago politics are, and the price one must pay to fight evil.

Honestly, I still don’t know the answers to those questions, though I think most Americans get it.

One thing about it though, by the time we were done running all of the different scenarios by each other, and discussed future possibilities, we were in agreement that this was indeed a brilliant, and inspired move.One that would not only stop Obama's thugs in their tracks, but frustrate the entire left from now until the end of time.

Since then, the brilliance of Sarah’s move has become more evident with each passing day.

For the Alaskan people, Governor Sean Parnell has proven to be quite capable, and hasn’t strayed from the Palin Doctrine of good government. The Alaskan people are well served, and they are millions of dollars better off than if Sarah had stayed and fought a losing battle.

Sarah has made good on every promise. She is one of the best spokesmen Alaska has ever had. I don’t know if you’ve looked, but shows about Alaska are everywhere, and quite popular. Sarah is about to add her own show about the great state to the mix.

Politically, Sarah Palin is a powerhouse. She stands head and shoulders above everyone else. Her endorsement of a candidate is coveted, and as Rick Santorum stated recently, the only one that matters. She has made a difference in some very high profile races, and chosen solid leaders to replace corrupt, out of touch losers,

Personally Sarah has done quite well, and she deserves absolutely every bit of it. Her first book sold over 2.5 million copies, was a number one best seller, and her tour had people camping out overnight, in terribly cold weather, just to get a chance to meet her. She has a second book due out this fall.

Sarah promised to speak out for causes that mattered and has raised a boatload of money for organizations she believes in. She’s raised a lot of money to support our troops, special needs children, pro-life causes, and education.

As a motivational speaker, Sarah is constantly in demand. Same goes for the political arena. She headlines everywhere to sell out crowds, as she delivers a message of real hope, and real change.

While the other so called front runners for 2012, the GOP establishment show ponies, are conspicuous by their absence from the battle field, lest they say the wrong thing and blow their chance at being the GOP’s designated loser, Sarah is out there every day pounding on the Obama regime, and rallying the troops.

Of course, unlike the others, Sarah isn’t focused on 2012. Nope, she knows our real battle is now. If the Republic has any chance for survival whatsoever, we simply must take back Congress, and take it back big time. If we fail to win a strong victory this fall, the damage Obama and his minions will do will be irreversible. We are close to that point now.

I have lived through 11 Presidents. I’ve seen poor leaders, as well as one great leader among them. I’ve seen a lot of pretenders to the throne. Never in the history of the Republic have we witnessed a tyrant like Barack Obama though. The amount of damage this corrupt Chicago rabble rouser has done is simply mind boggling.

Thankfully, we have a leader who is up to the task. Someone whose love for our country is above reproach. A true patriot, and a true warrior.

A lot has been said, and a lot will be said. In the end though, one must simply say: Thank you Sarah Palin.

You are a bright light in otherwise dark times. You are the one true leader this nation has. The one person who has the guts to take on Barack Obama with full force and never give an inch.

No matter how viciously you are attacked, you just come back twice as hard, landing blow after devastating blow to Obama and all of those who would seek to destroy America.

Thank you for unselfishly relinquishing power for the good of your neighbors, and thank you for never backing down against evil.

On July 3rd, 2009 you changed the world. You started writing a new chapter in history. A history that now looks to have a happier ending than it once did.