Thursday, Dec. 09, 2010
Palin in Progress: What Does She Want?
By Jay Newton-SmallFor the longest time, Sarah Palin was leery of Facebook. Some of the comments left on her page during the 2008 vice-presidential campaign were so withering and unpleasant that it took months of coaxing by her staff and her daughters Bristol and Willow to convince Palin that she should give it another try. So she waded back into the digital fray just after she resigned the Alaska governorship and as her aides were compiling a new press list. Her first Facebook post, in August 2009, accused the Obama White House of creating "death panels" as part of health care reform.
That offhand remark, as inaccurate as it was incendiary, helped incite weeks of embarrassing town-hall meetings for Democrats, which in turn nearly brought down the Administration's top priority. Palin, working at the time in San Diego on her first book, was surprised by her post's galvanizing power. With just a few keystrokes, she discovered, she could ruin White House press secretary Robert Gibbs' day, or as she puts it, "I find it a great way to communicate with people directly without the media filter."(See pictures of Sarah Palin's life since the 2008 election.)
There was no more talk of press lists. Since then, Palin has posted 307 messages to her 2.5 million Facebook fans, reaching her base much as Ronald Reagan reached his in the 1970s with his weekly radio commentaries. Eight Palin lieutenants scattered across the country were quietly given the job of policing her site. To this day, they scrub anything that is threatening, pornographic or unfit for children; that questions Barack Obama's citizenship or the parentage of Palin's toddler son Trig; or that hints that the government was behind the 9/11 attacks. Beyond that, though, pretty much anything goes, and over the past year, she has used her page and her Twitter account to promote her books and television show, endorse nearly 100 Republican candidates and blow Denali-size holes in the daily news cycle.
While other Republicans followed predictable and even plodding paths toward the White House this year, Palin has moved along two parallel tracks, one befitting a candidate, the other designed for a celebrity. It is often hard to tell where one stops and the other begins, and that is by design. A presidential candidate used to need a central headquarters and satellite offices in all the early primary states; now all a contender like Palin needs is a cable modem. Working largely from her lakeside house in Wasilla, Alaska, Palin raised millions of dollars, produced three viral Internet videos and endorsed more than seven dozen Republican candidates (most of whom prevailed). (See pictures of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party.)
At the same time, however, she worked more on her profile than on her platform, releasing her second best-selling book in two years and starring in her own cable television series and in the process putting as much as $13 million in the bank. Palin has been particularly adroit at keeping her name front and center on both stages, whether jabbing Washington Republicans for their pork-barrel spending or turning up in Hollywood to watch her daughter Bristol advance to the final round of Dancing with the Stars. (Bristol's ribald safe-sex PSA, meanwhile, became something of a YouTube sensation.)
Palin's maneuvering has Republicans a little stressed out. Barbara Bush, who recently expressed hope that Palin might stay in Alaska, isn't the only GOP elder voicing concern over a potential Palin run for the White House. "The same leaders who fret that Sarah Palin could devastate their party in 2012 are too scared to say in public what they all complain about in private," wrote Joe Scarborough, a former GOP Congress-man and host of MSNBC's Morning Joe, in an op-ed. "Enough. It's time for the GOP to man up." Only Obama seems unfazed by Palin's game. On Nov. 24, he was quoted as saying that he doesn't "think about" Palin, but even if that statement is accurate, he is perhaps the only person in politics who can reasonably make the claim. (Comment on this story.)
If anything, Palin looms even larger in the public consciousness now than she did two years ago, a fact that has implications for the Republican Party, Obama and the rest of the nation. There is little sign that she has a master plan to capture the GOP nomination, and yet her moves over the past year suggest that her political intuition is easily as good as that of her more experienced (and all male) rivals. Indeed, her go-with-her-gut confidence is something many voters think Obama often lacks. "She has amazing instincts," says Rebecca Mansour, Palin's speechwriter. "That said, they're never uninformed decisions ... She knows what's at stake."
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So what exactly is at stake? Does Palin really want to be President and assume the burdens that go with the job? Or is she just teasing the Grand Old Party while she lays the foundations for a more comfortable life as a public provocateur, doing TV, writing books, making speeches and dabbling in politics as it serves her greater goals? The former scenario is what many in the Republican Party are dreading; the latter one is freezing the likely GOP presidential field until she clarifies her plans. And Palin, naturally, wisely and consistently, is coy about the answer. "I would run because the country is more important than my ease, though I'm not necessarily living a life of ease," says Palin, who answered questions from TIME via e-mail. And in a shot at Obama's habit of playing golf during the "recovery summer," she added, "I'm very busy helping people and causes. So busy, in fact, I haven't had time to hit the links in quite a few years."
Inside Sarahland
The golfing dig at Obama is exactly the kind of barb that has delighted Palin's fans and infuriated her detractors from her first moments on the national stage more than two years ago. She has a sixth sense for her opponents' weak spots a useful tool in politics but perhaps an even more valuable one when considering life as a permanent pundit. She doesn't act like a candidate: she hasn't kissed the rings of GOP leaders in Washington, hasn't hired pollsters and Svengalis or made a habit of spending her weekends in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. GOP veterans say she may be the first Republican hopeful in a generation who doesn't need to bother with these prerequisites. She does have a growing staff with roots in the conservative wing of the party. But one clue to the Mystery of Sarah is that her circle of aides looks less like a campaign in the making than a quirky family business in which Palin is the chief product. (See pictures of Sarah Palin's fashion looks.)
At the center of the enterprise is her husband Todd, 46 part Mr. Mom, part manager, part consort. As she writes in America by Heart, "He has been a partner to me in every conceivable way in life, in love, and in doing battle with the New York Times." (When asked about divorce rumors in the summer of 2009, Palin gasped, "Have you seen Todd?") In the past few years, Todd quit his job on Alaska's North Slope as a production operator for BP, began handing the family's modest commercial-fishing business to the couple's 21-year-old son Track and became CEO of Sarah Inc., functioning as chief of staff, top adviser, lead scheduler and family enforcer. The Palins still drop everything, though, for his annual participation in the Iron Dog snow-machine race.
If Palin has no Karl Rove or David Axelrod whispering in her ear (she says she doesn't need one), only her husband comes close. His small-business experience makes him a strong advocate for small government and lower taxes. He listens in on most of her interviews and preps her for TV appearances from the studio Fox News built in their Wasilla home. He's the one who will leave staffers with a kind word or the family's thanks; he's also the one who, when it's required, does the firing. He is often more passionate than his wife when he perceives a wrong. He monitors the news about her with a Google alert that goes to his BlackBerry. (See pictures of Sarah Palin's reality-TV show.)
Below Todd, the lines of authority blur and then largely disappear. Palin's inner circle consists of four far-flung staffers who have little in common other than their loyalty to her. Thomas Van Flein, 47, has served as the family lawyer for several years and has expanded his portfolio from personal matters to everything from endorsements to a prospective presidential bid. Mansour, 36, is a former Holly-wood screenwriter turned political blogger who is based in Los Angeles. Her fierce championing of Palin online won her a spot on Palin's staff soon after Palin resigned from office. Andrew Davis, 33, was brought on to help Palin vet Republicans seeking her endorsement in 2010. A former campaign aide to George W. Bush, Davis works out of Sacramento, and his role has steadily grown from researcher to general political adviser. Virginia-based Tim Crawford, the treasurer of Palin's PAC, worked in the Reagan White House and, at 58, is the oldest and most experienced of the group. (Comment on this story.)
Like most retainers, Palin's crew is not a team of rivals: it is devotedly, self-effacingly protective of its boss. Palin has hired some people virtually sight unseen, and yet the most important credential appears to be loyalty. For example, Joshua Livestro, a bombastic Dutch conservative living in England who used to blog at Conservatives4Palin.com, won a spot doing research at $4,000 a month after Mansour noticed his ferocious defense of Palin online. (He has never met Palin or any members of her staff face to face.) Foreign policy aide Michael Goldfarb, a former McCain staffer, has met Palin in person only "once or twice," he says, but has become one of the few staffers trusted enough to speak with reporters. Palin's wildly popular videos, meanwhile, were shot and produced by Eric Welch, a country-music-video specialist Palin met backstage at the National Tea Party Convention earlier this year. "The staff," says Crawford, "has grown organically. We don't have titles. When something's needed, we all pitch in, from xeroxing and collating to weighing in on endorsements and speeches to traveling with her."
The main gang of six Sarah, Todd, Crawford, Mansour, Van Flein and Davis has settled into something of a routine this year: Palin and her husband receive a daily morning briefing from Davis and Mansour via e-mail. It includes links to articles on candidates she's endorsed, what's happening inside the Beltway and around the world, and local sports news in the areas where she's traveling. The staff holds three conference calls a week usually without Palin but the conversation via Skype, e-mail and cell phone is continuous.
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Palin expects long days from her staff, and she has lost nearly a dozen part- or full-time aides in the past year. Many, such as spokeswoman Meghan Stapleton, speechwriter Lindsay Hayes and domestic-policy adviser Kim Daniels, have left on amicable terms or for personal reasons. But she can be an exacting taskmaster and like most pols is quick to freeze people out if she doubts their fealty, several privately say. Still, comebacks by prodigal staffers aren't unheard of. The current constellation of staff, Palin recently told TIME, suits her fine. "I don't need 'handlers.' I don't like traveling with 'an entourage.' I have a few very good people who work for me, and I really don't see the need for a large, expensive bureaucracy."
Sarah 2.0
The most intriguing thing Palin has done since 2008 is march steadily to the right. Once a moderate Republican who proudly appealed to Alaska's independent voters, she is now much more overtly conservative. Though her powerful videos, meant as they are for mass audiences, usually lack specifics, her speeches and tweets are far more pointed. She has mocked Obama's "vast" nuclear-arms experience acquired as a community organizer and slammed him for apologizing to the world for America's greatness. In a speech to the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in April, she hit Obama for "coddling our enemies and alienating allies" and for offering "tepid sanctions" on North Korea. (See winners and losers from the 2010 midterm elections.)
Palin has lately folded into her Facebook posts a healthy dose of kitchen-table economics, as when in early December she called on governors to resist federal bailouts and get their budgets in order. She has accused the Administration of bankrupting the government by trying to hire its way out of the recession. She delights in pointing out the inconsistent scrutiny of the "lamestream media." "The biggest change I've seen in her in the last year is that her scope is much broader," says Van Flein. "When I first met her, oil and gas, making the state more efficient those were the issues that consumed her. Her focus has broadened to where her targets are national, foreign and economic issues."
If Palin has shrewdly anticipated the Tea Party's rise, the mechanics of her operation are a little pokier. She hasn't made a big fundraising push, holding just two events for her PAC this year, compared with Mitt Romney's nine. Still, her popularity has helped her rake in the cash online and by mail: through her PAC, now 23 months old, Palin has raised $5.4 million, more than Tim Pawlenty and Haley Barbour combined, but less than Romney, who has raised $8.8 million. The bulk of her funds have gone to pay for her travel, staff salaries and fundraising itself, and she spent about the same amount on 2010 candidates as her likely rivals did: less than 10%. But Romney has devoted the past two years to building a much broader network of statewide PACs, which will enable him to raise millions more if he proves successful in the early contests. Palin has not moved beyond her simple federal PAC. (See pictures of Tea Party souvenirs.)
The pattern of Palin's endorsements in 2010 signals that she at the very least wants the option to run. She endorsed 92 GOP candidates this year, some after careful consideration, others on the fly. Palin favored hopefuls much like herself underdog conservative women, or mama grizzlies, as she called them but she had a checklist too: she looked for those who were pro-life and anti-stimulus and backed expanded oil and gas drilling, including opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. (Comment on this story.)
Her picks were not strictly ideological; when it came to states that are important in the 2012 GOP presidential calendar, Palin was much more pragmatic. She backed Terry Branstad for governor in Iowa and Kelly Ayotte for Senate in New Hampshire over candidates preferred by the local Tea parties. And where she was bold, she was strategically bold: she got behind South Carolina gubernatorial hopeful Nikki Haley very early in 2010, when Haley was trailing her rivals. That was a long-shot bet in a state that has been the make-or-break contest for Republican presidential hopefuls. Governor-elect Haley now owes Palin a debt.
There is something unmistakably improvised about the way Palin operates. Eleventh-hour decisions mean that her team has had its share of missed flights, misspelled candidates' names, appearances canceled at the last minute, endorsements in races attributed to the wrong state, to say nothing of made-up words like "refudiated." Her endorsements often took recipients by surprise, and when she did campaign for a candidate, it was often so late that the local reporters didn't even know she was in the state. Three days before the elections in November, Palin was in New York City for a series of Fox News interviews. She had hoped to add a day trip to New Hampshire on Nov. 1 to appear on behalf of Ayotte but discovered that her Fox commitments were more demanding than she had expected. So the Ayotte trip was scrubbed. It was not a big decision as these things go, but it was a reminder that political chits are a much smaller consideration for Palin than they might be for other presidential hopefuls at this stage.
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That a politician of Palin's stature often wrestles with her schedule is a reflection, aides say, of her being a mother of five without a nanny. The Friday before the elections, for example, 2-year-old Trig had a routine operation related to his Down syndrome, and Palin did not want to commit to any events until she was sure that he was recovering. That's a decision every parent can understand and that constant calculation is a part of her unusual appeal with women. Her aides say family issues will be a big factor in Palin's decision about her future, but which way they cut is anyone's guess. Even her close advisers acknowledge that Palin is playing by a new set of rules. "Sarah does things differently," notes John Coale, who set up her PAC. "She doesn't hire a lot of consultants. She, as they say, listens to the beat of a different drum."
Will She Repeat Her Own History?
Asked via e-mail what she would do if elected, Palin carefully says the first priority "of the next Republican President" should be "to sign a bill for the repeal and replacement of Obamacare with true free-market, patient-centered reform." Obamacare's repeal, she adds, "would help to cut future deficits. It would also send a strong signal to America's workers and employers that government is back on their side and is no longer seeking to impose its one-size-fits-all 'solutions' from above." Palin says she would "also look for entitlement reform, as well as a systemwide audit of government spending with a goal to move us toward zero-based budgeting practices and, ultimately, a balanced budget. We need to start really living within our means. As any mother or father will tell you, don't spend what you don't have." (See 10 health care reform ads.)
Palin implies that she is unworried by the way she has become a lightning rod to both the right and the left. "My positions are not at all controversial. The majority of Americans agree with me across the board on the issues. I think it's a personal thing that probably stems from media demonization of me and mischaracterization of what I stand for," she says. "Shoot, if I read and believed all the lies these guys write about me, I wouldn't like me either!"
Such statements suggest that Palin may get into the race just to set the record straight. Her new book a folksy mashup of Thomas Jefferson, Alexis de Tocqueville, Calvin Coolidge, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times argues that the U.S. under Obama has lost its sense of pride and come unhinged from the values of family and small government. She continues to attack the Washington crowd, by which she pointedly means both Democrats and Republicans. Palin has used this playbook before. When she ran for governor of Alaska, she abruptly resigned her chairmanship of the statewide board on oil and gas conservation to protest the commission's corruption and then launched a revolt against the "boys' club" in Juneau. She is poised to run a similar play against GOP insiders in Washington. "Some in the GOP establishment have a problem with me because I've been taking on the good-ol'-boy network for a couple of decades now," she says, "and some of the good ol' boys obviously don't like it." (See pictures of Republican memorabilia.)
Palin has time on her side. Her popularity among conservatives means that she can wait until the last minute perhaps as late as a year from now before jumping into the Republican sweepstakes. And she could raise millions of dollars overnight. A number of veteran GOP operatives think she could win the nomination, even if polls today give her no chance of beating Obama. If Palin does run, "there would be excited thunder from the grass roots, celebration in the White House and despair among GOP leaders," says Mike Murphy, a longtime Republican consultant. (Comment on this story.)
But Palin thinks Obama is vulnerable, and she implies that she is the one to take him on. "In battleground states, he's polling at 40% or below," she notes. "The country is rejecting his agenda ... My vision of America is diametrically opposed to his. He sees America as the problem. I see America as the solution." Asked what she makes of Obama's presidency thus far, Palin quipped, "Two words: Jimmy Carter." Asked who can beat him, she needed seven more: "Someone who can draw a sharp contrast."
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