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[tompurdue]

Today, my alarm clock went off.  It was an alarm I set three-and-a-half years ago, to check this prediction:

My opinion: the name "Sarah Palin" will be used in 2012 exclusively by page 8 news reports asking, "Remember when everybody was convinced Sarah Palin was going to be important? Whatever happened to that?"

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Comments

[jcsbimp]

I still keep dreading that sometime this year, she'll say "I'm in!" and all of those folks who are running somewhat cool on the other candidates in the primary, all of those true Conservatives, evangelical Christians, and Tea Partiers, will surge forward in renewed support and enthusiasm. Republicans will have more than their mutual hatred of our first Black president to fan the flames of imminent victory.

[tompurdue]

"True Conservatives, evangelical Christians, and Tea Partiers" are not a majority. In fact, they're only about a quarter of the country, and they tend to be geographically concentrated in red states.

They would turn out in droves with enthusiasm to vote for her, but not a single other person would. If national turnout is over 50% (which it almost certainly would be), she'd lose.

Enthusiasm is useful, but you still only get one vote, and enthusiasm brought on by extremism tends to inspire counter-enthusiasm in the other side.

Maybe we'll get lucky, though: the "true Conservatives, evangelical Christians, and Tea Partiers" will decide Romney doesn't represent them, and run Palin as a third party. But I haven't been a good enough person to have earned that.