The Moment

Some presidential campaigns begin with a speech. Others start by taking the pulse of party leaders. Sarah Palin’s 2012 bid kicked off over a steaming pot of moose chili under TV lights in her Alaska kitchen. The former vice-presidential candidate assured the world she was ready, should God open the door for her so much as a smidgen. “I’ll plow through,” she promised–as if anyone imagined otherwise.

The interval between one campaign and the next is not usually measured in hours. But votes were still being counted as anonymous advisers to Senator John McCain, amid the smoking rubble of their Obama-bombed effort, began taking Palin down. She was a ditz, they whispered, who didn’t know that Africa is a continent, a diva whose $150,000 wardrobe–including silk boxer shorts for hubby Todd–belied her down-home reputation. Talk about airing a campaign’s dirty laundry.

Palin hit back in her signature style. “Jerks,” she said of her veiled foes. It was in keeping with the particular brand of brass that makes her, rawness aside, a plausible–perhaps formidable–future candidate. If any politician can survive the spectacle of sorting through her family’s suitcases to determine which duds are legally hers (the rest are being returned to the GOP; imagine the bewildered staffer opening that package), it’s Sarah P.

By meeting the post-election smear campaign head-on, she may have silenced it. On Nov. 11, McCain appeared on the Tonight Show to announce he “couldn’t be happier” with his former running mate, despite polls showing she may have cost their ticket more votes than she earned.

A guttering torch is being passed in the GOP, and the battle is on to see who will seize it: Mitt Romney, 2008’s also-ran? Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty? Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, whom some look to as a Republican Obama? The party’s spectacular collapse has spawned a wide-open struggle for the throne, and the long knives are already out. How’s Palin with a knife? Ask the moose.

Drawing Room PAGE 20