The call of duty being what it is, and Palin being the patriot that she is, there was no way that she would have refused the offer of John McCain in 2008 that she be the vice-presidential candidate. Further, the McCain campaign was in the doldrums and, being a loyal Republican, she accepted his request.


That it was the right one for McCain and the GOP was nearly immediately made manifest by her earth shaking acceptance speech, and the concomitant rise in McCain’s fortunes, to the point he actually was ahead of Obama in the polls.


 Forget all the nonsense that McCain lost because voters switched to Obama due to some supposed fault or other of Palin. The simple facts of the matter were that McCain was ahead, then came the Lehman Bros. crash, the economic panic, his “suspending his campaign’ and his support of TARP plus his poor debates with Obama. Nobody could have won in the face of that onslaught-Palin had nothing to do with his huge loss.


Looking ahead to the current GOP campaign for the nomination lets suppose that McCain had not asked Palin to run what could the scenario now be? Palin would be the hugely popular, attractive, well spoken, fresh faced candidate. Can anyone doubt that if she had announced a run, had electrified the country,especially the Tea party element, that we would have even heard of Santorum or perry or Bachmann? 


Who could imagine any result out of Iowa yesterday other than the reformist, right to life, 2nd amendment, anti-corruption, pro-Israel, unsullied by personal scandal Palin winning in a landslide against the tired old Beltway representatives?


None of the following would have figured in the reporting of Palin’s campaign if she had not honored the call of the party in 2008;


There would have been no “gotcha’ looking down their noses professorial type interviews with questions about “the Bush doctrine that nobody would have understood the reference to.


No snide,condescending big city interviewer to country person questions like “what newspapers do you read’?


Nobody would have heard of Bristol Palin, or Levi, or cared about her pregnancy, or seen her trying to make a life for herself on television which the left scorned.


Nobody would have come up with an insane conspiracy theory about Trig not being Palin’s natural born son. Plus he would be independent and old enough now that  Palin couldn’t be attacked for using him as a “prop” when mothering him.


There would be no nonsense about Palin dressing up in fancy clothes (which is OK for Michelle Obama btw)


Sensation seeking “authors” wouldn’t have move in next door to write a boilerplate hack job full of hearsay “scandal” about her.


It is unlikely that Palin wouldn’t have had to resign (to save her family from penury) because if she hadn’t been in the nationwide spotlight she most likely wouldn’t have been the target of every nut case in Alaska bring ludicrous ‘ethics” charges against her.


McCain’s team wouldn’t have made money writing tell all post campaign books placing the blame for McCain’s loss on Palin.


Tina Fey and assorted “comedians”, including filthy mouthed “satirists” wouldn’t have cashed in by running Palin down-to the delight of the left.


No journalist or extreme leftist like “Daily Kos” would have made the impossible connection between Palin and the Giffords tragedy.


Those examples, and hundreds more, show what Palin has endured out her sense of loyalty to party and love for America. That self-sacrifice may have cost her an eventual run for the presidency-certainly it has in 2012 which is, I believe, not only her loss but America’s.