(washingtonpost).Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska and GOP "It" girl, can warm up the Republican base like a hot toddy in a duck blind. But further inside the party organization, the air is a little nippy.
What happened? In a word, bungling.
Everyone seems to have a Sarah Palin story of ignored calls, mishandled invitations or unanswered e-mail. Disorganized is how one might charitably describe the Palin operation.
"Basically, it's just rude," says one political operative who is a Palin fan. "They've been running the great snub machine. That's the reason the boys in the Republican Party are unhappy with her."
That unhappiness has been building gradually in the past seven months, and it was on full display this week as the party faithful gathered for a fundraising dinner at which Palin originally was invited to speak. She was later uninvited, and Newt Gingrich took her place,Watching the dinner-speaker spectacle develop, then unravel, then redevelop (Will she or won't she speak/attend?) felt like watching a middle-school romance in which a friend tells another friend that so-and-so has a crush on you-know-who, but don't tell anybody.
There's more -- and stories vary -- but a common theme emerges: Seven months after the election, Palin still can't shoot straight. Unless something changes dramatically and soon, "Missed Opportunity" should be the title of her memoir.
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By the time Palin returned to Alaska last fall, her popularity and fundraising ability were second only to Barack Obama's. Instantly, she was drowning in speaking requests. Boxes and boxes of invitations stacked up -- and went unprocessed.
Without any effort on her part, 75,000 to 80,000 fans around the country organized pro-Palin groups. Said a frustrated Palin promoter: "All she had to do for those 75,000 people was hold an electronic town hall, and she couldn't get around to it."
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