President Palin for 2012?
2008-11-08 22:00
Cape Town - Sixty-nine percent of Republican voters say Alaska Governor Sarah Palin helped John McCain's bid for the presidency, even as news reports surface that some McCain staffers think she was a liability.
This is according to a report published by Rasmussen Reports, an electronic media company which specialises in opinion polling information.
Only 20% of GOP voters said Palin hurt the party's ticket, according the Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Six percent said she had no impact, and five percent were undecided.
Ninety-one percent of Republicans had a favourable view of Palin, including 65% who said their view is Very Favourable. Only eight percent had an unfavourable view of her.
When asked to choose among some of the GOP's top names for their choice for the party's 2012 presidential nominee, 64% said Palin. The next closest contenders were two former governors and unsuccessful challengers for the presidential nomination this year - Mike Huckabee of Arkansas with 12% support and Mitt Romney of Massachusetts with 11%.
Controversial week
The results of the poll may come as quite a surprise to many, as reports of deep divisions between McCain and Palin's aides surfaced following Barack Obama's historic election win.
In the days following McCain's loss, Palin's lack of geographical and political knowledge was a big talking point in the media.
According to Fox News Chief Political Correspondent Carl Cameron, there was great concern within the McCain campaign that Palin lacked "a degree of knowledgeability necessary to be a running mate, a vice president, a heartbeat away from the presidency", in part because she didn't know which countries were in Nafta (North American Free Trade Agreement), and she "didn't understand that Africa was a continent, rather than a country just in itself".
Palin apparently asked whether South Africa wasn't part of the country as opposed to a country in the continent.
Other damaging information that has come to light was part of Newsweek's Special Election Project, which allowed reporters to gather behind-the-scenes information on the presidential campaigns with an agreement that none of their reporting would be published until after election day.
Newsweek reported that Palin's shopping spree at high-end department stores was apparently more extensive than previously reported. While publicly supporting Palin, McCain's top advisers privately fumed at what they regarded as her outrageous profligacy.
During the last month of the campaign Palin was dogged for days by an outcry after it was reported at the time that the Republican National Committee bought clothes and accessories worth $150 000 for her from upscale stores such as Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue.
Slams critics as 'jerks'
Palin has hit out at these and other allegations, calling here anonymous critics "jerks".
"I think if there are allegations based on questions or comments that I made in debate prep about Nafta or about the continent versus the country when we talk about Africa there, then those were taken out of context, and that is cruel and mean-spirited, it's immature, it's unprofessional, and those guys are jerks," Palin said.
It's not fair and it's not right," she said.
She also described accusations that she spent exorbitant amounts of money on clothes for the campaign as "sexist."