Sarah Palin was surrounded as soon as she was spotted passing through the gates to the Iowa State Fair. And, as expected, the story line was that she took up much of the attention from the Republican candidates who were also trying to drum up support in advance of the Iowa straw poll.
Palin pressed flesh, petted cows, held children and signed countless autographs, all while answering questions from a rather cowed media scrum. Lots of questions. In fact, she answered so many questions that, according to Politico -- who was actually there and not relying on an anonymous source -- the press kind of fizzled out. Here's what Ben Smith said:
By the time she trudged up a dirt parking lot to the fair's VIP area, only ten or so reporters were left, and we'd run out of questions. She looked up, seeming a bit startled by the silence, and drew a few more.
Nobody asked her about the natural gas pipeline which looks all but dead. Nobody asked her about the current governor's attempt to undoe her oil tax policy in Alaska. Both of which were her signature pieces of legislation. No reporter even mentioned her quitting on Alaskans.
And nobody is the wiser about her presidential aspirations. She did say that she would decide in September, and that if she did run, it would be a very unconventional campaign, according to the LA Times:
"Each campaign that I've ever run in these 20 years of elected office has been kind of unconventional, right, Todd?" Palin said, turning to her husband. "I've always been outspent 2:1, 5:1, 10:1. I never won any polls heading into election night but usually won the election."
She said that if she were to run, she wouldn't do things the "traditional" way. "We want new! We want new energy, we want conviction and passion and candidness, even if through that candidates make mistakes," she said.
Dozens of journalists swarmed around Palin as she exited the hog barn to hear her say that she ... hasn't decided yet whether she's going to run for president. But she's close, she said. Next month. Definitely.
"Practically speaking," Palin said, "it has to be."
The longer Palin waits, the greater the chance that Texas Gov. Rick Perry - who enters the race today in South Carolina and is scheduled to stump in Iowa on Sunday - could take Palin's place in the hearts of the social conservatives whom Palin and Perry appeal to.
Those conservatives who have flocked around Palin, a conservative evangelical Christian, are likely to dominate the straw poll but same-sex marriage and abortion aren't on the top of the minds of many Iowa voters.
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