The Glorious Third

By Hendrik Hertzberg
The New Yorker

Sara, Sara,
Whatever made you want to change your mind?
Sara, Sara,
So easy to look at, so hard to define.
—Bob Dylan, “Sara.”

Sarah Palin spells her Christian name a letter longer than the singer spells his muse’s, but her whims are likewise elusive and her motives similarly mysterious. Ever since the 2008 Republican nominee for Vice-President of the United States suddenly announced that she would resign the governorship of Alaska at the end of July, nearly sixteen months before the expiration of what was supposed to be her first term, a single question has been on every lip: What on earth was that all about?

No one knows. Speculation, some of it fact-based, abounds. She is sick of politics. Or she’s just sick of Alaska politics and wants to do her politicking in the Lower 48. Or she wants to run for senator next year. Or she wants to help other Republicans running for senator or governor in other states, with a view to collecting Presidential I.O.U.s. Or she needs time to coach the ghostwriter and promote the product of a cash-rich book project she recently signed a contract for. Or she thinks the Alaska legislature is getting stroppy (e.g., it might override her refusal to accept millions in federal stimulus funds) and figures it’s better to let her lieutenant governor take the fall. Or she wants to fish more. Or there’s an asteroid-size scandal hurtling her way, and she wants to be outside the blast area when it detonates. Or there’s no big scandal, just a lot of little ones that aren’t even true but nonetheless require the services of lawyers too pricey to retain on a government salary. Or she’s bored. Or (though she is one of the few political job-quitters in memory not to have given this as a reason, as well as one of the few who could say it plausibly) she wants to spend time with her family....(Remainder.)