Sarah Palin to resign Alaska governor's office this month

Alaska governor Sarah Palin is resigning, she said in a news conference in her Wasilla home this morning, and will inaugurate Lt. Governor Sean Parnell on Saturday, July 25. Immediate speculation is that she is preparing for a run at the 2012 presidency; the timing of the announcement, on a day that most public employees are off work, is curious. She made the disclosure flanked by most of her staff, including Parnell, and she would not make any comments as to why she was resigning, or answer questions. She did say that she believed she would be more effective outside of the government; and that "I know when to pass the ball for the team... and when to pass the ball for victory."

Some political watchers and media pundits on Twitter publicly wondered whether Palin's resignation was connected to the Todd Purdum profile in Vanity Fairthat posited Barack Obama won the presidency in 2008 because of Palin's position on the Republican ticket. And certainly, the statement released by her office reflects this conjecture; "Once I decided not to run for re-election [as Alaska governor], I also felt that to embrace the conventional Lame Duck status in this particular climate would just be another dose of politics as usual, something I campaigned against and will always oppose." While the imagery expressed by these words reflect political weakness, her fans have taken the news to mean hope for 2012. Whether she could overcome the significant questions about her intelligence and leadership ability, not to mention her many ethical and familial liabilities, is doubtful.