Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin Read Online Free PDF Page B

built-in countertop for a nonexistent receptionist. Cartoons, a pinup-girl calendar, and sheets of tacked-on paper littered the walls, floors, and windows. Were it not for the optimism filling my heart, the word
dump
might have crossed my mind.
    With a bathroom that self-locked and required a credit card to pick open, a large storage closet, two mini-offices, and a third office for candidate Palin, command central was a diamond in the rough. Sarah’s ex-brother in law, Jack McCann, had contributed some decent desks and chairs, so we had at least a small sense of office potential.
    I’d arrived at around ten o’clock and met a small group of volunteers who came and went over the next hours. I would soon learn that with the exception of me and an ex-correctional officer named Kelly Sharrow, this was a family affair.
    Sarah arrived shortly after me, dressed for work in jeans and with her hair pinned back. She set down paint supplies next to her omnipresent oversized red shoulder bag.
    â€œFrank, thank you,” she said, shaking my hand. A radiant smile, framed by chocolate colored eyes that would later charm hardened members of the media like Bill Kristol and Sean Hannity, lit up the room. Sarah asked me repeatedly about my wife, kids, and extended family. When I explained that my father had passed away two yearsearlier—and was unable to mask the pain of that loss—her condolences were sincere. She asked questions and got me talking about myself. Her interest in a person she’d known for all of an hour was flattering, endearing, refreshing, and energizing all at once.
    For me, it took only a minute to see beyond her physical charm to a warming heart. Though not yet a powerful political voice, Sarah was more than a former beauty queen (Miss Wasilla, 1984), she was a concerned Alaskan woman on a mission. As we spoke, there was none of that “You betcha!” folksy manner that provided so much material for political satirists, standup comics, and impressionists during the 2008 presidential campaign. It was straight-up, neighbor-to-neighbor or parishioner-to-parishioner, from-the-heart conversation. Later on, in March 2006, as I was recruiting a woman to join us as a fund-raiser, I summed up my impressions this way:
    Sarah is an absolutely wonderful woman . . .
    She’s a mother of 4, her husband works on the slope. They are commercial fishermen in the summers out in Bristol Bay. Just regular folks, but she was a 2 term Mayor out in Wasilla and really pulled that city out of its regulatory doldrums to turn it into one of the fastest growing cities in the U.S. . . .
    Her last run for political office was for Lieutenant Governor. She went up against Loren Lehman, who outspent her 5 to 1, and he only beat her by 1400 votes or 2% . . .
    I have had people write to us at the campaign and tell us that while they don’t agree with a stance Sarah has taken, they support her run for Gov, because they respect her being open on the issues . . . She is not fake, but a real everyday person.
    She is EXTREMELY fiscally conservative.
    It took no more than a minute for me to appreciate her honesty and integrity; a theme she emphasized throughout the campaign. In one early bout of pique about a gift she’d received after speaking to the local Bartlett Democratic Club, she answered a question about a gift disclosure this way:
“That was just a $4.00 cup they gave me . . . I’m so dam honest I even disclosed that gift!”
    While I was surprised at how few of us there were on that first day—maybe ten or twelve people in and out—we accomplished a great deal. Over seven hours, we completed most of the painting (the best touch being the gold stars of the Big Dipper on the Alaska state flag splashed across the entryway ceiling), shampooed carpets, vacuumed floors, and cleared trash.
    Sarah had brought along her younger daughters, four-year-old daughter Piper and eleven-year-old Willow. During