Sarah Palin for President

Nothing sounds more like elections than Iowa, and no other name is as speculated as hers when talking about 2012. And when these elements are combined, the equation is solved: President Palin. She fosters the confusion, and some sectors within the Republican Party get very tense with the mere idea. The most recent case is that of Barbara Bush, wife of former President George Bush, Sr., who, during an interview with the eternal Larry King, flatly said: “I sat next to her once, thought she was beautiful. I think she’s very happy in Alaska, and I hope she’ll stay there.” As Americans would say: “Ouch.” That hurts.

But Palin is deaf to this music. She conducts her own media orchestra, supported by Fox and ultraconservative Glenn Beck, and uses her two books as intellectual score. The former governor of Alaska between 2006 and 2009, 46 years old, was yesterday complimented by her faithful fans in a bookstore in Des Moines, Iowa, where she went to promote her latest literary legacy, “America by Heart: Reflections on Family, Faith and Flag” (the three big Fs of family, faith and flag that matter in the life of the former Republican vice presidential candidate in 2008). “This is my America, from my heart and by my heart,” the politician says on the book released Tuesday.

“I give it now to my children and grandchildren, and to yours, so they will always know what it was like in America when people were free.” It appears, according to the illustrated Palin, that nowadays the United States is not a nation where its citizens are free.

Palin weighs “the state of things.” Or in other words, the creator of the term “mama grizzly” states that “here in Alaska, I always think of the mama grizzly bears that rise up on their hind legs when someone is coming to attack their cubs, to do something adverse toward their cubs.” She has not yet defined her view regarding 2012, but all her moves point in that direction — so much so that President Barack Obama has been questioned on the possibility of having to compete against the uncrowned queen of the ultraconservative tea party. “I don’t think about Sarah Palin,” Obama, self-controlled and confident as always, told ABC journalist Barbara Walters.

Supposedly, this week was expected to be calm and focused on giving thanks. But the long Thanksgiving weekend has offered information about Korea, with the extra contribution from Ms. Palin who, in a slip-of-the-tongue, mistook south and north and declared that the U.S. should stay with its “North Korean allies.” “They couldn’t resist the temptation to turn a simple one-word slip-of-the-tongue of mine into a major political headline,” Palin was quick to write on her Facebook page.

In an entry on her social network profile entitled “A Thanksgiving Message to All 57 States,” the former campaign mate of John McCain wryly referenced the error Obama made when he said during the election campaign back in 2008 that he had visited the 57 states, when in fact there are only 50 (plus the District of Columbia, or the nation’s capital, Washington). Palin says the liberal press has it out for her. Maybe. But she can’t deny she makes it really easy.