Your analysis about Reagan is correct, but you have to also consider that in 1978 Reagan was 68 years old, and Sarah is 23 years younger than Reagan was at the time, so I can't expect her to have comparable life and political experience as Reagan. Yet, Sarah has demonstrated during her brief political career that she has an extraordinary capacity to lead and motivate, which helped Alaska improve on her watch. During that time she did more for Alaska than many prior governors had done in full terms.
Sarah may not have all the experience that Reagan had, but she has the wisdom, charisma, and conservative values of Ronald Reagan. And more importantly, she believes in them. She has a fighting spirit and the tenacity to follow her ideals in a way I haven't seen recently in American politics. I can't think of a Republican politician besides Palin that points out Obama's policies of destruction day in and day out. Yet no matter how much ridicule she endures from each end of the political spectrum, Sarah maintains the same passion for advancing her political values as Reagan did.
Though your post aims to ridicule Sarah and belittle her accomplishments, the fact is that she is an accomplished politician and woman, that has a large, dedicated following. You can try to diminish her, but the fact is she has accomplished a lot more than other politicians that have been successful - indeed, she is more accomplished and experienced than Obama who won with 53% of the vote.
If you think such strengths (which are present in true leaders such as Reagan and now Palin) have less weight than the innuendo and hateful comments the mainstream media peddles, or the conventional wisdom voiced by the Sarah haters, then you really underestimate Americans. It is true that Americans made a mistake when they elected Obama, and it is true that every time they elect a democrat they make a mistake, but something tells me that the USA would not have risen to its status in the world if the American people only continued to make mistakes. When push comes to shove, Americans come through.
That's why, I believe that after the mistake of electing Obama, we as a country will vote for a true conservative reformer the next time around. And if Sarah decides to run, she has what it takes to build on her public persona (much like Reagan did when he had comparable negatives at a similar point before the 1980 election) and win people over.
Even if everything you wrote was true and valid, the voters managed to elect a guy like Obama to the presidency. If an Obama can rise to the most powerful position in the world, there's no reason Sarah Palin can't.
It's not her values or conservatism that many of us doubt, Victoria. It's her intelligence. All the heart-felt values in the world are useless when presented with a problem beyond one's ability to comprehend. The presidency comes with a load of problems that demand a keen mind, and I'm sorry, I haven't seen a shred of evidence that she possesses one.
Someone else mentioned that FR is an echo chamber, and it's a true statement. So, the fact even here, amongst people who fall to the right of any conventional definition of conservative, she has so many detractors should tell any thinking person that she's not going to be president. She's not going to win the nomination even if she runs.
If by some Perotish quirk she does win the nomination, you can bet that many otherwise faithful Republicans, myself included, will not vote for her. Not because we'd prefer Obama, but because in the event of a Palin nomination, the message must be sent that it is unacceptable lest it happen again. We'd rather deal with four more years than open the door to future Palins. That way, when we do take back the presidency, we'll do so with a candidate who'll do us proud and not embarrass us for the next four years as Carter embarrassed the Democrats.