Public Image of Sarah Palin - Suitability For President

Suitability For President

A February 2010 ABC News/Washington Post poll showed 71% of Americans felt Palin lacked the qualifications necessary to be President of the United States. In a poll from October 2010 the number dropped to 67%, with 27% seeing her as qualified and with self-described Tea party members split evenly.

In response to people such as Republican strategist Karl Rove who have suggested that starring in the reality show Sarah Palin's Alaska may be incompatible with running for president in 2012, Palin pointed out that Ronald Reagan was an actor prior to becoming president. This led former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan to write, "Excuse me, but this was ignorant even for Mrs. Palin. Reagan people quietly flipped their lids, but I'll voice their consternation to make a larger point." According to Noonan, who described Palin as a "nincompoop", "Here is an old tradition badly in need of return: You have to earn your way into politics." In a similar vein, former Reagan White House political director Ed Rollins invoked the line Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy in expressing his view that Palin is "no Reagan." Other prominent Republicans to oppose her include former First Lady Barbara Bush, and language such as "a problem" and "virtually unelectable" continued to accompany the prospect of a Palin candidacy among Republican pundits through 2010 and early 2011.