I don't even know where to start. She has her reasons, I'm sure, and the pundits on both sides will have theirs. I must admit, however, that it makes me happy, because it sure feels like a defeat.

Too bad this incredibly bad year for Republicans is a year (or three) too early. I want single-payer health care and there's a lot of suck-ass Democrats (Baucus, Dodd) in too deep with health care lobbyists to even put it on the table, to say nothing of the Repubs.

Even though Palin didn't -- and won't, hopefully -- ever have a vote in this national health care issue ... I'm pleased that this particular hand puppet is leaving the hand.

(The monkey's paw in all of this, of course, is that sooner or later she's going to be a pundit on Fox News, and get to very carefully craft a public persona, without things like having to be accountable to a voting public getting in the way of her fiery, down-home rhetoric. That is, until she forms her exploratory committee in 2011, anyway ...)