Barracuda watch

An Alaskan friend of Christopher Orr reinforces my vibe that Sarah Palin is no Dan Quayle. If Troopergate or some as-yet unknown scandal or the sheer near-impossibility of prepping for a national campaign from scratch don't fell her (okay, a lot of ifs), she's going to be trouble for Democrats:

What the Republicans missed about Sarah Palin then--and what the Democrats seem poised to miss now--is that she is a true political savant; a candidate with a knack for identifying the key gripes of the populace and packaging herself as the solution. That keen political nose has enabled her to routinely outperform her resume. Nearly two years into her administration, she still racks up approval ratings of 80 per cent or better.

She also won some three quarters of the vote in her reelection as Mayor of Wasilla. Many local observers of her performance in both offices cast her as authoritarian, ill-informed and politically opportunistic. But the mass of voters think otherwise.