Sarah Palin decision not to run locks in GOP presidential field

JENNIFER JACOBS and JASON NOBLE

The Des Moines Register

October 6, 2011 ET

The deci­sion by Re­publican rogue Sarah Palin not to run for pres­ident almost certainly locks into place the Re­publican field vying to chal­lenge incumbent Demo­crat Barack Obama.
The deci­sion came just a day af­ter New Jer­sey Gov. Chris Christie also dec­lined to run,"It's unlikely that any big name can­didate is go­ing to swoop in at this point," said Uni­versity of Iowa po­lit­ical sci­entist Tim­o­thy Hagle.
Palin, the 2008 vice pres­idential nom­i­nee and for­mer gover­nor of Alaska, an­nounced her deci­sion Wednesday evening in a letter to support­ers. Rather than seeking office her­self, she will focus on electing oth­ers that share her commit­ment to "freedom and free mar­kets,"           

she said.

"I be­lieve that at this time I can be more ef­fective in a decisive role to help elect oth­er true public servants to office -- from the nation's gover­nors to con­gres­sion­al seats and the pres­idency," Palin wrote.
In most national polls, the field is led by for­mer Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who is seen as rel­atively moderate, fol­lowed by more conservative can­didates, such as Texas Gov. Rick Perry, busi­nessman Herman Cain, Minnesota Con­gresswoman Michele Bachmann and for­mer Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santo­rum. Ron Paul, the lib­ertar­ian-leaning Texas con­gressman, and for­mer House Speaker Newt Gingrich round out the field of those com­peting in Iowa. For­mer Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman is skipping Iowa and focus­ing on New                         

Hampshire.

"It gets down to saying, 'Now is the time for choos­ing,'" said Iowa Tea Party Chairman Ryan Rhodes.
The can­didate whom Re­publicans in Iowa and across the nation will choose, howev­er, re­mains very much an open question.With­out Palin, "the race in Iowa will now be be­tween Romney and some­one else -- hard to tell who at this point," said Re­publican Au­drey Perry Mar­tin, a California-based election law attor­ney and politics watch­er. "Romney is the only can­didate with sta­ble support right now, and the oth­er can­didates are jockeying to be his main com­pe­tition."
Since los­ing the 2008 election, Palin has been a me­dia sen­sa­tion, writing books, com­ment­ing reg­ularly on Fox News, en­gaging support­ers on       

Facebook and drawing at­tention from the national me­dia at ev­ery turn.

But much of that at­tention stemmed from a single question: Will she or won't she?
Palin behaved like an quasi-can­didate for months, dropping in on the first-in-the-nation voting state of Iowa three times this summer. The first vis­it was for the pre­miere of a doc­u­mentary about her life, timed to co­incide with