Palin-Beck ticket? You betcha

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fox news / the associated press Sarah Palin, seen during an interview Wednesday on the Fox News Channel, says Glenn Beck (inset) is �a hoot.� (CP)

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FILE - In this May 5, 2009 file photo, newscaster Glenn Beck attends the Time 100 Gala, a celebration of TIME Magazine's 100 most influential people in the world in New York. (AP Photo/Evan Agostini, file) (CP)

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The Associated Press People stand in line early to meet Palin. (CP)

WASHINGTON -- Palin-Beck 2012?

Sarah Palin has suggested Fox News firebrand Glenn Beck could be someone she'd consider as a running mate if she makes a bid for the White House in two years.

"I can envision a couple of different combinations, if ever I were to be in a position to really even seriously consider running for anything in the future, and I'm not there yet," Palin told the conservative news agency Newsmax as she promoted her memoir, Going Rogue: An American Life.

"But Glenn Beck I have great respect for. He's a hoot. He gets his message across in such a clever way. And he's so bold -- I have to respect that. He calls it like he sees it and he's very, very, very effective."

Palin and Beck have long been admirers of one another, with the former Alaska governor often praising the Fox News host on her Facebook page. A Palin-Beck ticket would be a dream come true for the legion of so-called tea party protesters vehemently opposed to Barack Obama's presidency.

The pair shares a tendency to strike fear into the hearts of their supporters. Palin, for her part, has alleged Obama is aiming to do away with the elderly and infirm with the so-called death panels in his health-care reform overhaul, while Beck has accused the president of being a racist, a socialist and has also drawn parallels between his policies and those of Adolf Hitler.

The Anti-Defamation League has cited Beck, who also has a syndicated radio show, as the "most important mainstream media figure who has repeatedly helped to stoke the fires of anti-government anger."

Needless to say, it's a potential ticket that has some moderate Republicans squeamish.

"It's not going to happen; it's not anybody's dream," Republican strategist Charles Black, who worked on John McCain's presidential campaign last year, said Wednesday when reached at his D.C. office.

"It's way too early to be focused on it. We don't even know who's going to run."

Palin has been playing coy about her presidential aspirations as she promotes Going Rogue this week, saying that running for president in 2012 is not on her "radar screen right now" while suggesting at the same time it's not beyond the realm of possibility.

But with the media blitz has come fresh criticism from those who helped run McCain's campaign. This time, however, they aren't hiding beyond the cloak of anonymity -- they're openly accusing Palin of lying both in her memoir and in her high-profile interviews this week.

Steve Schmidt, McCain's campaign manager, has already dismissed Palin's portrayal of him in Going Rogue as "fanciful and total fiction."

And now Nicolle Wallace, another McCain strategist, is bitterly disputing Palin's assertion she pressured the self-styled hockey mom into her infamous interview with CBS's Katie Couric last fall by telling her the news anchor had low self-esteem.

"The whole notion there was a conversation where I tried to cajole her into a conversation with Katie is fiction," Wallace told MSNBC.

-- The Canadian Press

She can still draw a crowd

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. -- Hundreds of Sarah Palin fans lined up Wednesday at a Michigan book store to get the chance to meet the former Alaska governor as she kicked off a national tour for her book Going Rogue.

Some supporters camped out overnight to be among the first to get wristbands from the Barnes and Noble bookstore at Woodland Mall in Grand Rapids. Those with the orange bands had the opportunity to have the former 2008 Republican vice-presidential candidate sign their copies of the book at the three-hour signing event Wednesday evening.

The memoir was released Tuesday but has topped best-seller lists for weeks.

"Everyone here has been excited and patient," Barnes and Noble spokeswoman Maddie Hjulstrom said of the waiting crowd.

Calvin College students Megan Patzky and Sarah Cranmer were among those waiting overnight to get wrist bands. The two 20-year-olds skipped their Wednesday classes at the private college located less than a mile from the book store.

-- The Associated Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 19, 2009 A16