I agree that the Africa story was a little far-fetched to begin with (regardless of whether it is true or untrue), but the stories about infighting within the campaign had already been leaking out well before the election was over.
I really don't think it was ever in question that she and McCain didn't see eye to eye on everything. This is completely common in political campaigns between candidates and the VP candidate. It happened to Kerry and Edwards when Kerry wanted Edwards to be an attack dog but Edwards wouldn't do it for his own political future. I don't think it is going out on a limb to say McCain and Palin were fighting some (which was probably aggravated even further by the fact that they were running behind in the polls). Its incredibly normal.
And Palin was put on political lockdown by the campaign shortly after the Couric interview so that something similar didn't happen again (which was a smart move in my book simply to let the story get out of the frontpages). Once again, it doesn't prove that Palin is an idiot, but it shows that people within the campaign had major concerns about the public perceptions of her in that way.
Regardless, don't expect Sarah Palin to disappear from the spotlight. We will hear a lot about her between now and 2012. Both the media and Palin are happy to see her in the news, and people are interested in stories about Palin. She's definitely famous after this election season and she has higher aspirations as she claims herself:
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/11/11/palin-not-ruling-out-2012-bid/
Palin not ruling out 2012 bid
As Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin heads to Florida to attend the Republican Governors Association annual conference in Miami, she says she'd consider a run for the White House in 2012 or beyond.
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
