Randy Highsmith drove roughly 80 miles, spent the night in a parking lot hunkered down in a sleeping bag and waited more than hour with several hundred people as storm clouds gathered overhead — all just to spend just a few seconds in the presence of his icon.Read the rest of the story here.
And he loved every minute of it.
Highsmith was ecstatic shortly after leaving the Barnes & Noble bookstore in The Villages, where he met former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, whose book tour landed in Florida on Tuesday.
Palin’s visit to The Villages was sandwiched between appearances in the Jacksonville suburb of Orange Park and Orlando.
“She’s my political hero,” gushed Highsmith, tightly embracing two autographed copies of Palin’s memoir, “Going Rogue: An American Life,” and a handful of bookmarks. “I think she is as amazing as she is on TV.”Highsmith had driven down from High Springs to The Villages on Monday night, arriving about 11 p.m. with his daughter, Alyssa, and father-in-law, Earl Mock.
There, the trio discovered that 114 people had already beat them to a spot in the store’s parking lot, awaiting Palin’s scheduled stop at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday.
Last year’s Republican vice presidential candidate, who remains coy about her future presidential ambitions, had already provided Highsmith a reason to be thrilled by the book.
He serves as the national chairman of a group — 2012draftsarahcommittee.com — that hopes to see Palin to run for president, and Highsmith’s organization drew kudos from Palin in the book for its support of her.
“Not since Ronald Reagan have I been so excited about a political candidate,” Highsmith said. “I think she’s the standard-bearer for conservatives for 2010 and beyond.”
- JP
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