Geraghty: The Sarah Palin Show Comes to the NRA

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NRO's Jim Geraghty blogged that Sarah Palin related to her NRA convention audience Friday on a very personal level:

Palin’s appearance here was widely interpreted as an omen of her interest in running in 2012. But the NRA members did not greet, listen, and applaud her as a potential president; her connection with the crowd was on a much more personal level, almost as if listening to an intimate friend. Palin herself, has lost any semblance of speaking like a politician; there’s no jargon, no strategic ambiguity or opaque wording; she’s moved from dropping her ‘g’s to punctuating each point with a sarcastic jab at her image in the eyes of her critics — “Oh, but I’m the idiot.” She took a moment to defend President Obama from a criticism from an animal-rights group over killing a fly: “Swat away, Mr. President.”

In his brief introduction of her, the NRA’s Chris Cox described her as “a literal force of nature.” We can quibble whether or not she has become a hurricane or heat wave; but as a road show, she’s continuing to leave dazzled audiences in her wake.

WBTV's first report was below the headline "Sarah Palin stirs up NRA conventioneers in Charlotte":

The crowd erupted in applause when the former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican candidate for vice president walked to the podium around 2:30 p.m.

She told the crowd she had already told the 'tech guys' to turn off the TelePrompTer and that she had her speech right here as she pointed to her palm which read "I love the NRA!"

Palin is an NRA member who has drawn praise from the group for supporting gun rights.

The Associated Press seized on Gov. Palin's remarks during her speech that the Obama administration and the Democrats are no friends of America's 80 million firearms owners:

Sarah Palin says President Barack Obama and his Democratic allies would ban guns and ammunition if they could get away with it.

The former Alaska governor said during a speech Friday before the National Rifle Association that political backlash is the only thing stopping Obama from gutting the Second Amendment. Palin says the public needs to stop Democrats in their tracks, starting with the November elections.

Time Warner's cable news service "News 14 Carolina" reported:

She told a crowd at Time Warner Cable Arena that criminals -- not guns -- are responsible for gun violence, and that legal gun owners know how to make their voices heard responsibly.

“Don’t retreat, reload,” the former Alaska governor told the crowd. “When we talk like that, they think it’s inciting violence; it’s not. We know that our power, our arms, politically speaking, is the ballot box.”

- JP