Sarah Palin On Mitt Romney's Conservatism: 'I'm Not Convinced'

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has tried as best she can to remain diplomatic when it comes to assessing the state of the 2012 primary race. Her skepticism of Mitt Romney has been evident throughout, but it's always couched with strained excuses as to why voters should back Newt Gingrich -- usually, the excuse being that voters should vote to keep the primary going.

That changed slightly on Sunday morning when the 2008 vice presidential candidate took some legitimate swipes at the GOP frontrunner.

"I trust that his idea of conservatism is evolving and I base this on a pretty moderate past he has had, even in some cases a liberal past," Palin told Fox News Sunday. "He agreed with mandating on a state level what his constituents needed to be provided, needed to purchase in the way of health care and Romneycare, which of course was the precursor to Obamneycare."

Palin then went on to correct herself, calling it "Obamacare" before deciding that she should "coin" the term "Obamneycare," though Tim Pawlenty actually has the rights to that one.

"I am not convinced [of Romney's conservatism] and I don’t think that the majority of GOP and independent voters are convinced, and that is why you don’t see Romney get over that hump," Palin continued. "He is still in the thirty-percentile mark when it comes to approval and primary wins and caucus wins. He still hasn't risen above that yet because we are not convinced... He has spent millions and millions and millions of dollars and hasn't risen yet."

Romney's difficulties with the conservative base are fairly well documented -- and often overstated. And while Palin's comments on Sunday don't help the cause, it would have been a lot more damaging had they come a year or so ago, when more GOP voters took their cues from her.

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Comments

[HOT ICE]

07:58 PM on 02/15/2012

Mitt Romney is getting 30% of votes of the Republican Primary Voters. Palin says "He is still in the thirty-percentile mark when it comes to approval and .......". She should know the difference between the terms "percentile" and "percent" before she makes such comments on the National TV.

[RENA PICKEL]

05:39 PM on 02/15/2012

Sarah P needs to go home.!! She is like me ~~~~~she has only 1 vote. Mitt Romey will bring this country out nof the mess we are in!!! Obama, has done nothing but LIE to the AMERICAN people.
If we are DUMB enough to VOTE this awful man to office we deserve what we get. Ameica will be on fire like Greece. Rick Santorum is a Washington insider!!! Simple as that!!!

[Dan Leo]

02:24 AM on 02/15/2012

http://palinyouth.blogspot.com/2012/02/dear-rick-i-seen-on-tv-that-you-are-now.html

[getoffmedz]

07:14 PM on 02/14/2012

Sarah who??

[RENA PICKEL]

05:40 PM on 02/15/2012

I will be glad when we can say OBAMA who !!!

[sweatermoose]

12:50 PM on 02/14/2012

Sweatermoose on Sarah Palin's Relevance, Intelligence, and Integrity: 'I'm Not Convinced.'

[IndependentAndProud]

12:37 AM on 02/14/2012

She's not convinced.
Yeah, so?

[ChaCubed]

09:56 PM on 02/13/2012

Sarah Palin: Pundit.

Only in Bizarro World.

[bbbot]

09:06 PM on 02/13/2012

Notice how the interest factor in general, toward the gop primaries has waned.

[trron9]

05:42 PM on 02/13/2012

Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, since your political ambitions to be Vice President failed America has grown tired of you, although I personally don't support Romney who are you to criticize him as you didn't fulfill your obligations to the good people of Alaska! Obama 2012!

[Rexter]

04:56 PM on 02/13/2012

"Sarah Palin 'Not Convinced' Of Romney's Conservatism"

And if she were? What difference would it make.

[NoBliss]

03:08 PM on 02/13/2012

Sarah Palin commenting on the degree of Romney's conservatism is like Charles Manson commenting on Son of Sams' sanity.

[ardis]

02:25 PM on 02/13/2012

I'm Not Convinced Palin: "But I support Gingrich because when he called the Ryan Plan "extremist..right wing social engineering", trashed free enterprise "rich people manipulating 1000s & talking all the money", promoted the Individual Mandate at the Fed level for 20 years, lobbied for Freddie Mac until it tanked the U.S. economy, was $300,000 ethics sanctioned booted out of the House leadership by conservatives in his own Party, dumped two sick wives for mistresses, and spent the last ten years sitting on a couch with Pelosi, Hillary, & Al Sharpton selling their statist agendas--I JUST KNEW HE WAS A TRUE CONSERVATIVE, so keep voting for Newt in the GOP primaries so we can keep vetting Romney." It's an ambarrassment that Foxnews is paying this clown to spew her unhinged garbage. Palin is an A-Grade idiot. Ditto Talk Radio & assorted carping talking heads. The problem isn't free market success story with balanced budgets Romney, the problem is the loser "Anybody But RomneyBots" derangement syndromes making fools of themselves chasing one will 'o the wisp deficit executive experience Beltway establishment hacks after another intent on a lemming suicide pack in November. No wonder general election voters are coming to the conclusion (read the new polls) the GOP brand is not serious & is not fit to govern. It manifestly is not.

[getoffmedz]

07:07 PM on 02/14/2012

Nice work.

F&F

[FromViewAbove]

02:14 PM on 02/13/2012

Heads Up Sarah, if you suck and tell, you could end up with dry mouth in 2012.

[Foraker]

01:27 PM on 02/13/2012

Careful there....Palin almost sound like she's trying to get the Democratic vote for Mitt.

[Seymourhiney]

01:26 PM on 02/13/2012

I am totally convinced that Palin is always in a state of funk. How does this half baked/half term governor of a state with 600,000 people citizen Romney, who was Mass governor, served a full term in the state of 6,587,536. Romney left office and the state had the highest % of citizens with health insurance.