What Is Palin's Allure?

I don't get it. If you can't hang with Katie Couric in an interview, etc., how do you translate yourself as big-stage political material? Are conservatives that desperate? Apparently, yes they are. A thousand lined up in Noblesville, one town north of me, to get 30 seconds of face time and a book signed. From the Indy Star report:

Best-selling author Sarah Palin pulled in the parking lot of Hamilton Town Center in Noblesville at 5:40 p.m. to a crowd chanting her name.

"Sarah, Sarah, Sarah ..."

She got off the bus holding her youngest son, 19-month-old Trig. At the podium, she thanked everyone waiting in the rain for her arrival. People had initially been in line starting around 7 a.m. today to get 1,000 wristbands, used to limit the number of people getting books signed. They lined up again about 3 p.m. to prepare to enter the store. She called them good hard-working Americans, the people from whom she wrote her book "Going Rogue."

I can see going if you gave money during the Presidential run, although if I had, it might be to demand answers more than anything.

But really, what's the allure? I remember the Couric interview, where she said in essense that the bailout had to be done. That's a deal-killer for me, straight away. I don't get how 'conservatives' can be so excited about a fiscal liberal. Is it that her other 'conservative' bona fides simply cancel out everything else with so many Republicans? I just don't get it.