Poor Sarah Palin; Nowhere near as rich as critics say

Acquiring a lot of money didn't used to be a bad thing in America, even for Democrats. But now that President Barack Obama has got his and suggests there really ought to be a limit to wealth, many are implying that acquiring mucho moohla as retired Republican Gov. Sarah Palin has done -- and is doing -- is somehow, well, sort of un-American.

When it comes to money and people and the combination thereof, there is no greater authority than Forbes.

So in true Forbes tradition, diligent Dirk Smillie set out to estimate just how many endangered U.S. dollars not yet in China have been acquired by Alaskan Palin since her gubernatorial resignation almost exactly one year ago. His results will disappoint Palin's hypocritical wealthy critics.

As a private citizen now, Palin is no longer required to publicly report her income. And there's no way in Skagway she's going to volunteer such info to anyone, let alone the likes of ABC or NBC News.

Noted Palin un-lover Norah O'Donnell, who's not exactly pulling down homeless income from NBC, recently threw out the number of $12 million earnings in the past 12 months for the mother of five and wife of an oil field union member and snow-machine racer.

According to Smillie, Not!

In fact, not even close.

Try around half of that. Maybe $10 mill max. More likely seven. Still an attractive chunk of change for most of us not named George Soros or Barbra Streisand. 

Smillie talks to an inside source and carefully pores over Palin's public reports, "Going Rogue" book advance, likely royalty earnings on 2.2 million ongoing sales minus the advance, rough Fox News commentary compensation (BTW, Palin will talk immigration Friday evening on the "O'Reilly Factor"), estimated Discovery Channel documentary dollars and a dozen speeches so far for around $100k each.

Meanwhile today, Palin's SARAHPac sent another e-mail appeal out seeking donations to continue her travels and donations in support of "common-sense conservatives." She said:

We have to make the choice as a nation between continuing on our destructive path of deficit spending that is moving us towards economic disaster, and saying ‘enough is enough’.

If the Democrats are allowed to maintain their large majorities in the House and Senate, our economy will continue to struggle under the looming threat of tax hikes, the scope of the Federal Government will continue to expand, and the national debt will spiral out of control.

So, don't cry for her, Alaska. And the good news for Palin, whatever her last year's earnings, they were sufficient to afford that backyard fence back in Wasilla to guard against the transient peeping Joe next door.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Getty Images

Comments

[Greg]

She's richer than most Americans, though.

[Trotter]

Greg,

Half of all Americans +1 are richer than most Americans...

[madmag]

Dumber, too.

[Bullwinkle]

It's not how much money she has, it's the fact that she quit her job in office, right when she saw how much money she could make off the gullible.

[William Shipley]

She quit her job last August when she realized that the Demogratic strategy was to keep her out of the 2010 election by filing almost daily ethics charges claiming such things as that she answered reporter's questions in her office and some of the questions weren't about official business.

The idea was that it was free to file ethics complaints, you didn't even have to be a real person. And she could spend the next year and a half filing responses. Then they could campaign on how many ethics complaints there were.

She saw through the strategy and is now in the game for 2010 in a big way. And they're sorry.

[Hostile Knowledge]

I just love listening to the progressive rimmers screech every time Palin's name is mentioned.

Hey! Progressives! Can you say "Madame President?"

[Newagegop]

It's baffling to me why democrats (not progressives) are really worried about Palin. She's got a serious libertarian streak. Civil unions, defacto drug decriminalization, school choice, free markets...I'm not sure why she's so scary. It really must be folks believing the media image of her vs. her actual governing style and record. You can't support Rand Paul and be that scary.

[DEO]

implying that acquiring mucho moohla as retired Republican Gov. Sarah Palin has done -- and is doing -- is somehow, well, sort of un-American.
______________________________
It's not that. You're missing the point.
No one begrudges $arah making a buck....it's the silly hypocricy and lip service that is hilarious.

You know...she is the poster child for christian conservative values and her daughter is sleeping with a boyfriend in the next room and produces a love child. Doesn't even enter the sanctity of marriage. At least when $arah herself got knocked up pre nuptuals, she married, and had Track 8 months later.
SOOOO, then she pontificates about her SERVANTS HEART, blah, blah blah and she doesn't DO ANYTHING without charging $100,000.00.

She's a charleton....they are good at making a buck, but lets call a spade a spade.

[Lberalism:the real bridge to nowhere]

Feminism is being redefined in a way that lefty deficit promoters such as Boxer,Pelosi,Kagan and Napolitano see as a threat....what a blessing for the rest of us.

[Kate]

Whatever she's made, it's more than enough to cover the balance of her legal bills without asking her fans for more money. I think it's reprehensible that a woman who makes more in a 30 minute speech than many Americans make in a year, has the nerve to ask for money.

As far as her leaving due to what she called frivolous ethics complaints, if they were so frivolous and she had a personal attorney and state attorneys working on them, she was obviously free to do her job. She didn't need her office to do any work on them, unless she's very poor at delegating, which wouldn't surprise me in the least. If she had just admitted she was quitting to make enough money to take care of her special needs son in his later years, I'd have said more power to her and would have understood. Instead, she lied about it, however, considering her past I should not have been surprised. Lying is her strong suit.