Ragarding 2012, Palin will make a calculated decision based on money, and nothing else. She's ignorant, but not stupid, so despite any delusions of grandeur, somewhere in that mind of hers she has to know she's unelectable. Consider the implications of running: she'll have to make her finances public and she'll have to step outside the cocoon of Fox. Her extremist views were just rejected in the swing states of Colorado and Nevada, and her protege was rejected in her home state of Alaska. So, it will all come down to the money, which is all she has ever been about.
"It does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are 20 gods or no god. It neither picks my pocket, nor breaks my leg."
-- Thomas Jefferson