Is This Guy Sarah Palin's Secret Weapon in Iowa?

What a surprise! My Main Man and all around great guy, Peter Singleton makes the Wall street Journal! A pretty fair article; it is kind of surprising to see what others may think of you. No other candidate has this type of dedicated grassroots support.


Hey Iowa, if you run into Peter, shake his hand and tell him you're ready to volunteer for an unconventional campaign to Revive, Restore, and Renew America in 2012! .~ teledude

The Wall Street Journal
By NEIL KING JR.

(excerpt)
DES MOINES, Iowa—Prominent Republicans here pretty much splinter into two camps on the question of whether Sarah Palin will jump into the 2012 presidential race.

One side points to a mysterious California lawyer named Peter Singleton as proof the former Alaska governor will definitely run. The other side points to Mr. Singleton as proof she won't.

"When it comes to Palin in Iowa, it's pretty much Peter Singleton," said Iowa Tea Party Director Ryan Rhodes. "The guy is everywhere."

Crisscrossing the state in a series of rented cars, the 56-year-old Mr. Singleton has spent the better part of five months visiting obscure county GOP chairmen, befriending tea-party activists, buttonholing lawmakers in the lobby of the state Capitol, and amassing a database of potential Palin supporters. His base camp is the Days Inn in West Des Moines, where he washes his shirts in the sink.

Deepening the mystery: Mr. Singleton swears he has never met Ms. Palin and has no contact with her team. "I'm just a dedicated activist working on my own," he said.Ms. Palin's aides concur, insisting that she hasn't met with Mr. Singleton and that he is in no way coordinating with her political-action committee.

But not many Republicans here buy the lone-wolf theory.

"I came away from our conversation convinced Mr. Singleton is organizing for her, and has an inside track on her 2012 campaign," said Jeff Jorgensen, GOP chairman of Pottawattamie County in the state's southwestern corner. He met with Mr. Singleton over breakfast last month.

State Sen. Kent Sorenson, an up-and-comer in Iowa tea-party circles, emerged from his talks with the Menlo Park lawyer with a different conclusion.

"To send someone you've never met, an operative from another state, just seems odd," he said. "It suggests Sarah Palin is simply not serious about Iowa." Mr. Sorenson plans to support Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann if she runs.

Ms. Palin's plans for 2012 remain a big topic across a state famed for its first-in-the-nation caucus, a contest—now set for February—that rewards those who really work the state, from county fairs to small-town living rooms.

Ms. Palin, who appeared at a tea-party event in Wisconsin over the weekend, is slipping in most national polls, but GOP activists here believe she would scramble the emerging field if she jumps in. She told Fox News this week that it is still too early to decide whether to jump into the 2012 race.

Other presumed candidates—Tim Pawlenty, Haley Barbour, Newt Gingrich—are now popping into Iowa almost weekly. Many are beginning to hire operatives and lease office space.

But Republicans strain to cite any evidence of a fledgling Palin campaign in Iowa—beyond the ubiquitous Mr. Singleton. Ms. Palin hasn't visited the state since December.

"I can't think of a single person outside of him who says they're ready to drop everything and work for Sarah Palin if she runs," said Maureen Olsen, publisher and editor of the Neola Gazette and state president of the Iowa Federation of Republican Women.

The tall, sleepy-eyed Silicon Valley lawyer and former Oracle salesman seems to have found his calling in Iowa's political byways. Until last year, he had never worked on a political campaign. A Northern California native, he spent a decade as a small-time investor after leaving Oracle in the mid-1990s. He then got a law degree and clerked for a Nevada Supreme Court justice, at age 52.

He first traveled to Iowa in August with a map of the state, and one contact at a tea-party group.

"I drove around to the big counties and went into the election offices to shake hands and meet people," he said, perched at a table in the basement of the state Capitol, where he can often be found hobnobbing lawmakers and scribbling notes on a legal pad.

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