INDIANOLA, Iowa – Sarah Palin delivered a populist broadside here Saturday against President Barack Obama, professional politicians of all stripes and what she called the “crony capitalism” that she said is destroying the country. But she offered no fresh clues about to whether she will seek the presidency in 2012.
The former Alaska governor used a tea party rally to chastise the president and a “permanent political class” that she said has protected their powers and enriched themselves, their friends and their contributors at the expense of ordinary Americans and the country’s well-being.
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“There is a name for this,” Palin said. “It’s called corporate crony capitalism. It’s not the capitalism of free men and free markets, of innovation and hard work and ethics, of sacrifice and of risk. No, this is the capitalism of connections and government bailouts and handouts … and influence peddling and corporate welfare.”
Palin has said she will announce by the end of this month whether she will join the race for the White House in 2012. On Friday night, she told reporters “there’s room for more” candidates in the GOP field and when she arrived to greet supporters at a local restaurant, she was greeted with chants of “Run, Sarah, run.”
Many of those in Saturday’s large and enthusiastic audience, who braved repeated downpours until shortly before Palin appeared, came in anticipation that she might tip her hand in her speech. She stopped well short of that, but instead offered one of the most sweeping critiques of the political system since she first appeared on the national scene.
Former leader of IMF leaving sex scandal, United States behind
NEW YORK – Former International Monetary Fund leader Dominique Strauss-Kahn was believed to be heading to his native France on Saturday, leaving the U.S. behind after the collapse of a sensational sexual assault case that cost him his job and possibly his French presidential ambitions.
Strauss-Kahn, his wife, Anne Sinclair; and his daughter Camille left his rented New York City town home, carrying about a half-dozen pieces of luggage. He didn’t say where he was going, but French media have reported he was expected to board a plane to Paris on Saturday.
It would be the diplomat and economist’s first return to his homeland since his May arrest on charges of forcing a hotel housekeeper to perform oral sex and trying to rape her.
Strauss-Kahn, 62, spent almost a week in jail, six weeks on house arrest and nearly two more months barred from leaving the country before Manhattan prosecutors dropped the case last week, saying they no longer trusted the maid, Guinean immigrant Nafissatou Diallo.
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