Editorial: The pit bull limps away

No doubt more than one governor in this recession has fantasized about walking away from the difficult job.

But the resignation of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was a stunning example of poor leadership.

Not only did Palin, last year's Republican nominee for vice president, announce that she would not run for reelection next year. She also decided to quit with nearly 18 months remaining in her current term.

Why? It was hard to tell from Palin's rambling news conference on the day before Independence Day. She cited a "higher calling" to unite the country along conservative principles.

Presumably that means she is entertaining a run for the presidency in 2012. At the very least, it means she intends to help shape the national political discourse in the coming months and years.

But before Palin immerses herself too deeply in her new calling, she should ask herself this: Why should the country listen to, or vote for, a quitter?

Short of a terminal illness, there was no good reason for Palin to walk out on the people who elected her.

If her reason was the mounting legal bills from ethics probes she referenced, she still could have cashed in on her celebrity after her current term expired.

If she wanted to spare her family from the sometimes nasty glare of publicity, she won't accomplish that by thrusting herself onto the national stage again in the Lower 48. This is the pit bull she told us about?

And if she wanted to embark on a career as a Fox News talking head, she could have done so after honoring her commitment to voters.

Quitting public office for no good reason practically disqualifies Palin for higher office. Her record now reads like this: small-town mayor; governor for less than three years of a remote state with fewer people than Delaware; failed national campaign for vice president; quit governor's job.

It's the record of someone who got a taste of the spotlight and lost interest in the job at hand.

Her decision is also a reflection of how governors' political fortunes in general are falling lately. The job of governor might not be the stepping stone it once was.

It's relatively easy to govern when oil prices are high and tax collections are up. But across the nation in this recession, governors find themselves in the role of the bad guy, or gal, covering deficits by raising taxes, or cutting programs, or both.

There's nothing wrong with ambition. It's why Palin got herself elected governor in the first place. But this is not the example of Tom Ridge, summoned to Washington from his governor's chair to take over the job of Homeland Security czar after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Palin has given us the example of just plain giving up.