Monday's edition of "Follow the Money" on FOX Business Network featured former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and she appears to have returned to making equivocal statements about her 2012 intentions.
The transcript has Eric Bolling asking Palin whether there's any chance of her "making a play, even after Iowa or New Hampshire?"
Palin responds, "You know, it's not too late for folks to jump in. And I don't know, you know, it -- who knows what will happen in the future?"
Such non-committal answers from Palin about her own possible candidacy were commonplace for months until she announced in early October:
After much prayer and serious consideration, I have decided that I will not be seeking the 2012 GOP nomination for President of the United States. As always, my family comes first and obviously Todd and I put great consideration into family life before making this decision. When we serve, we devote ourselves to God, family and country. My decision maintains this order.
Palin's appearance with Bolling, the announcement says, features much criticism of President Obama, largely related to energy policy and the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which if completed will carry bitumen from Canada's oil sands to refineries and petrochemical plants in the U.S.
And with the U.S. poised to become a net exporter of refined petroleum products for the first time since 1949, Palin criticizes the delays as part of "Obama's terrifyingly naive assaults on domestic developments that can lead to energy security and lead to more jobs being created."
The delays, she thinks, are "100 percent" political posturing motivated by the environmental base of the Democratic Party, and she argues that delaying the line endangers national energy security.
(Keystone XL) is ready to go. But, no, that environmental lobby is just too strong. (Obama doesn't want to erode part of that base. And it's all political. And -- and it's very, very unfortunate. Of course, we're just going to become more and more reliant on foreign regimes and very tumultuous areas of the world that seek, ultimately, our demise.
It makes no sense. This is a national security issue. It's a job issue. But, no, politics are trumping, in the Obama administration, any kind of common sense that's needed to allow such a pipeline.
And lest anyone think she's singling out Obama over delays on the bitumen line, Palin also leveled criticism at House Speaker John Boehner and other House Republicans for tying the Keystone project to a cut in the payroll tax:
And, you know, when you consider the combination, anyway, of these two issues, the payroll tax cut and a pipeline being combined, you know, I don't know all the ins and outs of that political inside baseball stuff, why -- why Boehner and others would -- would seek to combine the two. But that's what we're facing today.
When you consider that most Americans are absolutely fed up with government's failure to take more of our money from our paychecks and from our income and from our production and they're supposed to be prudently spending our dollars on government services and projects, and yet they've failed, because we're on the road to bankruptcy. We want fewer and fewer dollars taken from the private sector.
So payroll tax cut, I say to Boehner and to, you know, the other politicians that are in po -- in Congress, yes, extend the payroll tax cut for as long as possible because of the situation that we are in, not trusting government to prudently spend the money that they take from us.
In addition to further criticisms of President Obama on foreign policy grounds, and a hope that the death of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il will lead to a unified Korea, the transcript also features Palin dishing out praise and defense of Tim Tebow, the quarterback of the Denver Broncos whom critics perceive as overly religious:
I am pro-Tebow. And being on Team Tebow, I'm so proud of him using the platform that he's been graced with, that he's been blessed with, to do positive things. And, you know, he's not ashamed of his Saviour. He's not ashamed of Jesus. And I -- I think what Tim Tebow is -- is saying there in his shout-outs and thankfulness to what the Lord has blessed him with is -- is, you know, Jesus will rock your world if you give it all over to him. Just -- just try it and see what he's going to do in your life. So I'm proud of him.
Palin's appearance will be broadcast Monday night on Fox Business Channel starting at 6 p.m. Alaska Standard Time.