But at the end of the day, it was not to be — at least not this year. And in a weird way, that might be a good thing emotionally for people like me (and there are a lot of us) who have been so ill-treated by many in the GOP that we wanted raw catharsis as much as we wanted victory. However, anyone who thinks Gov. Palin or any of us “cultists” are going to go away has another thing coming — in fact, a reinvigorated Palin movement is already coalescing. The people who would have been the core supporters of a Palin campaign are now the biggest and most powerful bloc of free agents in the 2012 primary, and I’m practically salivating at the idea of watching the establishment candidates trek up to Wasilla to genuflect and beg for an endorsement. Every last one of them.

Here’s hoping that Sarah has the chutzpah to drag a few of them out on the water for uncomfortable “photo-ops” involving fishing boats and large amounts of live salmon (I’m looking at you, Governor Romney).

As for the rest of us, we are more than happy to throw our weight around. We’re not in the mood to kiss and make up with the party bosses, and no one can afford to take us for granted. If you thought we were going to make your life hell as a campaign, wait until you see what we can do as a pressure group. We’ve already got a huge presence on the Web thanks to Conservatives4Palin and the rest of the Palin bloggers, and we now have a big grassroots network as well thanks to the hard work of Organize4Palin. Do you really think we’re not going to use all of that cool stuff?