Palin, a sólo días de tomar una decisión

New York Times:

Ms. Palin, a one-time Alaska governor, is reportedly just days away from deciding whether to run for president.

In the meantime, her Twitter feed and Facebook page have gone silent for the last 10 days. Her Web site has not been updated recently. And Ms. Palin has not appeared on Fox News for a week, since before the last Republican presidential debate.

In a letter to donors late last week, Tim Crawford, the chief of her political action committee, wrote that Ms. Palin was “on the verge of making her decision of whether or not to run for office.”

Mr. Crawford noted that “someone must save our nation from this road to European socialism,” and asked for money as a way of demonstrating support if she throws her hat in the ring. He gave no clue to her decision, though he added that time is “running out.”

In fact, the political clock is ticking away. Ms. Palin now faces serious deadlines in October that, if missed, could keep her name off the presidential primary ballot. The first of those comes on Oct. 15. By that date, Ms. Palin’s election team must deliver a letter of candidacy to the secretary of state in Utah if she wants her name to appear on that state’s ballot.

Utah is by no means a critical primary state, especially in a race that features two Mormon candidates, not to mention the former governor of the state. Ms. Palin could decide that she does not need her name to appear.

But Florida comes next. By Oct. 31, that state’s Republican Party must deliver to state officials the list of candidates who are running for president there. It is a ballot she has to be on if she wants the Republican nomination.

(...) If Ms. Palin tells them she is running, aides will move quickly to incorporate a campaign committee, probably in Delaware. They will have to find a headquarters building. (An aide promised it would not be inside the Washington Beltway.) Calls will be placed to 15 or 20 wealthy supporters to begin preparing for a fund-raising blitz.

And she will have to quickly change her status at Fox, which has already forced out two other contributors (Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum) for pursuing the presidency. A spokeswoman for Fox News said Ms. Palin would be treated similarly if she makes definitive steps toward setting up a campaign.

Any of those moves would leak out quickly, and the people around Ms. Palin know it. When Ms. Palin formed her political action committee, it quickly became public knowledge.