Perhaps, but one cannot be certain of ‘what might have been.’
Obama and Palin needed the six years or so of semi-obscurity they were about to embark on before ambition — and John McCain — intervened. Instead, their growth was checked at a critical moment, and, as it seems now, won’t be resumed quickly — not in the presidency as Obama is learning, or in a media frenzy, as Palin has found
They are famous for life; they will always have money; what they can never have back are the years washed out by destructive celebrity. “She’s been microwaved, she needs now to marinate,” somebody once said of Palin. But the time for slow-cooking is gone.
Via Noemie Emery: Obama, Palin met fame before they could grow | Washington Examiner.