Local Republicans fired up for Palin Pensacola visit

News of Gov. Sarah Palin's visit to Northwest Florida threw local Republicans into a Monday morning tizzy.

Party volunteers opened the GOP headquarters in Shalimar at 10 a.m. and found a line stretching around the building.

The flow of people and phone calls had not diminished by 2 p.m., when the headquarters was supposed to close for the day. "It's been like herding cats," said Craig Otto, the chairman of Okaloosa County's Republican Party executive committee.

Folks were registering to vote, collecting signs and bumper stickers and, in great numbers, signing up for tickets to see Palin, the vice presidential candidate, in Pensacola.

Aaron Brock, the unlucky volunteer who'd been tapped to answer the phones Monday, said shortly before closing time that less than 100 of the 500 available tickets for the Palin event remained.

"I'm excited. I'm going," Fort Walton Beach resident Maria Morekis said as she stood in line. "She's just a good woman with a lot of good principles."

Palin is scheduled to speak at a "Road to Victory Rally" held at the Pensacola Civic Center. The event was scheduled to get underway around 11 a.m.

Brock said he hasn't seen the Republican base this fired up since the party announced Palin as the choice for vice president.

He said Palin's recent pointed criticisms of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, and questions she's raised about the people he has associated with, have helped reignite Republican fervor.

"It's a little different since she took the gloves off and is going after Obama," Brock said. "It's been like a shot of Vitamin C."

Palin, to be sure, has excited the conservatives in this staunchly conservative region of the country.

"Boy she really nailed Obama over the weekend," gushed Donald McFadden of Mary Esther. "I think she's brilliant. She has a lot of charisma, a level head and she's pro-life."

Miriama Devine, a 27-year-old Crestview mother of three, brought her year old daughter Meilana with her to pick up Palin tickets. Devine said she can relate to Palin, a mother of five, on a personal level.

"I'm intrigued by her," Devine said. "Just the fact she's like this every day. She's a woman, she has kids, she can hold a job and run a household. She can do it all. She definitely makes me interested in knowing she could run our country."

Glenn Wagner of Shalimar was trying to get tickets so he could take his three daughters, aged 17, 14 and 11, to see Palin speak.

"They're more excited to go see her than a rock concert," he said. "I think they know real people when they see them. They're concerned for the future of their country."