As others bolt, Sarah Palin stands by 'tea party' convention

Explaining her decision to speak at this weekend’s for-profit tea party event, Ms. Palin, the popular but often polarizing ex-vice presidential candidate, says in a USA Today column today that ”it’s important to keep faith with people who put a little bit of their faith in you.”

Palin writes she thought “long and hard” about the decision to headline the $349-a-plate lobster dinner after others like Rep. Michele Bachmann (R) of Minnesota pulled out citing questions brought up by the House Ethics Committee over the Tea Party Nation’s for-profit status.

Palin is set to receive a $100,000 speaker's fee, but she writes that “any compensation for my appearance will go right back to the cause.” It’s likely to go to SarahPAC, her political action committee, which, among other things, is helping "tea party" backed Senate candidate Rand Paul in Kentucky.

John O’Hara, author of “A New American Tea Party,” has cautioned fellow activists against fawning over any one leadership figure, falling prey to what he calls the “cult of personality” that led to the election of President Obama. (Indeed, a more natural tea party star may in fact be Keli Carender, who blogs as “Liberty Belle.”)

And to at least one of over 800 commenters to Palin’s column, the former Alaska governor’s explanation for sticking with the tea party convention is “just more secessionist rambling.”