The article is a must-read. This quote comes from page 6.
Palin, Inc. The Revolution Will Be CommercializedHow Sarah Palin Has Become a Singular National Industry -- New York Magazine
Sarah Palin is already president of right-wing America—and it’s a position with a very big salary.
By Gabriel Sherman Published Apr 25, 2010
....
The Tea-Party movement is Palin’s political base and a central part of her audience. Early on, it was a profit center, too, but politics and the profit motive had a near-disastrous collision in early February, when Palin showed up at the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville to deliver her first significant public speech since stepping down from office. Landing Palin was the work of Judson Phillips, a smooth-talking Nashville defense lawyer who was active in the tea-party movement and wanted to make a business out of it.
....
Phillips saw Palin as the linchpin of his new business, and was willing to pay top dollar. And since the tea-party convention was a profit-making enterprise, Palin insisted on her full fee.
Sometimes, for the right organization, Palin takes a pay cut. While negotiating with Phillips last summer, she was also in negotiations to speak to a Nashville group called Proclaiming Justice to the Nations, a Christian organization that supports Israel. Laurie Cardoza-Moore, the group’s president, wanted Palin to headline a dinner in Nashville during the National Religious Broadcasters convention. ... “She was willing to come in and speak for <$50,000>, and that said a lot to me,” Cardoza-Moore says.
To help pay Palin’s fee, Phillips turned to Bill Hemrick, the founder of Upper Deck baseball cards, for a seed investment of $25,000. With Phillips, Palin struck a hard bargain. Her contract stipulated that for almost any reason she could back out and send a surrogate. “If we fart wrong, she is gonna back out on us,” Phillips declared in one planning meeting, according to a participant. “That’s how detailed this contract is.”