Sources in the McCain camp, the Republican Party and Washington think tanks say Mrs Palin was identified as a potential future leader of the neoconservative cause in June 2007. That was when the annual summer cruise organised by the right-of-centre Weekly Standard magazine docked in Juneau, the Alaskan state capital, and the pundits on board took tea with Governor Palin.

Her case as John McCain's running mate was later advanced vociferously by William Kristol, the magazine's editor, who is widely seen as one of the founding fathers of American neoconservative thought - including the robust approach to foreign policy which spurred American intervention in Iraq….

In the two weeks since she was named as Mr McCain's running mate that is just what has happened. While Mr McCain was publicly distancing himself from the policies and personalities of the Bush administration, Mrs Palin was sequestered with a series of former aides to George W. Bush.
Mr McCain's chief foreign policy adviser, Randy Scheunemann, an influential neoconservative, wasted no time in briefing Mrs Palin. He quickly made Steve Biegun, a former number three on the National Security Council, her chief foreign policy adviser.

Steven Clemons, of the New American Foundation think tank in Washington, a chronicler of the ebb and flow of neocon power in the White House, bemoaned the appointment, saying Mr Biegun "will turn her into an advocate of Cheneyism and Cheney's view of national-security issues."