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India Today, via Associated Press Sarah Palin speaking at a conference in New Delhi on Saturday.

NEW DELHI — Sarah Palin said on Saturday that she wasn’t ready to announce a presidential run. “I don’t think there needs to be a rush,” she said during an appearance at a conference here in New Delhi. Running for political office is a “life-changing decision that so affects a family,” she said, and many questions still needed to be answered.

Ms. Palin’s speech at a conference organized by the media group India Today touched on many subjects, including her sympathy with the people of Japan and their “humble cooperative spirit,” the dangers of a green-energy policy and her children texting her news of a moose in the yard of her Alaska home. Ms. Palin made numerous references to America’s entrepreneurial and pioneering spirit, and India’s unlocking of the same to become a vibrant global giant.

Together, she said, the two countries will lead the world in the 21st century. “There is no natural limit for United States and India relations,” she said. India is the second-fastest growing major economy in the world after China, but is still hobbled by extreme poverty, inefficient infrastructure and political corruption.

Ms. Palin and her husband, Todd, were in India for such a short time that they did not get a chance to see the Taj Mahal, in part because it is closed on Fridays, the only day they had free time. Instead, according to local media reports, they went to one of New Delhi’s glitzy new shopping malls.

Hundreds of India’s top business executives, journalists and politicians packed a ballroom at the Taj Palace hotel to hear Ms. Palin. After being introduced as the “sexiest brand in Republican politics,” she detailed her upbringing and her Alaskan political career before riffing on central themes — the importance of individual independence, free markets and the need to drill for oil.

A “secure, stable supply of fuel is key to a prosperous America,” she said. “My vision of a free and prosperous America has much to do with energy.” But that won’t come from green energy, she said, which has destroyed thousands of jobs in Scotland and England and helped create a massive debt in Spain.

America should “capitalize on our own resources right there on our doorsteps,” she said, by tapping into billions of barrels of oil that are “warehoused” in Alaska.

In the past decade the India Today “conclave,” as the conference is called, has played host to Bill and Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, Colin Powell, Pakistan’s Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto, the writer V.S. Naipaul, Afghanistan’s Hamid Karzai and the Queen of Jordan, among others.

This year, Ms. Palin’s peers include the Egyptian opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei, Germaine Greer and the “serial hacker” Josh Klein. The conference has been trying to secure Ms. Palin as a speaker for two years, executives said. “We see there is a change happening in America,” Kalli Purie, the director of the conference, said in an interview before Ms. Palin’s speech. “She represents middle America so it is good to get her perspective.”

Ms. Purie would not disclose the fee Ms. Palin earned from the speech, but said the group paid what Ms. Palin’s representative at the Washington Speakers’ Bureau, a booking agency, sought.

After her speech, Ms. Palin answered specific questions about foreign and economic policy. Asked how she might have the handled the financial crisis that led the United States government to fund billions in bank bailouts, Ms. Palin said she “didn’t think it was such a tough situation that had to lead to all those bailouts.” Instead, she said, the government could have allowed “the free market to decide who the winners and losers should be.”

Quizzed on outsourcing, a hot-button issue in India, Ms. Palin evoked free trade several times, affirmatively, to a smattering of applause from the audience.

She was critical of China and America’s relationship with the country, saying “America is economically linked to China. They hold much of the note,” referring to America’s treasury bills. It is a “dangerous place to be,” she said.

She also criticized her own party. “Too often Republicans have the fighting instinct of sheep — they just sit back and take it,” she said. The party was not always happy with her, she also admitted. “I’m pretty independent and some players in the Republican hierarchy don’t like that.” Her independence may have to do with being a “busy mom,” she said. “I’m so busy I don’t have the time to play some of the games these guys want to play.”

Asked why the party lost the last presidential election, Ms. Palin gave a nod to President Obama. “Candidate Obama had a strong campaign and was the agent of change,” she said. Ms. Palin agreed with moderator that she, too, was a change agent but said, “I wasn’t the top of the ticket.” She quickly added: “I’m not saying I should have been.”

Hillary Clinton was as strong a candidate as Barack Obama, she added, and “she had more experience.” Ms. Palin added that it will “be fascinating to see what Hillary decides to do in the coming months.” Ms. Clinton, she predicts, “will be a strong candidate in the future.”

“It is time for a woman to become president,” she added, though it doesn’t necessarily mean she should run. “There are a lot of good potential female candidates out there. There are a lot of gals.”

And asked about her husband’s prospective title if she entered the White House, Ms. Palin made the familiar “First Dude” crack, then suggested a new moniker: “First Gentleman.”

Quickly, though, she added: “Man, that’s getting way ahead of ourselves, isn’t it?”

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* Who thinks that Tim Kaine, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is running for the Senate from Virginia? Apparently Ken Cuccinelli, the state’s Republican attorney general, does. His folks appear to have snatched up http://www.timkaine.com/. Clicking on it takes you to Mr. Cuccinelli’s Web site.

* Wondering how Evan Bayh, the recently retired Democratic senator from Indiana, will fill his time? He announced a while back that he had joined a law firm in Washington. But now he has a more high-profile gig as a regular contributor on Fox News. A news release says Mr. Bayh will offer “commentary and analysis across all Fox News platforms and will participate in programming leading up to the 2012 presidential elections.”

* Having trouble deciding whom to pick for the Final Four? President Obama will be offering his picks for the N.C.A.A. men’s basketball tournament on Tuesday and will unveil them on ESPN on Wednesday, reports Mike Allen of Politico.

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President Obama told Democratic donors in Miami here that while we “can’t be naïve” about what is happening in the Middle East, he believed Israel would ultimately benefit from the recent upheaval in Egypt.

Speaking to a group of about 80 supporters at a dinner and private reception at the home of Michael Adler, a real estate mogul here, Mr. Obama recounted what he said he had told a group of Jewish leaders who visited him at the White House recently. Miami has a large Jewish population, and issues related to Israel are of deep interest here.

“All the forces that we see building in Egypt are the forces that should be naturally aligned with us. Should be aligned with Israel,” Mr. Obama said, adding, “I told them we have to be sober, we can’t be naive about the changes that are taking place in the Middle East. Our commitment to Israel’s security is inviolable, is sacrosanct. But we should not be afraid,” of what is happening in the region.

The president went on: “I’m actually confident that 10 years from now we’re going to be able to look back and say that this was the dawning of an entirely new and better era. One in which people are striving not to be against something but to be for something.”

Mr. Obama also said: “When you look at what’s happening around the world what’s happening in the Middle East, it is a manifestation of new technologies, the winds of freedom that are blowing through countries that have not felt those winds in decades, a whole new generation that says I want to be a part of this world,. It’s a dangerous time, but it’s also a huge opportunity for us.’’

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Office of Representative Gabrielle Giffords, via Associated Press Gabrielle Giffords in March of last year. Close friends in Washington are taking steps to ensure the political standing of the Arizona congresswoman, who faces re-election in 2012.

As Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona continues to make progress toward recovery from a gunshot wound to the head, an uncomfortable question is beginning to seep into the political conversation in Arizona and Washington.

What does the future hold?

Ms. Giffords was just beginning her third term in the House when she was was shot on Jan. 8 during a meet-and-greet event in her district. She remains in a Houston area rehabilitation facility as she works to recover, a process that, in spite of reports of her early progress, could be slow and difficult.

For weeks, there has been nearly no talk about her political future as members from both parties merely said they expect her to return to Washington whenever she is healthy enough to do so.

Now some of her closest friends in Washington are beginning to take steps to ensure that Ms. Giffords is politically strong as well. Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York are hosting a fund-raiser for Ms. Giffords next month. The money could be used for Ms. Giffords to mount a re-election bid in 2012.

“We want to make sure that when she does come back, she’s not starting from scratch,” Ms. Wasserman Schultz said in an interview Wednesday night. She said the fund-raiser would help Ms. Giffords be in the
“strongest possible position to run for re-election.”

And friends are also acknowledging a different possibility, prompted in part by the abrupt announcement last week that Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, a Republican, would not seek re-election in 2012. Those close to Ms. Giffords said she had begun to talk about the possibility of running for the Senate before she was shot.

“It’s something that she talked about, but not something that she talked about in any great detail,” Ms. Wasserman Schultz said. “When she does come back, she will go through the same process that everyone who considers running for higher office does.”

The Arizona Democratic Party chairman, Andrei Cherny, told The Washington Post that “it goes without saying that even before the attack, she was at the top of everyone’s list.”

It is far too early in Ms. Giffords’s recovery to have serious conversations about a statewide candidacy, Ms. Wasserman Schultz said. And she stressed that before the shooting, the congresswoman from Arizona was focused primarily on representing her district and winning re-election in November 2012.

But even a mention that Ms. Giffords had been interested in running for the Senate has consequences for the Democratic Party in Arizona, and nationally, as the race to replace Mr. Kyl takes shape.

Mr. Kyl’s departure offers Democrats a rare opportunity to pick up a seat in a state where voting behavior during presidential races has been trending in their favor. Senator John McCain of Arizona, the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, won his own state that year, and won re-election to the Senate in November. But senior Democratic officials have said they believe the rapid growth in the state’s Hispanic population is making it friendlier territory for them.

However, other potential candidates, like Janet Napolitano, the Department of Homeland Security secretary and the state’s former governor, are all but frozen out of a public conversation about a possible run for now. And state Democratic Party officials are understandably wary of doing anything that might be interpreted as offensive to Ms. Giffords.

The dynamics are different on the Republican side, where Representative Jeff Flake of Arizona has already announced he will run for Mr. Kyl’s seat. Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who gained national fame for his hard-line stance against illegal immigration, is reported to be actively considering a run as well.

What remains unknown is how long Democrats can wait for Ms. Giffords to improve. The election is almost two years away, but a competitive Senate contest will be very costly, and any contender will have plenty of campaigning to do.

There are precedents in other states that could help guide the Democratic Party as it carefully navigates the delicate issues of Ms. Giffords’s recovery and the party’s interests.

In South Dakota, for example, the state’s senior senator, Tim Johnson, had bleeding in the brain in December 2006 and underwent emergency surgery. He remained in a rehabilitation hospital for months and returned to the Senate for the first time nearly a year later, in September 2007.

Similarly with Ms. Giffords, colleagues helped raise money for Mr. Johnson while he was recuperating. And in 2008, he won another six-year term in the Senate.

Ms. Wasserman Schultz said that the fund-raiser for Ms. Giffords would be a reception that will take place in Washington. She said there is “no specific ask” in terms of the amount of money donors might contribute.

“We are encouraging people to come and join us and celebrate Gabby and make whatever contributions they are comfortable making,” she said.

Ms. Giffords had $285,000 cash on hand in her campaign account at the end of 2010, according to Ms. Wasserman Schultz.

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House Speaker John Boehner said Wednesday that he and his fellow Republican leaders found “common ground’’ with President Obama during a lunch at the White House, but did not reach any specific agreements on how to cut spending to reduce the federal deficit.

With the White House preparing to send a free trade agreement with South Korea to Congress for its approval, Mr. Boehner said the two sides believe that trade is one area where they might work out a compromise. He said he told the president the House is ready to take up not only the South Korea pact, but also two others that have been stalled – one with Colombia and another with Panama.

But the White House has said it is seeking amendments to the Colombia and Panama agreements before it will move forward.

Mr. Obama, who vowed to do a better job of reaching out to Republicans after the drubbing his party took in the November mid-terms, invited Mr. Boehner, Representative Eric Cantor, the Republican leader, and Representative Kevin McCarthy, the Republican whip over for a discussion that focused largely on the economy. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and the White House chief of staff, William M. Daley, also attended.

Mr. Cantor called it “a fairly robust conversation about the need for all of us to work together to send a signal that we’re serious about cutting spending. We had agreement on that. I guess the particulars and the details will be where the disagreements may lie.’’

There’s little question about that; the initial list of budget cuts produced today by Republicans in the House took aim straight at some of Mr. Obama’s most favored proposals, such as those involving green energy and high speed passenger trains.

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6:11 p.m. | Updated Jon Huntsman, the United States ambassador to China, has informed the White House that he plans to step down in the next few months, further stoking speculation about his presidential ambitions. 

The White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, told reporters that the president’s staff was aware of Mr. Huntsman’s imminent departure. But he dismissed reports that aides increasingly believe he will challenge the president.

“Ambassador Huntsman has told several people inside this building that he plans to leave during the first part of this year,” Mr. Gibbs said. “I have talked to several people inside this building and I have not heard anybody say they know what the future holds for Ambassador Huntsman.”

A former Republican governor of Utah, Mr. Huntsman was widely seen as a potential rival to Mr. Obama until the president chose to send him to China. Most political observers had expected that Mr. Huntsman might seek the presidency in 2016, after his boss would be off the scene.

But confidants of Mr. Huntsman’s back home have said he is considering whether to move more quickly by trying to capture the Republican nomination in 2012.

That would put the ambassador in an awkward position for the next several months. But Mr. Gibbs said the White House expected that Mr. Huntsman would focus his attention on China-related issues for as long as he remained in the job.

“We believed and continue to believe that he brings a broad range of experience to an extremely important ambassadorial post with one of our most important relationships in the world,” Mr. Gibbs said. 

“The president and I think the American people expect that somebody that holds the post of ambassador from the United States to China will dedicate their full energy and time to that position,” Mr. Gibbs added. “And we believe that Ambassador Huntsman believes that as well.”

Update:
Mr. Huntsman has delivered a letter of resignation to President Obama and will leave his post effective April 30, a White House official said Monday evening.

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