Palin reads cheat notes from her hand at Tea Party Q&A

Sarah Palin clearly had notes scribbled on her hand at the National Tea Party Convention Saturday.

Huffington Post obtained photos of the former governor answering pre-determined questions after her $100,000 speech.

At the same event, Palin mocked President Barack Obama's use of a teleprompter.

"This is about the people and it's bigger than any king or queen of a tea party and it's a lot bigger than any charismatic guy with a teleprompter," said Palin.

During a question and answer session after her address to the convention, Palin clearly looks down, reading notes off her hand. The words included "energy" "tax" and "lift American spirits."

HuffPo's Stefan Sirucek comments:

"You can bet that the President wasn't reading scribbles off his extremities while he sparred with Republicans and Democrats in an unscripted format in his recent Q&As. Palin, on the other hand, seems to need a cheat-sheet just to get through a contrived lovefest with a smitten interviewer and an adoring audience."

Palin was expected to receive $100,000 for her speech. Appearing Sunday morning on Fox News, she confirmed this.

"They're writing a $100,000 check and as I said from day one on this, I'm turning right around and being able to contribute it back to the cause," she said.

Huffington Post later obtained detailed photos of what was written on Palin's hand. It appears to read, "Energy, budget cuts, tax, lift American spirits". The word "budget" was crossed out.

This video was uploaded to YouTube on Feb. 6, 2010.

Download video via RawReplay.com

Stephen C. Webster contributed to this report.