Check the sky for flying pigs.

Has Hell frozen over?.

The impossible has happened. Alex Spillius, Washington correspondent  of the London Daily Telegraph has actually written a respectful, almost positive article on Sarah Palin. For nearly two years this man, together with his fellow Telegraph hack Toby Harnden, has totally belittled and trivialised Palin as an irrelevant airhead with quotes from the usual run of Republican “consultants” to buttress his disdain for The ’Cuda.

Spillius and Harnden, even though resident in the USA have never, to my knowledge, made any attempt to use actual shoeleather to research Palin or sought to arrange an interview.  Instead they have been content to parrot talking points from the NYT and WaPo or dinner party put downs from the great and the good of the Beltway.

But that video has affected the mercury in the political barometer.

Sarah Palin has released a campaign-style video heralding a “mom awakening” across America, renewing speculation that she will run for the White House in 2012.

Having styled herself as a “hockey mom” during her failed 2008 campaign with Sen John McCain, the mother of five has been instrumental in helping women, some of them relatively unknown, to win Republican primaries.

Nikki Haley, who is likely to become South Carolina’s first female and first Asian American governor in the autumn, was struggling until Mrs Palin endorsed her.

The fact that the new, slickly produced video became an instant talking point among Washington’s political class demonstrated how the former vice-presidential nominee retains a star power unmatched by anyone else in her party.

No Spillius article on Palin is ever complete without the compulsory quote from the Republican “consultant/strategist” – yet this time it’s no hit job…..

Despite the lightweight content of the video, she has recently made more policy-based speeches, including one on the need to protect defence spending from government cuts that Right-wingers are demanding.

Mary Matalin, a veteran Republican strategist, told Politico that while Mrs Palin wasn’t quite ready for a presidential bid, “every time this conversation takes place she has advanced the ball in her favour”.

An article like this in the UK’s top selling broadsheet is important on two levels. Firstly, for the Brits, it allows a foreign audience to see Palin as a serious political figure rather than a one minute wonder out of a Jerry Springer show.

But it has a much deeper significance for the USA. Spillius, Harnden and Co. purvey gossip and rumour from the political players of DC and their hangers on. For Spillius to write something like this means that there has been a shift of the tectonic plates.

Washington has started to take Sarah Palin much more seriously – and it’s beginning to show….