Quitting is what Sarah Palin does best, but will she heed entreaties from her tea bagger fan base and reneg on her speaking engagement at the National Tea Party Convention at Opryland in Nashville next weekend?

A full-scale intramural brawl has broken out over the convention, mostly its producer Judson Phillips, the founder of the Tea Party Nation, one of the dozens of tea bagger splinter groups around the country, failed at first to mention that he was operating the meeting as a for-profit venture — a sort of political Amway convention.

Stephanie Mencimer at Mother Jones reports that because of the dissenion in the ranks, sales of the $349 tickets to the Palin event Sunday night are down — and holders of the $549 tickets to the other weekend sessions are demanding and receiving refunds:

Anthony Shreeve is an activist in Dandridge, Tenn. who quit the convention organizing committee over the expensive ticket prices. He says he has it on good authority that most of the approximately 500 speech-only tickets have not been sold. Shreeve adds that Phillips “isn’t going to sell any more,” and says other would-be attendees have been demanding — and receiving — refunds. Late on Tuesday afternoon, I tested his claim by attempting to buy 10 tickets to the dinner. If I’d been prepared to shell out $3,587.10, that would apparently have been no problem. “I really hope that Sarah Palin doesn’t come to this event because it’s going to be really embarrassing for her to walk into a half-empty room,” says Shreeve…

Given all the negative publicity, Shreeve is surprised Palin hasn’t pulled out already. “In her contract she is allowed to send a representative if she can’t make it if she’s sick or something. Maybe she’ll come down with the flu,” he says with a laugh. He adds that Tea Partiers have written her letters pleading with her not to come because they believe that reports of a glitzy, high-priced dinner would hurt the real Tea Party movement, which prides itself on its thrifty, grassroots image. Meanwhile, [Tami Kilmarx, a nurse in Nashville who also resigned from the Tea Party Nation convention planning committee after falling out with Phillips,] reports that Nashville activists have contacted the Washington Speakers Bureau, which represents Palin, with concerns. And she says Tea Party activists in Tennessee have been trying to reach Palin through the media to let her know that Tea Party Nation does not represent the majority of Tea Party groups in the state. (Of the 42 Tennessee Tea Party groups, only one is officially supporting the convention.)

MoJo also reports that some sponsors have pulled out, including the National Precinct Alliance, the American Liberty Alliance, American Majority, and the Federation for American Immigration Reform — and right-wing extremist Rep. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee may be withdrawing as speaker. As of this writing, she is still listed among the speakers on the convention’s homepage:

Our Sponsors include Tea Party Emporium, Judicial Watch, Eagle Forum, The Leadership Institute, Vision America, SurgeUSA, Smart Girl Politics and National Taxpayers Union. Participants include: Tea Party Express, The Memphis Tea Party, National Precinct Alliance, Young Americans for Freedom, The Evergreen/Conifer Tea Party, North Carolina Freedom Tea Party, Rep. Michele Bachmann, Rep. Marsha Blackburn, Joseph Farah, Angela McGlowan, Judge Roy Moore, Tom Fitton, Bruce Donnelly, Ana Puig, Steve Milloy, Mark Skoda, Keli Carender (aka Liberty Belle), Dr. B. Leland Baker, Walter Fitzgerald, Philip Glass, Dr. Rick Scarborough, David DeGerolamo and Lori Christenson.

It sounds like the first national tea bagger convention has all the makings of a train wreck. Too bad Judson Phillips, in typical proto-fascist fashion, has banned the media. So unless an attendee with a Flip camera or camphone releases video to You Tube, we may never know how bad it really was.