Sarah Palin contemplating bid for U.S. Senate

(CNN) -- Sarah Palin may not be done with politics after all.

The former Alaska governor, who was also 2008's GOP vice presidential nominee, said Tuesday she's contemplating a bid for U.S. Senate against Democrat Mark Begich. He's up for re-election in 2014.

"I've considered it because people have requested me consider it," Palin told conservative radio host Sean Hannity on his show. "I'm still waiting to see what the lineup will be. And hoping there will be some new blood, new energy. Not just kind of picking from the same old politicians in the state that come from political families."

Begich, a former mayor of Anchorage, was elected in 2008. He defeated longtime GOP Sen. Ted Stevens, who died in 2010 in a plane crash.

The 2014 race is labeled "lean Democratic" on the Cook Political Report, and the Rothenberg Political Report rates the race as toss up/tilt Democrat. Both are non-partisan political handicappers.

Alaska Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell and Joe Miller, a Republican who lost a U.S. Senate bid in Alaska in 2010, have both said they'll run against Begich next year.

"Sen. Mark Begich has got to be replaced," Palin told Hannity. "He had not done what he had promised to do for the people of Alaska, which is to represent what it is the nation needs in terms of energy development."

"Because he's on the wrong side of the aisle, he has to go along to get along with his Democrat leadership, and that's a shame," she continued. "That's a waste of opportunity for our nation."

Palin, who currently acts as a commentator on the Fox News Channel, told CNN last month she would definitely hit the campaign trail for fellow Republicans next year.

"Time's-a-wasting. Things are moving really quickly and if we don't get out there and defend this republic then America will be transformed into something we do not recognize," she told CNN.