Posted on 09/11/2008 6:30:55 PM PDT by Chet 99
On a day when people paused and prayed, when Barack Obama joined John McCain at Ground Zero and made peace with Bill Clinton over lunch, when the ads were stilled and the e-mails sheathed just for a while, GOP Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin held a peace conference of her own with the Mainstream Media, when she sat down with ABC News anchor Charles Gibson in Fairbanks, Alaska.
Charles Gibson, gentleman journalist, was not about to field dress Sarah Palin before a national television audience, but at times he seemed to be trying. They were sitting practically toe to toe, and there was no forced conviviality. From the very beginning, he pushed her on her credentials, her experience, her "hubris" in thinking she was qualified to be Vice President. "I'm ready," she shot back, and when he asked again whether she had hesitated at all before accepting John McCain's offer of a place on the ticket, she made it clear that her son was not the only one heading off to war. "You can't blink," she said. "You have to be wired in a way, of being so committed to the mission, the mission that we're on, reform of this country and victory in the war, you can't blink."
She parried questions like a fencer. Pressed about her lack of foreign policy experience, she pivoted to her work on oil and gas policy, calling energy "a foundation of national security."
(Excerpt) Read more at time.com ...
Remember, she is running for VICE-President. She doesn’t have to know everything about everything on January 20. I guarantee you she knows more now than O-boy will know in ten years.
If she had not come off as direct (”don’t blink”), the drive-bys would’ve immediately jumped on that as her being “indecisive” so it was a no-win situation, and that was what Charles was hoping to achieve.
After her two wonderful speeches, expectations were so high I’m not sure Jesus Himself could’ve lived up to them. She handled him directly, he didn’t trap her as he tried on numerous occasions to do and she called him on it, and she was not intimidated by him.
Don’t lose your enthusiasm because of one interview. She’s come for “such a time as this”, and the public and the base already KNOW that. :)
Sarah Palin seems to have a bit of a photographic memory. She is able to recall statements and speeches and replay them in her head, so her answers may seem too pat for the left, when they are unable to trip her up.
Sarah Palin did extremely well on her first interview, considering the confrontational pounding that Charles Gibson gave her. What I heard on the news, today was that as the media and Obama keep concentrating their attacks on Palin, they are deminishing Obama, rather than the other way around.
It was the plan of the Obama campaign to go after McCain on the issue of age, by attacking his VP candidate. They had their ads and talking pts already to go for Mitt Romney and Pawlenty. McCain threw them a curve, and they have failed to adjust their swing. They just keep striking out.
As Karl Rove pointed out in the WSJ, yesterday, Obama can’t win by running against Palin. It makes him look like he’s not even qualified to be VP.
Oh, I definitely think she got over the bar of “what she needed to do.” But I think she’ll have to keep showing rapid improvement.
And make no mistake: I’m glad the consensus here is that she did well. This place is a great barometer of how the Republican evangelical and conservative base sees her. And it’s clear from this thread that the base isn’t disappointed in her performance. So I take great heart in that.
My main worry is about how that interview would play with fence sitters. that’s the lens I tried to view it through.
Now that Sarah has made herself available to the communist MSM, her next interviews should be with Hannity & other conservatives.
GO SARAH!!!
“Seriously? Thats a HORRIBLE answer to a question about whether she is ready to lead, because it sounds like she’s on Oprah or IS Oprah.”
No, I don’t think so. Swing voters have their doubts about her, when it comes to this. Simply blurting out, “Oh, yeah, I’m totally ready to lead,” will do nothing to set their minds at ease. They’d feel better hearing that she understands the gravity of the office and is a thoughtful person. To them, she will sound like George W. Bush, and that will scare them away. You need to keep in mind that these swing voters don’t like the way Bush has governed and McCain/Palin are trying to convince them that it won’t be 4 more years of Bush.
So, understand, I’m not questioning her ability to lead. I’m criticizing her approach to that question.
What liberals don’t seem to realize is that the independents LOVE her. The “fence sitters” are no longer “fence sitters”, and the more that Obama keeps attacking her, the more the independents are turning away from Obama. They see the attacks as attacks on them and their values.
I read a remark from an independent in Michigan that said that what the Democrats don’t seem to realize is that the middle of the country and small town America is not fly over country. It IS the country. The elitist left is so out of touch with America, that it is sad. The left constantly underestimates conservativism.
You’re right: attacks from the left will NOT bring down Sarah.
But Sarah’s can bring down herself. And she needs to be careful about that.
Yes, Sarah could bring down herself, but she won’t. Obama is bringing down himself. McCain and Obama don’t need to a thing, but be who they are.
The Obama campaign and the media pimps keep saying that McCain is running on a personal narrative. Well, that might be, but Obama is running on a personal meta-narrative, that he keeps trying to re-write.
The general public don’t understand meta-narratives and they don’t relate to it. Sarah Palin is real, they relate to that.
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