[Update] 9/11/2008- Those looking for excerpts of Sarah Palin's ABC interview can find the excerpts here and the video of those excerpts here.
Once ABC confirmed the first interview with Sarah Palin since she became John McCain's vice presidential running mate, questions ensued about the details of the interview and how and where it would be conducted. Many of those questions are answered.
Once ABC confirmed the first interview with Sarah Palin since she became John McCain's vice presidential running mate, questions ensued about the details of the interview and how and where it would be conducted. Many of those questions are answered.
As details are emerging, via The Politico, about the interview, it is seen that the first of the interviews will be seen on World News and it will be a sit-down style interview between Charlie Gibson and Sarah Palin.
Other details show that Gibson and crew will have "extensive" and "repeated" access to Palin over a two day period, which will include multiple interviews with no topics off limits and no preset "ground rules."
Gibson will be spending much of Thursday and Friday with Palin, first at her son's 9/11 deployment ceremony in Fairbanks, Alaska, and at her home in Wasilla, Alaska.
The remarkable offer to ABC, made last Friday, is part of an ambitious project to sell Palin well beyond the right — to a broad swath of women and independent voters, including former supporters of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.).
“I see women right at the forefront of that, but not exclusively,” a campaign adviser said.
There are two interviews with Gibson set for Thursday and on Friday Gibson will follow Palin to her hometown of Wasilla and Anchrage for further opportunities to speak with the candidate.
When an official was asked to describe her appeal, they responded by saying, "I think she is accessible. I think she is honest. I think she is real, and I think she is fearless. In Alaska, she has been such a target because she has always fought for the interests of her constituents, because they’re her neighbors.”
According to Gallup, Independents are already swinging towards the McCain Palin ticket with a 12 percentage point jump from the numbers shown before the Republican convention where 40 percent of Independents favored McCain to 52 percent after the GOP convention.
What some are expressing surprise over is the Democratic support has risen by 5 percent for the McCain/Palin ticket since the GOP convention going from 9 percent to 14 percent.
The most recent ABC News/Washington Post poll, which is one of the three out of the last seven (figures at linked URL changes as each new poll results are released) organizational polls, that still showed a tie between the two candidates, they show:
White women have moved from 50-42 percent in Obama’s favor before the conventions
to 53-41 percent for McCain now, a 20-point shift in the margin that’s one of the single
biggest post-convention changes in voter preferences. The other, also to McCain’s
advantage, is in the battleground Midwest, where he’s moved from a 19-point deficit to a
7-point edge.
Taking those polls with a grain of salt to allow the post convention bounce to wear off, the two groups that these interviews are aimed at gathering support from, as shown above, Independents and women, are already swinging towards McCain by large margins.
The McCain campaign is hoping that after the public sees Palin handle these interviews, more Independents and women will like what they see and continue to swing towards McCain's campaign.
The interviews will air in parts with the first being seen on World News Thursday night, then later on Nightline and on Good Morning America Friday morning.
There is no reason to expect that Palin will not come out of these interviews stronger than before and with approximately 35 campaign fundraising stops from now until the election that she is expected to attend, there will not be a lot of opportunities for hit to kick back for interviews.
Her job is to help her running mate, not pander to the press at the expense of doing what she is slated to do.