Bozell: Barbara Walters vs. Sarah Palin

There's absolutely a guarantee that the media deeply hate her
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When ABC's Barbara Walters includes Sarah Palin in her list of the year's "Most Fascinating People," Media Research Center founder Brent Bozell advises, make no mistake - it's a compliment delivered with the back of her hand. Walters began her Palin segment by slamming Sarah with "Many people find the thought of you as president a little scary":

This is not what Walters asked President Obama in yet another gooey Barack-and-Michelle hour-long ABC interview on Thanksgiving night. Clearly, a large, energized chunk of the American electorate believed -- and continues to believe -- the idea of Obama as president to be horrifying. Instead, Walters lobbed softballs like this:

"When we come back, we'll hear about family life in the White House, just who slept through the midterm elections, the importance of SpongeBob SquarePants and the night the Tooth Fairy didn't show up. Stay with us."

Liberals like Walters always assume that if you're liberal, you're smart; if you're conservative, you're either evil or stupid. Or both.

It was Michelle Obama who claimed she went to bed early on Election Night, like she always does (so much for Walters being a skeptical interviewer). And it was Michelle Obama who tried to make excuses for the Democratic fiasco by sounding remarkably uninformed.

"I mean, my understanding is that, number one, every president in history has lost Congress at the midterms," the first lady claimed. "Maybe that's overstating it, but it's happened for every president in my lifetime." The president tried to clean it up: "It's the norm."

Walters just sat there, lost in her adoring gaze, accepting these assertions, which were flat-out wrong. Even the last president didn't lose Congress in the 2002 elections (Republicans kept the House; Senate Democrats had captured the majority earlier that year with the switch of Sen. Jim Jeffords). Neither did the first George Bush in 1990 (Congress was firmly Democrat), or Ronald Reagan in 1982 (when the Senate stayed Republican, and the House stayed Democrat).

[More]

- JP

Quote of the Day (December 10, 2010)

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Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit:

"Last night on her television special liberal... Barbara Walters dismissed Sarah Palin as 'uninformed', telling the former Republican governor, 'Many people find the thought of you as president a little scary.' She wishes... In the real world, away from Hollywood and DC pundits, Americans are afraid of another two years of record deficits, historic debt, record unemployment, Keynesian spending, illogical foreign policy and TSA agents groping children, nuns and grandmothers. Americans saw Obama triple the national deficit in one year on a failed stimulus plan. That’s what scares Americans, Barbara."

Addendum: Via TheRightScoop, according to Mark Levin, ABC edited out the part of Sarah Palin's answer where she said she read his book Liberty and Tyranny.

- JP

Video: Barbara Walters interviews Gov. Palin

"Determined, patriotic and faithful"
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Here's the full interview from last night's Barbara Walters special, "10 Most Fascinating People of 2010":


h/t: Jim Hoft

- JP

Video: A preview of Walters' Sarah Palin interview

"I'm the biggest klutz in the world"
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Gov. Palin, the only person to make Barbara Walters' "10 Most Fascinating People of 2010" list three consecutive years in a row, will be joined by her Husband Todd for the interview, airing Thursday at 9PM Texas Time.

In the interview, the prospective 2012 GOP presidential candidate addresses false rumors circulated by the lying Palin haters that the two have been having marital problems, telling Walters, "There's a lot of BS out there."

On ABC's "The View" Wednesday, Walters showed a short video clip from the interview as a tease for her special. Unfortunately, to watch the clip, you have to endure a few seconds of Joyless Behar, an incredibly nasty and ignorant person. Even Whoopi Goldberg had to clue Behar in after Joyless said, "Isn’t it a Little Racist to Call it Black Friday?" Then there was the time she agreed with Eve Ensler that "global warming causes earthquakes." And Behar calls Sarah Palin "stupid." But we digress:


- JP

Sarah Palin to Barbara Walters: I Could Beat Obama

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Gov. Palin has said in two high-profile interviews this week that she is seriously considering becoming a candidate for the White House. She replied, "I am," to reporter Robert Draper's question asking if she was considering a 2012 run.

"I'm engaged in the internal deliberations candidly, and having that discussion with my family, because my family is the most important consideration here."

Draper interviewed the 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate for a New York Times Magazine cover story to be printed Sunday.

Gov. Palin also told ABC's Barbara Walters that she is seriously weighing a run, and she believes she could beat President Obama in 2012:

"I'm looking at the lay of the land now, and ... trying to figure that out, if it's a good thing for the country, for the discourse, for my family, if it's a good thing," Palin said in an interview scheduled to air in full Dec. 9 on ABC as part of Walters' "10 Most Fascinating People" of 2010.

Asked Walters: "If you ran for president, could you beat Barack Obama?"

"I believe so," Palin said.

The full Sarah Palin interview will air Dec. 9 at 9PM CST on "Barbara Walters' 10 Most Fascinating People" special.

- JP

Scott Brown: Sarah Palin is Presidential Material

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In Barbara Walters' interview with Senator-elect Scott Brown (R-MA) for ABC's 'This Week', she asked if he considered Sarah Palin to be presidential material:

Brown told Walters, “Well sure, I mean she’s been a mayor and a governor and has a national following… I know she’s very popular.”

The 41st Senator added the caveat that he’s never met Palin, she’s never contacted him, and he hasn’t read her book, Going Rogue, though he says he hopes to.

A video of the interview is here.

- JP

Sarah Palin, One of 2009's Most Fascinating People

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Here's video of the Sarah Palin segment from Barbara Walters' "Most Fascinating People" special wednesday night:



- JP

Sarah Palin boosts 20/20 viewership to 7.9 million

From the Orlando Sentinel:

The combo of "Shrek the Third" and Sarah Palin (she was on "20/20") gave ABC a boost Friday night, according to preliminary ratings released this afternoon.

[...]

At 10, ABC's "20/20" drew 7.9 million and edged CBS' "Numb3rs" (7.8 million). Jay Leno amused 4.8 million for NBC.

h/t: Greg

- JP

Video: Sarah Palin talks to Barbara Walters about her future

Sarah Palin talks to Barbara Walters on ABC's "Good Morning America" about her future, the McCain campaign, Tina Fey, David Letterman and more:



Videos of the full Tuesday GMA interview are here and here.

- JP

Sarah Palin: What really matters in this world

On her Facebook Notes page late Monday night, Sarah Palin posted a brief message describing a segment of her interview with ABC's Barabara Walters as a "great conversation" about the country's special needs community:

Multi-Part Interview with Barbara Walters

Had a great conversation today with Barbara Walters regarding America’s special needs community. Her compassion for those who some in our society see as “less than perfect” comes from personal experience as she was so close to her sister. Barbara wrote lovingly about her sister in her #1 bestselling memoir titled, Audition. Barbara and I even attempted to interview Trig during this segment, but he was about as patient through the interview as any other one-and-a-half-year-old child! I appreciate Barbara highlighting America’s special needs community. The beautiful heart of our country shines when we embrace these precious ones. Knowing of their unconditional love and need for our embrace reminds me every day of what really matters in this world.

- Sarah Palin

- JP

Sarah Palin: TEA Party Movement Is "Beautiful"

In her interview with ABC's Barbara Walters, Sarah Palin said the same thing she told Oprah Winfrey -- that a 1012 run for president isn't on her radar screen. But then, as the Orlando Sentinel's "TV Guy" Hal Boedeker reports, she added...

[But] when you consider some of the ordinary turning into extraordinary events that have happened in my life, I am not one to predict what will happen in a few years," Palin said.

"My ambition if you will, my desire, is to help our country in whatever role that may be, and I cannot predict what that will be, what doors would be open in the year 2012," she said.

Will she play a major role? "If people will have me, I will," she said.

The former governor also said the position Team McCain took on the bailout was a mistake and praised the TEA Party movement:

"That very first bailout, yes. Now we have learned, too, it didn't fulfill the promises that were made by Congress, and by the White House, that bailing out these businesses that were 'too big to fail,' " Palin said. "That did not put our economy back on the right track. So we learn from our mistakes. The tea party movement, beautiful. It energizes our country. More power to these people who are showing up there."

The 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate also criticized President Obama's statements on health care reform:

Palin notes that the words "death panels" are not found "in any of those thousands of pages of different variations of the health-care bill." Yet Palin adds that the president is "incorrect, and he is disingenuous."

- JP

More on Sarah Palin's Barbara Walters interview

ABC News announcement Wednesday:

Barbara Walters will sit down with former Vice Presidential candidate and Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for a five-part series of ABC News interviews to begin airing on "Good Morning America" Nov. 17, the morning her highly anticipated book "Going Rogue: An American Life" is released.

ABC describes the upcoming interview, the first of Sarah Palin by Walters, as "wide-ranging" and says it will cover Palin's public life, both as Alaska's governor and the 2008 Republican Party's vice presidential candidate, as well as some aspects of her private life.

ABC plans to string portions of the interview out over several days, with segments scheduled to air on "Nightline" Nov. 17, on "Good Morning America" Nov. 18 and on "20/20" Nov. 20. It will also air excerpts from the interview across ABC News' various platforms.

- JP