Her answer was boilerplate stuff about not blinking and always defending America. It was the SAME response she gave to the "did you hesitate when asked to be VP" question:

I answered him yes because I have the confidence in that readiness and knowing that you can't blink, 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.

Palin didn't say that Bush had made blunders. She merely said that blunders had been made.

Generic, boilerplate, prepped answers.

GIBSON: What if Israel decided it felt threatened and needed to take out the Iranian nuclear facilities?

PALIN: Well, first, we are friends with Israel and I don't think that we should second guess the measures that Israel has to take to defend themselves and for their security.

GIBSON: So if we wouldn't second guess it and they decided they needed to do it because Iran was an existential threat, we would cooperative or agree with that.

PALIN: I don't think we can second guess what Israel has to do to secure its nation.

GIBSON: So if it felt necessary, if it felt the need to defend itself by taking out Iranian nuclear facilities, that would be all right.

PALIN: We cannot second guess the steps that Israel has to take to defend itself.

This is just too much of a blank check to be given out in public like that.  A little circumspection is called for, like "but we would hope they would think about the results of an attack" or something like that.

Very much kudos and props for your fair assessment. I thought she stammered a bit here and there but I was rooting for her and I don't think she made any gaffes. She's under tremendous pressure, but I agree that if you are going to be president, you need to show you can handle a TV interview, if you can't, how can you handle Putin. On that score, I think she's coming along.

Frankly, I don't see Obama as any more prepared, he's just a lot better at giving interviews. I really like her honesty and her REALNESS. I just feel I can trust her and believe in her, even if I don't agree with everything she says.

I'm very interested to see if she agrees with McCain on immigrant amnesty. I'm HUGE On amnesty because I have relatives who it directly affects. I'm for fairness in immigration policy. I basically believe EVERY SINGLE PERSON who wants to be an American (except criminals and potential terrorists) should have a PATH to being one, in a fair, timely fashion and at a nominal, low cost.

I'm at odds with a lot of my friends on this.

It is shocking how poorly places like DK treated the Palin nomination, how clumsy their attack and poor their assumptions were, and with the press following the tone if not all the details of every rumor that was thrown out there, the result was a much lowered expectation of Palin, and a huge audience for her.  

Obama's responses seem smarter than the press and infinitely smarter than the blogs in general, but he has not wrested control of the message back, and looks like he might not really see the new dynamics of the election.

I hope he knows that to engage directly with Palin makes him look as though he's not fit to engage with McCain directly... I think he knows that, but the press can still portray it as Obama vs. Palin.

If McCain were still getting press, he'd be screwing up, if, and I don't think he can but, if the focus is on Palin from now on, McCain will win.

To think, the Palin pick ended cold turkey a prime example of McCains ability to turns single gaffes into series of gaffes as he refuses to face reality (the 7 houses, 5 million dollar set of blunders)... cold turkey, no more said.

But the left bloggers, as a trend, not every individual, OF COURSE, are really addicted to being right and that means sticking to their first knee-jerk underestimation of Palin and her role in the McCain ticket.  They are wed to the notion that she sinks McCain, and if he rises, well, he must really be sinking, what you see is an illusion!

This question, which misstates the Bush Doctrine.

Several of the questions at the Democratic debate, which were ridiculous.

His question to Gov. Palin about the "Iraq is a task from God" line, which he dishonestly truncated (as most people have been doing on the blogs), and then, when she said "I don't think I said that," he insisted was an exact quote.

the democratic party I once knew.

Calling it a "Right Wing meme" is the kind of BS Republicans pull. I detest it when Dems do it. Please do not do it here.

She responded with, "I believe what Bush had attempted to do is rid of the world of islamic extremists.  Terrorists who are hell bent on..." etc. -- this is a really vague answer which isn't a response to the doctrine question.

It never works.

And now we're going hear for the next week how Palin doesn't even know what the Bush doctrine is.

She did not accept the premise of Gibson's question and then gave a sensible answer to the question. This type of stuff is what is killing the Left blogs right now. They look like fools when they act this way.

Thank You, BTD...thank you for recognizing that the left...is going over the cliff these days...granted, some of them were far gone during the primaries when it came to Hillary...but now...it is going beyond the pale...

But I'm surprised she didn't know what the Bush Doctrine is, and after Gibson didn't give her a clarification she answered the question as if the question was about world view.  And she sounded silly, IMO.

I never saw Gibson's questioning of Obama, so I don't have an opinion as to whether he was playing gotcha with Obama. But given the legitimate questions about Palin's readiness, I'm not terribly distressed by Gibson's trying to see how much she knows without getting a prompt for the release of talking points.  

She did qualify her answer by saying that she thought preventative war was appropriate only if attack was "imminent."  Technically, that's a different formulation than Bush, because Bush  assiduously avoided defining the level of risk that would warrant a preventative war. He just talked about smoking guns and mushroom clouds, creating the misleading impression that an attack from Iraq WAS imminent without explicitly saying so.  And we know now that he would not have considered himself bound by the word "imminent" in any case.

Greg makes a good point imo. Sarah Palin was awful tonight. I could only imagine Hillary doing the interview and being smooth because she actually understands foreign policy not what the neocons have whispered in her ear. It's as if this woman was given a set of talking points and key words she was supposed to blurt out.

Greg is right to call her out because after all John McCain's age is an issue and she could very well be President.

If this had been Obama, it would have ended his campaign.

But, at one point she indicated that we need to prevent Russia from controlling fossil fuel movement in an out of Russia.

1. Are we trying to exert control over Russia's fossil fuels?

2. If we are; do we want to openly acknowledge that we are working to exert control over Russia's fossil fuels?  It seems like we would want to deny this, even if it's true--just like saying the Iraq war had nothing at all to do with Saddam's potential influence on oil in the Middle East.

The question is, why should she?  She's already said in 2006 she wasnt following the situation in Iraq.  She's the governor of a very low-population, rural state.  Why would she follow it closely?  Many people might not know exactly what it means.

Now getting to BTD's point (since I'm sure he'll disagree with me and tell me I'm part of the problem by typing out my honest, gut reaction to the video I just watched), does this mean her answer is sensible? The best thing she said was, war should be a last resort. But that opens her up to a very easy attack, when her and McCain's foreign policy shows otherwise.

This is ultimately the problem with Palin. People like her personally, but the more she talks, the more inconsistencies and substance-less platitudes will come out of her mouth, leading to endless openings to go after. Does the Obama campaign have to specifically target Palin? Not necessarily. But when she talks, she's representing McCain, so if Obama should be able to pin the worst of what she says on him without much difficulty. (fwiw, I have no idea what the best strategy is, and I'm not going to pretend that anyone here does either.)

Obama did not say that he would do that.

everyone owes Charlie Gibson an apology for beating him up for ding the dame thing to Obama.

Thanks for the "ding the dame" (doing the same) pun -- intentional or not, I think it's brilliant.