Sounding ever more the presidential candidate, Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says she has “the fire in the belly” to make a 2012 run, but is concerned about the toll the campaign would take on her family. Palin also told Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren Thursday the state of the Republican Party is “sound,” despite attempts by the mainstream media to depict otherwise.
“I think the principles in the Republican Party are sound, the planks in our platform are great, the idiosyncrasies of some of the characters within the party are — you know, they are what they are,” Palin said. And the mainstream media really likes to capitalize on some infighting and some mistakes made within the party, so they exacerbate it, and make it sound worse than it is. But the planks and the platform are right for America.”
Alluding to the controversy surrounding former House Speaker and presidential candidate Newt Gingrich’s recent Medicare comments, Palin noted it is the media’s job to grill politicians on the issues and their positions — not to go for the personal “gotchas.”
“That is the media’s appropriate role in holding an official or a potential candidate — holding their feet to the fire, not playing the personal ‘gotchas’, but making sure that the record is clear regarding what it is that they say or the content, the context, of what it is that they’re saying,” Palin said. “Yes, that’s the media’s role. If the media doesn’t play that role, then they’re not a cornerstone of the democracy that we would like to believe that they are.”
Van Susteren asked Palin with several potential GOP presidential candidates recently dropping out, and with the field narrowing, is she getting close to making a decision on whether to take on the challenge.
“I think my problem is that I do have the fire in my belly,” Palin said. “I am so adamantly supportive of the good, traditional things about America, and our free-enterprise system, and I want to make sure that America is put back on the right track, and we only do that by defeating Obama in 2012. I have that fire in my belly.
“It’s a matter for me of some kind of practical, pragmatic decisions that have to be made,” she said. “One is, with a large family, understanding the huge amount of scrutiny and the sacrifices that have to be made on my children’s part in order to see their mama run for president. But yes, the fire in the belly? It’s there.
“And I know that my kids have heard it all — and yet, you know, the darts and the arrows keep flying. And you see that movies are being made, books are coming out,” Palin continued. “Hoarded emails from a disloyal former staff member have been compiled by a hateful blogger, and those are going to be released. Things like that, that are taken out of context.
“I’m at that point of saying, yes, you know, whatever — it’s going to keep on coming, and you know, I feel like I have a prayer shield in front of me that deflects a lot of that,” she said. “I just want to make sure that for my loved ones, for my parents, for my spouse, and my children and those close to me, that they have that tool to deflect — also so that they’re not adversely affected.”
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