Sarah Palin spends much of this morning’s interview with NBC’s Matt Lauer saying she does not want to go back and argue about the “inside baseball” of the McCain campaign. “That inside baseball stuff regarding the way a campaign works on that level — I certainly didn’t get bogged down in any of the potential skirmishes or perceived problems,” she says.
But then moments later, she steps to the plate. When Lauer asks her about the concession speech she had prepared to give introducing McCain on election night, Palin effectively says that she thinks McCain’s staff made the wrong call.
S. PALIN: Somebody said no, they said that it would be unprecedented, that a V.P. candidates wouldn’t introduce someone in a concession speech. And you know, all I could say was…
LAUER: Were you disappointed?
S. PALIN: A little bit because again — not — not for me personally to get to be up there on the stage and give one last speech, but to be able to say, “This is an American hero. Let us be thankful for what he just offered our nation. Now, let’s all work together to support the new president.
LAUER: Did you ever consider going to Senator McCain that night and saying, “Look, you know, I’d like to say this about you, would it be OK?
S. PALIN: By that time it was, you know, literally walking — walking down…
LAUER: So this happened in the last minute.
S. PALIN: … the aisle, almost going up to the stairs, yes.
S. PALIN: And all I could think of was, well, even if it were unprecedented — and I haven’t done research to see if other V.P. candidates had done such an introduction of their presidential candidate.
LAUER: Right.
S. PALIN: But, you know, I thought even if it was unprecedented, so what, you know. Geez, let’s do something a little bit out of the box there.
Later in the interview, she suggests to Lauer that it would have been better if McCain’s staff had allowed her to give more interviews. “You can’t be afraid of being able to seize opportunities, every opportunity you can, to talk to Americans,” she says.
See the whole thing here. (At the end, daughter Piper says she wants to do it again in four years.)
