Sarah Palin's $7 million book deal

Even though Gov. Palin is still in the media spotlight doing interviews with tv networks, foreign newspapers, and a steady stream of producers and agents, Gov. Sarah Palin is an immensely approachable politician. We arranged an interview via her office in Juneau, Alaska, There was minimal red tape and before we knew it, Sarah Palin was on the line answering our questions.

Question: First of all Governor Palin, we want to thank you for transforming our website from a tiny site to one that now employs three people full time. You created jobs for us during the campaign. We're very grateful.

Palin: You're welcome. These are tough times so I'm glad you have found something that works for you. I don't really know who you guys are and there was a lot of garbage written during the campaign. I hope you kept it accurate.

Question: We had a lot of fun, we were kept very busy, and yes, most of it was accurate. Anyhow, we're calling to congratulate you on your book deal. We understand it is worth $7 million, that's a lot of money.

journalist but I'm not a pen-on-paper person. Sure, I can write a book but my book is my image, it's my person. I'm not the one to put that image into words on a page, if you follow me.

Question: Yes, you'll need a ghost writer.

Palin: Well, ghost writer sounds like the guy is dead and I want my writer to be alive. It has to be an alive kinda book that answers 'Who is Sarah?", "Why does everyone love Sarah?", "Why didn't they love John McCain enough to elect him?" So what I need is someone who can, y'know put that image of Sarah into a format that is a book. The way I talk, the Sarah way of just ... I speak just like I think, it's like how Alaska people speak, it's not an Obama way with sentences all neat in a row, sentence period, sentence period, you know, the Harvard way of speaking. I am more flowing and the ideas, well, one thought moves into another and it is maybe, I dunno, difficult to capture that complexity of me in a book, so I'll need a darn good writer.

Question: What are these complex ideas you mention?

Palin: A complex idea is just a simple idea in a fancy outfit. Politicians, academics, the elite, they have this way of talking that makes everything so difficult to understand for Joe Six Pack American. I mean economics, what is economics? It's just a way of saying that some things need to increase, other things need to decrease, some things need to stay the stay the way they are. Why is Wall Street in a mess? Because some things increased too much while other things didn't increase enough, and some things stayed that same that would have been better if we increased or decreased them. So when Obama talks about it like it's a big, you know, mystery, he's just a Washington insider who doesn't want us to understand what's going on, which is that Wall Street robbed us.

Question: I guess any problem could be looked at as a matter of you have to increase it, decrease it, or leave it alone. 

Palin: Yes, that all anything is. It's like math. Two plus two is four, right? That's fine, you just leave it alone. Someone says two plus two is five, you say no, you have to decrease it by one to make it right. Same with the economy.

Question: What do you think of all these bailout packages, the failed bailout for the auto industry?

Palin: That's easy. That is not my problem anymore, that's Obama's problem. When his solutions don't work, then my job is to step in and say, "Hey you guys, it didn't work".

Question: But what if it works?

Palin: Then my job is to say, "You guys, I coulda fixed it better and quicker". That's politics

Question: Are you going to use your book as a launch pad for a higher profile in the Republican Party, possibly a bid for presidential nomination next time round?

Palin: That's an option to look at and say, "Hey, that's an option right there". It could be that God is calling Sarah to do that, but God might want to use me in another way. I mean, $7 million for a book, it's not about money for Sarah and Todd, it's about glorifying the Lord. So I will pray about it and we'll see.

Question: But you don't rule out that you might one day stand for president?

Palin: I don't rule out that I one day WILL be president. What I know about presidential campaigns, I learned it al very recently. John McCain, bless him, was like "Governor Palin, do you want to be vice president and I'm like sure, why not?" What I found out which I didn't know before was you have to have a good image in the mainstream media and when you have that, when you are a media darling, you can ride all the way to the White House. It's not what you say really but how you say it, and you have to have a gimmick or a selling point. Obama is the first African-American president, that's his gimmick. His gimmick trumped my gimmick as the first woman VP candidate for the GOP. Next time, I'll have the strongest gimmick. That's what matters, not where you went to school, who your friends are, whether you have Axelrod or Schmidt on your side. You know something, my research people, I had a whole team of researchers, they told me my red shoes, those Naughty Monkey Double Dare shoes, they were more important that anything I said in any city or state. Those shoes won millions of votes.

Question: John McCain would not have gotten many votes wearing those shoes.

Palin: Hah, true... And it's different for guys, I guess. The outfits don't matter so much.

Question: Those outfits, your outfits, cost the party a lot of money, perhaps as much as $200,000 when everything is added up including the make-up and hair. Isn't that excessive?

Palin: It's weird how the media picks that one thing, outfits, and blows it out of proportion. This was the most expensive campaign in history. You had Obama raising more than $100 million some months and people are complaining about $200,000 spent on outfits so I could represent the party in the best way possible. I'll give you some figures. Campaign teams eat a lot of doughnuts, junk food I know, but they eat 'em for breakfast, on the bus, at coffee stops, okay, you add all that up, and some guys have done the math, each side spent at least $50,000 just on doughnuts during the campaign. Why isn't anyone complaining about that? You know, Americans are losing their jobs and homes and both parties are spending 50 grand on doughnuts.

Question: You obviously have strong support among social conservatives in your party. How are you going to broaden your appeal so that you can win a presidential election?

Palin: Those are just labels, conservative, liberal, left, right, just names. In the end, there's just good ideas and bad ideas. Everyone, even a fool, can have a good idea once in a while. Let me tell you a secret, you know why we hammered Obama so hard on being a liberal? It's because Steve Schmidt [John McCain's campaign strategist] had research that showed 70 percent of people have a bad feeling when they hear the word liberal. You get someone labeled as a liberal, it's gonna hurt him. He doesn't have to be a liberal, you just gotta make that label stick. 

Question: So you want be campaigning as a staunch social conservative who's fiscally responsible?

Palin: Most people don't even know what the heck that means. It's like this, I got a bunch of good, popular ideas. You earn money, you get to keep that money with Sarah. You don't like foreigners and terrorists, nor does Sarah.  You want to make America number one in the world, so does Sarah. You wanna close our bodies to crooks and drug dealers, so does Sarah. You wanna keep a rifle in your truck? So does Sarah. That's how you win elections.

Question: A lot of people were saying after your defeat that you'd have to go back to school, spend a lot of time with people like Bill Kristol learning conservative fundamentals.

Palin: Yeah, right. Let me ask you something. How many votes did Bill Kristol get when he stood to be vice president of United States? None, zero, zip. He never stood. The last time Bill stood for office was as class president in second grade. He can't teach me anything.

Question: Barack Obama says he is very heavily influenced by Abraham Lincoln's influence as he chooses his cabinet and prepares to govern. Who are the major political influences in your life?

Palin: I'll say as president Bush once said, my Lord Jesus Christ, the greatest thinker and doer in the history of the world. He started off as one guy, God's son, and now he's the leader of the biggest force for good in the world, Christianity.

Question: Do you kave any influences in American political life.

Palin: I always admired Mother Teresa, but she's not American. Let me see, that's a tough one. It's not Ted Stevens, that's for sure. Ummm, oh, Ronald Reagan, yeah President Reagan. I'm too young to remember much abut him but President Reagan is a good answer.

Question: Good choice. Finally, Governor Palin, when will your book be published?

Palin: Gosh, y'know, publishing is worse than politics. It's all a case of my guy has to talk to your guy who talks to the next guy. It's out of my hands. Lawyers are working on it right now. And we have to find someone to write the darn thing, but when it's I'd you won't miss out.

Question: Thank you so much for your time, Governor Palin. We know you are very busy.

Palin: My pleasure, thank you for calling.

Catch her cheating ass red-handed: cheat's checklist of clues

"I'm looking for sex and love with an older woman."

How to stay in shape after 50: running and fitness

I hate my husband, what can I do?

In the mind of a compulsive cheat: why does he do it?

I divorced my husband because he had no sex drive

Kate, 49, explains why she is leaving Greg, 50, after 25 years of happy marriage

"How I helped my obese husband lose 50 pounds"

How Do You Know When Your Marriage Can't Be Saved?

The original top six supermodels: Cindy Crawford, Claudia Schiffer, Kate Moss, and friends

Karolina Kurkova lingerie model

"I want to leave my fat, lazy husband"

Men love to chase a woman, but they don't know how to keep her

My child has type 1 diabetes. How do we cope?