Palin OKs first interview

WASHINGTON -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, has agreed to her first interview since being named Sen. John McCain's running mate. It will be with ABC News anchor Charles Gibson this week, the network and McCain's campaign said Sunday.

Palin's media relations have gotten off to a rocky start. McCain campaign officials have complained about what they regard as the intrusively personal nature of some reporters' inquiries, and Palin mocked "all those reporters and commentators" Wednesday in her speech to the Republican National Convention.

Palin was the only member of the major parties' presidential tickets not to appear on a TV talk show Sunday. Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, said on "Fox News Sunday" that she would not put herself before a "cycle of piranhas called the news media" until reporters started to treat her "with some level of respect and deference."

That drew mild criticism from Democratic vice presidential nominee Sen. Joe Biden, a veteran of the talk-show circuit. "Eventually, she's going to have to answer questions and not be sequestered," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Hours later, the McCain campaign disclosed the plans for Gibson to interview Palin this week in Alaska.

McCain advisers rebuffed interview requests for Palin last week by saying she needed time to prepare for her convention speech. That left campaign aides scrambling to address questions about her political record.

Palin has not campaigned apart from McCain so far, instead joining him at events drawing ever-larger crowds.

On Fox, Davis said Palin would agree to an interview "when we think it's time and when she feels comfortable doing it," adding she is "not scared to answer questions."

"Why would we want to throw Sarah Palin into a cycle of piranhas called the news media, that have nothing better to ask questions about than her personal life and her children?" Davis said, adding, "Until ... we feel like the news media is going to treat her with some level of respect and deference, I think it would be foolhardy to put her out into that kind of environment."

McCain adviser Mark Salter said there were no ground rules on what Palin could be asked in the interview. He also said Palin had not been sent out to campaign on her own because McCain enjoyed the excitement she was injecting into his campaign.

"They're having a good time. We were riding a lot of momentum coming out of the convention. The crowds were large," he said. "The senator himself thought they should continue on for a few days."

Biden and Palin are scheduled to debate Oct. 2 at Washington University in St. Louis.

The Delaware senator, serving his sixth term in Congress, said that he has debated "an awful lot of tough, smart women" and that the debate with Palin will be no exception. But he would like to know where she stands on issues.

"She's a smart, tough politician, so I think she's going to be very formidable," he said, adding that "there's a lot of very tough, smart women in the United States Senate I debate every day." So going up against the first-term governor, he said: "It's not new."

Asked whether he would debate Palin differently than he would Mitt Romney or Tom Ridge, two former governors who figured into speculation about McCain's running mate, Biden said the only difference is that he knows their positions on issues.

"I have no idea what her policies are. I assume they're the same as John's. I just don't know," he said of Palin.

Biden said she delivered a great speech to the Republican National Convention last week in St. Paul, Minn., but "her silence on the issues was deafening."

The Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, praised Palin as a "skilled politician" but said McCain's decision to put her on his ticket was more evidence that they would continue the policies of the current Republican administration.

"It tells me that he chose somebody who may be even more aligned with George Bush -- or Dick Cheney or the politics we've seen over the last eight years -- than John McCain himself is," Obama said on ABC's "This Week."

Obama and Biden, whose campaign's central theme is a pledge to bring change to Washington, took issue with McCain's and Palin's promise to do the same.

"If you believe that George Bush has run this economy into the ground and mismanaged our foreign policy, who's more likely to change those policies?" Obama asked. "I don't think there's any dispute that that would be me."

McCain defended Palin, noting she is galvanizing his core supporters and has brought excitement to the campaign.

"We've been campaigning together, the electricity has been incredible," he said. "I'd like to say it's all because of a charisma injection on the part of John McCain, but it's not. They're excited about this reformer, this lifetime member of the NRA, the person who's a point guard. She has it."

Obama also acknowledged Sunday that he was probably too flip when he said it was "above my pay grade" to answer a question about when a baby is entitled to human rights. He gave his answer last month at a nationally televised religious forum sponsored by minister Rick Warren at his megachurch in Orange County, Calif.

Asked Sunday whether the "above my pay grade" answer was too flip, Obama said: "Probably. ... What I intended to say is that, as a Christian, I have a lot of humility about understanding when does the soul enter into. ... It's a pretty tough question.

"And so, all I meant to communicate was that I don't presume to be able to answer these kinds of theological questions."

Obama said he would delay rescinding President Bush's tax cuts on wealthy Americans if he becomes president and the economy is in a recession, suggesting such a move would further hurt the economy.

Nevertheless, Obama has no plans to extend the tax cuts beyond their expiration date, as McCain advocates. Instead, Obama wants to push for tax cuts for the middle class, he said on "This Week."

"Even if we're still in a recession, I'm going to go through with my tax cuts," he said. "That's my priority."

What about increasing taxes on the wealthy?

"I think we've got to take a look and see where the economy is. I mean, the economy is weak right now," he said. "The news with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, I think, along with the unemployment numbers, indicates that we're fragile."

Obama was referring to the two mortgage companies taken over by the government Sunday in what could become a huge taxpayer bailout.

McCain has hammered Obama over taxes in an attempt to paint him as a typical tax-and-spend liberal. McCain wants to make permanent the Bush tax cuts, which are set to expire in 2010.

"We can get this economy back on its feet," he said on "Face the Nation." "Don't raise their taxes. Get it going again. Americans are hurting in a way that they have not hurt for a long time."