Andrea Mitchell Goes After Palin Again

September 30th, 2008 1:38 PM

For the second day in a row, NBC's Andrea Mitchell depicted Sarah Palin as a bumbling neophyte, as she claimed that even the McCain camp is concerned: "The McCain campaign is so worried about Palin's ability to debate Joe Biden, she's gone home with the McCains, for debate camp in Arizona." However Mitchell didn't point out that Joe Biden himself is taking time off the campaign trail to prep for Thursday's vice presidential debate.

On Monday's "Today" show Mitchell highlighted Tina Fey's satirization of Palin appearance's with Katie Couric and on this morning's "Today" show the NBC reporter played up Palin's response to a Couric question on Pakistan as she teased: "more controversy about Sarah Palin."

The following excerpt occurred on the September 30 edition of the "Today" show:

MITCHELL: And more controversy about Sarah Palin, after she said U.S. troops should cross into Pakistan to hunt terrorists.

SARAH PALIN: If that's what we have to do to stop the terrorists from coming any further in, absolutely, we should.

MITCHELL: It's an Obama position McCain has criticized. Monday he tried to rescue his running mate.

KATIE COURIC: Are you sorry you said it, Governor?

JOHN MCCAIN: Wait a minute! Before you say is she sorry, she said it, this was a gotcha sound bite that...

COURIC: It wasn't a gotcha, she was talking to a voter.

MCCAIN: She was in a conversation with a group of people and talking back and forth and I, I'll let Governor Palin speak for herself.

PALIN: Well and in, in fact, you're absolutely right on. In the context this was a voter, constituents hollering out a question from across an area, asking, "What are you gonna do about Pakistan? You better have an answer to Pakistan." I said we're gonna do what we have to do to protect the United States of America.

MITCHELL: In fact the McCain campaign is so worried about Palin's ability to debate Joe Biden, she's gone home with the McCains, for debate camp in Arizona, supervised by McCain's own top strategists.