During her interview with Oprah Winfrey, Sarah Palin explained her infamous gaffe from the 2008 campaign, when Katie Couric asked what newspapers and magazines she reads, and Palin responded that she reads “all of them, any of them that have been in front of me over all these years.” And Palin said that she was annoyed at someone asking about what people in Alaska read.
“Now obviously, you’ve read books and magazines,” said Winfrey. “Why didn’t you just name some books or magazines?”
“Well, and obviously I have of course all my life read. I’m a lover of books and magazines and newspapers,” said Palin. “By the time she asked me that question, even though it was kind of early on in the interview, I was already so annoyed, and it was very unprofessional of me to wear that annoyance on my sleeve.”
“Was it that you couldn’t think of any in the moment?” Winfrey asked.
“No, it was more like, ‘Are you kidding me? Are you really asking me? To me, it was in the context of, ‘Do you read? How do you stay informed, you’re way up there?'” said Palin. “It seemed like she was discovering this nomadic tribe, a member of a tribe from some Neanderthal cave in Alaska, asking me, how do you stay in touch with the real world? That’s how I took the question.”
Winfrey later asked: “When you finished that interview, did you think, ‘I wished I had just named some magazines?'”
“Absolutely!” Palin replied. “Then we probably wouldn’t be talking about it today.”
