While the Democrat elite and their lackeys in the elite MSM media salivate at the thought of interviewing Governor and now vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in the real media, as opposed to the Anchorage Daily News or some smaller Alaskan rag, thinking they'll expose her and pull her down, they seem to forget that Governor Palin has been interviewed often by the national press and has done very well. 

Besides being telegenic, she had a tough-girl Alaskan résumé that most politicians could only dream of-the protein her family eats comes from fish she has pulled out of the ocean with her own hands and caribou she has shot. "It's never bothered me," she says. "That caribou has had a good life. It's been free out there on the tundra, not caged up on a farm with no place to move." During the summer, she and her husband spend time commercial-fishing thanks to a permit that has been passed down on the native side of his family from generation to generation. It's the kind of brutal work that most Americans stopped doing generations ago, but Palin relishes the challenge. "I look forward to it every year," she says.

Curious about what kind of a background could produce someone like Palin, I called up her parents, who live 40 miles from Anchorage in the small town where Palin was mayor. "Come on over," her father, Chuck Heath, said on the phone, "unless you have a problem with small dead animals."

Rarely has a yard so clearly broadcast the personality of its owners. A mound of a thousand caribou antlers rose next to the driveway, creating a surreal vision of an igloo made of bones. In between the birches stretched a stack of firewood the length of a semi-trailer. Buoys of all colors hung from the house and outer buildings. On the back of the Heaths' 4x4 a bumper sticker read, VEGETARIAN-OLD INDIAN WORD FOR "BAD HUNTER."

Chuck and Sally Heath are both retired from their jobs, she as a school secretary and he as a middle school science teacher, but they continue to work part-time as "nuisance-control specialists" (a.k.a. trappers) for the Department of Agriculture. Their most memorable assignment was trapping rats in the debris from the World Trade Center at the Fresh Kills landfill after 9/11. Neither Sally, a motherly former marathon runner who urges oatmeal cookies and herbal tea on visitors, nor her husband thought for a moment that a girl couldn't do everything a boy could. Nor can they remember a time when their now-prominent daughter, one of four children, balked at the lifestyle they lead...well, there was that one early-morning hunt when Chuck asked Sarah to hold the eyeballs of the moose he was skinning.

BARTIROMO: THANKYOUFOR JOINING US. TELL ME ABOUTTHE SIZ AND SCOPE OF THE OIL OPERTATIONS UPON THE NORTH SLOPE. ONE ANALONGY OUT THERE IS THAT ITS LIKE A STAMP ON FOOTBALL FIELD.

PALIN: THAT'S PRETTY ACCURATE. IT IS, OR WE HEAR THE ANALOGY ALSO, WHICHIS QUITE ACCURATE, ITS LIKE THE LOT THATYOUHAVE WITHYOUR HOUSE PLOPPED I THEMIDDLE YOUPUTYOURTOW PRINT ON THE LAWN OF THIS LOT, THAT ABOUT THE FOOT PRINT OF THIS OPERATION UP IN PRUDO BAY. ECONOMICALLY SPEAKING, THOUGH, IT'S ABOUT 20% OF THE U.S. DOMESTIC SUPPLY IS -- OF ENERGY IS PRODUCED UP ON THE NORTH SLOPE. SO VERY, VERY SIGNIFICANT ECONOMICALLY.PHYSICALLY, THANKFULLY, TINY LITTLE FOOTPRINT.

BARTIROMO: SO YOU'RE SAYING IT'S A TINY LITTLE FOOTPRINT, ACTUALLY THE OPERATIONS IN PRUDO BAY, BUT PEOPLE THINK OF IT AS SO EXPANSIVE AND SO MASSIVE THAT IT'S GOING TO HAVE A MATERIAL EFFECT IF IN FACT WE WERE TO SEEDRILLING THERE ON THE WILDLIFE AND ON THE COMMUNITY.

PALIN: WELL, ANWR AT THAT POINT IT'S ABOUT 2,000 ACRES THAT IS BEING ASKED TO BE LOOKED AT AND TO BE EXPLORED AND TO BE PRODUCED. 2,000 ACRES OUT OF 20 MILLION ACRES. THAT FOOTPRINT, IT'S ABOUT THE SIZE OF L.A.X. OR ONE OF THE LARGER AIRPORTS ACROSS THE NATION. AND THAT SHOULD ALLOW SOME PERSPECTIVE THERE ALSO. BUT YOU KNOW, NO ONE, I THINK, BUT ALASKANS CARE MORE ABOUT OUR WILDLIFE, ABOUT OUR CLEAN WATER, OUR CLEAN AIR, THE PRISTINE ENVIRONMENT THAT WE ARE BLESSED TO LIVE IN AND GET TO BREATHE IN EVERY SINGLE DAY. NO ONE BUT ALASKANS WILL CARE MORE TO MAKE SURE THAT WE ARE PRESERVING THAT PRISTINE ENVIRONMENT THAT IS ANWR, THE COASTAL PLAIN, PRUTO BAY, ALASKA AS A WHOLE. AND WHEN YOU ASK ALASKANS DO YOU AGREE TO ALLOW DRILLING TO TAKE PLACE ON THE NORTH SLOPE, SPECIFICALLY HERE WE'RE TALKING ABOUT ANWR, DO YOU WANT TO SEE THAT HAPPEN? AND WITH ALASKANS' LOVE AND CARE FOR OUR ENVIRONMENT AND OUR LANDS AND OUR WILDLIFE, ALASKANSARE SAYING YES BECAUSE WE BELIEVE THAT IT CAN BE DONE SAFELY, PRUDENTLY, AND IT HAD BETTER BE DONE ETHICALLY ALSO.YES, WE WANT TO SEE THAT DRILLING. SO HOPEFULLY THE REST OF AMERICA CAN UNDERSTAND THAT ALSO. YOU GO DOOR TO DOOR AND ASK ALASKANS IF WE ARE READY AND WILLING TO PRODUCE MORE AND CONTRIBUTE MORE TO THE U.S. AND THEY'RE GOING TO TELL YOU YES.

BARTIROMO: PRESIDENT BUSH TRIED THIS A NUMBER OF TIMES UNDER HIS WATCH. WHY IS IT WE HAVE BEEN UNABLE TOGET THIS DONE?

PALIN: I THINK THERE'S BEEN A LOT OF MISCONCEPTIONS AND MISPERCEPTIONS ABOUT WHAT ANWR IS ALL ABOUT AND UP ON THE NORTH SLOPE WHAT THE ENVIRONMENT ACTUALLY IS UP THERE. YOU SEE PICTURES, YOU SEE VISUALS FROM THE NAYSAYERS, THE CRITICS OF THE IDEA OF OPENING ANWR, AND THE PICTURES THAT THEY'RE SHOWING ARE MOUNTAINS AND -- POLAR BEARS.

BARTIROMO: POLAR BEARS.

PALIN: LOTS OF DIFFERENT WILDLIFE. THEY'LL SHOW MOOSE IN A STREAM WITH MOUNTAINS IN THE BACKGROUND.THAT'S NOT ANWR. AND AS YOUR PEOPLE GO UP THERE ALSO AND ACTUALLY GET TO SEE FORTHEMSELVES -- AND WE'VE HAD A LOT OF CONGRESSMEN AND CONGRESSWOMEN COME UP HERE THIS SUMMER EVEN TO SEE FOR THEMSELVES WHAT ACTUALLY IS ANWR, WHAT WOULD BE TOUCHED HERE IN TERMS OF LANDS AND WILDLIFE, THEN THEY SEE THAT THOSE VISUALSTHAT HAVE BEEN SHOWED AMERICA FOR ALL THESE YEARS ARE INACCURATE.THOSE ARE NOT THE PICTURES OF ANWR. THERE AREN'T MOUNTAINS UP THERE,FOR INSTANCE.SO I THINK THERE'S A LOT OF MISPERCEPTION OUT THERE ABOUT WHAT THE PLAIN ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE.AND THE VISUALS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO AMERICANS. I DO THINK, THOUGH, THAT AMERICANS ARE RECOGNIZING MORE AND MORE IT'S EVIDENCED IN THE PRESSURE THEY'RE PUTTING ON CONGRESS AT THIS POINT, THE CONSTITUENTS PUTTING ON CONGRESS, MORE AND MORE AMERICANS ARE RECOGNIZING IT IS TIME TO RAMP UP AMERICAN SUPPLY OF ENERGY, ESPECIALLY WE'RE A NATION AT WAR, A LOT OF THE ISSUES THAT ARE SO ADVERSELY AFFECTING AMERICA ARE BASED ON ENERGY SUPPLIES AS WE'RE RELYINGON FOREIGN SOURCES OF ENERGY TO FEED OUR HUNGRY MARKETS, MORE AND MORE AMERICANS ARE RECOGNIZING YOUR SISTER STATE UP IN THE ARCTIC, ALASKA HAS THESE SUPPLIES. WE HAVE TRILLIONS OF CUBIC FEET OF CLEAN NATURAL GAS. WE HAVE BILLIONS OF BARRELS OF OIL STILL SITTING UNDERGROUND, IN A SENSE BEING WAREHOUSED.IT'S TIME TO UNLOCK THESE RESERVES AND ALLOW COMPETITORS TO COME IN AND COMPETE FOR THE RIGHT TO TAP THOSE RESOURCES AND START FLOWING THAT ENERGY INTO THE DOMESTIC MARKETS THAT ARE SOHUNGRY SO THAT WE CAN BECOME LESS RELIANT ON FOREIGN SOURCES OF ENERGY. AS MORE AMERICANS RECOGNIZE THAT, MORE AMERICANS, IBELIEVE,ARE CHOOSING TO EDUCATE THEMSELVES ON WHAT ANWAR IS REALLY ALL ABOUT.