Excerpts from Sarah Palin's Interview With Fox News

SARAH PALIN RESPONDS TO FOX NEWS CHANNEL'S GRETA VAN SUSTEREN ABOUT THE RECENT ACCUSATIONS AGAINST HER INCLUDING CLOTHES, AFRICA AND NAFTA

Palin: [Clothes] Just Seem Like Such An Irrelevant Issue When You Consider What Is Going On In The World“

During Governor Sarah Palin first post-election sit-down with FOX News Channel's Greta Van Susteren from Wasilla, Alaska and spoke about the recent allegations that have been brought against.  She also discussed her feelings on the outcome of the election and her plans for 2012 and beyond.

The interview airs tonight during On the Record, 10PM ET.

*Mandatory Credit: FOX News Channel's On the Record

On accusations of ordering expensive clothing:
“I did not order the clothes.  Did not ask for the clothes.  I would have been happy to have worn my own clothes from day one.  But that is kind of an odd issue, an odd campaign issue as things were wrapping up there as to who ordered what and who demanded what.”

“I haven't really heard how all of that evolved, and hadn't really pursued it until we started getting criticized for supposedly asking for all of these clothes, my family and me.  And still don't have all of the answers.  But it just, at this point, especially seems so irrelevant unless the criticism continues in regards to my family or me demanding anything.”

“But it just seems like such an irrelevant issue when you consider what is going on in the world today and how a new administration is being ushered in and people being concerned about the direction of the nation and policies that will be adopted and also at the same time being excited about this historic moment in our nation's history, clothes just seem irrelevant.”

On accusations that she did not know if Africa was a continent or a state:
“So we discussed what was going on in Africa.  And never, ever did I talk about, well, gee, is it a country or is it a continent.  I just don't know about this issue.  So I don't know how they took our one discussion on Africa and turned that into what they turned it into.”

“I don't know, because I remember the discussion about Africa, my concern has been the atrocities there in Darfur and the relevance to me with that issue, as we spoke about Africa and some of the countries there that were kind of the people succumbing to the dictators and the corruption of some collapsed governments on the continent, the relevance was Alaska's investment in Darfur with some of our permanent fund dollars, I wanted to make sure that that didn't happen anymore.”

On accusations of her not knowing the countries in NAFTA:
“I remember that discussion, but there was never a question about, well, who are the participants in NAFTA?  So for my discussion there to be spun into something that it was not and then being broadcast on national television, again, based on anonymous sources, that's been another puzzling thing to me.”

“Along those same lines, of course, was the criticism that supposedly I didn't know who the participants in NAFTA were.  I remember, again, having a discussion about NAFTA and how Alaska, again, being relevant to the discussion with the trade that we have with Canada being our next door neighbors, how important it was that we continue NAFTA and having good relations with Mexico and with Canada, and wanting to know what Barack Obama meant by saying that he would want to, perhaps, unilaterally get in there and renegotiate NAFTA.”

On the outcome of the election:
“At the end of the day, American voters spoke.  It's the will of the people that it was not our time and our message was not the message of change that the majority of voters wanted.  So be it.”

“Now, OK, that said, chapter's closed now.  And now let me, let John McCain do all that we can along with our supporters to help unite the nation and progress under a new administration.”

On her plans for 2012:
“But I can't predict what's going to happen. I can't predict what's going to happen a day from now, much less four years from now.”

“You know, I have -- faith is a very big part of my life. And putting my life in my creator's hands -- this is what I always do. I'm like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I'm like, don't let me miss the open door.  Show me where the open door is. Even if it's cracked up a little bit, maybe I'll plow right on through that and maybe prematurely plow through it, but don't let me miss an open door.  And if there is an open door in '12 or four years later, and if it is something that is going to be good for my family, for my state, for my nation, an opportunity for me, then I'll plow through that door.”

On accusations of her going rogue during the campaign:
“So, as days went on, it was good, it was fine.  But being quite independent, just like John McCain is also, yes, maybe there is some characterizing of me going rogue when once in a while I would say something that -- hey, I said it from the heart. I believed in going off script once in a while in some of the rallies in order to really reiterate, perhaps, something that I believed about John McCain.”

“Maybe it wasn't written in the script, but so what. Geez, if this is all going to be so scripted and kind of like a movie screen and we have to follow verbatim everything that somebody writes for you, I don't want any part of that. That's not who I am and that's not who John McCain is either.”

“So, if I went off script once in a while, I can't for the life of me remember any one time where it would have harmed him, or the ticket. So I don't regret it.”

On what she would have changed about the way she was managed by the campaign:
“I would have preferred more opportunity to speak to the media more often, because there were a lot of things that I think it could have, should have said that could have, would have helped John McCain.  I have such great admiration for him.  I honor him.  I love him.  I believe that he is the best leader that we have in the nation right now, still, is John McCain.”

“And I would have liked to have had more opportunity to be out there speaking on his behalf, of the attributes that -- that he has, because he's so humble he doesn't do that himself.  He did not, I believe, have -- take enough opportunity, and that's just the way that he is, though.  He's too humble.  Take the opportunity to let people know the challenges that he has overcome, his ability to face adversity and overcome challenges.  I would have liked more opportunity to have done that for him.”

On female journalists' criticisms of her:
“I just would have loved to have the opportunity to have sat down and spoken with them and that's an odd thing, isn't it?  About candidates?  That it's a free-for-all.  Your life is an open book and you open yourself up to criticism and you'd better be ready to take that criticism, in other words, don't run for office if you can't handle it but when it's – you've got the big target on your back, then it is a free-for-all and the criticism that is coming your way is again, it had better be – you'd better be ready for it.  Otherwise you have no right running for office.”

“Kind of unfortunate but it's reality.”

On why people had such strong opinions for or against her immediately by the public:
“I don't know.  I can't answer that.  I don't know.  What it would be.  Perhaps the criticism would be what it is that I represent.  It certainly, what I think I represent is out of the box when you consider most conventional candidates for higher office, national office.  Even though it certainly being a Washington outsider and not part of that “elite” group I think that some would want to chose from perhaps just being an outsider and an unknown.”

“Certainly there was a tremendous amount of curiosity there and some chose to satisfy their curiosity based on facts and someone's record.  And others chose to satisfy their curiosity based on those – I'm going to characterize them as those bloggers in their parents' basement just talking garbage.”

“You know, that's everybody's choice, I guess, and where they want to go to.  To write about someone but there were some oddities there.”

On how she felt she was treated by the mainstream media:
“…it was mind-boggling to consider what it was that -- that we were going to be up against, when you could see that something was written about, something was stated in the media.  I knew the truth and I had the record to prove otherwise and yet it would either take too long to unring that bell that had just been rung or there was no attempt at all to correct the record.”

“That was pretty frustrating.”