Sarah Palin doesn't like being asked questions about questionable things she has said.
That was the lesson Today Show anchor Savannah Guthrie learned Monday morning when she asked the former Alaska governor about her controversial remarks connecting her son's alleged post-traumatic stress disorder to President Obama.
“I want to ask you about something you mentioned on the campaign trail,” Guthrie said. “You said that President Obama may be to blame for some of the PTSD that’s out there.”
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“I never said that,” Palin shot back.
The interview then went entirely off the rails. “You guys brought me here to talk about Iowa politics and the caucus tonight,” Palin fumed, “not to talk about my kids. That was a promise. As things go in the world of media, you don’t always keep your promises, evidently.”
Following her son Track’s January arrest for a domestic-violence incident, Palin suggested, while on-stage endorsing Donald Trump for president, that her 26-year-old vet child came back from his service with PTSD; and that Obama’s lack of “respect” for U.S. soldiers is partially to blame.
Watch @SarahPalinUSA speak out on TODAY in exclusive interview. #IowaTODAY https://t.co/Kbol2A7w9x
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) February 1, 2016
Nevertheless, Palin attempted to explain away the remarks to her stunned hosts. “I never blamed President Obama,” she asserted. “What I have blamed President Obama in doing, though, is this level of disrespect for the United States military that has made manifest in cutting budgets, in not trying to beef it up and let our military do the job they’re trained to do, and in specific issues we’re talking about that are so hot today, specifically, let’s get in there and utterly destroy ISIS.”
Further pushing Palin, co-anchor Matt Lauer jumped in: “Do you regret the comment on that day of the endorsement?”
“What did I say that is offensive?” a befuddled Palin replied.
“That you seem to lay it at the feet of the president,” Lauer elaborated.
“I don’t regret any comment that I made because I didn’t lay PTSD at the foot of the president,” the reality TV star explained. “If you have a specific quote, it allows the media to be credible, if you would tell me what you’re talking about.”
Lauer attempted to take control of the interview by noting for the audience, and for a furious Palin, that “there were no specific promises made about content of the interview; only this would be your first interview since you endorsed Donald Trump.”
But she wasn't quelled: “Well, I was told that this interview is about the caucus tonight in Iowa, and right on who will it be to put America back on the right track and restore constitutional government that we’re lacking today.”
And then the end finally came.