FORT MYERS, FLA –

Sarah Palin blasted the Democratic nominee today at a Clearwater rally trying to stoke fears about a potential President Obama, “I am just so fearful that this is not a man who sees America the way you and I see America as the greatest source for good in this world.”

As the GOP ticket slips in the polls, she accused Barack Obama of declining to provide funds to American troops and not supporting soldiers in Afghanistan, “Our opponent voted to cut off funding for our troops even after saying he would never do so and he said that our troops in Afghanistan are just quote air raiding villages and killing civilians and that’s not what our brave men and women in uniform are doing in Afghanistan.”

These are the same remarks that on Friday Palin told FNC’s Carl Cameron she believes “disqualifies” him from being Commander in Chief. The McCain campaign also used the same language in a new attack ad released today called, “Dangerous.”

The Obama campaign says their candidate was trying to emphasize the need for more troops in Afghanistan. Today, the camp released a response to the television ad from Retired Four Star Admiral, John B. Natham:

“As a recently retired Admiral, I know who has the strongest record of supporting the men and women currently serving in our military. Senator Obama has consistently voted to fund our troops in Afghanistan and Iraq and, just as importantly, a proven record of support when they return home. That’s why independent veterans organizations give Senator Obama higher marks than Senator McCain. Despite consistent distortions of his record, thousands of veterans like myself support Senator Obama because he has the judgment, character and integrity to be a great president. We will need a great president to lead us in these very challenging times.”

Even as the Dow keeps diving, Palin did not provide any details on how a McCain-Palin administration would fix the current financial crisis only to say that it is one of the issues that Americans want to hear about as opposed to the topics she was asked in her recent media interviews. She quickly moved on to repeat the attack she began this weekend of linking Obama to 1960’s radical William Ayers.

ST. LOUIS –-

The McCain campaign has been accused of muzzling their Vice-Presidential candidate resulting in only a very limited amount of media interviews and save one instance, no spontaneous questions from her traveling press.

Today, Sarah Palin said she disagrees with the notion that she was reigned in at all by the campaign and now that her debate is over she will interact with the press more. “I’ll tell you, what I will do is commit to not being so annoyed and impatient with mainstream media.” Palin said,  “And I will make that commitment because I do understand that that is how I speak to the American people in a position like this.  I speak to you and through you and that way, that message is received by American people.”

She said she looks forward to “speaking to the media more and more everyday and providing whatever access the media would want,” which would be welcome news to her lonely traveling press corps.

She told FNC’s Carl Cameron that she wishes she had more time in the day to be on rope lines and communicate to voters directly, but understands it doesn’t work that way and she must talk to the press, “We go through you and we talk to voters through you.  And I’m accessible.  And now that the debate is over, and also — you know yes, I kind of feel like, all right.”  Palin said, “The wings are flying here.  Let’s soar, let’s get out there and speak to voters and let them know what their choices are.  And I’m excited about this opportunity in this last month.”

The Alaska governor did throw one slightly veiled jab at the media during the interview when she was asked how she felt about her debate performance last night,  “It was a great opportunity to get to speak directly to Americans.  That’s how I looked at it when I walked into there saying, you know, we’re not going to be filtered. There’s not going to be the cutting and pasting and editing of any of our comments.  Right on.  Let me just talk to Americans.”

ST. LOUIS –-

Sarah Palin came under severe criticism after her interview with CBS News’ Katie Couric when the GOP Vice-Presidential candidate could not name a Supreme Court decision she opposed or even newspapers and magazines she reads. Her circular avoidance to the Supreme Court answer especially worried conservatives.

However, today in an interview with FNC’s Carl Cameron, Palin aimed to clear up that worry and said she was “flippant” during the previous interview because she was “annoyed” at the line of questioning. She did apologize several times during the interview and said that she should have named what Supreme Court decisions she disagrees with because it was an “important” question. She named three Supreme Court verdicts she does oppose:

“Kennedy versus Louisiana, where the Supreme Court will tell a state that they can’t impose the death penalty, even on heinous crime of repeat child rapists. That a state, its rights are taken away by the Supreme Court and we would not be able to decide for ourselves whether the death penalty in a case like that should be implemented or not.” Palin said, “The Kelo case also, with eminent domain. That affects me, as a governor. It affected me as a mayor, also. Part that property rights are so precious in this nation and for the Supreme Court to have sided with government, instead of the people, the property owners on that. That was frustrating. And then another one personally affected me, also. The Exxon Valdez oil spill. Siding with the oil company, as they decimated Alaska’s coastline and much of our fisheries and much of our coastal communities livelihoods — the people who live there. And they sided with Exxon on the punishment, the punitive damage that was to be awarded.”

She also said that she “reads the same things that other people across the country read” including the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and the New York Times—despite it often being bashed by the McCain campaign.

She said she didn’t answer what periodicals she reads because she was “taken aback” by the question and saw it as Couric accusing Alaskans of not being “in tune with the rest of the world.”

ST. LOUIS –- News broke yesterday that the McCain campaign was pulling out of Michigan effectively conceding the state to Barack Obama. This morning, Sarah Palin told Fox News Channel’s Carl Cameron that she disagreed with the decision and tried to stop the pull-out adding that she is willing to help the camp continue to fight for Michigan:

“I read that this morning and I fired off a quick e-mail and said, ‘Oh come on do we have to? Do we have to call it there?’ Todd and I would be happy to get to Michigan and walk through those plants of the car manufacturers.” Palin said, “We’d be so happy to get to speak to the people in Michigan, who are hurtin’ because the economy is hurtin’. Whatever we can do and whatever Todd and I can do in realizing what their challenges in that state are, as we can relate to them and connect with them and promise that we won’t let them down in the administration. I want to get back to Michigan and I want to try.”

Even though Palin broke with the campaign on their Michigan decision, there are no plans for the McCain camp to try again in the Wolverine State as they have pulled their ads and are sending their staffs to other battleground states.

Keep checking back for more on FNC’s exclusive interview with Sarah Palin.

ST. LOUIS –- Fox News’ Carl Cameron conducted the first post-debate interview with Sarah Palin this morning. The extensive interview went over last night’s Vice-Presidential face off, her debate prep, campaign strategy, media access and the hits she has been getting for not having more access to the media, and of course the much talked about and criticized interview she did with CBS’s Katie Couric.

Palin told Carl that she was “annoyed” at some of the interviews she has done, “Ok I’ll tell you honestly the Sarah Palin in those interviews is a little bit annoyed because it’s man no matter what you say you are going to get clobbered. If you choose to answer a question you are going to get clobbered on the answer,” Palin said. “If you choose to try and pivot and go on to another subject that you believe that Americans want to hear about you get clobbered for that too.”

She then aimed to defend herself for some of the criticism she got for the Couric interview. She was blasted for not answering Couric’s question on any of the periodicals she reads or even a Supreme Court decision that she disagreed with. She defended some of the circular answers she gave the CBS anchor saying that she did not get to cover some of the topics she saw as important, “But in those Katie Couric interviews I did feel that there were a lot of things that she was missing in terms of an opportunity to ask what a V.P. candidate stands for. What the values are represented in our ticket. I wanted to talk about Barack Obama increasing taxes, which would lead to killing jobs. I wanted to talk about his proposal to increase government spending by another trillion dollars.”

She then slammed Barack Obama calling him disqualified to be President of the United States, “Some of his comments that he has made about the war that I think may — in my world– disqualifies someone from consideration as the next commander in chief.” Palin said, “Some of his comments about Afghanistan and what we are doing there supposedly– just air raiding villages and killing civilians. That’s reckless. So I wanted to talk about things like that. So I guess I have to apologize about being a little annoyed, but that is also an indication of being outside that Washington elite and being outside the media elite also and just wanting to talk and just wanting to talk to Americans without the filter and let them know what we stand for.”

Stay tuned to Fox News all day as Carl Cameron reports on his interview with Palin. Also keep checking back here as this is just the first installment of my blogs on their tete a tete

YORK, PA –John McCain said there is “no room for partisanship” when it comes to the Georgia-Russia crisis and refrained from criticizing his Democratic rival on foreign policy during an interview with Fox News’ Carl Cameron today.

“I respect Senator Obama’s views and I believe that it’s important that we act in a bipartisan fashion now,” McCain told FOX after a town hall meeting in York. “There’s no room for partisanship now.”

His reluctance to make Georgia a political issue comes on the same day one of his key surrogates, Sen. Joe Lieberman, criticized Barack Obama as lacking the experience to handle the crisis.

During the interview, McCain focused his fire on the Russians, who he said were acting in “violation of all international norms,” and reiterated his belief that they should be booted from the G8.

“Clearly, Russia no longer shares any of the values and principles of the G8, so they should be excluded and I think long-term they must pay a price for this act…which is clearly at the best, you could call it a gross and outrageous over-reaction to what might be viewed by some as provocation,” McCain said. “Thousands of innocent people are being rendered homeless, killed and wounded and there’s no necessity for it.”

McCain foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann told reporters aboard the campaign plane today that McCain’s views on G8 expulsion are getting increasing support, noting recent comments by British opposition leader David Cameron.

The presumptive GOP nominee also had some subtle criticism for President Bush’s dealings with the Russian leader during the past eight years.

“I don’t know if the president quote, ‘missed the boat.’ But, I do believe that the president probably had a higher opinion of Vladimir Putin than I do,” McCain noted, but resisted to criticize the commander in chief when asked if President Bush should have returned earlier from the Olympic games to address the crisis.

He also stressed that NATO needs to reconsider Georgia’s bid for membership, arguing that the body is currently limited in how much assistance it can provide the “small struggling democracy.”

“Through the NATO membership, that if a member nation is attacked, it is viewed as an attack on all. I would move forward at the right time with the application for membership in NATO by Georgia,” McCain said. “We don’t have, I think, right now, the ability to intervene in any way except in a humanitarian, economic way, and do what we can to help the Georgians.”

Other highlights:

On whether he trusts the Russian declaration of a cease-fire: “I think it depends on whether they think they’ve achieved their objectives or not. I think they want a regime change. They want a compliant person in charge in Tbilisi. And I think they want control of the energy supply. And I think it’s part of this — also this effort to re-exert age-old Russian influence in the region. And that applies to Azerbaijan, to Ukraine and either countries in the region who will, I think they believe, will take — learn a lesson from this experience that Georgia’s had.”

On whether the Russians can claim victory so far: “I think it’s a set back for democracy, for progress. Not only in Georgia, but it could be in the region. But, you know the Russians have tried this in the past. I don’t think they can extinguish the flame of independence in Georgia, or Ukraine or other countries in the region. So, in the short term, I think they probably won some kind of corp-victory. Putin has articulated it before and now he’s put his words into action. And I think it’s a real wake-up call for all of us.”

 Myrtle Beach, SC–

As the embedded producer with the Romney campaign I ask Governor Romney a lot of questions. Tonight in the spin room of the Fox News Debate it was the governor’s turn to ask one of me.
Governor, I told you I would get to the bottom of it! Please click below for the mysterious question, its answer, and debate analysis from Carl Cameron.
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Bedford, NH

Governor Romney held one of his last rallies here before primary day. The excited crowd of close to seven hundred was one of his biggest and most enthusiastic to date. His stump was tweaked and he even gave the audience some insight into his non-stop energy saying, “There’s an old family saying that if a Romney drowns in a river, look upstream for the body.”

The crowd might not have expected it, but the highlight of the evening took place before the presidential hopeful even took the stage. Senior advisor to the campaign Tom Rath got the crowd energized for the governor with a special rendition of campaign and Red Sox favorite, Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline:

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Confused? Let Campaign Carl explain exactly what is going on:

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Romney starts visiting polling locations early tomorrow morning–trying to shake as many hands as possible scrambling for those final votes in this first in the nation primary.