Palin takes foreign affairs lesson in private

Gov. Sarah Palin

On Wednesday, Republican presidential candidate McCain and his vice presidential candidate Palin are expected to meet jointly with Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili and Ukrainian President Viktor Yuschenko. Palin was then to meet separately with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

However, Gov. Sarah Palin today banned reporters from her first meetings with world leaders, allowing access only to photographers and a television crew. The campaign told the TV producer, print and wire reporters in the press pool that follows the Alaska governor that they would not be admitted with the photographers and camera crew taken in to photograph the meetings. At least two news organizations, including The Associated Press, objected and were told that the decision was not subject to discussion.

CNN, which was providing the television coverage for news organizations, decided to pull its TV crew, effectively denying Palin the high visibility she had sought.

Palin planned to meet Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe in New York on Tuesday as the United Nations General Assembly convenes this week. She also was expected to meet with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

Those sessions and meetings scheduled for Wednesday are part of the Republican campaign’s effort to give Palin a crash course in foreign affairs. She has never met a foreign head of state and first traveled outside North America just last year.

From every indiation it appears that Sen. McCain has been doing everything possible behind the scenes to conceal Palin’s lack of foreign affairs experience from the American people. Palin has had just two interviews since Sen. John McCain chose her as his running mate on Aug. 29.

Palin has been criticized for avoiding taking questions from reporters or submitting to one-on-one interviews.