Thanks for all the e-mails (and for the ones over the weekend about my first ABC post–although I confess I wasn’t able to keep up with all of those). This is the best exculpatory explanation I’ve come across, via e-mail:

Rich:Let me see if I can make the point a little clearer in Palin’s favor.Are you saying that she didn’t know that President Bush had said we would not wait to be attacked but would attack first if we have sufficient evidence that a state means us harm, i.e. preemption? Are you saying that she didn’t know that President Bush had said that he believed the path to stability in the Middle East was democratization?Are you saying that she didn’t know that President Bush had said that states which harbor terrorists will be held as responsible as the terrorists themselves?If you are saying that she didn’t know these things then I agree that would be quite shocking and unbelievable from anyone who has watched even a little T.V. news in the past 8 years. But what evidence do you have of this?But if what you are saying is that Sarah did not know which of those, or some other policy, to identify with the moniker, The Bush Doctrine, then I say so what? Neither did Gibson and neither do many experts in the field including apparently Henry Kissinger, (who as I am sure you know is the smartest man in the world), at least according to the McCain piece in the Atlantic written well before any of this became an issue.