Palin emails show her coping with rise to VP slot

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) - As Alaska governor, Sarah Palin struggled with the gossip about her family and marriage.

As newly minted Republican vice presidential nominee, she was dismayed by the sudden onslaught of questions from reporters, especially one about whether she believed dinosaurs and humans existed at the same time. She also dealt with death threats.

At least once, she prayed for strength. Other times, she fired off messages to her aides, most fierce when the subject was defending her record or her family.

The glimpse into Palin came in more than 24,000 pages of emails released Friday from her first 21 months as governor. They showed a Palin involved closely in the day-to-day business of the state while trying to cope with the increasing pressures that came with her rise from small-town mayor to governor to national prominence.

The emails were packed into six boxes, weighing 250 pounds in all, stacked in a small office in a complex of buildings near the state capitol in Juneau.

Within minutes of the release, Palin tweeted a link to the website for "The Undefeated," a documentary about her time as governor and her arrival on the national political stage.

Her supporters, meanwhile, encouraged everyone to read the messages. "The emails detail a Governor hard at work," said Tim Crawford, the treasurer of her political action committee, Sarah PAC, in a prepared statement.

Palin is among the top tier of potential 2012 presidential candidates in polls of Republican voters. Her recent bus tour of the Northeast fueled speculation about her national ambitions. She has said she has not yet decided whether she will run.

"It's insane," said Tony Leadholm, an academic counselor at the University of California, Davis and a Republican who finds Palin too conservative for his taste. "It seems anywhere you go, the release of these emails is in your face and there's war going on and actual real people who have actually declared their intent to run for president."

The emails were first requested during the 2008 White House race by citizens and news organizations, including The Associated Press, as they vetted a nominee whose political experience included less than one term as governor and a term as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska.

The nearly three-year delay in releasing the material has been attributed largely to the sheer volume. Lawyers went through every page to redact sensitive government information. Another reason was the nearly 500 open records requests during Palin's tenure, and the state's decision to deal with smaller, easier ones first.

The emails cover the period from the time Palin took office in December 2006 to her ascension to GOP vice presidential candidate in September 2008.