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SARAH Palin's new television series showing her fishing for Alaskan salmon and scaling a glacier is the kind of free media exposure most politicians can only dream about, writes Steve Holland.
Will her reality TV show translate into a Republican presidential campaign for Palin, the party's 2008 vice presidential nominee? Or will it expose her as a publicity hound? These are questions circulating among Republicans as Palin remains coy about whether she'll seek her party's nomination to challenge Democratic President Barack Obama in 2012.
Sarah Palin's Alaska premiered on the TLC network less than two weeks after the Republican party made big gains in the recent congressional elections. Political analysts agreed the show can only help soften the image of the former Alaska governor who most Americans see as an uncompromising, Tea Party, conservative and a deeply polarising figure.
Palin, 46, has her work cut out for her. A Gallup Poll said 52 per cent of Americans view Palin unfavourably, the highest percentage holding a negative opinion of her since Senator John McCain picked her as his vice presidential running mate in 2008.
The first TV episode showed Palin in her element: fishing with her family as brown bears cavorted nearby, struggling to climb a glacier in Denali National Park, preparing for a Fox News appearance from her lakeside home and complaining about an investigative journalist writing a book about her next door.
"This is none of his flippin' business," she says of author Joe McGuinness.
Politicians usually have to spend millions for this kind of exposure. Adweek estimated that Palin could receive up to $2 million (BD 753,000) in free media exposure per episode, or $18 million (BD 6,777,000) in total.
In other words, if Palin were to make a run for the White House in 2012, TLC will have presented her with an unprecedented tide of soft-focus campaign support.
TLC said the show was watched by nearly 5 million people - a large number for a small cable channel - and was the biggest programme launch in terms of audience in TLC history.
