Katie Couric 'Really Felt Bad' After Sarah Palin Interview (Exclusive Video)

Pretty much everyone's seen Katie Couric's interview with Sarah Palin, which became one of the most talked about moments of the 2008 Presidential campaign and earned Katie both praise and scorn depending who you asked. Palin accused Katie of "gotcha journalism" by asking questions about what magazines she reads, and there was more name-calling since, but surprisingly as she admitted on the Watch What Happens Live after-show, Katie felt bad following the testy exchanges with the Alaskan governor.

"I think I went through all these different stages," Katie told host Andy Cohen. "At first, I actually really felt bad for her because she was so clearly struggling with some of the answers and her sentences were pretty convoluted at the time. But I thought that people who really liked her and supported her would continue to do that after the interview and people who disliked her would feel that was validated. So I felt like everyone would see it from their own political prism, but I think what happened is there was a large swath of independent undecided voters and I think it had an impact on their vote." Cut to 5:30 in the video below to go straight to the Palin conversation:



Katie said that with the responsibility of being an interviewer, "you want to do a challenging interview but you don't want to have anybody not do well and have a tough time," so there was empathy when she saw Palin getting tripped up a bit. It's something that Katie thinks anyone should feel.

"You have to have icewater in your veins to not feel sorry for someone in that situation," she said -- hinting that the ask might be out to reunite with Palin when Katie's new show premieres in September.