It wasn't just a home run, said CNN's Wolf Blitzer; it may have been a grand slam.

"A very auspicious debut," said NBC's Tom Brokaw.

It was a "perfect populist pitch", said CBS' Jeff Greenfield.

"Terrific," said Mort Kondracke on Fox News Channel.

"A star is born," said Chris Wallace on Fox.

"A star is born," Blitzer said.

"A star is born," said Anderson Cooper on CNN.

Palin combined jokes about being a hockey mom with searing criticism of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

It was a spur to a convention audience ready to get worked up, to a large extent because Republican leaders had pushed the notion that the news media was being sexist or too aggressive in questioning her qualifications for the job.

For a relative rookie on the national stage, however, she understood the nuances of speaking to a television audience better than the more experienced and fiery Rudolph Giuliani.

Cameras lingered on shots of her family in the audience - her dozing infant passed from her husband to a daughter, her pregnant teen-aged daughter gripping the hand of her boyfriend, her soldier son about to be dispatched to Iraq.

"I've learned quickly, these past few days, that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone," Palin said.

At that, some on the convention floor chanted "N-B-C, N-B-C".

Her speech was the main event on Wednesday, and may prove the most important in the convention for the GOP.

During its coverage, CNN ran a countdown clock in the corner of its screen, ticking down the hours, minutes and seconds to when Palin was due to take the stage in St.

Paul, Minnesota.

"So far this week the focus has been on John McCain's running mate, perhaps because everyone loves a good mystery," Katie Couric said in opening CBS' prime-time coverage.

Former McCain rival Mike Huckabee, part of the undercard on Wednesday, thanked the "elite media" for uniting Republicans behind its ticket.

"The reporting of the past few days has proven tackier than a costume change at a Madonna concert," Huckabee said in an applause line to the convention.

An offnote was struck ahead of Palin's speech.

An exchange, reportedly done after an MSNBC segment on the campaign with NBC News' Chuck Todd, the Wall Street Journal's Peggy Noonan and Mike Murphy, a former McCain aide.

Their comments were caught on a live microphone but weren't played on the air; NBC News wouldn't comment on how the material became public.

The remarks could not be independently verified, but Murphy and Noonan appear to be critical of Palin's selection.

Noonan is heard to question whether Palin was the most qualified choice, and says, "It's over."

But Noonan later wrote on The Wall Street Journal Website that her remarks were taken out of context, and the "it's over" comment did not refer to McCain's chances.

She said questions about whether she was the most qualified were raised in her own mind on Wednesday when she happened to see Texas Senator Sen.

Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Noonan wrote that she suspected Palin's candidacy "will be either dramatically successful or dramatically not; it won't be something in between".

Nampa-AP

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