Republican Sarah Palin's became the hottest new face in the Republican Party in late August 2008 when she was announced as the surprise pick of Arizona Sen. John McCain to be his running mate. Palin is only the second woman to appear on a major party presidential ticket -- Democrat Geraldine Ferraro was first, when she ran unsuccessfully for vice president with Walter Mondale in 1984 -- and Palin is the first woman to run for vice president on the Republican ticket.

In 2006, Palin (PAY lin) was elected Alaska's youngest and first woman governor. When she began her political career, she was viewed as a rising Republican star but she won election to the governorship as a maverick reformer at arm's length from her party. Born in Idaho, Palin moved to Alaska when she was three months old with her parents, a teacher and a school secretary. She grew up in the small town of Wasilla, just outside of Anchorage, played on Wasilla's state championship girls basketball team in 1982, wore the crown of Miss Wasilla in 1984 and competed in the Miss Alaska contest. She studied journalism and political science at the University of Idaho, graduating in 1987. After returning home, Palin eloped with her high school boyfriend in 1988 to save money on a wedding. She helped out in her husband's family commercial fishing business and appeared occasionally as a television sportscaster.

Sounding themes that would resurface throughout her political career, Palin won a seat on the Wasilla City Council in 1992 by campaigning as a "new face, new voice" and by opposing tax increases. Four years later, she was elected mayor at 32 by knocking off a three-term incumbent. Palin conflicted with the city's staff and fired department heads who supported her predecessor, leading opponents to dub her "Sarah Barracuda," reviving a nickname she earned on the basketball court for her fierce and adversarial style. Palin relied on the tax revenue she once derided to help fuel the city's rapid growth by funding infrastructure improvements that attracted big-box stores. During her tenure as mayor of Wasilla, population 6,700, the city's operating budget grew from $3.9 million to $5.8 million. Wasilla's growth and booming sales tax revenues allowed her to cut property taxes. Republican Party leaders took notice and began grooming her for higher office. At the end of her second term as mayor, party leaders encouraged her to enter the 2002 race for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor. Against veteran legislators with far more experience, Palin finished second by fewer than 2,000 votes, making a name for herself in Alaska's politics.

Palin campaigned actively for the Republican ticket, led by Frank Murkowski, who had served 22 years in the Senate before running for governor. After the election, Murkowski rewarded her with several job offers before she accepted an appointment in 2003 to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, which gave her a chance to learn about the state's energy industry. She was joined on the panel by state Republican Party Chairman Randy Ruedrich, and months later, Palin was the driving force behind an ethics probe of his activities. Ruedrich faced questions about conflicts of interest with oil companies, the most serious of which had to do with a sensitive document that was leaked to an energy lobbyist. Commission staff also complained that he had used the state office to do work for the party. As the commission's chairwoman and designated ethics officer, Palin spearheaded the investigation that ultimately prompted Ruedrich to resign from the commission. She was asked to personally search his desk and computer files for evidence relating to the allegations. Hamstrung by confidentiality rules, Palin was unable to talk about the case, grew frustrated and resigned from the commission 11 months after accepting the post. Her efforts were later vindicated when Ruedrich admitted ethics violations and paid a record $12,000 civil fine.

However, by that time, Ruedrich had been reconfirmed as state GOP chairman and Palin grew estranged from the party. She contemplated a primary challenge in 2004 against Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican who had been appointed by her governor-father to succeed him in the Senate, but Palin instead endorsed conservative Mike Miller in the primary. Palin also joined with Democratic state Rep. Eric Croft to file an ethics complaint against Alaska Attorney General Gregg Renkes, who had close political ties to Gov. Murkowski. The complaint alleged that Renkes' ownership in a coal company represented a conflict of interest when he negotiated an international trade deal with Taiwan. Her stand was again vindicated when Renkes resigned his position.

While she firmly established herself as a party outsider, Palin harbored ambitions to run for statewide office. She kept her name before the voters by appearing in a television ad in early 2005 to support a proposed pipeline that would carry natural gas from the North Slope to Valdez, where it could be liquefied and transported in tankers. The plan differed from the approach backed by Gov. Murkowski and the state's major oil producers, which involved constructing a pipeline from Alaska through Canada to the lower 48 states. In October 2005, before Murkowski decided whether he would seek another term, Palin entered the Republican gubernatorial primary.

Murkowski suffered politically from his decision to appoint his daughter to his Senate seat, and also for using state funds to purchase a jet for his travel. He also faced criticism that the natural gas pipeline deal that he had negotiated was a sweetheart deal with oil producers. Against this backdrop, Palin's outsider status and personable campaign style connected with voters even as opponents criticized her light resume and her answers to policy questions, which they said lacked substance. In a profile just before the Aug. 22, 2006 primary, the weekly newspaper Anchorage Press described Palin as "a small-town, angel-faced mother of four, an avid hunter and a fisher with a killer smile who wears designer glasses and heels, and hair like modern sculpture, who's taking it to the boys ever so softly." Palin won the three-way gubernatorial primary with 51 percent, followed by former state Sen. John Binkley with 30 percent and incumbent Murkowski with 19 percent.

In the general election, Palin faced former Democratic Gov. Tony Knowles. He left office in 2002, barred from serving more than two consecutive terms, and lost a 2004 Senate race against Lisa Murkowski. Knowles, who had entered the race late, ran on experience and said he was the best candidate to negotiate a pipeline deal that could deliver Alaska's great natural gas reserves to market. Palin entered the general election with a double digit advantage in the polls, but also had the challenge of rallying the party and the leadership, which included her old nemesis Ruedrich. But in an election year in which the national mood seemed to be running against incumbent Republicans, Palin's outsider status was a blessing to the party. On Election Day, she defeated Knowles, 48 percent to 41 percent, with independent Andrew Halcro, a businessman and former Republican state representative, winning 9 percent.

Dominating the state agenda in 2007 was the construction of the natural gas pipeline. Alaska legislators had filed a lawsuit in November that had prevented Gov. Murkowski from sealing the pipeline deal he had negotiated with Exxon Mobile, ConocoPhillips and BP, three corporations with strong ties to the state's oil industry. Palin favored a market-driven plan aimed at getting large producers to compete against each other. In March, she proposed the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act. The bill allocated $500 million in seed money to begin the process of constructing a natural gas pipeline, and froze production taxes for 10 years for producers that agreed to transport their gas through the pipeline. Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and BP balked at Palin's plan and said they would neither bid on the project license nor commit their gas to the pipeline if another company was selected to build it. Despite this opposition, Palin's bill easily passed both houses of the Alaska Legislature. In August, the legislature approved TransCanada Corporation's $26 billion pipeline proposal with a slated completion date of 2018. In response, BP and ConocoPhillips formed a partnership with North Shore oil and pledged to initially invest $600 million to develop a competing pipeline that would transport natural gas through Canada to the lower 48 states.

Palin also introduced a budget that reduced state spending by $124 million, which fell short of her goal of slashing spending by $150 million. She later vetoed $231 million from a proposed state budget, but the remaining $1.54 billion still exceeded her target spending levels. In 2008, state lawmakers reintroduced $58 billion in projects that were cut from the 2007 budget, but Palin vetoed the projects again.

Having already earned a reputation as a party outsider, Palin continued to buck traditional GOP positions. She ended the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere" project by withdrawing state funds for the proposal, which was spearheaded by Alaska's influential congressional delegation and called for construction of a $400 million bridge to connect the Alaskan city of Ketchikan, on one island in southeastern Alaska, to its airport on a nearby island. But Palin made sure the state kept the $200 million in federal funds that Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young had procured for the project. In December 2007, Palin once again challenged big oil by signing a bill that increased the state's basic oil production tax by 2.5 percent, a move that is expected to boost state revenues by $1.5 billion in the upcoming fiscal year. In 2008, Palin proposed that some of the revenue be used to fund rebate checks in the amount $1,200 for every citizen, citing the increased cost of energy, and the Legislature approved the plan.

In her first term, Palin also pushed ethics reform legislation through the Legislature and signed an ethics bill into law in July 2007. However, her leadership on governmental reform issues was weakened when her own behavior came under scrutiny in August 2008 with allegations that she had pressured Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan to fire Palin's ex-brother-in-law, Mike Wooten, a state trooper engaged in a custody battle with Palin's sister. Palin fired Monegan in July 2008, and later claimed her decision was not connected to Monegan's refusal to fire Wooten. Palin's office released an audio recording of a phone call that boards and commissions Director Frank Bailey made to a state trooper lieutenant. During the call, Bailey listed complaints about Wooten and claimed Palin was unsure why he had a job. Bailey has been placed on leave while an investigator hired by the Legislature looks into the matter.

In March 2008, Palin, the mother of four, made the surprise announcement that she was seven moths pregnant with a fifth child. Palin, a member of Feminists for Life of America, has always been a staunch pro-life advocate, and she carried the child to term knowing he had Down's syndrome. Trig Paxson Van Palin was born on April 18, 2008. Palin returned to work within a week of giving birth, insisting her family life would not affect her ability to govern. Palin's approval ratings hovered around 80 percent through the last months of 2007. Speculation that she was being considered as McCain's vice presidential pick surfaced earlier this year. When she took the public stage with McCain as the new GOP ticket was unveiled on Aug. 29, 2008, a national audience saw Palin side-by-side with McCain, her infant Trig cradled by one of her daughters standing behind her.