Would YOU read it?

Paulie Brading

"It might as well have cooties. Hardly anyone wants to touch the thing, or get close to it," wrote Steve Rubenstein in a special column to the San Fransico Chronicle. According to Rubenstein many nonchain bookstores won't sell it, with one bookseller telling him, "Our customers are thinking people, they're not into reading drivel."

For the record the column is discussing Sarah Palin's book. We've been assulted with a non-stop blitz by the mainstream media with Sarah Palin in the fishbowl of celebrity everywhere we look. While I've often thought Palin has difficulty grasping her own responsibility for her actions it's the tight focus of the media that is selling her and her book. 

During these tough economic times people are dropping $28 bucks to buy the book which I predict will be bargin bins before the December holidays.

Did you touch it? Did you buy it? Did you read it? Is your book club ready to discuss it?

  • TB (unverified)
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    NO! I am afraid of viewpoints that are contrary to my own. I only read things about and by people who I agree with. It keeps me from being confused by reality, and from having a painful understanding of other people who don't think like me.

  • Bill Bodden (unverified)
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    Ellen Goodman thought the book was a waste of 24 bucks and change.

    Frank Rich considers Palin as The Pit Bull in the China Shop

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    It's already being given away to anyone subscribing to various right wing publications, and is being sold at retail in a number of venues for well under $10.

    That said, as is reflected in the number of Dittoheads or Fox viewers, this book will be a huge hit. People who have never bought another book in their lives will buy this one. The purchase itself is a chance to StickItToTheLiberalElites. No need to even read the damned thing.

    So to answer your question, I didn't read Clinton's book, Hillary Clinton's book, Al Gore's book, or millions of other books with some actual content, why would I bother with another dummied up ghost written campaign precursor?

  • LT (unverified)
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    Last night, at the end of the National Book Awards on CSPAN, the MC made a reference to next year's awards, "Front runner in the fiction category is Sarah Palin's new book".

    I like the analysis I have heard that she is not running for president so much as to be the next Oprah + Rush.

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    I generally only read autobiographies that are written by the "auto." I doubt Sarah Palin could write a thank-you note; even to John McCain for giving her an instant shot at millionaire stardom.

  • Buckman Res (unverified)
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    "Our customers are thinking people, they're not into reading drivel."

    What is truly interesting is the level of disdain, vitriol, and unbridled hatred lefties feel for Palin.

    She’s not going anywhere politically, yet she is such a threat because of the way she connects with middle America that Newsweek assigned 11 reporters to fact-check her book in hopes of discrediting her.

    Also noteworthy is the lack of support Palin receives from feminists who remain silent in the face of the ongoing hate-storm she endures. Are the only women politicians worthy of support those who espouse leftist philosophy?

    We are seeing proof that misogyny, sexism, and irrationality are alive and well on both sides of the political spectrum.

  • Bill Bodden (unverified)
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    "What is truly interesting is the level of disdain, vitriol, and unbridled hatred lefties feel for Palin."

    "Disdain" is correct in most cases. "Vitriol" may apply in other instances, but "unbridled hatred" only comes from the fringe.

    The disdain is not so much towards Palin as a person but what she represents - in a couple of words - dishonesty and hypocrisy.

    "We are seeing proof that misogyny, sexism, and irrationality are alive and well on both sides of the political spectrum."

    More hyperbole.

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    I generally only read autobiographies that are written by the "auto."

    Really? I'm curious then, what is the last autobiography you read? Ben Franklin's?

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    disdain, vitriol, and unbridled hatred

    Hatred implies respect or (at the least) fear. I feel neither about Sarah.

    She's the popular mean cheerleader girl from High School Daze, and seems to not have grown past that age and outlook. Supremely selfish, aggressively ignorant, hysterically vengeful. What a package.....

    Substitute bemused contempt for vitriol and embarassment for unbridled hatred and you've pretty much described my POV.

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    Hollywood has lowered the bar so far, one can hardly be surprised. Yeah, it's a threat to the republic, but so is Tom Cruise's "art".

    Maybe if there were quotes scattered around, people would realize that they really don't want to read it. I mean, hearing about her comment in there, that she tells vegetarians that if God hadn't meant for man to eat animals, he wouldn't have made them out of meat, pretty much would have done in any curiosity I had. Not that I ever did.

  • Bill Bodden (unverified)
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    "Maybe if there were quotes scattered around, people would realize that they really don't want to read it."

    Search Media Matters for America for "Sarah Palin" and you'll get plenty of examples demonstrating she either doesn't know what she is talking about or she has no compunction about saying anything she wants to, regardless of reality.

  • mp97303 (unverified)
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    Why in hell would I read a book by someone who doesn't consider me to be a "real American"

  • rw (unverified)
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    I am with Pat. ALL of these morons in politics are writing "memoirs" long before they should be. A memoir was to be written after a life lived long and with engagement -- looking back over the long view of one's work.

    I fought fire to save those trees they are processing into vanity editions for the powerful middle-agers who prefer to speak their minds in premature tomes instead of publishing accessible and economically-feasible articles.

  • Old Ducker (unverified)
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    Never. Palin is just another neo-con puppet. I had more sympathy for Dan Quayle.

  • mamabigdog (unverified)
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    The book is already in the bargain bin- selling for $14.50 on Amazon.com and the detested WalMart, which is where I suspect Palin's most (stark) raving (mad) fans will pick up her book.

  • Kurt Chapman (unverified)
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    Nope, but then I also didn't purchase or read Hillary's, Gore's or anything from Michael Moore.

    I suspect she is a non-entity politically and just stays out there to make the buck$ and drive the extremist crazy on both sides.

  • rw (unverified)
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    I think Kurt is right. SHE is not cravenly doing as he says, she has to stay in her delusion to do as she does. But her publicists and the hounds who are egging her on... well, THEY know they are making us nuts and like it. It will drive sales and spinoff product.

  • KJ (unverified)
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    I'm not planning to read Palin's fiction. I'm getting all the insight I need from AKMuckraker on the Mudflats site. AKM is an Alaskan who is fact-checking and posting commentary as she plows through the Palin book. On the other hand, there is an interesting book out there that I do plan to read -- Going Rouge -- a collection of essays by established political writers like Chris Hays of the Nation magazine. Going Rouge can be ordered online at http://orbooks.com/

  • Joel H (unverified)
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    Buckman Res., feminists have definite values and a specific agenda. Why should they support a woman who's hostile to them? Are you seriously complaining that they are not playing identity politics?

  • rw (unverified)
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    Joel, Buckman has a little tiny pinch of a point, but not much more. I detest all that Palin is about and what choosing her showed about the people in power and how they view women! However, I also actively and vocally detested the way the media treated our gender during the election. That transcends "identity politics". I think Buckman was just trying to troll for a cheap shot, but beyond that, there is a meaningful, albeit brief, conversation to be had on this.

    Thank you for pulling up sufficient energy to address it.

  • College Student (unverified)
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    Do you think media coverage in the U.S. is biased? We are looking for people interested in politics to take our Institutional Research Board approved study.

    Many people feel that the media can lead people in different ideological directions. We are Smith College students in a Senior Political Psychology Seminar and we want to invite you to take our survey. We are investigating the relationship between media coverage and political information. If you take our short, confidential survey you can choose to be entered into a raffle for a $50 gift certificate to Amazon.com. If you are interested, follow this link to Surveymonkey.com

  • College Student (unverified)
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    opps...here is the link:

    http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=T4JLkCcNbd7TRexboclKxA_3d_3d

  • Jason (unverified)
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    And this entire conversation only proves the sophomoric nature of politics with grown adults. You all sound like junior-highers who like to name-call and talk trash about the 6th grader you can't stand on the playground.

    Grow up!

  • LT (unverified)
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    Thanks for the link, Bill.

    I suspect what worries some of the more moderate Republicans (the folks who did NOT back Conservative candidate Hoffman in the NY special cong. election) are sentiments like this from Frank Rich.

    "Her ever-present booster Continetti, writing in The Weekly Standard, suggested that she recast the century-old populist outrage of William Jennings Bryan "

    Let's have some intellectual rigor here. I hope it is not "disdain and vitriol" to ask this question:

    Compare and contrast Bryan and Palin and their effects on turn of the century politics (Bryan at the turn of the 20th century, Palin in the early years of the 21st century.

    As I recall, Bryan got involved in the Scopes trial--could teaching Darwin's theory of evolution get someone into legal trouble.

    I think that upon research, it might just be true that Palin and Bryan represent the same thread in history, just a century apart.

    Jack--were you just being snide, or do you have evidence that Obama didn't write his 2 books himself. If you do have such evidence, what was the name of the ghost writer?

  • JJ Ferguson (unverified)
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    That's too grotesque to consider. Jim K arlock in drag. "Hi, I'm James A K arlock, your climate saviour, but instead of talking about the House race, tonight I'd like to introduce you to my other persona, 'Marie'". Funny. Never figured JK as GLBT. This is worth cross posting to Portland Transport Blog, that suffer like saints with his incessant cut/copy/paste.

    Carshlock, I would take Peri Brown's good advice, back on the "Coal" thread. Figures when you had the floor , you "were too busy for blogging right now". What a jerk. You wouldn't even know this blog existed, except that Kari covered your senile ramblings, and now you spam him daily. Why abbreviate "JK"? Just say "JerKoff".

    Posted by: Peri Brown | Nov 23, 2009 9:05:04 AM

    Why don't you use your real name? It's banned. That means, "shove off", not make up "jamieee". Got problems with that? email Kari. Otherwise why should we listen to a lying electronic trespasser? You've been asked to leave. Deal with that or get the f*ck out!

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