Apparently Rush Limbaugh has called Sarah Palin's book "truly one of the most substantive policy books I've read". Personally, I thought it was the finest spy novel since Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
Before you start bashing me for being an elitist liberal, let me point out that I'm not objecting to Rush Limbaugh praising the book, or saying anything about Sarah Palin. I'm just sayin', politicians do not write policy books, much less substantive ones . . . except Al Gore, and his book was terrible. Also, given what a rotten campaigner he is, I'm not sure it's even fair to call him a politician.
But I digress. The point is, Palin's book is not supposed to be a policy treatise. It's a political memoir. It may be a very fine political memoir, for all I know. So why not say that, rather than claim it's a sterling example of some genre it was never intended to be?
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She is one of the best things that's happened to the Democratic Party lately. Which is unfortunate.
Is she? I could see piling on during the campaign since she was providing so much energy for McCain. But the left hates Palin more than they hated Bush. At least they had legitimate gripes about Bush. I feel embarrassed on their behalf just watching it.
Breathe deeply and repeat the mantra: the vulgar level of political discourse is simply signaling group membership. The vulgar level of political discourse is simply signaling group membership. ...
Perhaps he said it because he knew that it would get so much attention! I happened to catch just a bit of Rush's show today, and he was having a great time playing the many, many reactions to that quote of his about Palin's book. He might have explained his comment, but I didn't listen that long.
I also heard him challenge some news organization that has a team of 11 reporters fact-checking Palin's book. He said that they should take the same 11 reporters and have them fact-check Al Gore's book 'to see if they can find any facts in it'.
I don't listen to Rush, but I do know the A.P. ran a fact-checking piece on it that credited 10 reporters, not including the by-lined reporter.
Also, given what a rotten campaigner he is, I'm not sure it's even fair to call him a politician.
I don't know, I'd argue that convincing about half the world to voluntarily reduce their GDP for no good reason makes him a pretty darn good campaigner.
Lincoln said you can fool some of the people all of the time.
He got more votes than George W. Bush.
He got a statistical handful more votes in electorially unimportant places at a time of peace, a balanced budget and an extended booming economy, running against a guy from Texas with no substantive experience, who couldn't string a grammatically correct sentence together to save his life. The only positive thing you can say about Gore's campaign is that it was better than John Kerry's.
Also, given what a rotten campaigner he is, I'm not sure it's even fair to call him a politician.
I don't know, I'd argue that convincing about half the world to voluntarily reduce their GDP for no good reason makes him a pretty darn good campaigner.
I'd also argue that serving in the House, Senate and Vice Presidency for 25 years makes one a politician.
He didn't convince half the world to reduce their GDP. He convinced half the world to reduce the GDP of the other half. Much easier proposition to sell.
It should be noted that the relevant category here is not "policy books" but "policy books I've read." Who can guess what that might cover?
Are you drawing a distinction between convincing the world to talk about a reduction of GDP and actually reducing GDP? As far as I can tell, Al Gore has only accomplished the former, and not the latter. Even the hyper-green Europeans are going to miss their Kyoto-protocol goals.
Yes, but missing their goals doesn't count because the USA didn't even ratify the treaty.
Hehe, missing the target just means they didn't reduce GDP enough.
Maybe her publisher is an advertiser and paid him to pitch her book on his entertainment show.
You know McCain should have recalled that Bloomberg dressed up in a woman's clothes for some event. Having him campaign in drag would have been a lot more exciting than Palin and if they won Obama could have had comments like, 'It's unbelievable. Who could have thought 20 years ago when the Berlin wall came down that a Jew in drag would have been vice president of the US.'
Party pooper.
Wow. Congrats on sounding like a pale grovelling GOPer 12 hours after daring to mildly criticize Limbaugh. I know, I know... Readership oblige. I recommend writing the next Limbaugh/Palin post at the sound of Dylan's "Gotta serve somebody".
Apparently a big part of the book is a petty, error-ridden settling of scores with the McCain campaign aides. You know, the stuff statesmen are made of. Predictably, the aides are now defending themselves by leaking private e-mails. So, while all this looks quite sleazy and low right now, it's far from hitting rock bottom.
Palin/Cheney 2012!
I wasn't going to buy it, but now I may reconsider. Anything that makes has AP and Newsweek this up in arms must be worth reading.
A fool and his money are soon parted.
Nothing worth owning ever came cheap.
Well, Rush does have one advantage when commenting on the book; he actually read it first, and then proceeded to comment. What a novel concept!
Sadly, looks like his comments weren't actually influenced by the content of the book.
You must read fast.
Let me get this straight: You're posting about a comment on the radio that you didn't hear. The radio comment was about a book you haven't read. So you admit to being completely uninformed about the subject matter, but you will offer an opinion on such subject matter anyway?
I'd like to mock, but there is a level of silliness that is beyond mockery.
PS: Is there no possibility that this book is a political memoir that contains a good deal of substantive policy discussion? Mind you, I don't know this to be true. I haven't read the book and I do not offer opinions on books that I haven't read. But it seems to be in the realm of possibility and I don't see how one can say that it is not the case without having read such book.
Yes, just so. And similar observations apply to other windbags here posting content-free opinions on the book which they have not read.
I like McArdle's thoughtful economic analyses. But her politics are tinny and brittle, and unadorned with facts. This post of hers was ill-advised because it added absolutely nothing to the conversation about this book. We already know the left hates it the the right loves it; no need for them to read it to say so. And no need for us to read McArdle's blog to find that out.
In the end people are going to have to read this book for themselves. Reviewers thus far have shown themselves to be biased, unreliable and ignorant - it is complete poppycock to offer opinion on an unread book.
But the reviewers, of course, have received advanced copies of the book and read it. And how would you know the reviews are biased and ignorant if you haven't read the book?
Stop being such a biased, ignorant windbag.
This is Mcardles thing. Every now and then her contract stipulates that she has to somehow mention the screaming mimis of the know nothing party, to make her "libertarian" "economics" more marketable. She hates doing it, because she's just smart enough to know how stupid they are and how stupid she'll look if she doesn't differentiate herself. So she goes content neutral, gins up a bunch of posts on a non-existent opinion, and keeps the engine running while she heads back to the bar. Best she can do. Lay off, dittoclowns.
Here's a challenge for McArdle. Why don't you do a post on the economics of talk radio?
PS: Is there no possibility that this book is a political memoir that contains a good deal of substantive policy discussion?
Close to zero.
The book is #1 at both Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
"The book is #1 at both Amazon and Barnes & Noble."
Which just shows P.T. Barnum was right.
I'm pretty sure the last third of the book is filled with Sarah's homespun solutions to modern problems. Whether that makes it a serious policy treatise or only partly a policy book might be best left to one who has read that far.
I think Megan is using "policy" in a Washington-speak way. Things like let's s drill for more oil in the U.S., restrict abortions, beef up the U.S. military, don't regulate CO2 emissions, cut taxes, don't nationalize health care, don't count as "policies." Only books written by highly educated non-politicians actually count as books on "policy."
That's the only way I can figure out this unusually dumb comment by an unusually smart woman.
I think it's clear what I was saying; if you don't get it, I'm sure others do.
But if you want to talk about actual reviewers, here is a quote from Ana Marie Cox, a reviewer, courtesy of the Washington Post:
I cannot claim to have completely read "Going Rogue"--I had to skim
the last 150 pages (or more than one-third). I only got the thing into
my hands late Monday afternoon with a deadline of early evening. It's
terrible, I know, but if I didn't read it all, neither can Sarah Palin
claim to have completely written it.
I haven't read her review, and won't bother, but please feel free :-)