November 13
The Los Angeles Times reports on Palin’s new Twitter account (http://twitter.com/SarahPalinUSA), but frets that she didn’t do it the way they would have.
Guess it was a slow news day?
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The Wall Street Journal reports Palin will visit Ft. Hood on December 4 as part of her book tour. Previous announcements only gave the specifics of stops up to Thanksgiving, but did include Fort Bragg, NC.
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Palin will be the keynote speaker at the Shasta Cascade Logging Conference in Redding, CA, on February 8 to kick off the weeklong timber industry gathering. Tickets — $74 and $54 — went on sale 11/16 at the Convention Center box office, as reported by the Record-Searchlight.
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Palin posts at Facebook: Obama Administration’s Atrocious Decision
Horrible decision, absolutely horrible. It is devastating for so many of us to hear that the Obama Administration decided that the 9/11 terrorist mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will be given a criminal trial in New York. This is an atrocious decision.
Mohammed and his terrorist co-conspirators are responsible for the deaths of more than 3,000 Americans. Thousands of American families have suffered through the loss of loved ones because of the disgusting attacks launched against the United States, and now this trial venue adds insult to injury, in addition to compromising our efforts in the War on Terror. Heaven forbid our allies see this decision as a reason to become less likely to support our efforts in the future.
Read more here.
November 14
First glimpses of the 11/23 Newsweek cover — lifted from a Runner’s World profile — boasting Palin in jogging shorts and the headline “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Sarah?” A trio of smart men weigh in: Evan Thomas, Jon Meachum, and Christopher Hitchens preach to the Newsweek greatly-dwindled choir about why the Republican Party should ditch Sarah, including such sexist observations as Thomas’:
Obama knows the long odds against a right-wing populist winning the presidency, no matter how good she looks in a skirt (or running clothes), brandishing a gun.
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At Politico, Andy Barr describes what could be Sarah Palin’s five book tour goals:
1) Reconnect with her base
2) Payback [the McCain campaign]
3) Stick it to the media
4) Send a message to the establishment
5) Burnish her image as a serious figure
Missing from Barr’s idea bank: Presenting policies — though Palin has clearly used Facebook to bypass the media’s focus on the personal as she deals with the political. No reason to assume Going Rogue won’t do the same.
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Three days before the record-breaking book hits the shelves, the drumbeat of Palin-bashing begins to crescendo. Among the more civilized attacks:
“The Sarah Palin interviews: Shill, baby, shill” Baltimore Sun
“Sarah Palin Going Rogue: The Wit & Wisdom (Or Lack Thereof)” Huffington Post
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November 15
And the attacks aren’t just from the left, as David Brooks — the “conservative” columnist for the New York Times and yet another smart man — uses his TV face time to call Palin “a joke” and insists “Republican primary voters just are not going to elect a talk show host.”
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Palin posts at Facebook: Really? Still Making Things Up?:
The book tour starts this week, and I look forward to it! I’m most looking forward to meeting many of you, shaking your hands, and telling you, “Thanks for loving America.” I’ll give you a scoop here and tell you what’s on the book’s Dedication Page – it’s dedicated to you – Patriots – who love the U.S.A. as much as I do.
Amazingly, but not surprisingly, the AP somehow nabbed a copy of the book before it was released. They’re now erroneously reporting on the book’s contents and are repeating many of the same things they spewed during the campaign and afterwards. We’ve heard 11 writers are engaged in this opposition research, er, “fact checking” research! Imagine that — 11 AP reporters dedicating time and resources to tearing up the book, instead of using the time and resources to “fact check” what’s going on with Sheik Mohammed’s trial, Pelosi’s health care takeover costs, Hasan’s associations, etc. Amazing.
We’ll keep setting the record straight, and we’ll keep reminding some in the media that Americans are very tired of their non-objective reporting.
Read more at Facebook.
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On Sunday with George Stephanopolous, the former Clinton advisor reads Hillary a passage from Going Rogue:
Should Secretary Clinton and I ever sit down over a cup of coffee, I know that we will fundamentally disagree on may issues, but my hat is off to her hard work on the 2008 campaign trail. Compared to the guys she squared off against, a lot of her supporters think she proved what Margaret Thatcher proclaimed: “If you want something said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.”
Hillary replies:
I’d look forward to sit down and talk with her. Obviously, we’re going to hear a lot more from her in the upcoming weeks with her book coming out, and I would look forward to having a chance to actually get to meet her.
The blogosphere hails the event as the “coffee summit” according to the New York Times: “Palin Finds One Bond with Clinton.”
November 16
The highly anticipated Oprah interview. Highlights from the Sarah Palin interview at the Chicago Times.
While Oprah is respectful, she is unusually cold and aloof most of the time. Also eerie is the lack of audience response. Palin appears professional and relaxed, even as Oprah hammers her with questions about Levi Johnston (father to Palin’s grandchild), focusing on tabloid issues rather than policy questions.
November 17
Ditto Tuesday on Good Morning America. Palin seems more comfortable with Barbara Walters, who asks, “Do you ever want to be president of the United States?”
Palin’s response:
That certainly isn’t on my radar screen right now, but when you consider some of the ordinary turning into the extraordinary events that have happened in my life, I am not one to predict what will happen in a few years.
My ambition, my desire is to help our country in whatever role that may be and I cannot predict what doors will open in 2012.
She notes the confusion resulting from the media blurring the line between her and Saturday Night Live’s Tina Fey so that many people now believe that Palin — not Fey — actually said she could see Russia from her house.
Graciously takes responsibility for the failed interview with Katie Couric, noting that she let her irritation with Couric’s condescending manner get the better of her: “It was unprofessional of me.” From the latest interviews, it’s clear Palin’s learned and grown.
Yes, Palin admits, the ridicule hurts. Walters shows a clip of Letterman’s latest — things that are more fun than reading Going Rogue — for instance, driving a car into a tree — and asks if she would ever guest on David Letterman’s show.
Palin replies:
I don’t want to boost his ratings. I do want him to sell my books though, so I hope he keeps it up.
Barbara dishes afterwards with Diane Sawyer that she finds Palin “very confident, very appealing. She tells it like it is.”
ABC will be running snippets through the week; the Walters/Palin interview will run in its entirety Friday 11/20 on 20/20.
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Laura Ingraham interviews David Frum — who recently called Palin “a cancer on the Republican Party” — and John Zeigler, author of Media Malpractice: How Obama Got Elected and Palin was Targeted. Hear it for yourself at Laura’s site.
At 1:00 EST, Rush Limbaugh interviews Palin and finally we hear something other than tabloid headlines. We hear issues and vision. See transcript at Rush Limbaugh.
At the L.A. Times in “Going berserk over ‘Going Rogue;’ Democrats’ reaction to Sarah Palin book and publicity,” Andrew Malcolm cautions:
Wow, for somebody who’s supposed to be such a political joke, an Arctic ditz and eminently dismissable as a serious anything except maybe a stay-at-home hockey mom, Sarah Palin is sure drawing an awful lot of attention from Democrats and eager critics. …
Every few minutes another note from Democratic National Committee operatives and others dropped into electronic mailboxes across the media-verse, helpfully passing on even the tiniest tidbit of negative news about Palin.
You know how sometimes a friend tells you how much he/she doesn’t really care about … someone else. Really doesn’t! And repeats it a sufficient number of times that you become convinced of precisely the opposite?
So maybe she does matter after all.
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Palin has an upcoming interview Wednesday, November 18, at 9:00 p.m. ET with Sean Hannity.
Going Rogue Book Tour begins Wednesday, in Grand Rapids.
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Those of you on the book tour stops, please send your Sarah sightings and observations to me: [email protected]
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