Book Bags

by digby

Jane is righteously taking on the wingnut liars today (as she does every day) but this time on the subject of this dumb pissing match about liberal book sales. Just read it. it's so ridiculous it makes you want to laugh.

As she points out, the right has subsidized these lousy writers and thinkers for decades. They buy their crappy books for their crappy book clubs (whining all the way about totalitarian leftists bookstore owners who refuse to sell their crappy crap) and give the impresion that they are successfully indoctrinating the country with their crappy propaganda. From the numbers of rightwing propagandists who are allegedly great authors and thinkers, you would think that the Republicans would rule with an 80% majority. The truth is they have always rigged the numbers.

As Jane points out, what has them upset is that we managed to push Greenwald's book to number one on Amazon in a day. It drove them into such a tizzy that they are now outright lying about Kos and Jerome's book sales in an attempt to discredit it. (Sigh. Why do I feel like I am dealing with kids all the time?)

"Crashing the Gate" is the most discussed book about Democratic strategy in decades. The review on the NYRB is almost ecstatic. Very influential people are reading and discussing it. Its sales are great and they are only half way through their book tour. It is, by all possible measures, a success. And it's a success on its own merits. I don't think George Soros and Barbra Streisand bought the book in bulk so that it will be selling for a dollar in remainder bins by the middle of summer. Real humans are reading the book.

If you haven't yet bought CTG, do it. It's an easy read, humble and insightful. Supporting liberal writers and thinkers like Kos and Jerome and Greenwald are one great way to make sure that our ideas penetrate the media industrial complex. And, if nothing else, it really seems to freak out the wingnuts. Consider it part of your entertainment budget.

Update: Patrick Neilsen Hayden has more on this. So does Greenwald.

Kos suggests a new marketing slogan and I think it's brilliant: "Buy 'Crashing the Gate.' Make a conservative cry."

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