Pounding The Podium

What is with this guy?  Are there really that few news stories with Afghanistan, Climategate, The Harry & Nancy Show, etc., that he has to devout 2 shows in a week to an attempt to discredit Sarah Palin?

Newsbusters first reported on Olbermann’s fixation with Palin’s book in Brad Wilmouth’s column saying that “Twice in the past week, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann has on his Countdown show tried to dismiss the popularity of Sarah Palin’s book Going Rogue by mentioning discounts like Newsmax’s promotion that offers the book for $4.97 to new subscribers. Olbermann first raised the issue on the Thursday, November 19, show, as he mentioned rumors of high sales numbers. Olbermann: “Publishing industry rumors, first week sales more than half a million. No idea if any of them were not at these 50 to 75 percent discounts.”

No idea Keith?  As in “I did absolutely no research because I knew that I would be immediately discredited?”  It would have taken all of 30 seconds to verify that every one of the books sold on the tour were sold at list price (and the last I knew that was over 300,000).  So you are totally dishonest in this regard as you either never checked or choose not to report any news that made your ‘point’ irrelevant.  Let me see if I can find a correlation to your ‘brilliant’ analysis….Okay how about this, Sports Illustrated continually offers promotions around the start of the NFL season where you can receive various items like blankets, hoodies, etc. with your favorite teams logo on it.  Does this mean that the items have no value or that Sports Illustrated is offsetting the cost of the item with the subscription.  And why give a promotion on something that no one wants, like a Keith Olberman book?

In keeping with his theme that “hey, I’m an author too and a darn site better than Palin!!” Olberman says to his next guest ”

OLBERMANN: Millions, she got it upfront, right? Because she’s not going to get millions if they’re selling this book at Newsmax for $4.97. You and I, as authors, understand: Get it uprfront, right?

Keith continues in his totally incredulous way way as follows:

RICHARD WOLFFE: We would hope that Bob Barnett did his job in that way. But look, you know, she is turning out the crowds. This book is selling, and let’s hope people are reading it.

OLBERMANN: It’s $4.97! If we sold books for $4.97, they’d be stacked up out here and people would be taking them as they went home.

Well I don’t know Keith, that ‘used’ copy of your book on Ebay for $0.01 remains unsold.  But let’s see how you and your guest stack up to Palin and some of the conservatives.

Going Rogue: An American Life ~ Sarah Palin
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1 in Books

Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government ~ Glenn Beck
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #8 in Books

A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity (Hardcover) ~ Bill O’Reilly
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #42 in Books

The Christmas Sweater: A Picture Book (Hardcover) ~ Glenn Beck
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #43 in Books

Glenn Beck’s Common Sense: The Case Against an Out-of-Control Government, Inspired by Thomas Paine
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #50 in Books

Our Choice: How We Can Solve the Climate Crisis ~ ALGORE
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,092 in Books

Renegade: The Making of a President ~ Richard Wolffe
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #4,084 in Books

Truth and Consequences: Special Comments on the Bush Administration’s War on American Values ~ Keith Olbermann
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #85,084 in Books

The Worst Person In the World: And 202 Strong Contenders (Paperback) ~ Keith Olbermann
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #112,453 in Books

Know Your Power: A Message to America’s Daughters (Paperback) ~ Nancy Pelosi
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #451,820 in Books

Wow, just think of how many really crappy books there must be between 50 and 3,092 and then 4,084 before we get to Keith Olberman’s stunning 85,084 topped by his 112,453 and yet still in front of Nancy Pelosi.  Your right Keith, in your case it makes every bit of sense to “get the money up front” let the publisher bear the burden of your flop.

Admittedly, I have never published a book, but I am encouraged by the fact that Keith Olberman has supposedly written at least two – I mean how hard can it be?

Next Mr. Olberman turns his attention to Sarah Palin’s planned visit to Fort Hood and expressing his ‘concerns’, really his ‘concerns’.  This from the same piece of brillance who said that nobody attacks military basis as all the soldiers carry ‘big guns’ – a remark for which he has never apologized, despite the horrors of Fort Hood.

“Olbermann brought up the possibility of “inappropriateness” of the visit to Fort Hood later in the show during a discussion with MSNBC political analyst Craig Crawford, who charged that the stop at Fort Hood “does look very opportunistic” and suggested it “could even backfire on the folks at Fort Hood in the end.” Right, opportunistic.  How anybody can listen to this guy let alone take him serious is beyond me.

The following sum’s up Olberman’s comments on the Fort Hood tour.

“KEITH OLBERMANN: Back to the book tour and this announcement that she`s going to go to Fort Hood. I mean, my instinct on this is if it will cheer somebody up there, I guess I`m for it. But politically, isn`t there an element of risk to doing this, a little sense of inappropriateness?

CRAIG CRAWFORD: Well, I mean, even giving the royalties to the victims doesn`t change the fact that it`s part of her book tour, and it does look very opportunistic. I just have a feeling that if Al Gore were to do this with a book, we`d be hearing a very different side of the story from places like Newsmax.

OLBERMANN: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: And if she goes there and, you know, talks to victims and tries to do something other than talk about her book, and if she gets very political, sure it can get backfire. It could even backfire on the folks at Fort Hood in the end.”

Apparently Olberman and Crawford have never viewed any of the footage of Palin visiting wounded soldiers and providing them comfort.

Inappropriate Keith?  I’d say you wrote the book on that.