In an unorthodox move, The Washington Post on Tuesday published two book reviews of Sarah Palin's Going Rogue -- one by liberal Ana Marie Cox of Air America radio, and one by conservative Matthew Continetti of the Weekly Standard. Continetti's is genuinely supportive. Cox's is genuinely snarky. (Obviously, it would have been nice if Hillary Clinton had received that treatment, but let's not overlook the balance here.)
There's also a snarky article by Post writer Jason Horowitz and Michael Shear headlined "The Book of Sarah embraces God & Todd."
Inside the Style section, the headline of the Cox review is "Rogue: Mostly flash, little substance. Surprised?" Isn't "mostly flash, little substance" a beautiful summation of the career of Ana Marie Cox? It's like Katie Couric suggesting Palin isn't deep.
Cox slams Rush Limbaugh in her review for calling the book substantive, even as she later confessed she only read part of the book:
Rush Limbaugh last week proclaimed "Going Rogue" to be "truly one of the most substantive policy books I've read," though that certainly raises questions about what other policy books Rush has read and by what lights he considers the Palin book to be one. For all I know, it may be true. There may truly be substantive discussion of policy, something that goes beyond the thudding "taxes bad"/"government small" rhetoric that characterizes the moments when Palin turns her personal narrative into a discussion of government workings.
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.
That's an incredibly lame excuse -- one that would get you a solid D-minus or worse in high school. (As if most politicians write their own memoirs without assistance?)
Continetti's review has a headline inside Style that says "To the right, she's the thriller from Wasilla."
Palin should be pleased that the three articles suggest this book is a Major Event. That's not even counting the snarky article by perpetually snarky TV writer Lisa de Moraes on the Oprah interview:
Based on what we heard Monday it appears that Palin's book...is a charming coming-of-age tale along Rebecca of Wasilla Farm lines -- the narrative of a naive girl who thinks we're so naive that we would believe she's a naive girl who never could have guessed, say, that a candidate form the party of the Decency Police might face just a widdle bit of a problem to have a teen daughter who was pregnant and not married.
