JOE McGINNISS

FDL Book Salon Welcomes Joe McGinniss, The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin

Author: Joe McGinniss
Sunday, September 25, 2011 1:55 pm Pacific time
Welcome Joe McGinniss, and Host Phil Munger “EdwardTeller”, (Progressive Alaska)

The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin

Host, Phil Munger:

Longtime journalist and award-winning author Joe McGinniss’ newest book, The Rogue, is the latest – but by no means last – book about Sarah Palin. Palin is not only the most famous Alaskan in history, she has uniquely combined political activity, celebrity, motherhood, grandmotherhood, a spousal relationship, borderline religious beliefs, professional victimhood, the American gossip universe, pop culture, legal obfuscation, new media and social networking. Increasingly known for being thin-skinned and somewhat lacking in spatial awareness, Palin, more than any American politician in a generation or so, almost begged McGinniss – or any investigative author – to move next door.

The Rogue is constructed around Joe McGinniss’ 2010 summer stay on the shores of Lake Lucille. His introduction to the ambience of Wasilla is lengthened by over a page, as he lists all the churches in the greater Wasilla area – about 50. He even misses some that are hard to find for one reason or another.

The chapters alternate between retelling the meetings, interviews, encounters, conversations, emails, hate mails, visitors and narrowly avoided altercations as they roll by, and looks back at Palin’s rise. The looks go back into her family’s background, before Sarah Palin was born. McGinniss throws a lot of fresh light and detail onto available biographical information about both the Heath family into which she was born, and the Palin family, into which she married. He adds quite a bit of important new information too. The looks back eventually merge with the present as it was when McGinniss finished the manuscript early this summer:

“This may be a strange thing to say in [opening] the last chapter about the star performer of the circus. But no matter how much my book sales might benefit from a Palin presidential campaign in 2012, I sincerely hope that the whole extravaganza, which has been unblushingly underwritten by a mainstream media willing to gamble the nation’s future in exchange for the cheap thrill of watching a clown in high heels on a flying trapeze, is nearing its end.”

In a review at the Euro-American Palin-centric blog, Politicalgates, Blueberry T has provided a fairly brief chapter-by-chapter synopsis. The subjects that seem to be brought up repeatedly by those interviewing the author this past week have centered around Palin’s two best-known sexual escapades (one pre-marital), the perception that McGinniss’ move next door was unseemly, questions about the birth of Trig Palin in early 2008, and the veracity of his anonymous sources. The author’s book tour interviewers, at least that I’ve reviewed, don’t seem to be interested in how thoroughly McGinniss has documented the fervor of Palin’s over-the-top devotees, nor in the deep ties Palin has had since the early 1990s to domininionist sects.

The author gratefully acknowledges how fully he was able to use the resources and existing material of such Alaska bloggers as Jeanne Devon, Shannyn Moore, Jesse Griffin and others. He also points out the importance of author-journalists such as David Neiwert and Max Blumenthal for their research on Palin’s ties to far-right, white supremacist and millennialist organizations.

On the other hand, McGinniss is wary of the symbiotic relationship media has come to rely upon regarding Palin. He seems to understand that had Alaska’s mainstream media done a better job up through mid-2008, he would have been left without a subject for this newest book.

It is too early to tell what McGinniss has achieved, past writing the easiest to read, most engaging trip yet through the strange world of PalinLand. As the author noted, much contained in the book has been covered before. Not this way, though, and not with this level of humor, wonder, snark and plain curiosity. His coverage of the voluminous hate messages, calls and emails is centered not on him, but on what this means in a larger way. His continual refusals to take guns proffered to him day after day by a succession of some of my longtime friends made me laugh, because he accurately caught my friends’ quirks in a touchingly warm way. Even though you don’t know these people, you’ll probably laugh too, as Joe introduces them, one pistol, shotgun or rifle-offering woman or man after another.

He was notably more charitable toward the vast shortcomings of Alaska society in The Rogue than he had to be when writing about the crazed oil pipeline construction days in his 1980 book, Going to Extremes. At that time, McGinniss’ book was one of several that addressed the wild times of that construction boom, including John McPhee’s brilliant set of sketches, Coming Into the Country. Even though McPhee’s pipeline era book was a masterpiece of tone, narrative and style, his predictions about Alaska’s future held up far less than did those McGinniss made back then.

McGinniss’ implications about what the pipeline meant in 1980 were mostly limited to the future of Alaskan society. Those in The Rogue have as much to do with the future of our fraying, tarnished American fabric.

Author Spotlight: Joe McGinniss on “The Rogue”
by Kindle Editors on 09/22/2011

Once more unto the breach, dear friends.

Or at least into the maelstrom.

My twelfth book, The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin, is now out from Crown.

Not for the first time, I’m expecting the publication process to be eventful.

Actually, “eventful,” is a euphemism. What I’m expecting are vitriolic attacks from Palin supporters on my character, ethics, reporting and writing skills, wardrobe, haircut, and even the brand of dog food I feed my twelve-year old Norwegian elkhound.

For some reason, my books seem to generate controversy. It started with my first, The Selling of The President 1968, continued through my 1980 book about Alaska, Going to Extremes, intensified with Fatal Vision, reached tragicomic proportions with The Last Brother, my book about the mythic arc of Sen. Edward Kennedy’s career in the 1960’s (as I recall, both Russell Baker and Art Buchwald published attacks on me the same day), and took on international proportions when criminal charges were filed against me in Italy because of The Miracle of Castel di Sangro.

This pattern—and when a phenomenon has continued for more than forty years, it’s hard not to call it a pattern–has occasionally caused me to ask myself: “What is it with you, McGinniss? Why do you keep writing books that you know will make people angry?”

My therapist has suggested that I have a higher than average need for invigoration, and that taking risks in my professional life provides it. I’ve learned not to argue with my therapist (she’s always right), but I’d like to offer an alternative theory: when I set out to write a book, I do so not knowing what the story will turn out to be.

I didn’t know whether Richard Nixon would win or lose the 1968 presidential election. I didn’t know what I’d find in Alaska when I traveled there for the first time in 1975. I didn’t know whether Jeffrey MacDonald was innocent or guilty of the murders of his pregnant wife and two little girls. I didn’t know how I’d wind up feeling about Teddy Kennedy and the carefully constructed Kennedy myth. I had no idea what would happen over the next nine months when I arrived in Italy, speaking not a word of Italian, in late summer of 1996.

Nor did I know how Sarah Palin would react to my moving in next door to her last summer.

My books are shaped by events that haven’t occurred when I start my work. Nothing is predictable, thus everything is volatile. I’ve never started a book with my mind already made up about my subject.

As Flannery O’Connor once said, “I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say.”

Often what I say is not what my subject was hoping to hear.

Thus, the sound and fury that often accompanies the publication of a new Joe McGinniss book.

I don’t expect it to be any different with The Rogue.

But as Samuel Johnson once said, “I would rather be attacked than unnoticed.”

So buckle up tight and take a ride on The Rogue roller coaster with me.

I’m heading for New York this afternoon to start doing publicity for THE ROGUE.

I’d say, “Let the wild rumpus start,” except it’s already well underway.

I look forward to the opportunities I’ll have in coming weeks to address some of the issues raised by critics.

THE ROGUE goes on sale Tuesday.

All an author can hope for is fairness.

Dave Weigel provides it here.

You don’t even know after reading his piece whether he liked the book.

But at least he read it carefully before opining about it.

Last week, Savannah Guthrie of the Today Show interviewed me at my home.

The segment will air tomorrow during the 7:30–8 a.m. segment, I’m told.

Savannah tweets:

@SavannahGuthrie

I’ve gotta say, I never expected this.

I don’t think Garry Trudeau did either.

He’s had “DOONESBURY” strips killed by newspapers before.

But for the Chicago Tribune and Newsday and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to drop
DOONESBURY for a full week because the strip contained quotes from THE ROGUE?

Hey, what is this, North Korea?

Many, many, many newspapers and blogs are discussing this.

I don’t have the time or staff (by the way, my “staff” consists of my left hand and my right hand) to put together a post that lists them.

But Garry tells me he’ll be on NPR this week discussing the censorship by mainstream media of cartoons that dared to make fun of Sarah Palin.

Has Sarah become the Blessed Virgin, and the USA a new Vatican City?

Major newspapers in Chicago, New York, and Atlanta refuse to run–for a full week or more–a comic strip that refers to excerpts from a book that dares to criticize a woman who once ran for vice president and then quit as governor of her state and has subsequently made millions of dollars by doing reality shows and appearing as a highly-paid political commentator on a right-wing TV channel?

Hey, people: we’ve got a problem.

In the Washington Post today, Michael Cavna takes note of the Doonesbury series of strips about THE ROGUE.

I couldn’t talk to Cavna because I am contractually prohibited from giving any real time interviews before September 19, but I thought that his description of my renting the house next door to Sarah and Todd last summer “…as if moving in on his prey…” was hilarious.

As if Sarah was ever prey, not predator.

Cavna also says that Garry Trudeau “has partnered with McGinniss for a cartoon collaboration.”

“Partnered” suggests that there is/was a creative and/or financial arrangement between Trudeau and me.

There is not.

There never was.

There never could be.

Garry Trudeau is a comic genius whose work has graced and enlightened and amused us for more than forty years.

I’m just a teller of true stories:  no more, no less.

That Trudeau considers THE ROGUE worth his attention is as high a compliment as I could ever receive.

My agent, Dave Larabell, of The David Black Agency, suggested that Trudeau–having done a week-long series about Hedley of Fox News stalking me as I was researching my book–might want to pick up the story line after I’d actually written the book and just before it was published.

As it happened, once he’d read THE ROGUE, he did.

So here’s the Monday strip:

Stay tuned.

They’ll only get better–or worse–depending on your perspective.

It’s about to happen.

For me, in fact, it’s already begun.

I did a three-hour interview with “an important person” from a major media outlet on Tuesday.

The result of that will be published nationally on Sept. 18.

On Thursday, I did an extended interview with a major figure from a national television network.

The result of that will be broadcast nationally on Sept. 19.

THE ROGUE goes on sale the next day.

It will not be ignored.

Yesterday, I spent five hours having my picture taken by a photographer for a major media outlet.  The result of that should be available for viewing on Sept. 18.  (Heads up:  it might not be pretty.  He kept telling me to “look mean” and said “Suppose you opened your door last summer and Todd Palin was standing there with a gun pointed at you:  let me see that expression.”)

I said, “There wouldn’t be an expression.  I would’ve slammed the door in his face and called 911.”

The photographer said, “Perfect!  I got your expression just as you said there wouldn’t be one.”

These guys are clever.  That’s why they get the big bucks.

I am contractually bound not to disclose in advance any of the interviews I’m doing before Sept. 20, so I can’t say where any of these folks came from to visit me.

But the fact that on three different days this week heavy hitters made a seven-hour round trip from New York City to interview, film, and photograph a mere author does not suggest that there will be no interest in THE ROGUE.

For better or worse,  I’ll be hard to miss on national TV and radio, and in print, starting Sept. 18 and continuing through at least the second week of October.

Doonesbury is already running strips about the book and those will heat up on Monday.

Even today, in Doonesbury’s “Say What?” quote section that runs beneath each day’s new strip, we see this:

“People around here don’t give a shit about Sarah anymore. They’re burned out on all her drama.”

— current Wasilla Mayor Verne Rupright, from THE ROGUE, by Joe McGinniss.

Confined to four small panels per day, “Doonesbury” has no room for context.

So let me share with you the context that surrounds the remarks of Mayor Rupright that appear on the “Doonesbury” page today.

You can read it all on page 44 of THE ROGUE:

“Do you want a gun?” is the first thing he asks me.

“Do you think I need one?”

He considers. “Mmmm, probably not. I think most of the threats are coming from Outside.  People around here don’t give a shit about Sarah anymore. They’re burned out on all her drama.  Do you have much experience with handguns?”

“None at all.”

“Then I think you’re better off without one. You’d be more likely to hurt yourself than anyone else…”

Very considerate and thoughtful, especially given last summer’s craziness.

Hardly inflammatory, and I don’t fault Garry Trudeau for using it.

Verne was great to me last summer when the chips were down, and he didn’t prove to be a false friend.

NINE days and counting.

I doubt that Sarah will wait that long to start attacking me.

I’ve seen what will come in Doonesbury next week, and it ain’t pretty.

As Maurice Sendak once wrote–and drew:

Given Sarah’s life and career, that quote could be about almost anything.

But if Hedley finds it boring, who cares?

It can’t be a reference to anything interesting.

So pay this episode no attention.

It’s just Roger and Garry and I—The Unholy Trinity—trying to distract you from important issues by making you wonder what’ll happen next.

Anand Giridharadas explains.

Strangely, she was saying things that liberals might like, if not for Ms. Palin’s having said them.