Mark Levin: It would appear that McGinness is a fiction writer

"And a bad one at that -- a hack."
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h/t: Timothy Donovan

- JP

Breitbart promises more McGinness bombshells

"People are reaching out to us" with testimony which debunks McGinness book"
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In an interview with Hugh Hewitt, Andrew Breitbart reveals that he's not through disassembling the living lie that is Joe McGinness, not by a long shot:


h/t: PalinUndefeated

See Also: McGinniss Confirms, Griffin Fumes, ‘Hooker’ Responds

- JP

Rush: 'Now this looks like the makings of a very lucrative lawsuit'

"These people are telling us who they are afraid of, and they'll stoop to anything..."
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h/t: Breitbart.tv

- JP

More Fallout From Bretbart's McGinness Bombshell (Updated)

“No one has ever provided factual evidence”
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There's more fallout from Andrew Breitbart's devastating bomb run on Joe McGinness and his book of lies. In a follow up posting at Big Journalism, Breitbart presents six of the more scurrilous of McGinness' unsubstantiated allegations in detail, "and how McGinniss used most of them in The Rogue, even though he admitted in his email that he could not prove them."

a) Todd had sex with a hooker, or with anyone else outside his marriage.

McGinniss dropped the “hooker” accusation–probably because he was afraid, as his email suggests, that the sole source “may be mentally unstable” and that even the National Enquirer appeared to be ready “to back off this story.”

Yet McGinniss did publish allegations in The Rogue that Todd flirted with other women (p. 115) and had sex outside his marriage (p. 169), based solely on sources identified as “an attractive white woman” and “a friend of his,” respectively. Both sources are identified in the book as having spoken to McGinniss in 2010–before the January 2011 email in which he admitted he had no factual evidence beyond “tawdry gossip.”

b) Sarah had an affair with Brad Hanson, or anyone else.

McGinniss presents no named source for this accusation in The Rogue other than an article in the National Enquirer in October 2008. He refers to “a friend of Todd’s,” who tells McGinniss in 2010 that the affair–which both Palin and Hanson deny–was “known” (p. 64). He also cites third-party rumors, cited in turn (apparently in 2010) by former Wasilla mayor John Stein, who states that “we were hearing” about an affair during the mayoral campaign in which he was ousted by Sarah Palin (p. 64). Similarly, he cites third-party rumors from a woman named Colleen Cottle, whom he speaks to upon arriving in Wasilla in 2010. McGinniss does not quote Cottle directly, but says that she fills him in on local gossip, and attributes a remark about the affair to her (p. 6). All of these flimsy sources pre-date McGinniss’s email in January 2011 in which he admits that: “[N]o one has ever provided factual evidence” for the claims he lists.

c) Track was a druggie who enlisted in the army to avoid a jail term. Or that he vandalized Wasilla school buses.

McGinniss’s basis for accusations of drug use by Track Palin is the National Enquirer, which in turn had quoted an unnamed “source” in 2008. He adds that “reports of Track’s drug use persisted even into the summer of 2010” but does not specify what those reports are, or from whom (p. 114). His primary source for the accusation of vandalism in 2005 is local gossip: “word spread immediately in Wasilla,” McGinniss says, though he also claims that an unnamed radio station and an unnamed television station in Anchorage reported the accusation (p. 113). In the end, McGinniss hedges his bets: “Whether or not Track was involved in the school bus vandalism…” (p. 113).

McGinniss does not include the accusation that Track “enlisted in the army to avoid a jail term” in The Rogue. However, he does quote an unnamed “friend” of Track’s who said that Track enlisted to avoid getting into “trouble” such as “[t]he school bus thing, theft issues, multiple stuff” (p. 113). McGinniss does not clarify whether the “friend” is speaking from personal knowledge, or merely repeating third-hand rumors, perhaps provided by McGinniss himself as a prompt. For good measure, McGinniss claims–again, without any evidence–that Sarah Palin engineered Track’s enlistment and his deployment to Iraq for political gain, and quotes an unnamed state trooper who claims Track showed no signs of patriotism on the way to the enlistment office (p. 114).

All of the “evidence” cited by McGinniss to substantiate his claims about Track Palin appears to pre-date his January 2011 email in which he states that Random House lawyers have told him that he has no evidence, and that “nobody” has provided proof.

d) Willow was involved in the vandalism of the empty house in Meadow Lakes. Or that Sarah rushed back from Hawaii to put the lid on that.

McGinniss’s only source is the National Enquirer, which made these claims in 2010. He also claims “[m]any in Wasilla” believe the story (p. 111). He also cites gossip related by Colleen Cottle in 2010–again, without quoting her directly (p. 6). None of this “evidence” was obtained after McGinniss admitted, in his email, that he could not prove the claim.

e) Trig is not Sarah’s natural born child.

McGinniss provides no new evidence for this debunked claim, quoting “questions” being asked on “blogs” and the like (p. 316). McGinniss also cites “many Wasillans” who allegedly say that “even if she had not faked the entire story of her pregnancy and Trig’s birth, it was something she was eminently capable of doing” (p. 285). In other words, he supports a lie, which he tacitly admits he cannot prove, by attacking Palin’s character.

f) Bristol was promiscuous as a high schooler and drank and used drugs, or became pregnant again after Tripp’s birth.

McGinniss’s source is again local gossip in the summer of 2010: “Rumors immediately run rampant,” he says (p. 204). Once again, he also cites gossip allegedly related by (but not directly quoted from) Colleen Cottle in 2010. He mentions a July 2010 interview in The Daily Beast with Bristol’s alleged new boyfriend at the time, Ben Barber, which does not discuss promiscuity or drugs, and actually contradicts the claim that Bristol became pregnant again. None of these “tawdry” rumors, which McGinniss admits in his January 2011 email have no factual basis, is supported by subsequent evidence.

[More]

Update: McGinniss Confirms, Griffin Fumes, ‘Hooker’ Responds

- JP

Andrew Breitbart Drops a Smart Bomb on Joe McGuiness

McGinniss email reveals his manuscript could not prove its most salacious allegations
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Andrew Breitbart dropped a smart bomb Friday morning which threatens to utterly destroy Joe McGinniss and his anti-Palin book The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin. But Breitbart's precision-guided weapon may have also caused some collateral damage to the reputation of McGinness' publisher, Random House. Also caught up in the explosion is disgraced anti-Palin blogger Jesse Griffin.

As Breitbart points out, even the establishment media, which is not kindly disposed toward Gov. Palin, has overwhelmingly greeted the McGinness book with scathing reviews and condemnation. McGinniss aapears to have knowingly submitted a book to his publisher that was filled with little more than unproven “tawdry gossip” and rumors that lacked “factual evidence, says Breitbart, and now faces "the fight of his literary life."

In the email below, sent in January of 2011, McGinniss reveals that his manuscript, then under legal review at Crown/Random House, could not prove its most headline-grabbing allegations. And yet, many of these “salacious stories” that lacked “proof” (in McGinniss’s own words) ended up in the book, and on televisions everywhere during the author’s current media tour … without proper sourcing, and without any apparent new evidence to support them.

McGinniss’s panicked state is evidenced by the identity of the recipient to whom he sent his email of distress. Jesse Griffin was the author of an obscure, low-rent, and now-defunct anti-Palin blog that obsessed over Trig Palin’s maternity–claiming, without any evidence, that Sarah Palin was not Trig’s mother.

Was Random House aware that its prized author was making a desperate overtime bid to save face? And if so, why did it allow him to come forth with most of those tawdry accusations without proof or proper sourcing?

This would not be the first time McGinniss has found himself in trouble over accusations of unethical journalism. In 1987, McGinniss agreed to pay $325,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by the convicted murderer who was the subject of McGinniss’s book Fatal Vision. He has also admitted to having surreptitiously distributed a competitor’s manuscript about Palin that was handed to him by his own publisher. The leak allegedly damaged the commercial viability of that book.

In 2003, Random House released a larger-than-life, massive bestseller by James Frey entitled A Million Little Pieces. Later, it was revealed that the book was a fantastical literary hoax that made its way past some of the highest-paid and most respected editors and lawyers in the literary world. Doubleday/Random House felt compelled to offer full refunds to those who had bought the book.

Has history repeated itself?

Mr. McGinniss has not responded to multiple requests for comment.

—–

From: Joe McGinniss
To: Jesse Griffin
Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2011 6:15 PM
Subject: I have to ask you for help

Jesse–

Legal review of my manuscript is underway and here’s my problem: no one has ever offered documentation of any of the lurid stories about the Palins. Shailey Tripp is the latest example.

APD and Sarah have denied that Todd had any involvement with her. To my knowledge, no one has provided any evidence that he did. TheEnquirer cites AlaskaWTF, which in turn cites the Enquirer: what good is that? I’m also told that the Enquirer is preparing to back off this story and save face by denouncing Ms. Tripp as an unreliable source who promised documentation she couldn’t provide.

She may be mentally unstable and prone to fabrication, delusion, or both. Her joint may be called Blue Hands Massage (brrrrr!), but she’s no Monica Lewinsky with a blue dress with a semen stain, that’s for sure.

Do you believe that Todd paid her for sex? If so, why do you believe that, other than that you wish it were true?

A lurid, sensational, defamatory story about Todd, based only on the account of a woman charged with prostitution, who is no doubt desperate for money, and who sold her story to the Enquirer, is a gift from heaven for Sarah.

Jesse, you can ridicule Sarah for calling in to the execrable Bob & Mark, but the fact is that as far as this story goes, there’s no there there. And rumors about what might come in weeks ahead are not facts. In fact, they’re garbage.

I’ve neither seen nor heard anything that indicates that Ms. Tripp’s story has any basis in fact. None of the endless crap Patrick posted about her before getting the boot from palingates.com offers any substantiation.

And even you write frequently that you know things you can’t yet post, but that soon “all will be revealed.” This has been going on since I first became aware of your blog, but as far as I know you haven’t substantiated a single claim or provided verification for a single rumor that you’ve posted about Sarah’s personal life, or the personal lives of any Palin family members. Thus, she gets to denounce what she calls “lies.”

Neither from you, the Enquirer, AlaskaWTF, palingates.com or anyone else, have I seen a credible, identified source backing any of the salacious stories about the Palin family.

Thus–as Random House lawyers are already pointing out to me–nothing I can cite other than my own reporting rises above the level of tawdry gossip. The proof is always just around the corner, but that’s a corner nobody has been able to turn. Maybe Jeff Dunn has, in which case I’ll be the first to congratulate him. But frankly, at this point, I’m tired of it, and I’ve run out of time.

No one has ever provided factual evidence that:

a) Todd had sex with a hooker, or with anyone else outside his marriage.

b) Sarah had an affair with Brad Hanson, or anyone else.

c) Track was a druggie who enlisted in the army to avoid a jail term. Or that he vandalized Wasilla school buses.

d) Willow was involved in the vandalism of the empty house in Meadow Lakes. Or that Sarah rushed back from Hawaii to put the lid on that.

e) Trig is not Sarah’s natural born child.

f) Bristol was promiscuous as a high schooler and drank and used drugs, or became pregnant again after Tripp’s birth.

Jesse, you were going on and on about Bristol being pregnant while doing Dancing With The Stars. And, if I recall correctly, at the time of her brief glossy-magazine-payday “reunion” with Levi, you surmised that she was pregnant by Ben Barber, or at least by someone who wasn’t Levi. You’ve recently suggested she’s had an abortion, publishing photographs that show her chubby then and thin now. But doesn’t that seem a little “thin” to you, based on nothing besides magazine pictures?

So much has bubbled at the salacious rumor stage for more than two years, but no one has been able to take even one story further.

Jesse, if you can put me in touch with people who are willing and able to substantiate any of the above, now is the time to do so. Otherwise, I hope you won’t complain that there are no startling new revelations in my book. My publisher and I think it’s damning enough without airing the family’s dirty laundry, but because Sarah’s hypocrisy about her family is one of the things that galls me most, I’d like to be able to publish facts in regard to a) through f) above, but I emphasize facts.

Not malicious speculation or third-hand rumors relayed by those who hold a grudge.

For any or all of those who’ve told you they’ll speak out, but not yet, now is the time. My book represents the last best chance to put the truth about Sarah in front of the American people in a documented, verifiable way. But I need facts that I can rely on. I didn’t live this long and work this hard over so many decades to wind up as AlaskaWTF between hard covers.

as always, and looking forward to seeing you in spring or summer,

Joe

[More]

- JP

Quote of the Day (July 30, 2011)

Via Jim Hoft
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Andrew Breitbart, at the Smart Girl Summit today:

“They’re doing to me what they did to Sarah Palin. If you’re effective they sue you. They do this to everyone they think is effective. And, they’re trying to shut me up and they’re not going to shut me up.”

- JP

Breitbart: How the MSM attempts to deny Sarah Palin's vindication

Palin 2.0 is a media contrivance to deny the truth about Gov. Palin
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New Media entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart explains how the media has been forced to change its narrative about Gov. Palin. The new narrative concedes that she was Good Sarah before being named as John McCain's running mate, but was somehow transformed into Bad Sarah during the 2008 campaign and remains Bad Sarah to this day. This narrative is, of course, has not a shred of truth in or about it. The Sarah Palin of today is the same Sarah Palin who effectively governed Alaska. The only thing which has changed is the media narrative, as they replaced their old lie with a new one:

So the mainstream media has invented a new meme with which to attack Sarah Palin. It started with Joshua Green’s article in the Atlantic a few weeks ago, in which he lamented “The Tragedy of Sarah Palin.”

Green wrote:

As governor, Palin demonstrated many of the qualities we expect in our best leaders. She set aside private concerns for the greater good, forgoing a focus on social issues to confront the great problem plaguing Alaska, its corrupt oil-and-gas politics…. And she succeeded to a remarkable extent in settling, at least for a time, what had seemed insoluble problems, in the process putting Alaska on a trajectory to financial well-being.

However, Green argued, Palin went wrong after 2008. She let her “worst impulses” take over. She “let herself be distracted by the many grievances she harbored against a wide range of enemies.” She “obsessed over her image, even more than most politicians.”

In this revision of revisionist history, the good Palin, which the mainstream media tried to suppress, somehow morphed into the bad Palin of their own creation.

A few conservatives have bought into this “Palin 2.0” meme. “How did a likable, consensus-oriented governor become such a divisive figure?” asked Michael Gerson this week in the Washington Post. (His colleagues know the answer.)

The truth is that there is no “Palin 2.0.” Sarah Palin today is the same woman she was then, albeit with more battle scars (many in the back). She has not changed her political principles or tactics. The same themes that leap off the screen in The Undefeated–her ethics, her fiscal conservatism, her commitment to the public interest–remain her creed today...

[More]

- JP

Quote of the Day (May 27, 2011)

Playing the Nazi card over ‘The Undefeated’
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John Nolte at Big Hollywood:

“I have won the BIG office pool. Here at the BIGS, we all picked squares to back up our prediction of who would be the first member of the MSM to compare the upcoming Sarah Palin documentary ‘The Undefeated’ to Leni Riefenstahl’s infamous pro-Nazi propaganda film. ‘Triumph of the Will.’ Personally, my gut told me this person would have to be uncommonly angry and cruel; someone willing to stoop to a level of partisan inhumanity where few fear to tread, someone so despicably desperate to destroy another they would use a political figure’s own children as weapons of attack. Well… Ladies and gents, Mr. Andrew Sullivan...”

- JP

Mama Bear Boosts Bila, Breitbart Books

More great summer reading
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Gov. Palin just moments ago gave a shout out via Twitter to Jedediah's new book Outnumbered and to Andrew Breitbart's recently released Righteous Indignation:

More great summer reading- hope Wasilla bookstores stock up w/"Outnumbered" & @AndrewBreitbart's "Righteous Indignation" http://is.gd/Y2ZhiL

Yes media/left, she reads. She also writes. Like you, she earned a journalism degree. Unlike you, she doesn't just re-publish stuff from foaming-at-the-mouth leftist bloggers.

- JP

Breitbart: Gov. Palin 'Definitely Gets Pop Culture'

"She should be on the cover of my book"
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In an exclusive interview with Human Events, Andrew Breitbart says that "we live in a world where pop culture defines everything," and the lamestream media wants to destroy Sarah Palin because "she represents the same message I'm trying to give people. It's walk towards the fire. Take off your boxing gloves and fight these people":


[More]

- JP

The Sarah Palin Show?

"Leftists are never more unattractive than when they are excoriating the Palins"
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With the news that Glenn Beck will leave his afternoon Fox News hour for new ventures, Megan Fox at NewsReal Blog opines that Roger Ailes should fill Beck's slot with a replacement who, like Beck, "makes the Left put their full-blown moonbattery on display." Among the 10 potential candidates to take over the 5 PM slot on Fox News she suggests is Gov. Palin:

Leftists suffer from a derangement syndrome even more acute than the one attached to George Bush when they talk about, read about, write about or even think about Sarah Palin. The second she appears in public, they are programmed like Terminators to lock on and destroy by any means necessary. Nothing is off limits, not even her physically disabled toddler. It’s sad, but it’s a great opportunity to expose the mentally unstable Left to regular folks. They are never more unattractive than when they are excoriating the Palins.

A show hosted by Palin would offer ample opportunities to tweak the Left. After the news or issues of the day, Palin could feature the “Caribou Barbie Corner” where she could demonstrate how to field-dress a moose or how to butcher a caribou and offer helpful freezing tips. That could segue into a cooking segment where a guest could help her prepare the day’s kill. Todd can get in on the action too in “Todd Time” where he can offer stay-at-home-dads advice and guidance as well as snow machine racing footage. This would drive the Left insane.

The best part would be watching the anti-woman feminists come out of the woodwork to try to strip her of her “womanhood,” further demonstrating the faux feminist agenda has nothing whatsoever to do with women, but with the cause of the Left alone.

[...]

Did I mention the Facebook group entitled “Sarah Palin Must Die?” It has since been removed, but it had over 1,000 members. She is definitely the right person to make the Left jump right off that cliff of civility.

[More]

While the prospect of Sarahcuda making the moonbats bark every weekday afternoon with her own TV program is indeed tantalizing, Palin supporters are hoping that the 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate has other plans and higher ambitions.

Some of the other candidates Megan Fox mentions are Tammy Bruce, Rush Limbaugh and Mark Steyn, among others -- all of whom have been successful in radio -- but we're not sure that success would carry over to television. Rush, for one, tried it years ago, and found that radio was much better tailored to his style. We like Megan Fox's #6 pick, Andrew Breitbart:

Andrew Breitbart is some kind of mad genius who has taken the Internet by storm with Big Journalism, Big Hollywood, Big Peace, and Big Government. “Big TV” is the next logical step.

Breitbart's effect on "progressives" is to drive them into fits of rage almost as intense and insane as the seizures into which our Sarah sends them. "Big TV" would be must-see TV for red-blooded conservatives.

- JP

Breitbart: Join Me and Sarah Palin at the rally in Anaheim Saturday

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From Andrew Breitbart at Big Government:

This weekend I have the honor of sharing the stage with one of the Tea Party’s and Republican Party’s fearless leaders, Sarah Palin. Since her arrival on the national stage, the Democratic Party has recognized her potential as a political powerhouse and has worked in tandem with its partners in crime, the mainstream media, to wage an unprecedented personal campaign against her and her family. The Tea Party can relate.

But the power of Alinsky and the politics of personal destruction vis a vis the Democrat Media Complex has reverse effects when the object of the hate bravely stands up to the bullies and thugs. The Tea Party and Sarah Palin have given America a great lesson in standing up to the bullies who have co-opted the Democratic Party and the American media.

As we head into the home stretch, Sarah Palin will be in California to draw attention to a state in economic shambles. After a generation of nanny-state and Ponzi scheme policies, Californians and Americans want a radical change. This is the Republican Party’s chance to win back one of the bluest states, and what better way to usher in that change than with a dynamic female leader like Sarah Palin cheering on fellow free market, limited government feminist success stories Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina.

“American Heart” singer/songwriter Jon David, other California GOP candidates and I will join Palin on stage to cheer on a new era of hope and change in the pursuit of helping California avert economic disaster.

I invite all of our readers to come down to have a rollicking and patriotic time. I’ll be hanging out to meet and greet one and all well after the bunting has been taken down.

(More)

Palin FACT SHEET - CA 9.29.10-1 - - JP

Breitbart: 'Kingmaker' Sarah Palin is good for the GOP

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Here's Andrew Breitbart, outnumbered three to one by lefty columnist Thomas Frank, Love Client #9, and Vichy Republican Kathleen Parker:



h/t: Frank Ross

- JP

Quote of the Day (June 30, 2010)

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Andrew Breitbart:

"Sullivan’s disgusting, ends-justify-the-means obsession with the personal family life of Sarah Palin breached every ethical and journalistic boundary known to the cosmos. Between airing Palin’s hacked private emails and making a cottage industry out of challenging the maternity of her son, Trig, sometimes the word 'irony' or 'hypocrisy' is not descriptive enough."

- JP

Andrew Breitbart joins Showdown in Searchlight lineup

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Tea Party Express has added Andrew Breitbart to the lineup of speakers headed by Sarah Palin for the March 27 Showdown in Searchlight. Here's the updated video ad:



Update: Andrea Shea King ("The Radio Patriot") will embed with the caravan as it tours from Searchlight to Washington, D.C.

- JP

Video: Sarah Palin's Address to the National Tea Party Convention

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Andrew Breitbart introduces Gov. Sarah Palin:



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Sarah Palin addresses the Tea Party Convention:



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Sarah Palin post-speech Q&A at the Tea Party Convention, Part 1:



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Sarah Palin post-speech Q&A at the Tea Party Convention, Part 2:



- JP

Andrew Bretbart: Punch them in the nose and take it on

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At the Perry Blogger Conference in Austin this weekend, Andrew Breitbart discussed the left and their lapdog media's campaign of hatred and demonization against first George W. Bush and then Sarah Palin:  



- JP