Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
From Sarah Palin's Facebook page:
"An interview with Oprah Winfrey is already scheduled, and I'm also hoping to have the opportunity to talk with Bill O'Reilly, Barbara Walters, Sean Hannity, Greta Van Susteren, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Miller, Tammy Bruce, and others, including local Alaska personalities Bob & Mark and Eddie Burke. (Variety is the spice of life!)."That's variety? Two celebrity interviewers who can help her book sell millions of copies and the full list of Fox News pundits with radio shows? There seems to be one variety missing: Real journalists asking questions that Palin might not be able to B.S. her way through.
Variety: "We got both kinds here, country and western."
Politics
Comments
Palin's experience with Couric taught her to avoid journalists with tough questions like, "What do you read?" She doesn't read, can't write (book is ghosted) and wants to lead. Perfect.
Posted by: MikeMa | November 8, 2009 9:19 AM
In all fairness western is a pretty much extinct subgenre of country. It was big in the '50's, shrank in the '60's & '70's and disappeared by the '80's.
Posted by: Rob Jase | November 8, 2009 9:58 AM
Real journalists? You betcha-not.
It's all part of the new GOP marketing strategy:
http://bit.ly/fxv3G
(satire)
Posted by: bondwooley | November 8, 2009 10:01 AM
If Fox and company do for Sarah's book what they did for Hoffman (NY 23) it'll be on the remainder shelf in no time.
Posted by: Rodney | November 8, 2009 10:04 AM
If I was Maddow, Colbert or Stewart I would feature a short segment, every night, ala "Nightline's" 444 days theme. I would show an empty chair and I would mention that Ms. Palin has declined the opportunity to set fake americans straight for the (plug in number here) day in a row.
It made Ted Koppel's career.
Posted by: democommie | November 8, 2009 10:24 AM
Democommie - who did Ted Koppel call out like that?
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 8, 2009 10:40 AM
I saw that quote by Palin above. It doesn't surprise me.
Yet Palin choosing to appear on all those right-wing outlets makes perfect sense from a business perspective as they give her an easy pipeline to the audience most likely to purchase her "book."
Palin is an idiot, but smart enough to know that the market for her screed is very narrow, and that's it's unwise to waste time with media which will have the audacity to call her on her crap instead of eating it without question as Limbaugh and Fox News will all happily do.
Posted by: CHV | November 8, 2009 10:56 AM
The scariest thing about Sarah Failin' is the fact that so many others still take her seriously.
On the one hand, I hope she gets nominated again, so she can doom the Republican ticket again. On the other hand, there are so many idiots in the world, she just might not doom the ticket.
Posted by: BaldApe | November 8, 2009 11:27 AM
"In all fairness western is a pretty much extinct subgenre of country. It was big in the '50's, shrank in the '60's & '70's and disappeared by the '80's."
Western goes back at least to the thirties, I think, with Bob Will and the Texas Playboys playing Western swing (which is some pretty fine music). I imagine that Western folk a la real cowboy songs goes back a lot further again.
I suppose that Country might be considered an ugly mutant child of Western and Bluegrass. Today's country is particularly schizophrenic, I think, using licks and chord progressions from rock, which would be heresy to the Country songsmiths of only a decade or two ago.
But rock and blues just will not be denied!
Posted by: Gingerbaker | November 8, 2009 12:15 PM
What I'm amazed is how someone that actually studied journalism could be so incapable of preparing for interviews by anyone above the level of a radio shock jock.
Posted by: muffinman | November 8, 2009 12:22 PM
muffinman @ 10 stated:
I remember many of my fellow college classmates that had zero interest in their studies. They worked hard enough to just to pass the class, where it was obvious they'd appreciated nothing taught in the class nor did they have any desire to retain what was taught. This occurred even in classes which were core to their major. It was my first conscious exposure to willful ignorance.
George W. Bush and Sarah Palin both appear to have that trait. For Mr. Bush to achieve an MBA I would assume he was exposed to quantitative business decison-making material, with some preliminary exposure to statistics in order to understand even the elementary level of material. But it was clear in his tenure during his Presidency he utilized none of that knowledge to inform his approach to managing his desk or that of his White House.
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 8, 2009 12:33 PM
Interestingly enough, a friend of mine who is a Harvard Business School grad says that Bush, much to my surprise, took his time at HBS seriously, and actually did quite well academically. In fact, he went to the unusual length of living off-campus so as to avoid the HBS party circuit. (I know that sounds like a joke, but actually there were a lot of hard partiers at HBS.)
Given his mediocre undergrad performance at Yale, his doing well at HBS is perhaps even more surprising. But the really discouraging aspect of all this is that he's actually capable of doing the hard work -- he just doesn't want to. And has slid by, not doing it, even through eight years as president.
Posted by: Dave | November 8, 2009 3:17 PM
Maybe that's part of the problem. You turn off the Republican base if you appear to have read and understood a book.
Posted by: BaldApe | November 8, 2009 4:55 PM
Ape @ 13:
That's called anti-intellectualism. Sarah Palin might as well be it's patron saint.
Posted by: CHV | November 8, 2009 5:01 PM
It seems like there is an error in formatting. Only the first paragraph should be indented as a quote, not the whole thing.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky | November 8, 2009 5:02 PM
"If I was Maddow, Colbert or Stewart I would feature a short segment, every night, ala "Nightline's" 444 days theme."
Michael Heath, I could be wrong, but I think democommie is talking about Ted Koppel's nightly mention of the Iran hostages. Every night on his show, no matter what else he was reporting on, he always stated it was "Day XXX of the hostage's captivity".
All these years later, and I still remember that.
Posted by: Rick R | November 8, 2009 6:36 PM
Rick R,
Nightline was originally entirely about the hostage crisis.
Posted by: BaldApe | November 8, 2009 7:17 PM
True. I watched it starting with the first show. But as the crisis dragged on and the show moved to cover other topics, they always kept that "it's day XXX of the hostage's captivity" announcement in the show.
Posted by: Rick R | November 8, 2009 7:28 PM
Rick R:
Thank you, yes that is what I was referring to.
Michael Heath:
Sorry, I thought that anyone who was watching television during the period was familiar with Mr. Koppels drill in that regard. He was always a good worker bee, but I really think his stint on that show gave him a chance to shine and he did so. I always thought he was far too easy on his interviewees but that's hardly a problem for him alone.
Sarah Palin, by comparison, makes W look presidential. That is so sad.
Posted by: democommie | November 8, 2009 7:50 PM
OT, but reading the wikipedia article on "Nightline", I came across this bit of it's history-
"On April 30, 2004, Koppel read the names of the members of the United States Armed Forces who were killed in Iraq. This prompted controversy from conservatives who believed Koppel was making a political statement and from Sinclair Broadcasting Group, which felt that ABC was undermining the war effort in Iraq. Others, most notably the Washington Post television columnist, thought it was a ratings stunt for sweeps, and indeed Nightline was the highest rated program during that time period, and had about 30% more viewers than other Nightline programs that week. Sinclair stations did not air the program.
Koppel repeated the format on May 28, 2004, reading the names of service members killed in Afghanistan, and on May 30, 2005, reading the names of all service members killed in Afghanistan or Iraq between the last program and the preparation of the program. This time, Sinclair stations aired the program as scheduled." (Emphasis mine)
Ugh. Only in Wingnuttia can a statements of facts associated with the cost of its policies read on the air be called a "political statement" by the right, and generate a controversy.
Sorry, I just found that whole "we won't let footage of the coffins of war dead be aired" thing extremely disgusting.
Anyway, back OT, I'd love Maddow to riff "Nightline" with a "it's day 63 and Ms. Palin still hasn't accepted our invitation to appear and discuss her book".
Posted by: Rick R | November 8, 2009 7:52 PM
I do remember Mr. Koppel distinguishing himself with his coverage of the Iran hostage situation. I don't recall that aspect of the show so thanks for reminding us. Perhaps Koppel's ritual is where Keith Olbermann got the idea of counting the days since Bush declared Mission Accomplished while our soliders remain in Iraq in harm's way.
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 8, 2009 10:25 PM
Love the Blues Brothers quote, Ed. I use it all the time (I live in the Nashville area, so it's fitting).
Posted by: Deepsix | November 9, 2009 1:45 PM