From today's publishing industry daily gossip e-mail, Publishers Lunch:
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NYT Parses Clinton Like Mad
What we can we say about the NY Times' curious trio of Bill Clinton stories--the news article about the book that followed the AP's embargo buster, the premature review that followed the next day, and today's mystifying infomercial for orchestrated right-wing reaction that actually covers/promotes Limbaugh and Drudge on page one (itself the third in David Kirkpatrick's curious trio of articles in which the newspaper tries to manage the political positioning of Clinton during the Kerry campaign)--that you haven't already thought to yourself?
Keeping it brief, let's try this: Given that Michiko Kakutani hating the book was a foregone conclusion, and that by her own definition she's unlikely to view the book any differently than she viewed Clinton's term in office ("In many ways, the book is a mirror of Mr. Clinton's presidency: lack of discipline leading to squandered opportunities; high expectations, undermined by self-indulgence and scattered concentration."), why give it to her to review? Particularly after we know how much she disliked Hillary Clinton's book this time last year.
Meanwhile, BN's Bob Wietrak tells the WSJ that pre-orders "tripled since Friday" (the chain ordered 300,000 to 400,000 copies). Of the early reviews, he comments, "The consumer doesn't need it to be filtered for them."
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The NYTimes hates Clinton? Gee, I'm shocked. Just shocked...