Time's Mark Halperin has finally raised his head from the extended Game Change tour to weigh in on the current state of President Obama. In a four point summary published Sunday, Halperin lists four ways in which Obama is repeating the mistakes of George W. Bush (someone, according to the NYT, people are beginning to miss). Says Halperin: (more...)

That's the question poised in Clark Hoyt's public editor column in the New York Times this Sunday, as Game Change tops the paper's nonfiction best-sellers list. The "racy" stories of "dysfunctional" relationships are captivating, but led Hoyt to a question of journalistic ethics: "How do you deal with a talker of a book reported in a way that the paper’s own standards do not permit?" (more...)

slideshow Game Change authors Mark Halperin and John Heilemann joined Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough in discussing their best-selling and oft blogged about book. Halperin mentioned during the event that the authors are in discussions with HBO about making a film version of their best-selling book. Their dreamcast? Meryl Streep playing Hillary Clinton and Will Smith playing Barack Obama. (more...)

Game Change, the dishy, exhaustively researched, and occasionally overwritten new book on the 2008 election by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, has dominated both political gossip and book publicity for the past week. It’s produced a small political scandal, a New York magazine cover story, and innumerable blog chatter. The book has been number one on Amazon since the day before its release, and the print run has reportedly already been increased twice. Nevertheless, the book is difficult to acquire in some parts of the country. For example, in lower Manhattan, the first four bookstores I checked had all sold out all their copies. The Strand had placed twenty-nine back orders for it, while the Union Square Barnes and Noble—where the woman in front of me was also asking for it—had placed about one hundred. With this in mind, we at Mediaite want to give you everything you’ll need to keep up with the chatter on Game Change, without your needing to read it. (more...)

Now that the dust has settled over the initial and headline-making revelations of the new campaign book Game Change, a number of people are beginning to question how authors John Heilemann and Mark Halperin managed to get all the juicy quotes they included in the book. Halperin described the process to Time managing editor Rick Stengel: (more...)

video Sarah Palin made her Fox News debut "The O'Reilly Factor," taking questions on today's top political news and issues. Host Bill O'Reilly was friendly and supportive, but did push Palin on the rumors of her poor intellect presented in the context of her media coverage. Nancy Pelosi, Iran, Harry Reid and of course, Barack Obama were all discussed, and as expected, Palin eloquently hit all talking points consistent with the conservative agenda. (more...)

video Guess who's tired of talking about Sarah Palin and some of the stunning revelations in Game Change, the new book chronicling the 2008 presidential campaign? Why its our old pal John McCain, who you may remember as Palin's running mate from yesteryear. While appearing on Today, McCain was pressed on allegations that the vetting process for Governor Palin was "wholly inadequate,' which appeared to irk Sen. McCain, who exasperated "I wouldn't know" if the vetting was appropriate. (more...)

It looks like on top of revealing all the dirty little secrets behind the lives of every candidate in the 2008 Presidential Election Mark Halperin and John Heilemann, the authors of Game Change, may be out to save the magazine industry. Following yesterday's excerpt in New York magazine (where Heileman is a columnist) which focused on the Edwardses (oof) comes today's Time.com (where Halperin is a editor-at-large) piece opining on the future of Sarah Palin. Interestingly the Time.com piece is not an excerpt from the book so much as a loosely pulled together extension of its Palin chapters. (more...)

video President Barack Obama came to the defense of Senate Majority leader Harry Reid who has received much criticism today over remarks he made about candidate Obama in the 2008 presidential campaign. In Game Change a book out today, Reid is said to have described Obama as “light-skinned appearance and speaking patterns with no negro dialect." Obama said to CNN's Roland Martin "This is a good man who has always been on the right side of history," in an interview taped Monday for TV One. (more...)

video The story of Harry Reid referencing a negro dialect in describing Candidate Obama has been a promotional gold mine for the publisher's of Game Change, the new book by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann chronicling the 2008 presidential campaign. The salacious splendor of the book is sure to be a hot topic for the next week, but some of the details are giving the media fits - best evidenced by CNN's Rick Sanchez asking guest Tony Blakely about President Obama's alleged use of 'jive' (more...)

video What happens when a planned leak of a salacious detail (Sarah Palin couldn't remember Biden's name!) gets shadowed by a more salacious tidbit (Harry Reid referring to Obama's non-negro dialect)? Viewers question your reasoning behind the piece. FNC's Eric Shawn noticed that 60 Minutes aired an exclusive interview with Game Change authors Mark Halperin and John Heilemann last night, and Palin was effectively the focus of the piece, with no mention of the Reid comment. (more...)

Who says no one is reading books anymore! Washington is still reeling today from revelations made in the uber-gossipy yet-to-be-released Game Change penned by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann. A copy of the book, which was technically under embargo until today, was discovered by the Atlantic's Marc Ambinder in a D.C. bookstore who shortly thereafter began posting the "juiciest bits" which shortly thereafter made international headlines. Not to be outdone the NYT apparently shortly thereafter got their hands on a copy and whipped up an embargo breaking review that called it "a spicy smorgasbord of observations, revelations and allegations — some that are based on impressive legwork and access, some that simply crystallize rumors and whispers from the campaign trail." It's true! Thus far the headlines sound like D.C.'s version of the behind the high school gymnasium gossip mill. And who could resist that. (more...)

video Hey, have you heard? Back in 2008 Senator Harry Reid lauded then-candidate Barack Obama for being a "light-skinned African-American with no negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one." This is one of many interesting bits of information coming from Game Change, a new book that chronicles the 2008 presidential campaign, by John Heileman and Mark Halperin released today. Given the vast amount of coverage, one would think this is the story of the year thus far, at least evidenced by the following video montage: (more...)

Game Change, the book out today by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann, is  making waves in NY and DC with its sensational revelations about the 2008 presidential campaign. One of those excerpts, posted by The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder, struck me as just a bit hypocritical. It concerns Cindy McCain and a previously discredited rumor, resurrected in Halperin's book.

Here's the passage, as posted by Marc Ambinder:

McCain aides confront Cindy McCain over reports that she had an extramarital affair (page 281):

"The man was said to be her long-term boyfriend; the pair had been sighted all over town in the last few years. Members of McCain's senior staff discussed the unsettling news, and their growing concerns that Cindy's behavior had been increasingly erratic of late. Weaver and others suspected that the Cindy rumor was rooted in truth. It was upsetting, Weaver believed, but not a threat."

This is exactly the kind of thing that a vociferous media critic pointed out, in the wake of the 2008 election, as an example of "extreme bias, extreme pro-Obama coverage," and a "disgusting failure" by the media. In fact, the exact thing:

"The (New York Times) story about Cindy McCain was vicious. It looked for every negative thing they could find about her and it cast her in an extraordinarily negative light. It didn't talk about her work, for instance, as a mother for her children, and they cherry-picked every negative thing that's ever been written about her."

That defender of Cindy McCain's virtue was...Mark Halperin.

I haven't read the book yet, but unless Ambinder left out the part where Halperin has ironclad sourcing and actual facts, Game Change seems to do little more than repeat a rumor, and add to it a rumor that a McCain adviser believed the rumor.

Also interesting, given Halperin's November 2008 j'accuse to the rest of the media (while he was already writing the book with Heilemann), is the fact that Marc Ambinder has released excerpts that devastate McCain, Harry Reid, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Sarah Palin, but describes the parts of the book about Obama thusly:

About Obama himself the book includes plenty of observations about his manner and temperament, many astute and some original, though no earth-shattering revelations.

Physician, get thyself out of the tank.

DEVELOPING Late last night, the White House announced that there would be no pool coverage for Sunday, January 10. While the President had no scheduled events this weekend, there was pool coverage yesterday. (more...)

video Past is prologue? Just in time for the 2010 mid-term election bonanza comes the much-anticipated Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. So anticipated in fact that what is billed as a "sweeping, novelistic portrait of this historic and unusual race" is under embargo until Monday. Ahead of the release the two are being interviewed on 60 Minutes this Sunday along with John McCain's former top campaign strategist Steve Schmidt. Additionally, Drudge has devoted a entire box to it, including what yesterday looked like an excerpt, but which appears to have since been removed. (more...)

Back in 2004 the must-read politico was Mark Halperin -- the New Yorker called him the "leading purveyor of inside dope." That, of course, was before the entire country became readers (and arguably purveyors) of inside dope thanks in large part to Politico. However! There is a new player on the scene, according to National Review editor Rich Lowry: Sarah Palin's Facebook page. Lowry describes it as a "must-read organ of conservative opinion." (more...)

We have entered the official Sarah Palin Going Rogue countdown. Come next week it is going to be all Sarah Palin, all the time, till at least Christmas. Probably more like 2012. So enjoy these last day's of relative Palin calm before the storm while you can. Or! Take an advanced look at what Palin's much-anticipated memoir contains, courtesy of Time's Mark Halperin. (more...)

A look at the Power Grid this week reveals a few fixtures that never waver: Oprah Winfrey, Rupert Murdoch, Anna Wintour -- these are media gods and little can upset that balance. But just behind them in the rest of the top ten all it takes is a big scoop or scandal to send ripples through the rest of the rankings. Here are the big shake-ups from the past week and a look at what caused them: (more...)