Coulter's phoney book sales totals exposed

[CatWoman]

I wanna have Sidney Blumenthal's baby :D

"What I think the key question is for Ann Coulter and all these other right-wing writers is, why is there a dagger in the New York Times best-seller list next to their books?" Mr. Blumenthal said in reference to the small symbol that appears next to Treason, which rocketed to the top of the Times list. According to the fine print at the bottom of the Times list, the dagger denotes "that some bookstores report receiving bulk orders."

"That means that someone is buying their book in bulk to put them on the best-seller list. These are bogus best-sellers," Mr. Blumenthal told The Transom. "I want to know why won't come clean and explain which rich right-wing sugar daddies are putting her on the best-seller list."

So who's buying up all these books?

"I don't know. I don't even know if she knows, but I know she's benefiting, and I know that all the other right-wing authors whose books have no merit in any way, on substance or as fact, are simply being put on there through a well-organized campaign involving vast resources of money of wealthy Republicans," Mr. Blumenthal said. "Ann Coulter is a phony best-seller."

http://www.observer.com/pages/story.asp?ID=7701

And by the way, MWO is back up. They vacation more than Dubya, but at least they earn them. Lots more on this at www.mediawhoresonline.com

[revree]

1. AND ANOTHER RIGHT WING BOOK ENTERS THE FRAY

Some piece of shit about how AL GORE stole the election - YEAH, RIGHT.

I guess we can take some hope in knowing that there are not as many right wing rednecks buying these books as we thought at first. Maybe the public isn't as stupid as we imagined...hmmmm...

[beanball]

22. Ann"the man"Coulters

book is good for outhouse toilet paper.

[zekeson]

42. Dude

that paper would never touch my ass!

[Liberator_Rev]

34. This practice became obvious a few years ago when

the wife of one of Starr's buddies, who was no celibrity in her own right published a nothing book and it shot up to the top of the best seller list. Then I noticed them charging that this was the way Michael Moore's books achieved that loft goal. Now, where did they get THAT idea???

[Giverney]

2. makes sense

I just couldn't believe that 'TREASON' was a best seller, I mean, that's just such a foolish title. Everyone knows who she was/is with the last book. I can see that one being bought quite a bit, but this is probably just re-gurgitated material. when this one hit the best-seller, I was skeptical :)

Good to see my instincts are somewhat still working :P

[oneighty]

3. There is nothing these

mean people will not do to have their way with us. It is political rape.

And I am bleeding.

180

[CBGLuthier]

4. It's an old trick

Scientologists used it with copies of Dianetics.

What will happen next is the boxes of books will go back to the publisher and then be shipped out again.

[arwalden]

24. True True True!!!! I Am A Former Waldenbooks Manager...

... and I can tell you that this is EXACTLY what happens. It's has nothing to do with actual CONSUMER SALES... but WHOLESALE SALES.

-- Allen

[DemDogs]

36. Thanks

for exposing her

[blondeatlast]

29. They sttill do, then they "donate" them in bulk to libraries,

but not really. If we (libraries) don't put them on the shelves, they rather rudely demand that we return the books. Of course we invoke the Postal regulation regarding unsolicited mail; but they are mean mofos--I've been called worse things than the word I've just used.

[disgruntella]

5. bookstores hide conservative books?

What-evuh...

And I didn't realize Six Flags was part of the 'alternative bookstore' community, roflmao

-- Reached by the Observer for comment, Coulter said:

"I have asterisks for Treason for one reason: I now belong to Premier Speakers Bureau, which sells directly to consumers at speaking events and concerts. Bookstores hide conservative books, so outfits like Premier create 'alternative bookstores' at places like Six Flags Great Adventure-and The New York Times bills 1,000 individual Americans buying my book as a 'bulk sale,'"

[blm]

8. O sure...

right wing books are hidden here in SC. I could never find any bookstore that carried Stupid White Men or Blinded by the Right.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

39. caught on tape in our local bookstore repukes using boxcutters & sharpies

on liberal books...and moving them to other locations throughtout the store....:puke:

[m_h_lovecraft]

6. Anyone catch Larry King Live last night?

He's been in the game so long that he just sort of gave her these dour looks, bordering on disbelief and disdain. He know more bought her BS than we do. He asked good tough questions, though he could have taken it further perhaps. It was just another forum where she simply cannot talk her way out. Very nice, made me smile.

[Maccagirl]

11. You could actually stomach watching that

flaxen-haired fascist for more than 30 seconds? Unless King reached over and smacked her silly he let her off easy.

[m_h_lovecraft]

14. I didn't go out of my way, I assure you

Late night channel surfing... wife stopped on it (she pays almost no attention to this kind of thing, as she is a serious academic) and simply became transfixed by Coulter's makeup and Adam's apple. She was intrigued by King's pointed question as to whether Truman was a traitor... from there, well, stuck.

[0007]

7. Fuck Ann Coulter and her stupid books

......'eh?

[CatWoman]

9. I love it when you talk dirty

:D

[Red_Viking]

10. Phony best-seller?

And here I was, thinking she is a phony carbon-based life form that bleeds green. Hmmm.

:dem:

RV

[maynard]

12. Trading treason

I walked into B & N yesterday and almost ran into the display of new books. I think the fire marshall needs to be called. Anyway, I was so tempted to switch her books with Hillary's book (whick was on the back of the display) but I couldn't move at least 50 books from one side to another without causing a scene. I did move her books when I went back to the current events section. I made sure Hillarys book had the jacket showing. I may not be able to save the world, but I will work on my own little corner of it.

Both Hillary and Ann are at 30% off.

[Democat]

13. Why does the NYTimes include bulk sales?

Maybe someone needs to contact them and do an interview and ask why they allow bulk sales to be included in the best seller totals.

If it's being used to manipulate the system, then they should exclude it.

Then again, the right wingers would probably just organize another way to bulk buy. At least this way you can see who might be cheating.

[West Coast Democrat]

15. What is this Premier Speakers Bureau?

This sounds like a conservative book "give-away" to me.


According to Ann:

"I have asterisks for Treason for one reason: I now belong to Premier Speakers Bureau, which sells directly to consumers at speaking events and concerts. Bookstores hide conservative books, so outfits like Premier create 'alternative bookstores' at places like Six Flags Great Adventure-and The New York Time bills 1,000 individual Americans buying my book as a 'bulk sale,'" she said.

[CatWoman]

16. Just googled it

http://premierespeakers.com/about.cfm

[CatWoman]

17. interesting -- they have a "search by fee" function

so I plugged in $45,000.

See what I got:

http://premierespeakers.com/search_results.cfm

[West Coast Democrat]

18. I don't see what this has to do with her books sales at all

Ann's story sounds bogus.

[Ksec]

19. It would be nice

to have a media that investigates this sorta thing like they used to.

[West Coast Democrat]

20. I just googled this somewhat related story

http://www.mcjonline.com/news/00b/20000828e.htm

Attempt To Make Christian Book
A Best Seller Investigated
LOS ANGELES, CA (CHARISMA) -- A literary agent is being accused of attempting to push a book by a leading Christian businessman onto the prestigious "New York Times Bestseller List". Alan Nevins of the Artists Management Group (AMG) placed orders worth more than $75,000 at four Los Angeles bookstores for copies of "Hope From My Heart: 10 Lessons for Life" by Amway co-founder and Orlando Magic and Miracle basketball teams owner Rich DeVos.

Nevins told "The New York Times" that he had not been trying to manipulate the sales list, but was arranging the sales for businesses that distribute Amway products to resell. However, Ron Land, a sales executive at publisher Thomas Nelson, said that the orders had been placed to "give our marketing a jump-start," a common practice.

In a statement, AMG said it was "concerned" by the incident. "As a matter of corporate policy, we don't condone or support any activities that could potentially jeopardize the integrity of any best-seller list." The company had asked for an independent review of what had happened and would "take whatever action is appropriate."

The sales push came to light after Karen Watkins of Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, Calif., turned down a faxed request for bulk sales because "it stunk." She told the newspaper: "I was stunned that he put something like this in writing." A spokesman for the newspaper said that the book sales would probably not have affected its listing anyway, as suspiciously large sales were routinely ignored in compiling the list.

DeVos' book recounts the life lessons he has learned since surviving a heart transplant a couple of years ago.


© 2000 charismanews.com

[blondeatlast]

33. Amazon is rumored to do this same schtick.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

21. They learned this from L Ron Hubbard. That is how DIANETICS stayed

at the top of the NYT bestseller list for so long.

RW Republicanism is a cult too so I suppose it's fitting.

[West Coast Democrat]

23. How does that work? I always wondered about that.....

and why does the NY Times let them get away with it?

[blondeatlast]

37. How it's done (my qualis follow) is this (kinda long):

Thousands are ordered pre-publication for outfits like her speaking agency. Many stores (discounters especially) base their purchasing almost entirely on wholesale demand, from say, Baker and Taylor. Pre-publication orders are already paid for, so they get counted as sales on "street" date. (All pre-pub queued orders are counted as sales on street date, not before).

So now there are, say, 100,000 copies of T*****n that have been sold to one outfit--BUT IT ISN'T A BOOK RETAILER (that's why NYT bullets them). But suppose she doesn't sell all 100,000 copies--no problem. Donate them to libraries, hospitals, prisons, etc (a practice universally loathed by libraries, I'm reasonably sure). Or, worse yet, return them to Baker and Taylor, then place another order for the next book tour one week later. The returns are NOT counted against sales, it is very important to note.

So you can see, savvy publishers and authors can get pretty sneaky about getting their books up there, And yes, people do buy books based on the NYT bestsellers.

My qualis: I am a library assistant (BS, not MS); I select books for the Collection Development office of my library, and I am constantly mmonitoring demand so that we can keep on top of things. I deal with publishers and authors wanting to sell their materials to us on a daily basis, and as a fornmer book buyer, I learned how the publishing world works quite well.

[teryang]

47. I know an assistant manager for a second tier chain

Which is still a huge corporation with a regional (multi state) footprint. I know this person quite well and trust him. He told me that it works the other way as well. When people ask for certain designated political books on the left political spectrum which are deliberately not kept in stock, they are supposed say we don't have it and not volunteer to put in a purchase order for it. "Just tell 'em we don't have it and we can't get it" which is an out and out lie. Occasionally when he thought it wouldn't be noticed he would order small numbers of such titles and put them out on the shelves.

One thing I can't figure out is how a company with policies like that can stay competitive. If I get right wing crap from a bookstore, I never go back.

[lazarus]

25. she accuses

Michael Moore of having bulk sales, as well. Anybody know about that?

[CatWoman]

26. know what?

if Mike has bulk sales, or about her accusation?

Laz,

on edit, did a google search. Found a DU thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/forum_archive_html/DCForumID45/1344.html

[lazarus]

27. If he has bulk sales

or had them.

[Democat]

28. Ann's excuse: "That depends on what your definition of 'sales' is."

I didn't do anything wrong, or maybe I did, but so did someone else.

[SoCalDem]

30. Bill Bennet's organization, AEI, Heritage, Cato

these phony-ass think tanks buy these books by the container load.. When they have their "meetings" and "conferences", the books are "for sale" in the lobby..

We all know that no one really buys these books.. Just check your 99 cent stores about a year later..

The organizations pay the "authors" to write them, arrange for all the "promotion tours" to talk about the book, and then buy them by the pound...

It's just an end-around and a way to manufacture "interest" in their agenda.. These guys have been at this for over 30 years.. they know what they are doing :(

[Democat]

31. Good overview of how it's done

Everyone knows it, but few people will say anything about it.

The question we should be asking is why our side doesn't do the same thing?

[CatWoman]

32. do we really need to?

Seems to my our side does pretty damn good in actual sales.

[OneTwentyoNine]

35. Dems don't need to do it--just expose Repigs and their game...nt

...

[grasswire]

38. they also...

....give them away as freebies with subscriptions to the RW mags such as Human Events. That's how it's been working.

Further, it's not as if these people have to go through the process of actually finding a publisher -- a process that requires some merit in writing. Their network just pops the books out. Regnery is the worst, an old Scaife pal.

[blondeatlast]

40. You got that right about not finding the publisher.

Regnery finds the "authors," wing-nuts who've made a name for themselves for whatever putrid reason. I suspect they have a legion of ghosts in their office putting words in the mouths of dumbasses.

On edit: make that "nuts"

[SoCalDem]

41. go to who owns what on google

you will find that Murdoch has bought many publishing houses and the others are mostly right wing owned too.. There are few "major" publishers left :(

[KoKo]

43. The books are "printed in China/Taiwan for pennies on the dollar" so they

are cheap! To buy in bulk would mean nothing. We are paying inflated book prices for books that used to be made in America by "Bookbinders/Typesetters" belonging to Unions.

Now.....check your books' binding....you will find the above names and possibly other "third world countries" who are pushing thse books off the assembly lines for pennies and they are sold in US and elsewhere at prices much higher than the $10 to $15.00 hard covers used to sell for in the 80's and early 90's.

Enough profit there that "Bulk Buyers" of a certain stripe have no problem buying and then dumping later at the "Family Dollar Store" in a Fundie town for a profit.......Just discount the Coulter or whatever book at $2.99 in the bargain bin and you're set. Or if it's a "strict" Dollar Store then they sell it for $l.00....They still make a profit......

It's disgusting.

[jsw_81]

44. Ann Coulter

[grasswire]

45. how do we know coulter even wrote her book?

People always suspected that her first book, on constitutional law, was written by some other Federalist Society member(s).

[stanwyck]

46. Wouldn't it be great

if there was a way to record how many people had actually READ the books we see on the bestseller lists? A friend of mine owned a bookstore back when "The Satanic Verses" by Salmon Rushdie came out. She sold out because of the publicity and kept ordering more for a waiting list. However, when she asked her customers when they returned to her nrighborhood store if they'd read the book, most had not. They just really wanted that book because of the buzz. Most found it too scholarly and difficult, not what they were expecting. My suspicion is that many of these right-wing "bestsellers" are not read. They may be bought in bulk and given away. But I have my doubts as to how many of these books are read. This market seems very manufactured.