Publishers Weekly: Penguin defends anti-Hilary book

[villager]

Penguin: No to Censorship


by Steven Zeitchik, PW Daily -- 6/22/2005


Penguin has responded to progressive activist David Brock, who yesterday assailed Ed Klein and publisher Penguin/Sentinel for what he called an "obviously false and defamatory" book about Hillary and sought "a public explanation of what, if any, editorial standards and fact-checking processes the Penguin Group applies to its imprint."

Penguin's statement through a spokesperson today did not detail that process but instead expressed support for its author while implying that Brock's criticism of the book amounted to censorship.

more at:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA610123.html

[Warpy]

1. Where is the LAWSUIT???

C'mon, Hillary and Bill, you don't sue these bastards and they'll just keep getting worse. Sure, you can take this one, and you've raised a daughter who knows who and what the right wingers are, but what about the next person? What if their kids haven't been raised to cope with that stuff?

Winning the suit isn't the point. Tying up resources, killing profits, and gaining subpoena power are the important things. If you don't sue, you give them a green light to continue, just like Kerry did.

You do know this book is out because he was too stupid to sue the smear boaters, don't you?

[funflower]

8. Let's see. What questions could we ask Ed Klein in his sworn depo???

[CrownPrinceBandar]

2. Fact checking=censorship...........

Hmmm. Penguin has made an interesting choice here: standing up for obviously inflammatory material and throwing objectivity to the wind. Even when some uber-cons like John Podhoretz are denouncing this book as trash and motivates him to gouge out his eyes.

There may be no Penguin books in my future.

[villager]

4. right -- saying inflammatory, untrue statements are libelous is now

"censorship" -- and yet, mainstream media deciding what is news and what isn't, doesn't qualify as "censorship" in this Brave New World of definitions...

[CrownPrinceBandar]

5. Not to be overly dramatic.............

but we are witnessing the death of truth in our society. Orwell was just 20 years too late in his prediction. Its shocking.

[villager]

7. not overly dramatic at all

and still shocking

[LynneSin]

3. That book is so bad that Bill O'LiesAlot won't even book Klein on his show

And that takes alot to be so retchedly horrible that you can't get booked on one of the most retchedly horrible shows on TV

http://mediamatters.org/items/200506210005

BTW, obviously Hanity has not a shread of decency left since obviously he'll book this hack on this show

[damntexdem]

6. Well, we all know how well penguins fly --

that's how well Penguin's excuses fly.

[Eloriel]

9. It is extremely shocking to me that a publishing house doesn't

understand what, exactly, is censorship.

Censorship which is protected by the Constitution is against GOVERNMENT censorship of private speech, period.

As DUers who have read Skinner's rules and guidelines know (unless they've been chnaged on this point), anyone who own private property, which DU is considered, is free to censor what goes on there at will. You can't come into my house and insult me without getting censored in the form of being kicked out.

What Penguin is calling "censorship" is really editorial control. A publishing company gets to decide what does and does not get published -- and when they choose NOT to publish something, that's not censorship, it's editorial control over their imprint.

If it were censorship, each and every one of us could go demand that our book be published too -- to deny us would be censorship! You could demand all your LTEs get printed in the NYT or WP.

I'm absolutely aghast at this response. It's either a bald-faced lie, or this world has gone even more bizarro than I had dared imagine in my most Matrix moments.

[ailsagirl]

10. I heard on Franken's program today that some repugs don't like it

I didn't catch everything but the gist was that Klein is
getting pounded... and not just by the Dems!!
:nopity:

He deserves it-- he's a hack

[villager]

11. I'm amazed Repugs are steering clear of it, too

...though that's what I hear. Wonder if there's something else behind their distancing from the "author?"