Explosive Email Shows Anti-Palin Author McGinniss, Random House Likely Published Literary Hoax (Updated)
by Andrew BreitbartThe awful launch week for the over-hyped, expected bestseller The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin, by controversial author Joe McGinniss, just got worse. Much worse.
After a week of universally scathing pans from the reflexively anti-Palin establishment media, McGinniss now faces the fight of his literary life: the accusation that he seems to have knowingly submitted a book to his publisher, Crown/Random House, that was filled with unproved “tawdry gossip” and rumors that lacked “factual evidence.”
In the email below, sent in January of 2011, McGinniss reveals that his manuscript, then under legal review at Crown/Random House, could not prove its most headline-grabbing allegations. And yet, many of these “salacious stories” that lacked “proof” (in McGinniss’s own words) ended up in the book, and on televisions everywhere during the author’s current media tour … without proper sourcing, and without any apparent new evidence to support them.
McGinniss’s panicked state is evidenced by the identity of the recipient to whom he sent his email of distress. Jesse Griffin was the author of an obscure, low-rent, and now-defunct anti-Palin blog that obsessed over Trig Palin’s maternity–claiming, without any evidence, that Sarah Palin was not Trig’s mother.
Was Random House aware that its prized author was making a desperate overtime bid to save face? And if so, why did it allow him to come forth with most of those tawdry accusations without proof or proper sourcing?
This would not be the first time McGinniss has found himself in trouble over accusations of unethical journalism. In 1987, McGinniss agreed to pay $325,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by the convicted murderer who was the subject of McGinniss’s book Fatal Vision. He has also admitted to having surreptitiously distributed a competitor’s manuscript about Palin that was handed to him by his own publisher. The leak allegedly damaged the commercial viability of that book.
In 2003, Random House released a larger-than-life, massive bestseller by James Frey entitled A Million Little Pieces. Later, it was revealed that the book was a fantastical literary hoax that made its way past some of the highest-paid and most respected editors and lawyers in the literary world. Doubleday/Random House felt compelled to offer full refunds to those who had bought the book.
Has history repeated itself?
Mr. McGinniss has not responded to multiple requests for comment.
—–
From: Joe McGinniss
To: Jesse Griffin
Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2011 6:15 PM
Subject: I have to ask you for help
Jesse–
Legal review of my manuscript is underway and here’s my problem: no one has ever offered documentation of any of the lurid stories about the Palins. Shailey Tripp is the latest example.
APD and Sarah have denied that Todd had any involvement with her. To my knowledge, no one has provided any evidence that he did. TheEnquirer cites AlaskaWTF, which in turn cites the Enquirer: what good is that? I’m also told that the Enquirer is preparing to back off this story and save face by denouncing Ms. Tripp as an unreliable source who promised documentation she couldn’t provide.
She may be mentally unstable and prone to fabrication, delusion, or both. Her joint may be called Blue Hands Massage (brrrrr!), but she’s no Monica Lewinsky with a blue dress with a semen stain, that’s for sure.
Do you believe that Todd paid her for sex? If so, why do you believe that, other than that you wish it were true?
A lurid, sensational, defamatory story about Todd, based only on the account of a woman charged with prostitution, who is no doubt desperate for money, and who sold her story to the Enquirer, is a gift from heaven for Sarah.
Jesse, you can ridicule Sarah for calling in to the execrable Bob & Mark, but the fact is that as far as this story goes, there’s no there there. And rumors about what might come in weeks ahead are not facts. In fact, they’re garbage.
I’ve neither seen nor heard anything that indicates that Ms. Tripp’s story has any basis in fact. None of the endless crap Patrick posted about her before getting the boot from palingates.com offers any substantiation.
And even you write frequently that you know things you can’t yet post, but that soon “all will be revealed.” This has been going on since I first became aware of your blog, but as far as I know you haven’t substantiated a single claim or provided verification for a single rumor that you’ve posted about Sarah’s personal life, or the personal lives of any Palin family members. Thus, she gets to denounce what she calls “lies.”
Neither from you, the Enquirer, AlaskaWTF, palingates.com or anyone else, have I seen a credible, identified source backing any of the salacious stories about the Palin family.
Thus–as Random House lawyers are already pointing out to me–nothing I can cite other than my own reporting rises above the level of tawdry gossip. The proof is always just around the corner, but that’s a corner nobody has been able to turn. Maybe Jeff Dunn has, in which case I’ll be the first to congratulate him. But frankly, at this point, I’m tired of it, and I’ve run out of time.
No one has ever provided factual evidence that:
a) Todd had sex with a hooker, or with anyone else outside his marriage.
b) Sarah had an affair with Brad Hanson, or anyone else.
c) Track was a druggie who enlisted in the army to avoid a jail term. Or that he vandalized Wasilla school buses.
d) Willow was involved in the vandalism of the empty house in Meadow Lakes. Or that Sarah rushed back from Hawaii to put the lid on that.
e) Trig is not Sarah’s natural born child.
f) Bristol was promiscuous as a high schooler and drank and used drugs, or became pregnant again after Tripp’s birth.
Jesse, you were going on and on about Bristol being pregnant while doing Dancing With The Stars. And, if I recall correctly, at the time of her brief glossy-magazine-payday “reunion” with Levi, you surmised that she was pregnant by Ben Barber, or at least by someone who wasn’t Levi. You’ve recently suggested she’s had an abortion, publishing photographs that show her chubby then and thin now. But doesn’t that seem a little “thin” to you, based on nothing besides magazine pictures?
So much has bubbled at the salacious rumor stage for more than two years, but no one has been able to take even one story further.
Jesse, if you can put me in touch with people who are willing and able to substantiate any of the above, now is the time to do so. Otherwise, I hope you won’t complain that there are no startling new revelations in my book. My publisher and I think it’s damning enough without airing the family’s dirty laundry, but because Sarah’s hypocrisy about her family is one of the things that galls me most, I’d like to be able to publish facts in regard to a) through f) above, but I emphasize facts.
Not malicious speculation or third-hand rumors relayed by those who hold a grudge.
For any or all of those who’ve told you they’ll speak out, but not yet, now is the time. My book represents the last best chance to put the truth about Sarah in front of the American people in a documented, verifiable way. But I need facts that I can rely on. I didn’t live this long and work this hard over so many decades to wind up as AlaskaWTF between hard covers.
as always, and looking forward to seeing you in spring or summer,
Joe
—–
mcginniss –
Update – Read: Caught: Random House Published Palin Smears After Lawyers Allegedly Told McGinniss No Proof Existed
Update – Read: Random House on Sarah Palin’s Privacy: A Tale of Two Press Releases
Update – Read: Random House ‘Rogue’ Scandal Update: McGinniss Confirms, Griffin Fumes, ‘Hooker’ Responds
Update – Read: Random House Doubles Down, Defends Anti-Palin Literary Hoax; McGinniss Spins Emails of Omission
Update – Read: Source for McGinniss in Random House Literary Hoax Accuses Andrew Breitbart of ‘Hacking’ Email
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140 Comments
(Scratching chin) And WHO is surprised by this hoax and literary fraud ?? After all he IS a LIB !
The harder the left works against Palin tells us that she is their biggest fear.
Whomever they reject, we must support!
Schadenfruede. of a sort. In his lberal fundamentalist zeal to smear Sarah Palin, he debunks almost every rotten smear they have ever come up with.
Preconceived notions get you into trouble, Joey.
The only surprise is that the e-mail has been made public. Every publishing house has teams of lawyers to oversee what is contemplated for publication. Not for interest in truth, but interest in potential lawsuits for libel which cost, according to the target of the libel, up to zillions in the gold of the realm..Truth has been a minor, if any, interest. What sells is the story, and scandal SELLS the rags by the ton.
AND can we believe that a so-called e-mail even exists?. Perhaps this too is another ploy to sell this, if reviews are correct, little more than a poison pen letter. Journalism is at base a purveyor of fiction, stories, tall – tales, lies, dreams… and has as its ethical base in many of the practioners contempt for the customers, knowing they'll buy anything if dressed in fashionable, entertaining, colourful packaging or hyped outrage as in Michael Moore?
Just like showbiz and politics?
Not really that shocking. Libs always accept rumors and wishes as fact; and damn facts as lies.
Wow!
No suprise that he looks like a creepy old perv.
Never let facts get in the way of the liberal lying narrative. For such a dunce, the left and the MSM are working overtime to destroy Sarah Palin. This should take care of itself, right? …she’s dumb, no worries for their Barry, and the overall Marxist agenda. What does it mean? Hmmm…
P.S. Not that any of this makes any difference, mind you. I'm gonna go ahead and write this book, with all these wild stories anyway. The media will lap it up. It will become the new Palin narrative, and that's what counts, right compadre?
Hugz,
Joe
It's sad how much NBC is in Obama's tank. They called Joe Mcginniss a "neighbor" Um he moved there in order to spy on her. I think they should've called him, "Sarah Pallin stalker", "Sarah Pallin hater" or "Sarah Pallin fiction writer"
Any of those three terms would be honest.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
When you're the target of attacks by the left, you know you're on to something positive. I hope Sarah sues him for defamation of character, libel and anything else she can.
Wow. As "smoking guns" go, that one is a howitzer. It reinforces my conviction that Governor Palin is the conservative figure most feared by the Left at this time. We should draw the appropriate lesson.
This stuff backfiring is now hinting of becoming biblical. Serves the Godless left right for idolizing a faux messiah!
Go Sarah -the nation needs you, the honest reformer whom they so fear!
Hey, let's remember their bible says to use, "any means to an end" dedicated to Satan. These are not nice folks.
It's amazing how the media are STILL vetting her for FOUR YEARS, and Obumbles and his disciples get offended for us wanting to see a goddam BIRTH CERTIFICATE!
So much for Random House being a reputable publishing house.
Your absolutely right.. Like eternal children, liberals seem to yearn for myths. And they elevate their leaders to royalty, a status that has repeatedly allowed very flawed people to escape the normal consequences of any serious observation and/or critical analysis.
Joe McGinniss.
Apparently just another lazy, fraudulent author, without a fact checker.
It won't be the first time an author, or a publishing house, scammed the public. It happens every day, in the MSM, in the stodgy old print media, and even in the New Media.
All I can say is, this cat better get a GOOD LAWYER
Sue Sarah Sue.
Random House publishes ‘simulated’ political pornography, as if the print word in the realm of politics didn’t have enough credibility problems.
Fanaticism has no basis in reality, and McGinniss provides it again.
The book debunks itself.
http://ladyliberty1885.wordpress.com/2011/09/22/h...
Hey Joe, contact Dan Rather. I heard he likes your style. Perhaps a meeting over drinks on a possible collaborative effort.
Oh, and don't worry. All of the LSM shows that had him on will do a follow-up, I'm sure (sarc off)
Well, when you begin with The Enquirer as your trusted source, what did you expect?
Just sayin'.
that's what i've been saying all along- anybody the Left hates this much must be exactly who & what this country needs most.
an honest author would have admitted he couldn't prove any of it.
The deviant behavior this buffoon accuses Palin of is a daily affair for democrats and the left. The left lives in the land of gray between right and wrong where anything and everything can be rationalized away in thier own twisted minds.
The left such as the MSN, celebrities, rock stars etc.. etc.. sell thier souls and ideals to sell thier product which is themselves. If they catered to only conservatives, they leave behind a major portion of thier profit. And since it's all about themselves and thier egos you can see why they cast morals and scrupples to the wasteside. And they call conservatives greedy and selfish.
The Today Show-Airtime on exchange of what? A morning show with children watching while he spews hatred; way to go, Matt! Can't wait for Sarah to smack you and the rest of the alphabet networks. For starters.
In the third paragraph Mr McGinniss wonders if by reporting as "fact" "fabrications and delusions" are not signs that Ms Tripp is "unstable". Well did not Mr McGinniss not just write a book of fabrications and delusions there by showing evidence he is unstable?
This author's book has backfired! Palin's popularity has increased due to this book. Now if Sarah really wants to see her poll numbers improve, she should pull a train with the Harlem Globetrotters.
All you conservatives and Republicans who are against Palin,……
ask yourself this question;………..
Why all this animosity toward Sarah from the Libs and MSM….????????
Sarah if not you,…..
then the SECOND best will have to do.
4 years of digging in her trash and going over every detail of her life and they have nothing but outright paid for lies and unprovable rumors that proves themselves to bacially a propaganda campaign at best. All the resources that have been focused on this attack…I ask one simple thing…
MSM just put 30 investigative reporters on barry and manchelle….just let them dig for thirty days…here a few places to start…solyndra, follow the "stimulas" pork, fast and furious, natural born citizenship, bad social securtiy number, the homo allegaitions, his simple only one ever "real estate transaction" over 30 legal transactions on just one deal? I could go on but….ACORN ,seiu, annenberg ripoff….voter faurd, illegal campiagn cash…muslim brotherhood connection…really not much to look into…
Thanks, Andrew B! I sure hope you didn't have to pay too much to jesse griffen (gryphen of the immoral majority) for the copy of mcginniss' email to him. He is boasting he is one of the main contributors along with shannyn moore and the jeanne devon of the bailey book. This shows the cheapness of this type person. gryphen/griffen also tells a different tale as to how mcginniss was put in contact with the owner of the property mcginniss infested.
Keep up the good work, Mr. Breitbart.
Textbook Liberalism 101 right there.
I break wind in your face moron. Nothing like the thoughts of a disgusting pos to shine light on what is wrong with you tards on the left.
With enemies like Joe McGinniss, who needs friends?
Sarah is ineluctable.
Pig Joe McGinniss grunting. Hit-and-run Joe proves again that he is a stupid liberal and fears Sarah Palin in a pants wetting frenzy of lies. Putting his lies on paper and getting another liberal fool company to publish them does NOT make them true in any sense of the word. Now he's condemned by his own words sent in an email. Liberals, without exception, are sad, stupid, sorry excuses for human beings. They are like barbarians at the gate and we must fight to preserve our country else they will loot, pillage and destroy us, our progeny and all we hold dear. True Americans took an 80 year nap and let these slime balls take power and now we must awake, fight and take back our country.
Caught with his literary pants down, little Joe is trying to act like a human being now. Ooops…too late. Liberals just have no class or integrity.
Run, Sarah, run!
There was a stunning contrast between two books that came out this week: One on Sarah Palin and one on the Administration of President Obama.
When the media covered the Sarah Palin expose, they drilled the author, not on his methods of investigation or sources, but simply on the dirt he claims he found on Palin.
For the author on the Obama Administration, the media used the talking points from the White House to try and DEBUNK the book and lay the foundation of doubt over the author's claims.
I'm fairly ambivalent about Sarah Palin, but I'm glad this book crashed and burned. This guy McGinniss is pure trash. I hope he loses a fortune over this whole mess.
I will not read the book but if liable is stated as fact I hope Sarah sues for deformation.
Other wise if liable is stated as one libs opinion then I hope he drops dead.
The only people who will read this book already hate Palin, no one will be persuaded its just a useless waste of paper good for nothing but feeding fires.
So finally, an e mail about Palin that the MSM is not interested in….
she probably doesn't want to wait in line behind you & your buddies.
That was my initial thought.
After sending teams to dissect and parse every word in all emails pertaining to Palin, all of a sudden they have lost interest.
Evidently they simply exhausted themselves in the first go round, and just didn't have it in them, to look at one more……..
double standard? no, just an unconfessed single standard.
"…the highest-paid and most respected editors and lawyers in the literary world."??? No. Most of them are apologists for and defenders of the sickness and rot of Marxism. How about revising your assessment, Andrew? Say they are "the highest paid propagandists in the world"?
PROPAGANDA & salacious gossip is what the present state of mainstream literacy and law are devolved into: a massive propaganda effort to devalue & denigrate Private Property, Liberty & Individuality.
how can such a GOOD LOOKIN THANG like sarah
SCEER these sum bich's
SO MUCH ??
WTF ?
Smoking gun? Let's talk about a loaded, well aimed gun. At just the right time in her campaign for the presidency she can file a defamation of character or libel or what-have-you law suits charging not only the despicable ( McGinniss ) but the august ( Random House ) by way of yet another illustration of her campaign theme that her most vehement opponents are merchants of focused hate. The suits could come one by one over the entire campaign season. Boy oh boy do these lying bastards know how to aid our cause or what?
If they keep this up, eventually they're going to turn her into Joan of Arc
Sue him for defamation and slander, Palins. Drag his name and his reputation through the mud. This fraktard deserves no mercy.
Could turn out to be a great campaign funding source if Palin sues McGinniss and Random House for Libel and Defamation
This SCUMBAG is pathetic! The only thing more pathetic would be a major network giving a LYING LOON like this SCUMBAG a platform to spew more of his LIES! The LOONS at nbc should have asked this SCUMBAG about his hit and run incident. More credibility, right SCUMBAG?
Some people ( tabloids) are buying it hook, line and sinker.
I love the line where they say if she run's for President the press will be all over her. Like they haven't been already?
LOL! http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2040110/T...
The more douche bags like this douche liberal work to KILL Sarah and our movement the STRONGER we get.
…I think it’s damning enough without airing the family’s dirty laundry, but because Sarah’s hypocrisy about her family is one of the things that galls me most,
This has the ring of envy from a man who never felt like his mother loved him enough. Those guys are always galled when they see a woman like Sarah who is always mindful of the children's welfare. He is envious of the children. He wants to destroy the mother/protector that he never had (and probably believes he deserved more). He hates those kids. Hates them with a passion that only a man with severe mother "issues" can feel.
Schadenfreude.
What, you mean that progressives who dislike Palin's politics have attacked her personal character with lies?
How ironic that some fool progressive author who hates Palin and bought into the lies is going to be the one who gets hurt by this.
What a mistake I made, eating my breakfast before reading this. I think I have to go throw up.
I am never surprised at the depth of vulgarity the Left displays, thinking they are both witty and intellegent at the same time.
Do you ever really READ what you write? Your lack of decency, moral compass or ability to grasp the benefit of having values is telling of your whole movement.
Go on and yuk it up with your fellow coffee shop trustafarians. One day reality will slap you silly, but don't come crying to us for sympathy.
Sarah Palin is the MOST FEARED conservative out there as far as the left is concerned.
JUST LOOK at how much the LIBRATARDS are going out of there way to trash her.
IF she was NOT a THREAT would They be saying anything?
They KNOW Sarah Palin IS electable,…
AND IF she runs against barry in 2012,…
She WILL CRUSH him with indisputable numbers.
Rush is RIGHT about the establishment Republicans ALSO FEARING SARAH
All the "serious" (sarc) pundits feel this way too. WHY else would they go OUT of their way to trash her.
THEY ARE TERRIFIED OF SARAH.
They are all peeing in their pants at the thought of her running.
Remember,.. the MORE they say how easy she will be to beat or how stupid she is etc,..
one word.
TERRIFIED.
And that's all you got. You all have tried to take her down and it hasn't worked. Better yet, it has in fact backfired right in your faces.
I call that Divine Providence.
I had a feeling that it was going to go this way. That book is nothing but evidence for a defamation suit. Despite the fact that she's a public figure, I think she should still have a case. And the fact that Random House published it. It's ridiculous. Their legal team needs to be fired. I'm an attorney, and I haven't dealt with much in the way of defamation cases and there is no way I would advise my publisher client to publish such disgusting drivel and lies.
Andrew…. you are brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. You get it.
This has to be one of the best things you have done.
Again, brilliant and sure glad to have you on our side.
Laughing all the way through the story. Go Andrew!
"c) Track was a druggie who enlisted in the army to avoid a jail term. Or that he vandalized Wasilla school buses."
McGinnis obviously does not know anything about the military. Druggies are not accepted into the military.
"Vandalism"? That would be a downcheck, but I don't know how bad.
Stupidity runs deep. and hatred makes you blind. I hope lawsuit is coming. Payback time.
We need to change this country's libel and slander laws for large media companies to the same as purveyors of goods – strict liability. Prove it or pay damages.
Fortunately, McGinnes is done for. He's commited professional suicide. Some one send him flowers . . . or a dead fish.
Thank you Andrew for your fine and usual real investigation.
That's why they're the Kneepad Media.
We have people digging for dirt on Palin 24-7 and she's not even running for dog catcher. We have a president that no one knows anything about… and there is total silence.
But I need facts that I can rely on. I didn’t live this long and work this hard over so many decades to wind up as AlaskaWTF between hard covers.
That would be a step up Joe. You're more like a Bulgarian News of the World knock-off that's been soaking in vodka for 40 years.
I think the only way a public figure can sue is if malice was the motivation (normally, very hard to prove). If I am correct, then this email could satisfy that requirement.
I see your still into hacking again, Breitbart. tsk tsk…
Also…"Jesse Griffin was the author of an obscure, low-rent, and now-defunct anti-Palin blog …."
"Now-defunct" ?? YOU WISH!!! ROFLMAO!!
You're a moron.
"I see your still into hacking again,"
Lie.
Sara is a child of Gods and God protects his own
Indeed Harry, indeed.
About our justice system, it grinds exceedingly slowly, but it grinds exceedingly fine. McGinniss will find out, and be bleed to death fiscally.
Watch for the kooks to start fundraising for McGinniss. Code Pink, ACORN nuts, Unions all will support the Evil One. I expect a MSNBC TV fundraiser headlined by Barbara Streisand, David Crosby, Bono, Jennifer Aniston, Chris Rock, Samuel L. Jackson, Oprah where they will defend the turd/JounoList.
Inelectable? What is that?
So…let me see if I've got this right. It is acknowledgement as such by the liberal publishing elite that makes this a hoax and literary fraud instead of just run-of-the-mill lying and character assassination. Right?
They will put it all on hold until after the election.
That is what he wants–the notariaty to sell more books.
Well I'm sick of the "establishment Republicans.". They are nothing but fake democrats.
why they fear Sarah Palin so much is because she truly is a hard working career women and mom
and even worse she is successful; 'they don't like folks they can't find real dirt on so they can control them
so we will just write things negatively about her that cannot be proved!
Oh, my guess is that they have it in them, but this one won't play to the narrative, so it's been put on ignore. And they wonder why we won't subscribe to the NYT anymore…
No denial of the itty bitty Tundra Tart's torrid affair with the 6'8", 220lb. college basketball player 5 years her junior. Interesting…………
As Ace Ventura would say, "I think we've found captain winkie".
I don't remember ever hearing obama deny any of the claims that he's a Marxist.
Using your logic, he must be.
Gold mine for Sarah.
Good.
I really like paybacks.
This could be the catapult that launches Palin into the Oval Office !
Sarah Palin will be rich after the lawyers are done with the publisher and author.
Will Imam Obama be implicated in the lawsuit ?
That was what I was thinking. Malice is quite obvious here.
The only thing accurate here is the spelling on Palins name. I grew up on a dairy farm. the dairy barn had an overhead rail that was used to clean out the manure. the manure pile was a good five to six feet deep and seventy feet long. The reason I mention this is I thought I would never see a bigger pile of crap in my life and then I read about this book.
So, in other words, McGinnis admits he wrote this book just because he doesn't like Sarah Palin. Quelle surprise.
DEF-A-MAY-SHEE-OWN!!!!
He hasn't denied beating his wife and children either.
He never said he wasn't bisexual…
He never said he and Rahm didn't have sex.
I wish Sarah would:
1. Sue the author of this book
2. Run for President, so we can have the pleasure of voting for her!
The Palins don't even need to worry about suing this guy for libel – he's obviously been revealed as someone who doesn't have any journalistic integrity … so, why pay any attention to him at all by dragging him into court?
The Palins probably have lots more money than he ever will, anyway.
But most assuredly obscure and low-rent.
Bravo Andrew and Team! Doin' what the lamestream media won't or can't do. Cheers!
Notice that now the Lefty pundits are in lock-step sarcastically saying how they fear Palin. They are whistling through the graveyard and it doesn't fool me. The left wants Romney, that's clear. They can't stand the fact that Sarah Palin withstood their words, their sticks, their stones…. and she has never looked better.
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