Salacious excerpts from The Rogue, Joe McGinniss' new tell-all biography of Sarah Palin, are dribbling out a week before the book hits shelves — a seemingly damaging scenario for the former Alaska governor, given that she's supposedly still weighing a presidential bid. Yet it's McGinniss who's facing a backlash. Early leaks from the book are spurring commentators to heap scorn on the mostly anonymously sourced account of marital infidelity, premarital one-night stands, and drug use. Many doubt the book will damage Palin's celebrity, or even her political prospects. Might it, in fact, help her?
Yes. This is just what Palin needed: Judging from the reviews, McGinniss' book sounds "like an unprincipled hatchet job," says Anna North at Jezebel. That's "exactly the kind of thing that the Palin camp expects from the Left, and exactly the kind of thing that they want." By apparently proving Palin's point that the "lamestream media" is out to get her, this "awful" book "can only help her."
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