"Have You No Sense of Decency, Sir...?'

Kudos to Hendrik Hertzberg, whose piece on Jerome Corsi's THE OBAMA NATION leads off this week's New Yorker. Hertzberg presents a well-argued, sustained dismissal of Corsi's book, which he says, "is an example of what used to be known, in the glory days of ideologically driven totalitarianism, as the Big Lie." Hertzberg properly distributes blame among all those responsible for taking this dump and for spreading it around: editor Mary Matalin, mogul Sumner Redstone, radiocons Limbaugh, Hannity and Savage, and the author, who is "a crackpot, a boor, and a bigot." Q.E.D., I say.

Speaking of books, and on a lighter note, what I find strange is this: candidate Obama has this book AUDACITY OF HOPE, which I liked and which lays out his thinking on a range of topics, yet he never mentions it. (Am I wrong?) If I were running for office, and if I had a book, I would constantly be telling people, "Buy my book and read it.You'll learn who I am and what I am about." If reporters asked me a question I would respond, "As I write in my book..." or "See p. 58," or "That's covered on 122." If cornered, you say, "I'm gonna write about that in my next book." Someone told me that could be seen as elitist, and I guess reading books (esp. hardcovers?) and worse, writing them, is elitist. Maybe. Well anyway, that's why he's the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party and why he's having his best week ever.