Professional Politicans, Pundits and Ghostwriting

Discussion in 'The Red Room' started by Yelling Bird, Oct 1, 2009.

  1. Yelling Bird

    Yelling Bird Probably a Dual

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    Did Bill Ayers write Obama's books?

    Did Lew Rockwell write Ron Paul's books?

    Did Sam Francis (until death) write all of Pat Buchannan's books?

    Did (relatively obscure academic/journalist friend) write Glenn Beck's books?

    Did Sarah Pain write her upcoming book, or did one of her journalist/academic friends do it for her?


    These professional politicians and public figures don't have time to write the books being sold with their name stamped on them. This should be common knowledge, right? Not to say that one should form an opinion of the books one way or the other based on that knowledge. They might all be great books. It's just insulting to one's intelligence to expect anyone to believe that all these people actually wrote these books.

    What say you?
    Last edited: Oct 2, 2009
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  2. Raoul the Red Shirt

    Raoul the Red Shirt Professional bullseye

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    I expect the publishing industry has whatever standard as to when a ghostwriter is employed, what credit is given, etc.

    I don't see why time is necessarily an issue preventing a politician from writing a book. In particular, the kinds of books we're talking about, which are frequently autobiographies/political philosophy.

    The former you're an expert on, and if you're a politician, you probably have enough of an ego that you've been socking away material for years.

    The latter is pretty much an outgrowth of one's speeches/columns that one is doing already.

    Beyond that, it seems to me that politicians and public figures have more time than you think. Not only do they have staffers to do a lot of the mundane tasks that most of us have to take care of ourselves, but also frankly their main jobs can be as time consuming as they want in many cases.

    As to whether it makes much of a difference to me whether they got someone generically to help them write the books, not really.

    My only concern would be if the person got wrongly denied credit he deserved for helping out.

    In the specific case of Obama-Ayers, I don't know if there's any real reason to think that Ayers helped Obama with his books, particularly when I believe the first one was written before Obama had met Ayers.
  3. Zombie

    Zombie dead and loving it

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    There is nothing wrong with any of these people using help to write a book. It's still their name on it and they still own all the words in it so I doubt they just say "go ahead and slap my name on it I trust you to write something good."

    It's just rare that the help is identified. Which is what Palin has done and which is what of course the shit on the left is going after her for. Of course once again they show they fear her above all other Republicans and they are hell bent on doing anything to smear her into oblivion.
  4. Order2Chaos

    Order2Chaos Ultimate... Immortal Administrator

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    It's possible. But except maybe a couple from Pat Buchanan and maybe Sarah Palin*, I'd guess not. I definitely don't doubt Obama wrote his books. And why is Glenn Beck in parentheses?

    *only because of the speed with which it was produced, but then, she did resign, so...
  5. Will Power

    Will Power If you only knew the irony of my name.

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    :rolleyes:

    They're all pulling William Shatners:D

    Anyone really think teh Shat really wrote all those long-haired books:huh:

    :rofl::lol::rofl3:

    The Reeves-Stevens did:jayzus:

    Ain't brain surgery to know teh Shat's name on a :tos: book will $ell it bigtime:)

    $ame thing with the folks Moose-e mentions in his OP:D

    :discuss:
  6. Ebeneezer Goode

    Ebeneezer Goode Gobshite

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    Aren't most of Tom Clancy's books now ghostwritten? He does the outline, and then hands it over to some guy looking to get a foot in the door.

    Good enough for him, guess it's good enough for non-professional authors.

    Personally I'm going to get my autobiography ghostwritten by Britney Spears. In crayon.
  7. Asyncritus

    Asyncritus Expert on everything

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    Because doing the nitty-gritty writing takes a huge amount of time, and is incredibly boring. Coming up with stories, ideas, and/or material is fun, and doesn't actually take all that long.* (It can be even quicker if you can dictate it and have someone do the tedious job of keyboarding it.) But after that, going over it again and again until you're actually sick of what started out to be a subject that interested you passionately, negotiating with editors and proofreaders, re-reading the proofs, and so on, all takes a lot of time.

    But if you come up with the basic manuscript and let someone else take care of the actual writing (including formulations and so on), you are still the "author" in the most meaningful sense of the word but you save a huge amount of time. (Unless your name is Isaac Asimov, who was not actually a human being, but merely a very advanced cybernetic brain for controlling a typewriter. The stories of his "death" are not actually true, but were put out for propaganda purposes. In reality, "he" was phased out when computers advanced to the point where anyone with a keyboard and a printer could churn out manuscripts. For those whose work is only made public on-line, they don't even need the printer.)

    A lot of "wordsmiths" use people for those purposes, and a lot of beginning writers make money and learn tricks by doing it. Only a true "word weaver," for whom the exact formulation is fundamentally important (such as a poet, or an author whose selling point is his eloquence as much as his ideas, if not more), would not trust his work to someone else in that way. Politicians, however, are not professional word weavers. They don't write their own speeches and, most often in my guess, they don't write their own books.

    * This, of course, is assuming the case where you don't have to do a lot of research, or the research is already done. Research can take a lot of time as well.

  8. Lanzman

    Lanzman Vast, Cool and Unsympathetic Formerly Important

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    Yes, which is why his later ones are pale imitations of his earlier work.
  9. shootER

    shootER Insubordinate...and churlish Administrator

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    Are you talking about the Ryan-verse books or the Op Center/Net Force stuff? While the former have really slipped (Teeth of the Tiger, in particular, is a steaming pile) the latter have always just used Clancy's name as a draw just to get people to buy them and they usually have the actual author's name on the cover.


    I actually re-read Red Storm Rising (written in partnership with Larry Bond, BTW) over the weekend. It's okay, but not nearly as good as I remember (and not nearly as good as what he wrote before and after it).
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  10. Lanzman

    Lanzman Vast, Cool and Unsympathetic Formerly Important

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    Yeah, I'm talking about the "Tom Clancy" books, not the "Tom Clancy Presents" stuff. And you're dead right about Teeth of the Tiger.
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  11. Tamar Garish

    Tamar Garish Wanna Snuggle? Deceased Member

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    Here's a topic we could use some garamet input in...I believe she has mentioned doing some ghostwriting in the past so is probably pretty knowledgeable on the subject.
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  12. Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee

    Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee Straight Awesome

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    How dare you. :borg:
    You're dead to me.
  13. Tamar Garish

    Tamar Garish Wanna Snuggle? Deceased Member

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    Not everyone is a blind hater.

    Garamet has done a lot to make me very angry at her recently but that doesn't mean I don't recognize an area of her legitimate expertise. When she posts on such topics is generally when she is at her best and I can appreciate those contributions.

    What have you done lately that isn't a lame joke or troll on someone here? :bailey:
  14. Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee

    Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee Straight Awesome

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    Why, only today I made a very thoughtful post that shootER liked. :bailey:

    :flow:
  15. Darkening

    Darkening Guest

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    You promised to kill yourself?



    Also the net force books are awful.
  16. Yelling Bird

    Yelling Bird Probably a Dual

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    Yeah, where are you Garamet?
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  17. Dr. Krieg

    Dr. Krieg Stay at Home Astronaut. Administrator Overlord

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    Red Storm Rising is a triumph of excellence, IMHO. I did discover a small mistake in the book a few reads ago(MiG-25 Foxbats, not Foxfire's Tom, jeez.), though.
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  18. Dr. Krieg

    Dr. Krieg Stay at Home Astronaut. Administrator Overlord

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    Really? Naval info is more my area........could you give an example?
  19. shootER

    shootER Insubordinate...and churlish Administrator

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    During an engagement, the loader in the Sergeant-turned-Lieutenant's tank "stomps on the floor switch" to open the bustle ammo compartment.

    It's never been a switch on the floor. It's mounted at about knee level, about halfway between the turret floor and the bottom of the ammo compartment doors (IIRC, it's actually referred to as the "knee switch").

    The only "floor switch" in the turret is the gunner's intercom control. You can step on it with the toe of your boot and talk on the intercom without having to take your hands off the GCU.


    It's mostly minor, nit-picky stuff like that (though his fire commands are completely bogus) and, to Clancy's credit, he redeemed himself with the tank battle stuff in Executive Orders.
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  20. Muad Dib

    Muad Dib Probably a Dual Deceased Member

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    Now just hold on there a minute! :nono:

    RSR was the second Clancy book I ever read. About 20 years ago. The Hunt for Red October was the first. I thought it was awesome.

    I got the Harpoon and then Harpoon II simulators and spent many, many hours decimating the Russian navy and air force thanks to what I learned from those 2 books.
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  21. Dayton Kitchens

    Dayton Kitchens Banned

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    How impressed would you be by an American politician who not only wrote his own books but could make major political and policy speeches and conduct debates speaking "extemporaneously".
  22. Muad Dib

    Muad Dib Probably a Dual Deceased Member

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    Did anybody here think Probe was garamet's best book ever?
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  23. Ramen

    Ramen Banned

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    I just finished it for the first time today. Can't recall ever fist-pumping while reading a book. :lol:

    Ending was kind of anti-climatic, though I suppose realistic, so-to-speak.

    Makes me want to reread all my Dick Marcinko books.
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  24. Dayton Kitchens

    Dayton Kitchens Banned

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    I've heard many people say the best parts of Red Storm Rising were written by Larry Bond.

    Though to be honest I'm more of a "Team Yankee" fan.

    One thing I've always liked about Harold Coyle's books is that he emphasizes just how much that simple fatigue would play in modern military operations.

    In Coyle's books, battles are began, ended, screwed up, avoided, or atrocities committed often simply because soldiers and sailors are too damn exhausted.
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  25. Dayton Kitchens

    Dayton Kitchens Banned

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    IIRC, in the original Harpoon wargame conducted by naval professionals, the Soviet Navy is indeed all but destroyed.

    Unfortunately, so is half the American Navy, all the British, and most of virtually every allied navy.
  26. Muad Dib

    Muad Dib Probably a Dual Deceased Member

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    I think the US Naval Academy used both programs. They were a helluva lot of fun.
  27. Dayton Kitchens

    Dayton Kitchens Banned

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    Coyle's dialogue does often sound "hokey" and "corny".

    But then again, that is true of most person to person conversations.

    Ever actually try to remember what REAL conversations sound like?

    Not the edited down version that sticks in our memories.

    Most person to person conversations contain a bunch of filler type words such as "like" and subjects that are restarted at least three or four times before anyone gets their thoughts out.
  28. Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee

    Scott Hamilton Robert E Ron Paul Lee Straight Awesome

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  29. shootER

    shootER Insubordinate...and churlish Administrator

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    I mean hokey and corny like the dialogue in the last few shitty seasons of MASH.

    Nobody speaks in puns and witticisms that much IRL.

    I still love his books, though (especially the first two), and it didn't get really bad until The Ten Thousand and after.
  30. Dayton Kitchens

    Dayton Kitchens Banned

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    To me, the set up of "The Ten Thousand" was the most freaking ridiculous.

    The Prime Minister of Germany basically forces a war with the United States because he was injured during World War II by an American soldier some FORTY YEARS ago.

    And then, vast portions of the German armed forces refuse to fight even as several U.S. Army divisions are marching across the heart of their country.
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