Despite San Francisco Bay Area bookseller claims that Sarah Palin's new book "Going Rogue" is "not for thinking people", the Amazon numbers say otherwise.

On a mission to show that Palin's book is selling much worse than, say, the idea of reading Osama Bin Laden his Miranda rights, the San Francisco Chronicle interviewed several local booksellers to find out how well sales of "Going Rogue" were not going:

"Our customers are thinking people," said Nathan Embretson, a bookseller at Pendragon Books in Oakland. "They're not into reading drivel."

"Anything like that we wouldn't carry," said clerk Emily Stackhouse at Cover to Cover Books in San Francisco. "We're a small store and it would probably gross us all out. Some things you carry because of freedom of speech, but a book like that is just gross."

A cursory glance at the Amazon.com Bestsellers list reveals that non-thinkers are not only buying "Rogue", which clocks in at #1, but also the works of Stephen King (#2), Dan Brown (3), James Patterson (9), John Grisham (12), and Mitch Albom (16).

I thought it would be interesting to find out what the non-thinkers are not buying on Amazon:

Nancy Pelosi's "Know Your Power", released April 2009, ranks #85,750.

Barbara Boxer's "Blind Trust", released July 2009, ranks #687,029.

Harry Reid's "The Good Fight: From Searchlight to Washington", released May 2009, #1,474,817.

Sarah Palin's book has sold out of its first printing and had sales of 300,000 its first day.

Apparently the job of a "bookseller" in and around San Francisco is not so much to sell product, but rather to give comfort to like-minded individuals and convert the remaining unwashed masses to lockstep ideology. Politics trumps profit, even though profit generates the much needed tax revenue, job growth, and consumer spending this state dearly needs.

(Author's note: I will not actually be purchasing a copy of "Going Rogue". See, my local San Francisco bookseller has a "buy 12, get one free" program and I just noticed that my next book is on the house. Would I dare make them special order "Going Rogue" just for me? You betcha!)

Dirk Salvo