Random House on Sarah Palin's Privacy: A Tale of Two Press Releases

First Random House promised Joe McGinniss would respect Sarah Palin’s privacy.

Then Random House boasted about how McGinniss had exposed Sarah Palin’s personal and family life.

May 2010:

One of the country’s most respected nonfiction authors, Joe McGinniss, is presently reporting and writing his next book, tentatively titled Sarah Palin’s Year of Living Dangerously, scheduled for publication in fall 2011 by Broadway Books. Mr. McGinniss is the author of Going to Extremes, a classic book about Alaska, and his work-in-progress returns him to the 49th state to examine Sarah Palin’s significance as both a political and cultural phenomenon and as an embodiment of the contradictory forces that shaped Alaska as it moved into its second half-century of statehood. Well regarded for his in-depth, up-close reporting, Mr. McGinniss will be highly respectful of his subject’s privacy as he investigates her public activities. (emphasis added)

This week:

Just in time for the kickoff of the 2012 presidential campaign, Joe McGinniss, the author of the classic account of the packaging of a presidential candidate, The Selling of the President, of the acclaimed search for the essence of Alaska, Going to Extremes, and of the bestselling study of the dark family secrets of an American patriarch, Fatal Vision, presents his already controversial investigative chronicle of Sarah Palin as an individual, politician, and cultural phenomenon.

Based on McGinniss’s on-the-ground reporting that began in late 2008 (which yielded an April 2009 Conde Nast Portfolio cover story) and continued with his return to Alaska in 2010, this book is a startling and penetrating examination of the illusion and reality of Palin–and a probing look at the Alaska and the America that have produced her, and the country she feels she is destined to lead. The Rogue delves deeply into Alaska’s political and business affairs and Palin’s political, personal, and family life to chronicle how and to what extent Palin and her beliefs, attitudes, and outlook will influence and even change life in America and the perception of America abroad. (emphasis added)

Given today’s revelations, Random House might want to reconsider its testimonials about McGinniss’s “well regarded” reporting.

Read: Explosive Email Shows Anti-Palin Author McGinniss, Random House Likely Published Literary Hoax (Updated)

Read: Caught: Random House Published Palin Smears After Lawyers Allegedly Told McGinniss No Proof Existed

Read: Random House ‘Rogue’ Scandal Update: McGinniss Confirms, Griffin Fumes, ‘Hooker’ Responds

Read: Random House Doubles Down, Defends Anti-Palin Literary Hoax; McGinniss Spins Emails of Omission