levi johnston. >> i don't know what sarah palin can do to levi johnston that adult life won't take care of itself. as far as bomb sources go, my source does reveal that as this entire time, she's just a character portrayed by sacha baron cohen and we all fell for it. >> will sarah palin do a traditional book tour or will she go rogue? >> i mean, she's not going to go to book stores done readings because it's entirely possible that anyone who would want to buy a sarah palin book wouldn't know how to locate a book store. so what she's going to do is just sell the books from the back of a truck at like nascar rallies and rascal scooter dealerships. >> so we can't expect to see her on this show or any other show on msnbc talking about what actually might be in her book? >> no, probably not. >> comedian christian finnegan. christian, great, as always. thank you very much. we appreciate it.

>> thank you, sir. >> sarah palin, coming to a book store near you. amazing. that will do it for this tuesday edition of "countdown." i'm david shuster in for keith olbermann. you could see me usually weekdays on msnbc alongside tamron hall. the show is called "the big picture." tune in from 3:00 to 5:00 eastern every day on msnbc. in the meantime, our msnbc coverage continues now with the rachel maddow show. good evening, rachel. >> good evening, david. thanks very much for that. and thank you at home for staying with us for the next hour. chuck schumer and howard dean are both joining us live this hour. plus we've got a jackie chan patriotic cameo appearance, and we have a new chapter for you in our ongoing investigation into the truth about the lies about

the community group a.c.o.r.n. that is all coming up over the course of this hour. but we begin tonight in the middle of the health care fight. in the senate finance committee, where there is no more gang of six. there's no more face-based mythical kumbaya bipartisan compromise. finally the whole committee, 13 democrats and 10 republicans were able to vote today on whether americans -- at least some of us -- will get the option of buying the same kind of health care that people with medicare currently enjoy. on the table today were two different amendments to put a public option in the bill. one from senator chuck schumer of new york. one from senator jay rockefeller of west virginia. >> 70% of the american people want this. i know supporters of the status quo are saying that it's simply, again, a government takeover but let me set the record straight once and forever, this will be optional. nobody has to do this. but i feel so strongly about it because it makes so much sense. the people that i represent need

this. >> that was senator rockefeller, of course. from the republican side -- >> so if you support single payer health care, if you support longer waits, crowded emergency rooms, lower quality of care, in other words, the rationing or the denial of care or the delay of care that you get in single payer systems, do you want that for america? >> rationing, denial of care? that's what actually being proposed? surely democrats are not going to let that litany of negative descriptions fly, are they? >> the main knock you've made on senator rockefeller's amendment, i presume on mine, is that it's government run. >> yeah. >> medicare is government run and most people like it very much. >> okay. but if it -- and it will come to a single payer, and that denies the american people choice. what's good now about medicare advantages. people in my state have 44 choices to go to, and -- and what you would be leading us to would be a system where there isn't choice. now, i want to give senior citizens choice. >> would the senator yield? would senator grassley yield? now, just made a statement that it will lead to a single payer.

how in the world do you make that leap? >> well, you know, there are healthy economists around here, and i can only quote two. one is heritage says that 83 million people are going to be forced out of their plan, employer plans, into public option. and lewin group says 120 million. >> who -- who -- who's that? heritage foundation, right wing think tank, and the lewin group, those are the research firms he can remember that have been supplying congressional republicans with their information about why health reform is such a bad idea. conveniently, the lewin group is the health insurance industry. the lewin group is run by a wholly owned subsidiary of united health care group, which is the second largest health insurance company in the country.

on the statements from the senator of united health then, any other major arguments against the public option today? >> if you went home in august and you heard from your constituents the way that most of us heard from our constituents, the people are really afraid of the, quote, public option. i put it in quotes because many of us on this side believe that it will lead to a government-run system, that it will lead to a single payer. >> people are really afraid, says senator ensign. in fact, 65% of americans are so afraid of the public option that they said in the last "new york times"/cbs poll that they would please like a public option, 65%. you know, the least surprising news of the day today was that not a single republican would vote in accordance with that 65% of the american people. no a single republican would vote for the public option. but that doesn't really legislatively matter, right? after all, the committee has a democratic majority and surely democrats will vote for a public option, won't they? >> my job is to put together a bill that gets 60 votes. now, i can count. and no one has been able to show me how they can count up to 60 votes with a public option in

the bill. >> democratic chairman max baucus says it's not that he doesn't want a public option. he does. he just won't vote for it unless everyone does. huh, leadership. in all on the first public option choice, senator rockefeller's amendment, there were five democrats who voted no. >> mr. conrad? >> no. >> mr. conrad, no. mrs. lincoln? >> no. >> mrs. lincoln, no. mr. nelson? >> no. >> mr. nelson, no. >> mr. carper? >> no. >> mr. carper, no. mr. chairman? >> no. >> mr. chairman, no. >> thus the rockefeller amendment in a majority democratic committee dies, with only eight senators in favor and 15 voting against. senator schumer, your turn. >> there's no question that the public option would improve this

good bill. >> so what say you, democrats, to the second public option choice of the day? the chuck schumer amendment. >> i will vote for the schumer amendment. >> senator nelson of florida switches sides. he's on board now. anybody else? >> mr. carper? >> aye by proxy. >> senator carper of delaware switches sides too. will the remaining three anti-rockefeller amendment democrats now follow suit? >> mr. conrad? >> no. >> mr. conrad, no. mrs. lincoln? >> no by proxy. >> mrs. lincoln, no by proxy. >> mr. chairman? >> no. >> mr. chairman votes no. >> no, no, and no. let me guess, mr. chairman, senator baucus, you voted against the democratic amendment for an option you say you support, again, why, because?

>> i don't see a bill out of this committee with public option getting 60 votes, so i'm constrained to vote against the amendment. >> that's at 3:50 p.m. eastern time in a 10-4, 14 against vote. the charles schumer public option amendment died, alongside its rockefeller counterpart. what does this mean? joining us from the russell rotunda on capitol hill is senator chuck schumer. senator, thank you for taking the time on this busy day. >> good evening. >> you and i agreed on thursday that if the public option could make it in the senate finance committee, it looked pretty good that it could make it anywhere, maybe all the way into the final bill. what does it mean that it didn't survive that committee today? >> well, look, it would have been better if it had passed. certainly, it didn't. but we picked up votes we didn't expect, particularly on my amendment, jay and i working as a team. and, you know, the senate finance committee is the toughest terrain here. it's more conservative than the senate as a whole, populated by a large number of rural

senators. and the senate as a whole is less conservative -- is more conservative than the house. so this is an uphill fight. we knew it. but a month ago the public option was dead. now we're alive and fighting. even two of the three senators who spoke out against it said they were interested in it, and we're going to keep working at it until we get this done. it's too important to good health care not to have the public option, and while i wouldn't say to you we're definitely -- you know, we're certain of winning on the senate floor, we're going to work hard at it, and i think we have a pretty good chance. >> there were five democratic senators who voted no on senator rockefeller's amendment. only three of those senators voted no on your amendment. did you imagine that you could pick up potentially more senator democrats who voted no, some of those three might further change or are they qualitatively

opposed? >> no i think they're open to change. senator baucus, as you showed on your show, was for it but wanted to see 60 votes. he obviously cares very much and wants to pass a health care bill. i think -- and i said this in the committee meeting, that by working hard, we'll be able to show him 60 votes. it may not be exactly as i proposed or jay proposed, but it will be a good, strong public option. i have spoken to just about every one of my moderate democratic colleagues. not a single one has closed the door on the public option on the senate floor. to say that the bill is dead and this is over is wrong. it's underestimating the strong support we have out in the country. it's also underestimating the fight of those of us who care a lot about it. again, is this going to be easy? no. but at the end of the day as you go through the process, i think we have a darn good chance of getting a good public option in the bill. >> let me ask you about one

thorny issue that i know has a lot -- a lot of political oomph to it, and that is the 60-vote threshold. when you say that the public option doesn't necessarily have 60 votes now, it might ultimately have 60 votes. when you assume that 60-vote threshold rather than 50 votes, are you saying that some democrats would literally filibuster a democratic reform bill just because the public option was in it? democrats will vote to filibuster? >> well, they can repose a filibuster on the specific amendment, not on the bill. but that's one of the things we're looking at here, saying to some members, look, a vast majority of the caucus supports public option. vote yes on cloture to let us have the vote, and then vote your principles, conscience, whatever you will when we get to the 51. so, yes, that is -- that is a real chance to do this. obviously, we're first trying for 60. if we can't get to 60, some of us will argue that for the public option and some other things, we can go to the 51-vote margin. not so much on reconciliation, but getting democrats to vote for cloture, even if they don't support the bill, giving your fellow democrats a chance to have their choice.

>> do you have support from other members of the democratic leadership and specifically from senator reid for an approach like that? >> well, we're -- senator reid has not unveiled his approach. we have been talking about it. he's waiting until the finance committee finishes the bill. but i know he is for a public option. each member of the leadership of the foreign and democratic leader are for a public option. so that gives me some optimism here. >> senator chuck schumer of new york who tried hard but ultimately unsuccessful trying to get the public option into the senate finance committee reform bill today. >> fight's not over rachel. >> and you will be able to tell us what going on from capitol hill is invaluable. thank you for your time, sir. >> thanks. bye-bye. governor howard dean will join us next in studio. stay with us. ♪

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today conservative democrats on the senate finance committee, people i call the conserve-a-dems were forced to pick sides on health reform and pick sides they did when they joined the unanimous republicans in voting against two versions of the public option, amendments that would provide one real alternative for americans who were not served by the lousy, unaffordable for-profit health insurance industry that we've got now. democratic senator max baucus explained his decision to vote against the public option with the adult equivalent of the "everyone else is doing it too" excuse. >> my job is to put together a bill that gets 60 votes. now, i can count. and no one has been able to show

me how they can count up to 60 votes with a public option in the bill. i don't see a bill out of this committee with public option getting 60 votes, so i'm constrained to vote against this amendment. >> leadership. i like this idea, but why would i vote for something i like unless everyone else likes it too? and senator ben nelson said yesterday that any health reform bill would not need simply a majority of 61 votes or a simple majority of filibuster and 60 votes, but according to ben nelson, democrat, health reform should have 65 votes in the senate, a super duper-duper majority. senator nelson explained, quote, anything less than that would challenge its legitimacy. and so it was that legitimate majority came to mean 65%, up from its original definition of 60 plus 1. and in talking points today, you should also know that senator nelson won his first senate term with 51% of the vote. he won his second term by 64% of the vote.

so by his super duper-duper majority standard, senator nelson isn't really a senator. not a legitimate senator anyway. be careful what you wish for. joining us now is howard dean, former chairman of the democratic national committee, former governor of vermont. governor dean, it's great to have you here. >> thanks for having me back. >> you just heard my interview with senator schumer. and he said something that i haven't heard him articulate before, which is that democratic leadership should be able to expect that even democrats who are going to vote against health reform should vote for cloture, should vote to end the republican filibuster, thereby

making the threshold 61 votes instead of 60. what is your reaction? >> that's true. core procedure in almost every lecture i have ever had anything to do with, including the national legislature, you could vote however you want to do, that's a conscience matter, but you owe it to your leadership to vote with the chairmanship. so i would expect all of the people caucusing with the democrats to allow a vote to go forward. and the chairman's argument is specious. you don't need 60 votes for a public option. you need 51. even if the people were to caucus with the democratic party and owe their chairs to the democratic leadership are willing to do the right thing. >> you're not chairman anymore but have you worked with a lot of the key players. the upper echelons in the democratic party right now, do they have it in them, to insist that all democrats vote for cloture? >> oh, yeah, i think the leader would look terrible if he couldn't get the votes for

cloture out of the democratic caucus, and i think they will support harry. he's been very good to them and he's a good leader. but you need 51 votes. the other thing about this, this is reconciliation, you need 51 votes. >> explain what that is. reconciliation -- it's rule. >> yeah. the senate has a filibuster rule. 60 people can -- i mean 40 people can grind the place to a halt. you have to get over 41. you have to get at least 60 if folks want to talk it to death. but they also prohibit you from doing that in the budget. for example, the bush's tax cuts went into the budget so that he wouldn't need a 60-vote majority to pass it. and this is a major piece of legislation. it could be passed in the budget. if you want to use medicare to expand the public option and let people under 65 buy into medicare, which is a really smart idea, because for the democrats it means you can get the program up and running by 2010. can you do that in the reconciliation bill with no problem at all because it doesn't require any new language and the budget's balanced. >> so in terms if we believe that the leader subpoena is committed to a public option, it seems like option a is get 60 democrats to vote for it. option b is insist democrats vote procedurally with democrats and then have you a 51-vote --

you have a 51-vote threshold because you defeated the filibuster. option c is don't even try for that, just pass it under reconciliation rules. >> and they can try option a and b, and if that doesn't work, they can go to c. it's a leadership -- if the democrats want this, they will get a public option. >> do you think they want it? >> i think they do. i think they're nervous about it but 65% of the american people want it. here's the problem with these guys, they're stuck. in the more conservative states, there's a lot of venom against it, even though the majority of people want it. and a lot of these guys have taken millions of dollars from the health insurance industry and they're stuck. and that's a real problem. if we don't pass this thing, we're going to lose a lot of seats. and everybody in america know knows without a public option, this thing is a farce. you're spending $60 billion of taxpayer money every year to the health insurance industry, who are ripping people off, kicking them off their insurance if they get sick, charging sick people two and three and four times as much as they charge healthy people. what we need san option so people can choose not to be in that system, and that's what the

public option fight is about. who gets to choose? does chairman baucus get to choose for everybody in america or do you get to choose what kind of insurance is best for you and your family? and we are arguing give the american people the choice. let us reform health care. we don't trust the politicians to reform health care. give us the opportunity to do that and the best way to do that is to give us some choices, like the public option. >> if -- part of the thing that's blocking political progress on this is that the health insurance industry and the medical industry, the people who profit from the system being broken the way it is now, have essentially lined the pockets of a lot of member of congress and senators? >> that's true. >> if that is the problem, how do you beat that problem? you can't out spend them retroactively now. >> the public doesn't like it and some of that's going on, some of the left wing groups are -- i shouldn't say left wing. you know, when 65% of the american people want something,

it's not exactly -- >> that's a big wing. >> what i call the democratic be wing of the democratic party, which is bigger than the democratic party itself. but, you know, more progressive groups are really upset about this. i don't blame them. this is not health care reform. what chairman baucus wants to do is not health care reform. and i am very grateful for senator rockefeller and senator schumer and for their bills. i take great hope in the fact that senator carper and senator nelson switched their votes because that means some for the of a public option, however weak, will get out of the senate and if that happens, we'll have a public option. but this is not because we want a single payer. this is so the american people have something they can choose between -- between the private sector and the public sector. what they want to do is choose to buy into medicare. that's essentially what this is. and most, 65% of the american people, would like that choice. >> howard dean, former democratic national committee chairman, former governor of vermont. medical doctor himself. great to have you here. >> my pleasure. >> thanks a lot. the political search and destroy mission against the community group a.c.o.r.n. now looks like it is the first step in a larger crusade that's got its next liberal target picked out already. our ongoing investigation, the truth behind the lies about

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a.c.o.r.n. into a political pinata set their sights on a white house official. his name is patrick gaspard, the political affairs director at the white house. according to an article published in the conservative magazine "the american spectator," he is a, quote, longtime a.c.o.r.n. operative. a.c.o.r.n. might as well be speaking to president obama in an earpiece as he goes about his

daily business ruining the country. once an allegation like that is in a conservative magazine, you know what happens next -- >> the white house political director is a fellow by the name of patrick gaspard, and he apparently has been in bed with a.c.o.r.n., so does a.c.o.r.n. have somebody in the white house in one way or another? >> you know what's really weird is that -- the answer to that is yes. >> actually, the answer to that is no. "the american spectator's" newly discovered evidence that mr. gaspard was a longtime operative was a 4-month-old blog post from a.c.o.r.n.'s founder which incorrectly stated that mr. gaspard was an employee. today that founder corrected his original post writing, quote, patrick was never on the staff of a.c.o.r.n. and that does appear to be the case, he was not an a.c.o.r.n. employee. but why let the facts be in the way of a good smear, right? despite the embarrassing

misfire, opponents of a.c.o.r.n. and conservative media and the republican party are so confident in the success of their war against a.c.o.r.n., that they're already planning who they're going after next. republican congressman steve king of iowa, who stood on the house floor last week and falsely accused president obama of working for a.c.o.r.n., telegraphed the next witch hunt that we have to look forward to. in an interview with "the washington independence," dave michael. >> what is the next natural target to defund the left? >> if this a.c.o.r.n. thing is successful, it looks like it is. >> well, a.c.o.r.n., they're part of the national arm and they're part of the funding. if those two can be pulled down and out of this society, that means that a lot of these people will reform, though. >> if those two can be pulled down and out of this society. the other organization that mr. king mentioned there besides a.c.o.r.n. is seiu, the service employees international union, one of the nation's largest

unions. congressman king's admission that republicans buoyed by the success of their anti-a.c.o.r.n. crusade will go after seiu next, it wasn't just an empty threat. yesterday three other house republicans held a press conference urging the u.s. census bureau to sever any of its ties to seiu. what is the connection between seiu and a.c.o.r.n.? why for the right does targeting one mean targeting the other? it is true they worked together in the past. most notably they worked on living wage ordinances. you heard of the myth mum wage, which requires all corporations to pay employees a certain amount per hour. this factors in a wider range of cost-of-living standards for different parts of the country living wage advocates say the federal minimum wage isn't enough to live on everywhere in the country so, therefore, some local standards for a minimum rate of pay should actually be higher than they are for the country as a whole.

a.c.o.r.n. and seiu have led successful campaigns to pass living wage ordinances in places like st. louis, hartford and chicago and oakland, california. in those places and in more than 100 other cities and counties in the u.s., local laws now say that any private company that wants a government contract has to agree to pay its workers the living wage standard, not just the minimum wage standard. you don't want to meet the living wage standard, fine? you just then don't qualify for government contracts. that's how these things work. many have argued that the success of living wage ordinances and the popularity of living wage ordinances laid the groundwork for president bush, of all people, to have to sign a law raising the national minimum wage, a la that was passed by the democratic congress back in 2007. both seiu and a.c.o.r.n., they

fine themselves under attack, both from republicans, which we documented on last night's show, painted a bull's-eye on a.c.o.r.n. as soon as a.c.o.r.n. started register a large number of likely democratic voters and from corporate interests who aren't crazy about things like minimum wage hikes, corporate interest that's gin up suspicions of groups they don't like, like funding pr efforts to destroy those groups, pr efforts run by guys like rick berman, a washington, d.c.-based lobbyist who we talked about on this show before. mr. berman runs the fake grassroots anti-a.c.o.r.n. website, rottenacorn.com. he also runs the fake grassroots anti-labor website unionfacts.com, which has an entire section specifically dedicated to sliming, you guessed it, seiu. the successful campaign that groups like a.c.o.r.n. and seiu have waged have raised wages and, therefore, the quality of life for millions of low-income americans across the country. and as a result a.c.o.r.n. and seiu have become the enemy of corporations that are willing to pay beltway slime merchants almost anything if it might mean avoiding paying higher wages to their own employees. the easiest way to destroy the whole movement to rage the wages and the standard of living for poor americans, of course, to destroy the best advocates of

that cause, to destroy the groups that organize and campaign for living wages and a raised minimum wage. so, a.c.o.r.n., we've already seen what those attacks look like. seiu, you're next. then who's next after that? and are democrats and liberals going to stand up for these guys, or are they just going to let them defend themselves and see how it goes? joining us now is peter drier. he's the professor of politics at occidental college in los angeles. he's also the co-author of a new study on media coverage of a.c.o.r.n., professor, it's very nice to see you again. thank you for joining us. >> good to be here. >> your study about a.c.o.r.n. details the extent to which the media got basic facts about a.c.o.r.n. wrong. so i have to ask your reaction to this breathless, erroneous report in "the american spectator" that president obama's political director was an a.c.o.r.n. operative.

>> well, you know, the attack on a.c.o.r.n. by the republican party by glenn beck, by rush limbaugh, by "the wall street journal," it's all an attempt to divert attention away from the fact that the republicans and conservatives have nothing to offer working families in this country. they've become the party of no, no jobs, no health care, no help for homeowners, and now it's become the party of no fact checking, because they've -- they've basically misrepresented what they're looking at when they're trying to attack a.c.o.r.n., seiu, president obama and the rest of the liberal community, the progressive community, that they're trying to dismantle. >> are you surprised that seiu seems to be the next target on their list? >> you know, who is seiu? seiu is janitors, security guards, nurses, hospital workers. these are ordinary, working people who formed a union in order to get better health care benefits and better pay and better working conditions. and seiu is the largest union in

the country that's been on the front lines of the fight for health care reform, for raising the minimum wage, the kinds of things you were talking about before. so i'm not surprised that glenn beck and rush limbaugh and the republican party and "the wall street journal" and lou dobbs and "the american spectator" and the republicans in congress are going after seiu because seiu is part of a broader movement, a movement of conscience, a movement for social justice of which a.c.o.r.n. is a part and of which other organizations are a part, that we can expect the extreme right to go after, too. next will probably be the sierra club. and then planned parenthood, and then the national council of churches. it's an endless list of people of conscience that right wing republicans and their allies in the business community and the conservative media want to destroy, and that's what this attack on a.c.o.r.n. and seiu is about. it's not about public policy.

it's not about misuse of federal funds. it's about destroying the power of the ordinary people to have a voice in their society. >> well, that said, though, democrats are not taking this on as their fight. last night on this show we hosted david iglesias, who was apparently fired as a u.s. attorney because he wouldn't bring what he thought were trumped-up charges against a.c.o.r.n. before the '06 election. and they were charges in which he thought were an effort to stop a.c.o.r.n.'s effective voter registration efforts. couldn't be more clearly partisan than that. and i feel that republicans know their attack on a.c.o.r.n. is a partisan war but democrats don't see it that way. do you agree the democrats haven't really come to their aid and don't seem to be planning to? >> if the republicans are successful in destroying the progressive community, there will be nobody left to vote for the democrats and support the democrats when they run for election, particularly the progressive democrats.

so the democratic party has to stand up for not only a.c.o.r.n. but for the other targets of the extreme right, and so far it's been a disappointment. some of the leading democrats in the house, in the senate have been running for cover and they have to stand up and support their allies because when it's time to support them, they're going to look -- turn around and seiu might be gone and a.c.o.r.n. might be gone and other organizations that have been the backbone of the democratic party supporting raising the minimum wage, providing health care for everyone. so the democrats have to -- at least those democrats that have been in the forefront of these fights, they have to stand up for their allies, because if they don't, then the progressive community, the liberal progressive community will be destroyed and the democrats won't exist anymore. >> professor dreier -- >> including the president of the united states. >> i guarantee you your answer to that question i just asked you is going to be played in front of conservative audiences

to rile up their activist base over the course of the next year. and the question is whether or not progressives will do the same in order to rile them up against it. peter dreier, professor of politics at occidental college, co-author of the study "manipulating the agenda: why a.c.o.r.n. was in the news and what the news got wrong." thank you for your time tonight, sir. i think you just made yourself famous. >> thank you, rachel. we'll see. we now know that the title of sarah palin's forthcoming sooner-than-expected book is "going rogue." catchy, sure. loaded, you betcha. loaded in a way that sounds way different to folks in alaska than it does to most folks in the lower 48. that explanation coming up. (announcer) we understand. you want faster ground shipping.

sarah palin's new book is called "going rogue," which is exactly the language she used to disparage one lifelong service agent in alaska in the sarah scandal. she is the gift that keeps on giving. first our holy mackerel story. there are about 6.8 billion people in the world. one out of every 12 million of them is a customer of china mobile, the china-run cell phone company. if you only count the people in the world who have cell phones, one in eight of those are a

customer of china mobile. on the occasion of this week's 60th anniversary of the founder of the people's republic of china, china mobile has done a little something for their many, many customers. when you call someone from your china mobile cell phone now, instead of hearing this sound -- [ telephone ringing ] instead of hearing that normal phone ringing sound, china mobile customers now hear this -- ♪ they have changed all 500 million of their phones so that the normal ringing phone sound is instead that patriotic song. the name of the song is the mandarin word for nation or country. yes, before you ask, that is being sung by jackie chan. yes, the exact same jackie chan who you are thinking of. china mobile says that anyone who doesn't want jackie chan singing a john ashcroft-style patriotic ballot as their ring back can go to the company's website to learn how to change it.

in the meantime, though, they want their 500 million customers to enjoy what the company is calling a gift. they're creepy, creepy, state-sponsored patriotic power-ballot gift. happy creepy birthday, china. finally, unbridled joy and amazement courtesy of one of joy and amazement's most reliable sources -- baseball. on sunday the seattle mariners played the toronto blue jays. on the local radio pregame show in cairo, the color commentator and former mariner mike blowers wad asked for a specific prediction for the game. and he spared no details in forecasting success in that game for a player who had just been called up from the minors. i promise you, this is totally worth it. listen. >> takes the click. final pick of the series. mike, who's yours? >> i think cleary, it is saspo today.

i expect i expect he will hit his first home run. he will get a good count and hit it out of the left center field. probably, maybe in the second deck. >> all right. i'm looking forward to it. his first home run of his career coming up according to mike blowers. >> on a 3-1 count. >> a 3-1 count, breaking ball, fastball? >> it will be a fastball. he's a 3-1 pitcher. >> how many rows back? >> second deck. >> how many rows back? >> i can't take that because people get their hands in the way so you never know. >> so that's before the game. blowers predicts this new player will hit his first home run in the majors. in his second at-bat in a 3-1 count off a fastball and he's going to hit it in the left side second deck. we now join hall of famer dave niehaus, who has called almost 5,000 mariners games. check this out. >> 3-1 pitch on the way. swung and melted into left field! he just missed the second deck! far, far, far away. i don't believe it! i see the light! i believe you, mike! unbelievable, it is 2-0, mariners!

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sarah palin's book is coming

out early. it was just in may that her purported multimillion dollar book deal was announced with

rupert murdoch's harper collins. at the time the company announced that the book would hit stores next spring. but since then ms. palin quit her job as governor of alaska, which has maybe freed up more time for her to be with her ghost writer. harper collins said today that the book is done already, wow, and that it will hit shelves on november 17th, and that it is 400 pages. 400 pages but no word yet on the font size. the publisher has also announced the title. it's going to be called "going rogue: an american life." the term rogue, of course, was first applied to palin by unnamed mccain/palin campaign insiders who in a watershed article for cnn during the campaign season alleged palin was, quote, going rogue, unquote. said quote, she is a diva. she take noes advice from anyone. she does not have any relationships with trust with any of us, her family or anyone else. the same source in the same article also saying, quote, she is playing for her own future

and sees herself as the next leader of the party. remember, divas trust only unto themselves as they see themselves as the beginning and end of all wisdom. in the same article another mccain/palin campaign source, who was described as having direct knowledge of the process to prepare palin after she was picked as vp said, quote, her lack of fundamental understanding of some key issues was dramatic. the same source said she was the hardest to get up to speed than any candidate in history. that's the context in which sarah palin was described as rogue during the campaign. and one way to see today's announcement about her book is that, that dim, dim, dimmy mcdimmerson view of her among the people who worked with her on the vice presidential campaign is now enough of a point of pride for her that she's chosen it as the title of her book. but there's also one other way to see today's announcement about her book. in alaska, the word rogue has a whole different association with sarah palin. do you remember trooper gate?

trooper-gate was the major ethics scandal that loomed over governor palin's time as governor, even before she was chosen as senator mccain's running mate. while governor palin's sister was in the midst of a messy divorce from an alaska state trooper, governor palin allegedly pushed for that trooper to be fired. the governor denounced that brother-in-law as a rogue trooper. when the top law enforcement officer in alaska, the former police chief of anchorage, refused what he said refused what he said was pressure to fire the trooper. palin's office denounced him as a rogue as well. i don't think she meant it as a compliment. joining us, the writer who writes for the mudflap.net. you wrote on your blog today, sarah palin hopes to make the term "rogue" impish and

endanger, she may have fooled her ghostwriter and those in the lower 48 but she will not fool alaskans. what did you mean by that? >> as you were saying, the term "rogue," while most people in the lower 48 would associate that term with what you mentioned and the tina fey "saturday night live" "going rogue" skit. alaskans have a deeper understanding and it goes further back. the trooper gate scandal coming to a head the summer before she was nominated and tapped to be the vp really brought into clear focus those two instances you talked about. the word "rogue" when applied to trooper mike wooten who can be argued to be not a particularly sympathetic character, the use of that term "rogue" rogue cop, he ended up pushing papers at a desk job. it was felt he couldn't be safe

in a practical car with the public because governor palin felt he was a danger to herself and the public and her family. that word "rogue" has pretty devastating implications for him and also for walt monahan, working with integrity anyone who worked with him, the model police chief anybody hoped to have, ex-marine, when he was called a rogue, he actually sought out a hearing in front of the alaska personnel board in order to clear his name, to have this is day in court, as it were, to address the reputational harm that label of "rogue" had caused him. this is a very sore spot for many alaskans the use of that word "rogue" she was bandying around harm she perceived as scramble to power as our potential vice president.

>> in trying to understand the way this might be received, the book title might be perceived differently in alaska than here, i want to note you posted a picture on muttflats showing walt monegan's mom. i'm the mother of the "rogue" and obviously i love him. did mr. monegan being called a rogue by sarah palin being called a rogue by him and his mom, did it generate a big response because he was so popular. >> it did there. was a group called "alaskans for truth" that held a rally in downtown anchorage by the governor's office so outraged by the way the media was handling the trooper-gate scandal and sarah palin handling it and her attorney general who since resigned and 1500 people came out, for alaska is a huge rally,

certainly the hugest i have ever seen. here is this wonderful woman with that sign, you know, i am the mother of the rogue in quotes walt monegan, and she stole the show. people were getting choked up, she was getting choked up. it is a serious thing. alaska is a small town. when you start maligning people that are cohabiting in that small town, it is really hurtful in a way sarah pay lain made clear to all of us up here. >> alaska blogger jeane devon who writes for the mudflat, of which i am a great fan, i will admit. >> thanks for having me on the show. >> and now, what's next for president obama's health care option after the committee voted it down today and my friend, ken jones will tell us why you really should not take a cab in chicago if you are feeling

nauseous. we'll be right back. ♪ crunch time, wheat thins. you and your tasty whole grain. this can only end one way. (crunch) wheat thins. toasted. whole grain. crunch. have at it.

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we turn now to our mobile etiquette correspondent, kent jones. i know enough about the story to be worried about this report. >> you might be. cab drivers in chicago are lo y lobbying the city council to add a surcharge of $50 to anyone who vomits in the taxi. clearly a volatile issue. let's take a look. >> it's tough gig driving a cab, late nights, traffic hel