Asymmetrical Information

Or are they simply books pointing out deceptions and lies that Bush and his administration has told?

Ketchup, you mean he really is the bastard son of Satan and Hitler and he's been lying about it all this time? Wow!

During my Friday night trip to my local Barnes & Noble I found the exact same phenomenon. The Current Events section has been expanded since last I visited (yay), but that space was primarily for the books with names like _50 Ways to Help Get Bush Out of the White House_ and _Halliburton is Taking Over the Entire Executive Branch_. On the plus side, Tyler Cowen's book was stocked in the Economics section.

Who needs a manufacturing sector when it looks like Bush-Bashing is the real growth industry?

My experience in our local bookstores is much the same. I can only rarely find the conservative books advertised on weblogs on B&N's shelves, and have to order them from the internet. But if I wanted to, I could build an outhouse with all the Chomsky books at the store (and that's not a bad idea, come to think of it).

Which begs the question: I wonder who the owners of Borders and B&N support? If "nobody" is the answer, why don't they seem to want to sell books to me, a guy who walks in, cash in hand, only to walk out again, sans libre?

The imbalance in right vs left political books may be a corporate level decision. Last week at my local Borders (SF East Bay area) I asked the Manager why 9 of 10 current event/political type books on the new non-fiction section at the front of the store and over 75% of the main section were anti-Bush, anti-WOT. She said that all those stocking decisions are made at the corporate level and "that's what people are reading". In personally think that's BS, but maybe we need to shop for books other than at Borders or Barnes and Noble. I will be interested to see what selections are available after Bush wins a landslide victory in November.

I don't find it as weird that they're stocking all these books as that they've labeled Michael Moore a social scientist.

Wow--you all just now noticed this phenomenon? It's been going on for about 2 years now, judging by the majority of both chain and independent bookstore shelves (because I've done an extensive survey, of course--but seriously, at least as far as the Left Coast goes). I'd be curious to hear if this is the case in less liberal areas--anyone in the Midwest know?

It was certainly the first thing I noticed when I walked into a St. Louis - area Borders for the first time in a long time. Michael Moore (and others) books were set up to be the first things seen upon entry.

This is true of every single Borders I have ever been in, and having just taken a pretty long road trip, I've seen several in several different areas. Barnes and Noble appears to be somewhat more balanced in their selections, particularly when it comes to the display books--there are generally a few right-wing books on the table and the end-caps as well.

The other thing I've noticed in Borders is that nearly all of the employees' picks are similarly skewed. Tells you a little bit about who Borders hires. I know that the woman who manages the Borders here in town is definitely far-left by the books she recommends, and so are her employees.

I also read a newspaper interview recently (while on the road) with an independent bookstore owner who makes it his practice to push the left-wing books as much as possible. He says he just frowns and grits this teeth when his customers order anything to the right.

It's all about money. It could be that the Bush-bashers are offering their books to the trade at a greater discount, thereby giving the bookstores a larger margin.

I am not sure how different this was from the Clinton years when my local B & N and Borders had titles like "Boy Clinton", "Hell to Pay" and "Crimes and Misdemeanors" all over the place. It's simply a function of who is in power. When Reagan was in office, subscriptions to the Nation and TNR surged. When Clinton came into office, the American Spectator's numbers took off and Rush Limbaugh became dominant on talk radio. I don't see anything new here.

I am from Minnesota, but the choic is much the same whichever regional bookstore I travel to. If one never searched on the internet, one might get the idea that no alternatives existed.

As for Julia, I had noticed this long ago. Not much point in saying it aloud however, B&N and Borders aren't terribly interested in that kind of money anyway, it would appear.

Coincidentally, I was browsing the Brown University bookstore this weekend, with much the same impression of stocking policies.

What started me looking was the news that the Moore-debunking book is now up to #9 on the NYT nonfiction bestseller list. Funny -- it was nowhere to be seen there. And there were a heck of a lot more than nine titles on display on the Recent Nonfiction island. Several anti-Bush, anti-Republican volumes, however, with only one O'Rourke title as counterbalance (being humorous, it was probably deemed marginally acceptable).

Proceeding back to the Political Science shelves, I had no better luck, though I did take note that several of Noam Chomsky's books were on display.

This is no different than what Rush Limbaugh talked about when he first published his two books over 10 years ago. He said that his books were always in the back of the store, or shelved in some inaccurate place, so that browsers couldn't find them. And remember this was WAY before the "red state/blue state" partisanship that has developed since 2000.

It's a market decision. I'd bet that center-Dems (and the center-Pubs who've turned against Bush) meet the three magic criteria: (1) decent disposable income, (2) can read, and (3) likely to read. Claims of large bookstore chains trying to insidiously influence the public deserve the same short shrift given to other conspiracy theories.

This is not new...some years ago when "The Bell Curve" was the center of the fury of the media I decided to pick up a copy. No luck at the local B&N, so I tried Borders. They didn't have it either, and when I tried to order it the refused on the grounds that "we don't deal in hate books."

No wonder Amazon, with all its faults, is getting more and more of my book budget.

Tim

Nice analysis, but wrong. How can a book be in the top 10 NYTimes, but not stocked?

Frankly, I get the sense that bookstore managers have leeway on what is put out on the shelves and what is displayed. They choose to do this.

If it were a market decision, thew titles displayed would track with sales e.g. on Amazon, number 18 in the nonfiction bestseller list (The Connection : How al Qaeda's Collaboration with Saddam Hussein Has Endangered America by Stephen F. Hayes) is not ut at my B&N, while number 24, House of Bush, House of Saud by Craig Unger is easily found.

It always amazes me that the left, which can easily construct a fantastic Rube Goldberg conspiracy contraption out of the flimsiest of material seems patently unable to connect two simple dots together.

I attended a music festival at Lehigh University (PA) this past weekend, and I happened to walk past the campus bookstore. An entire front window display was filled with Michael Moore books (along with Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, which apparantly has been coopted by the anti-Bush crowd). I guess Moore is what passes for scholarly thought these days.

FYI, that window display was only my second most depressing sight of the weekend, the first being a student wearing a Mao Zedong t-shirt...

I have noticed the same thing. Even "conservative" books that show up on bestseller lists are often difficult to find in stores. Somebody is buying and reading these books, which means that somebody is taking the time to find them. I really find this situation puzzling. I can understand clerks shelving the books so that their favorite political books are more visible and furthermore, I can understand independent booksellers who only stock political books with which they agree. In fact, I know of some independent booksellers who only stock political books if they are left-wing. I do not understand the stocking decisions of the large chainstores. Not stocking a bestseller seems like burning money to me, but then I am not in the book business.

The only explanation of this phenomenon I can think of at the moment is that left-leaning readers are more likely to buy on impluse than right-leaning readers. This would mean that the store can trust right-leaning readers to special order that best seller, whereas, the left-leaning reader is more likely to buy something after browsing. Yes, this explanation sound a bit lame even to me, but perhaps someone here can improve upon it.

WARNING: Snarky comment follows. Skip to next comment if you are looking for any intellectual content!
As soon as this thread appeared, I made a mental bet that a certain frequent commenter who does not like Bush would weigh in with a self-congratulatory comment. I was not disappointed. Again, apologies for the snarky remark, but I could not help myself.

I'm from KC, and I was thinking only a month ago that there was a remarkably even split between right/left books. The new releases section had an about equal selection on those lines, and if anything, it seemed that the current events section was half and half, maybe 60/40 left/right.

But then they moved the store, so I'm not too familiar with it, but the few displays I did see seemed to be loaded with "50 different ways to get rid of Bush" kind of stuff.

Point is, if it is on the bestseller list, it's probably because they are available, and we are just excercising selective perception... a book that says "50 Ways to get rid of Bush" sticks out in the mind stronger than any given pro-bush book, at least to me.

What I did find amusing is that there is a graphic novel, which, to judge from the blurbs, is a very anti-bush anti-war piece, was sitting in the social science section. I can't recall the name of the novel.

I didn't realize graphic novels, regardless of political tilt, managed to get outside of the comics section near the sci-fi. But I guess it does.

Well, I guess if selling those books is good for the economy...

Then again, if there are plenty of them still on the shelf, perhaps they aren't selling as well as the stores would like us to believe?

And of course, just like Michael Moore movies, these books are, mostly, preaching to the choir.

Although none of this explains why right-leaning books are so difficult to find. After all, aren't the Republicans the rich ones who can afford to buy those expensive books - and furthermore, don't care about the trees they kill when they buy the books?

I've never worked in a bookstore, but I wonder if anyone gets any bonus based on sales?

If not, then so what if a popular but politically-incorrect book is not stocked? It's not as if it would impact their salaries. They're no different from a tenured professor or civil service; there is no accountability.

So, yes, Borders sales would go up if they stocked the #9 best-seller, but the people making the decision wouldn't benefit (directly).

Pogo:

I'd bet that B&N and other stores have demographic information about who actually goes to their stores and purchases what books, and that bestseller lists are relatively crude in comparison to their data. It might be, for example, that there are more Bush supporters in rural America, and that those consumers are (a) not well-served by bookchains b/c it's inefficient to build a huge bookstore in relatively rural areas, and (b) are well-served by the Internet, leading to highly ranked books by sales, but not by bookstore sales.

It could also be a function of an overly self-referential dependence on its own data. B&N looks at its data, sees centerists, and structures the store for those centerists. The right-wing people come in, can't find the Hayes book, and stop coming in. So now the data is even more skewed to the centerists. And on it goes.

But I have a really hard time believing that there are that many corporate-types in B&N land who are willing to give up the marginal dollar to secretly support Kerry.

[See Average Joe, I can be non-snarky. I said "right-wing" instead of "wingnut", "Hayes book" instead of "Hayes laugher." So there. Can't we all just get along?]

Tim,

I can accept your analysis, at least to to some degree. I think your point about selection bias is more likely.

Don't be fooled into thinking that "corporate-types in B&N land" would be unwilling "to give up the marginal dollar to secretly support Kerry." Why would that be difficult to believe? Self-interest is not merely monetary.

Anything for The Party.

I have worked in a chain bookstore before and unless my experience is atypical, I find these claims of collusion against conservative titles to be absurd. A few things that I observed:

1. The managers do get a bonus based on sales goals. They are almost slaves to the weekly/daily/monthy goals and how far above or behind the plan they are. Hiding Ann Coulter's latest in the back room won't help them reach this goal. I once witnesses a store manager sulking because he lost a sale of a softcover book that he erroneously told a customer that it was out of stock. I can't imagine what he would be like if he had to sit on 50 hardcover copies of Hannity's latest at 35$ a pop.

2. In relation to point 1, that back room as well as the rest of the store has a finite amount of space. These stores get inspected by people from the district office at random. There is nothing a store manager seems to like better than inventory flying out off the shelves and a clean storeroom. Making sure books won't sell seriously hurts this goals.

3. Manager input as to what gets stocked and where is actually quite limited. Our chain HQ sent us a top ten list and instructed us on various displays which had to be put up and in what parts of the store. If the control is that tight, I can't imagine that they have leaway to hide an entire class of books.

"The Bell Curve" was the center of the fury of the media I decided to pick up a copy. No luck at the local B&N, so I tried Borders. They didn't have it either"

The Borders I worked had a copy of Bell Curve the whole time I was there.

Also the corporate level mukity muks send out a "pull" list every month. I am afraid that a book stays on the shelf or not based demand. Sorry no great conspiracy just good old fashioned corporate capitalism.

Eamon,

I find your response fascinating. I suspect what you say must be true to some degree, but it does not fit with my experience of having to use Amazon for my book choices. The books I want are no less popular than the left-leaning ones, but no one ever seems to carry them.

A famous far-left independent bookstore in St. Paul, The Ruminator, has just announced it will close. The complaint from the right is that no-one really bought those books at all, but it stayed open by grants and donations.

I have no problem believing that people would sabotage their own economic interest in favor of some ideology. Russia and Eastern Europe took 70 years to finally go out of business, and they always acted against their own economic interest.

Just 2 years back, the bestseller lists were full of attacks on the Clinton administration (even after it was out of power) and liberals. You had Ann Coulter's screed 'Slander ..'. Prior to that you had Olsen's books on Hillary Clinton. You had LImbaugh's books and so on. Were there any liberal attack books ? [ There were one or two, such as Frankken's 'Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot'. At that time, we were told -- liberal books don't sell, so thats why more aren't published.

Then Moore's book 'Stupid White Men' came along. Even then the flood gates didn't burst till about a year ago, when Franken's new book, Moore's new book came out and a whole host of liberal writers realized that they could make money by doing something they liked.

I wandered by the bookstore the other day. Books attacking Bush are still in the majority, but there are half a dozen books by conservative writers defending Bush, attacking CLinton etc etc. One more point worth nothing is that the party that is out of power is more likely to be vicious in attacking. [ Of course, the right wingers continute to attack Clinton, so it doesn't matter who's in power to them]

BEtween all these attacks, there are some nice middle of the road books (PLan of Attack, The Vulcans). But unless they have a real famour author (as in Plan of Attack), they don't really sell. Conserative books do.

A few years back, liberals used to say that the fact that there were conservative books were the result of conspiracy by conservative publishers. Now the conservatives are claiming that this is due do liberal bias. The wheel turns around .

Incidentally, a few months back I was in a huge Barnes and Noble (Route 17 in Paamus, NJ). Richard Clarke's book had just come out, but they had sold out. Naturally, I could have ascribed this to the evil conservative attack machine, or I could put it down to the usual vagaries of ordering and distribution.

I have strong memories of going into my hometown B&N in central New Jersey in the Clinton era and seeing "Hell To Pay" and other books featuring ugly photos of Hillary and Bill prominently displayed in the same section. It's what sells. It was lame then and it's lame now.

I went to the Political Science section of our local Borders (Cambridge, Mass.) to look for recent books on American government for work. 90% of the books were partisan screeds of one type or another, totally useless for my purposes and with a shelf-life that makes Dannon look like Diderot. Apparently, there is no political science being conducted in this country today that the public will ever hear about.

What we are seeing here is Sturgeon's Law combining with the perceived academic responsibilities of large bookstore chains. Nothing to be done about it.

This brings up another issue that Kevin Drum brought up a while ago. Many of the books that could be stocked in Political Science or Social Science would be inappropriately scholarly for the average reader. Should Borders and B&N be expected to carry them?

I also seem to recall a wave of anti-Clinton screeds during the late 1990s, and my suspicion would be that the stocking decisionmakers simply like to cater to the opposition view.

Think about it: Average Bush Basher walks into the store already angry, sees aid and comfort waiting in the Pol/Soc-Sci racks, spends $75. Average Bush Supporter walks into the store, sees ten Shrubbery Tomes, gets angry, immediately selects or special-orders something that will prove all the other guys wrong.

Or maybe not. But in times past I have purchased titles like "The Rape of Nanking" and "The Wealth and Poverty of Nations" off-the-shelf at Barnes & Noble, so I don't think the sections are entirely lost to the harpies.

"The Wealth and Poverty of Nations"

Speaking of books that don't age well... I also bought that as an impulse. Enjoyable, but a little awkward when he reveals that the best model for development is Japan.

Here, and by here I mean central Kentucky (Lexington, Louisville, Cincinnati,) the phenomenon is the same. The decidedly liberal books do get superior placement at the largest bookstores. You are assailed by them immediately upon entering the store. However, I'm convinced that the media firestorm surrounding most of these titles fuels their placement more than politics alone. Once everyone starts screaming about a book that is "controversial" everyone wants to buy it... It ends up right there when you walk in, so you remember it and everything you've heard about it right away.

More conservative authors probably get more sales through Amazon.com since I notice many of them appear on the web pages of conservative talk show hosts with links to amazon.com. I've also noticed, much to my irritation, that if you buy just one book on those lists, Amazon immediately starts recommending you hundreds of other conservative books. Apparently, enough people who shopped for that one book also shopped for many other conservative titles. Conservative authors who make the NYT best-sellers list always complain about the lack of press their books get... hence, less display space in popular bookstores.

Pogo, I am sure it is possible that SOME people would be willing to sabatoge their own economic interests in order to advance a political view, but I can't believe it is that widespread as the conservative posters on here would have us believe. At the end of the day, we all need to eat, pay the rent and the car loan no matter how strongly our political beliefs are. A manager of a B&N COULD intentionally try to screw up the store's bottom line to hurt conservatives, but he could also get fired.

Here in South Carolina its an even split in whats stocked. But the Coultiers and Hannitys are much more prominently displayed than the Franken or Moore books. I think some of the reason for the perception that theres a antiBush sentiment among publishers is the books written by ex Bush appointees are being looked at as more political than historical. The Clarke and Oneill books come to mind as examples. There is also the perception that books such as Woodwards latest on the Bush presidency are antiBush, while I found it to be without bias. The thing to remember is negative sells better than positive. People that love Bush know why they love Bush, people that hate Bush are always looking for more ammo, and the same can be said about Clinton. In fact, I dont think any book has had the impact that Joe Kleins Primary Colors had, and that was far from Clinton friendly.

Speaking of books that don't age well... I also bought that as an impulse. Enjoyable, but a little awkward when he reveals that the best model for development is Japan.

IIRC, he acknowledges the publication post-facto problems with that analysis in later edition(s) of the book.

Well, easy enough to see what the good people of Barnes and Noble are think, and where they're donating.

Searching for "Barnes" as employer at www.opensecrets.org, we get the following....

RIGGIO, LEONARD
NEW YORK,NY 10021
BARNES & NOBLE/CHAIRMAN
6/30/2003
$2,000
Gephardt, Richard A
3/11/2003
$2,000
Kerry, John
11/20/2003
$2,000
Davis, Jim
4/8/2004
$2,000
Menendez, Robert

SMITH, MICHELLE
WANTAGH,NY 11793
BARNES & NOBLE/VPHR
5/27/2004
$500
Kerry, John
5/24/2004
$200
DNC Services Corp

KAPLAN, GLENN MR
NEW YORK,NY 10024
BARNES & NOBLE INC./CREATIVE DIRECT
3/6/2003
$700
Women's Campaign Fund
3/26/2004
$1,500
Women's Campaign Fund

RONNINGEN, JUDITH A
BELLEVUE,WA 98008
BARNES & NOBLE/LEAD BOOK SELLER
4/23/2004
$2,000
Kerry, John

MORAN, JOSALYN L
NEW YORK,NY 10038
BARNES & NOBLE/MERCHANDISE DIRECTOR
4/29/2004
$2,000
Kerry, John

ERCOLANO, A
NEW YORK,NY 10001
BARNES & NOBLE INC./VP TRADE BUYING
4/26/2004
$500
EMILY's List

FULLER, THOMAS
NEW YORK,NY 10009
BARNES AND NOBLES/BOOKBUYER
5/13/2004
$200
Kerry, John
5/17/2004
$200
Kerry, John

MORRIS, LAURA N
BROOKLYN,NY 11201
BARNES & NOBLE INC/EDITOR
5/27/2004
$250
Kerry, John

RENWICK, SUZETTE
LA CROSSE,WI 54601
BARNES AND NOBLE
1/31/2003
$1,000
Feingold, Russell D
5/14/2004
$1,000
Democratic Party of Wisconsin

KING, STEPHEN
TRYON,NC 28782
BARNES & NOBLE/RETAIL
6/20/2003
$1,000
Edwards, John
9/29/2003
$250
Miller, Brad
MCMURRAY, HEATHER
EL PASO,TX 79912
BARNES AND NOBLE/BOOKSELLER
8/15/2003
$300
Dean, Howard

MCMURRAY, HEATHER
EL PASO,TX 79912
BARNES AND NOBLE/BOOKSELLER
2/5/2004
$200
Dean, Howard
4/9/2004
$1,000
Kerry, John

WRIGHT, ALBERT
SYRACUSE,NY 13207
BARNES AND NOBLE/BOOKSELLER
1/8/2004
$200
Dean, Howard
5/14/2004
$200
Kerry, John

SEIFERT, EVAN
CHARLOTTESVILLE,VA 22902
BARNES AND NOBLE/BOOKSELLER
5/24/2004
$1,950
Kerry, John

CAMPBELL, JOAN MS
LINCOLN,NE 68502
BARNES & NOBLE/PART-TIME
4/9/2004
$1,000
Fortenberry, Jeffrey Lane

HUTCHISON, JUDITH MRS
KIRKWOOD,MO 63122
BARNES & NOBLE/BOOKSELLER
12/31/2003
$1,000
Bush, George W

Draw your own conclusions about who Barnes and Noble staff and executive want to win the election.

Wow -- that's a hard act to follow, BC.

Here in northern Indiana, the local B&N has the anti-Bush books prominently displayed. I'm guessing that there are just more of them; perhaps it's a corollary of Galt's law: the party in power writes serious non-fiction, the party out of power writes best-selling flame-breathing polemics.

Eamon: I hope what you're saying is true, but since I can no longer trust the NYTimes or WaPo to print the truth, I have little trust that even sales figures (and bestseller lists) aren't also falsified.

Would a business do this even when it affected their bottom line? Of course. The fact that Regnery press sold thousands of books for decades when none of the publishing houses would touch their authors is an example of how how ideology trumps business.

Uh, BC,

Individual managers (at least at Borders) do not choose what books are ordered. Books are ordered due to inventory turn over, or special order per customer request.

There is a monthly marketing packet that is delivered from the corporate level. The "hot" books are marketed per these instructions and corporate policy.

Again if you dislike the selection of books in the store you can blame ordinary supply and demand.

"I wonder who the owners of Borders and B&N support?" I actually *am* one of the owners of Borders and B&N, since I own stock in both companies (not major pieces of my portfolio), and I support Bush. However, what matters in practice is more who the executives and key employees (buyers, store managers) support.

People who work with books tend to be leftish, and at the margin, this may skew their decisions toward lefty books. I doubt it's much of a skew, though, since sales are very measurable and in a competitive market one can't afford to leave piles of money on the table. So Ann Coulter will be carried, even if they can't stand her; however, a lesser-known writer with a conservative orientation might be ignored.

From my experience, the decisions are made higher up the chain than store managers. When I visit my mother in Florida, the nearest major mall is in a neighboring county, one that is solidly Republican. The B. Dalton in the mall (B. Dalton is B&N) carries Mother Jones, The Nation, The American Prospect, and the Utne Reader, but not National Review, The Weekly Standard, The American Spectator, or Reason. Nope, no bias there. I asked the manager, and she said that she has no control over what magazines are stocked.

I was actually sneered at by a clerk at a Seattle Borders when she saw my selection of books and magazines, which made clear my political sensibilities. I was disppointed, but not surprised, as it WAS Seattle, and I had to dodge the Public Citizen activists as I made my way to the Metro tunnel downtown.

'I have little trust that even sales figures (and bestseller lists) aren't also falsified. '

Yup, everybody's lying. Only safe way to operate.

'Would a business do this even when it affected their bottom line? Of course. The fact that Regnery press sold thousands of books for decades when none of the publishing houses would touch their authors is an example of how how ideology trumps business.'

It seems to be an example of ideology trumping facts in your case. There have always been leftist publication houses as well (lots of them). YOu could make exactly the same claim about them.

When the right wing attack machine started churning out anti-Clinton books (Barbara Olsen, LImbaugh, Lowry, Coulter etc.), a few years back, we had conservatives telling us -- why aren't there more liberal attack books ? Because no one wants to buy them.

Now that Franken, Moore, Conason, Krugman etc. have written anti-Bush books, suddenly, the fact that these books are popular is (gasp) an example of bias. If there's anything constant about conservatives, its their constant whininess that they're being somehow discriminated against.

FWIW, both local Borders and B&N that I have seen stock National Review.

Until Franken's and Moore's books cracked the bestseller list, there was

'When I visit my mother in Florida, the nearest major mall is in a neighboring county, one that is solidly Republican. The B. Dalton in the mall (B. Dalton is B&N) carries Mother Jones, The Nation, The American Prospect, and the Utne Reader, but not National Review, The Weekly Standard, The American Spectator, or Reason'

In a liberal area of NJ, I see Natioanl Review and the Weekly Standard all the time. Reason is liberatrian, not conservative. I see Mother Jones, but I don't remember if I've seen the others.

I have noticed the same thing. Even "conservative" books that show up on bestseller lists are often difficult to find in stores.

Hmmm. You all must not live in North Carolina. The other week during a visit to Barnes and Noble in an attempt to pick up some Duke University hotties while they sipped their lattes I was struck by the number of pro-Bush books in the primary location on the table sitting at the entrance to the store.

Please note that I happen to LIKE GWB. I know -- hard to believe that someone who might actually be interested in sex would support #43. That's the way it is, though.

Looks like B&N is selecting their stock based on, gasp, an assessment of who would be actually buying things at their store....

Yup, everybody's lying. Only safe way to operate.

So I should you're lying. But that means I can't trust you, and therefore...shoot, I'm very conflicted now.

Just for the record, the B & N on 3rd Ave. in Mahattan has the anti Michael Moore book in the front window. Guess the bias isn't as pervasive as some would have us believe.

It is impressive that some commenters can both hold that (1) liberals read these anti-Bush books because they are silly, hysterical conspiracy theorists and (2) there is a conspiracy among the management of major bookstore chains to suppress conservative books.

To more seriously address a question posed above: some conservative books can be best-sellers even though they are not big sellers at Borders/B&N because there are significant direct sales and book club sales of conservative books. It takes a shockingly small number of sales to get a book onto the best-seller lists, and a couple of TV commercials on Fox News or the Limbaugh show soliciting phone orders can make the difference.

Until somewhat recently, it was also the case that some conservative books became best-sellers because of bulk sales to the author or persons affiliated with the author. There is nothing particularly unwholesome about this; if someone is doing a lecture tour, they may want to buy a few thousand copies of their book to sell on tour, betting that even if they have bought some excess copies it's still a good investment because you can say then your book is a best-seller. Authors of business and self-help books frequently used to do the same thing. Recently, however, the NYT and other compilers of best-seller lists have excluded certain bulk sales in their calculations.

I think it's amazing that anyone can toss out an idea like:

I'd bet that center-Dems (and the center-Pubs who've turned against Bush) meet the three magic criteria: (1) decent disposable income, (2) can read, and (3) likely to read.

without the least shred of supporting evidence. Of course, he doesn't come right out and say that those he hasn't mentioned fail to meet the "magic" criteria because (perhaps) that would be offensive.

If the left was rational, which has been suggested here, they would not hide right wing books and accept the reduced sales.
If the left was rational, they would buy stock in Haliburton to participate in the obscene profits from contracts that are among the most audited in business.
If the left was rational, they would be the right.

I was in the Newark airport about a month ago, and waited around near a different bookstore, I don't think it was Borders. Anyway, they had set up in the front of the store a big rack full of both mainstream and obscure anti-American & anti-Bush screeds - Moore, Chomsky, etc., as if they were all bestsellers!

I wish I had asked the arab-looking clerk/(manager?) who exactly decided to promote these books so obviously.

Slartibartfast:

"Of course, he doesn't come right out and say that those he hasn't mentioned fail to meet the "magic" criteria because (perhaps) that would be offensive."

Are you kidding me? I wasn't hiding anything. It was meant to be offensive. That's why I said it. And I was rightly chided for it.

But if the mystery is still unclear, what I so subtly implying is that only illiterate morons would continue to support Bush. Does my assertion make it true? Of course not. But let's be honest - I'd bet we're all too willing to believe that people who use magic crystals to heal their bodies are either thick or silly. I'm not sure why such assumptions are any more wrong about Bush supporters. Seriously, what has to happen for you guys to give up on him? At this point, the rest of us realize that whatever it is won't happen. But we're still curious.

I wasn't hiding anything.

No, I guess you weren't. Still, it's better to be safe. If you value your credibility, that is.

only illiterate morons would continue to support Bush

Provably wrong. To borrow your technique, only a total idiot would make such an assertion.

Maybe Eric Alterman is correct about the right-wing bias of the media and the NYT is over-emphasizing the importance of conservative titles, while the business executives at bookstores know the truth and tailor inventory to match same.

Maybe the distortion is not even deliberate. Perhaps the staff at the NYT think "Gosh, I read all those conservative books, and all my friends read them, therefore they must be pretty popular."

;-)

Slartibartfast:

You can do better than that. Watch and learn, grasshopper:

(Proposed Slarti-whatever response)

"what I so subtly implying is that only illiterate morons would continue to support Bush"

That's a bit rich. If you're going to accuse someone of being illiterate, it helps if you don't immediately prove your own innability to use the language. Borrow 10 dollars from your friend with a job (so he can't be a Dem) and buy an "am." Snark works better when it's not self-defeating.

Ah. A troll. Forget I said anything.

I had an independent bookstore in the small town where I grew up refuse to order books I wanted on two occasions: first, when I was 14 years old and wanted to read Anton LaVey's "The Satanic Bible," the owner said she couldn't in good conscience order that book for me. I told her that I had my mother's permission (my mom always said that I could read whatever I wanted as long as I promised to ask her if I had questions), and she said that she just refused to propagate those ideas. I bought the book at Barnes and Noble. The second was when I wanted to read "The Bell Curve," and I was told that the store didn't carry that book and never would.
I now make it a point from time to time to, when I notice that a particular controversial title isn't stocked at a store, ask to special order it, even if I don't want to buy it, in part to see what the store's response will be, and in part because I hope they'll order it and it will lead to someone reading it who otherwise would not have.

I cannot believe that Borders or B&N is motivated by anything other than profit. If you see a bias in the books that are displayed, I can bet that if they do not sell they will be replaced with books that do.

That being said, my mother once purchased "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot" for my Red State father as a gift only because it was prominently displayed at the bookstore.

Coke and Pepsi famously fight over shelf space at the grocery store and I wonder why it would not be the same for Conservative versus Liberal titles on the book shelf.

Tim asks

Seriously, what has to happen for you guys to give up on him? At this point, the rest of us realize that whatever it is won't happen. But we're still curious.

Well, I can't answer for anyone else, but for my part, I'll give up on him when the alternative is something other than converting the War on Terror to nothing more than a set of porkbarrel projects for favored Democratic constituencies, a dramatic tax increase, altering "No Child Left Behind" such that the funding increase remains with the accountability revoked, a foreign policy that favors Europe's interests over America's, etc.

Am I crazy or does it appear that somecallmetim thinks he's a centrist?

Traveling around I find the bias in display to be fairly universal. Borders, B&N, Waldenbooks, B.Dalton, even places like Media Play and Books-a-Million. Where? New England, Ths South, The Midwest...and friends out west report the same.

I say 'fairly universal' because there are exceptions, though the are few--and many I call 'exceptions' simply because the overkill of Bush-bashing books isn't so extreme.

Since this phenomenon pertains to display, as opposed to stock, the idea that the stores would be hurting themselves by not displaying rightist books is nonsense. The conservative books are simply harder to find--they are there.

And it is no end of fun to find an employee with leftist dripping off of them and have them get you the book you need.

Jack, retail is all about display. If something is hard to find, it is less likely to be purchased. This is pretty basic retailing stuff. Sure, a determined purchaser can find a sales clerk to get it for them or ask them to order it, but many people have neither the time nor the patience. Others won't know the item even exists unless they see it. Many sales are lost by an item not being displayed in a prominent manner and conversely, many sales are gained simply by having the product out front. So the true nonsense is your claim that a store won't hurt itself by not displaying a product.

' was in the Newark airport about a month ago, and waited around near a different bookstore, I don't think it was Borders. Anyway, they had set up in the front of the store a big rack full of both mainstream and obscure anti-American & anti-Bush screeds - Moore, Chomsky, etc., as if they were all bestsellers!'

Airport stands are typically run not by Borders and B&N, but by local newstand vendors.

'I wish I had asked the arab-looking clerk/(manager?) who exactly decided to promote these books so obviously.'

"Arab-looking" ? Gak, that sounds like a crime. How can we let someone Arab looking work in an airport ?

Anyone with a brain would probably figure out that the "Arab looking" guy at Newark is probably Indian, since they run most newstands in this area.

'Traveling around I find the bias in display to be fairly universal. Borders, B&N, Waldenbooks, B.Dalton, even places like Media Play and Books-a-Million. Where? New England, Ths South, The Midwest...and friends out west report the same.'

I've yet to hear anyone explain to me why, when 2 years back, the prominent new attack books were conservative books (Coulter's Slander, OLsen's books etc.), there was no conservative complaining of bias. At that time, it was simply the market at work.

It seems to me that conservatives, for all their proclaimed belief in the market, don't really trust it. Now, its left wing booksellers who are trying desperately to stop them from buying conservative books, whereas 2 years back, it was the market at work. Why the all-knowing, all powerful market would tolerate this remains unclear.

Of course, despite the fact that conservatives don't have a real target now (since Clinton left), they still haven't stopped their attacks on Bill and Hillary, out of power for 3.5 years. Wait till Kerry comes to power, then you'll see viciousness and attacks that make the curent Bush attacks look like a picnic.

One reason that conservative books might not be in stock as much is that there really isn't that much demand for them by the general populace. Most of Regnery books only achieve best seller status by virtue of bulk purchases. This means that those who want these books mostly likely got them from the bulk purchaser, such as a fundraiser. Therefore, there isn't much need to stock too many, since they have already been distributed.

It appears that life is just not as much fun without a little paranoia to tweak the political junkies.

Perhaps it would make more sense to simply change the section heading from "Social/Political Science" to what it truly is, "Partisan Hackery."

Here's a totally unscientific case-in-point: I have no idea what anti-Moore book y'all are talking about, and I wander around a variety of bookstores on a weekly basis. Why don't I know about this book (and will someone give the title/author)?

I can't say much about the conservative booklash (just coined that) against the Clintons, since I'm afraid I wasn't paying much personal attention to these things back in the 1990's (and I was far more left-leaning then, so I might have been more inclined to notice). I did work in two different independent bookstores for almost all of Clinton's time in office, though, and while there were certainly a number of Clinton-bashing books I don't remember as many of them, or that they were as prominently displayed, as the current crop of anti-Bush tomes. One of those bookstores was aquite liberal, East Bay Area store in a town with more than its fair share of PhDs, the other a very ideologically mixed bag managed by a diehard Republican.

I certainly don't subscribe to any conspiracy theory--I don't think that most bookstore owners, corporate or independent, are consciously attempting to suppress conservative responses to Moore et al. But I can say that one of the things we always tried to do in both stores was to display books representing other perspectives in Debate/Rant X, not only to provide balance but because we might actually sell some.

Julia:

I have no idea what anti-Moore book y'all are talking about, and I wander around a variety of bookstores on a weekly basis. Why don't I know about this book (and will someone give the title/author)?

I assume they all mean this one:

Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man
David T. Hardy & Jason Clarke
(c)2004

Supposedly it attempts an exhaustive review of alleged Michael Moore lies and distortions. Haven't read it myself, though.

There's a simple explaination for this, and it isn't that conservatives are oppressed. The fact of the matter is that the 'conservateve' books really don't sell very well in ordinary bookstores, and the bookstore owners know it.

The majority of conservative books are sold either in bulk to conservatives groups, or through the internet. It's just one of those things, for the most part, people who like bookstores are either liberals, or not interested in SS books.

From Bones: "The fact of the matter is that the 'conservateve' books really don't sell very well in ordinary bookstores"

Really? I'd like to see some data as proof before accepting such a premise. Same for the claim of 'bulk purchases'.

In the meantime, check out Hugh Hewitt's page, and his 'e-mail for the day', about a reader unable to find his book in two bookstores, despite being #8 on Amazon. Curious, that.

As for the post on "Why the all-knowing, all powerful market would tolerate this remains unclear". Please; are you trying to assert that the self interest driving the market is only a monetary one? Heavens, there are a few Nobel economists who would beg to differ.

In any event, that's why Amazon does so well. They are getting more of my dollar simply because thay will sell me the books I want.

Why can't Borders and B&N?

'As for the post on "Why the all-knowing, all powerful market would tolerate this remains unclear". Please; are you trying to assert that the self interest driving the market is only a monetary one? Heavens, there are a few Nobel economists who would beg to differ. '

Good god -- a conservative/libertarian type admits market failure. Will wonders never cease ?

The point is that if there was this great bias, then there would be alternate bookstores and chains selling these books. Indeed, a few years back, there was much less demand for liberal books, and conservative CLinton-bashing books dominated. At that time, liberal writers (unless they had some record, such as Franken or Moore) had trouble getting published. Indeed, when Moore's "Stupid White Men" remained on the NYT bestseller list for 54 or so weeks, it was a novelty because for much of that time, it was the only liberal book on the list (conservative books would come on the list and go off, but Moore's book outlasted them all).

And incidentally, leave off pointing to Amazon as a possible alternative source. While it is an alternative source, liberal bush-bashing books such as Franken's books have still done very well recently, better than corresponding conservative books. Clinton's book was at the top for w a while and "Against all Enemies" and "Imperial Hubris" are still doing well (not liberal books, but anti-Bush).

In the old days, stores might not have a separate political table or display, now they do, and its full of both liberal and conservative books. TQhere are more liberal attack books now (which is what you'd expect when the party in power is conservative) and the country is more partisan than a few years back.

And yet, conservatives seem to forget the tons of books from Hannity, Ingrahm, LImbaugh, Coulter, O'Reilly, Savage and others over the last 2 years or so. There are plenty of conservative books, and they are all readily available.

My conclusion therefore is not that conservatives are being discriminated against, but that they're being whiny in complaining about discrmination. A bit like the hard left types, really.

Incidentally,

Gee, erg, I guess that's why there's now a Conservative Book Club, so you can actually purchase the books that aren't being sold in Borders and Barnes & Noble.

Incidentally, I had posted an addendum to my comment of a few days ago, and it never appeared.

What I had said was, I noticed while on my road trip that there was very little difference between the display windows at the various Borders I came across and the display window at City Lights bookstore in San Francisco. Given that City Lights IS an "alternative" store, this fact should come as surprising and might cause someone like Mr. erg to think twice about what he is saying and take the partisan blinders off for a minute.

Also, I was in both a Borders and a Barnes and Noble yesterday looking for copies of a few of the big existentialist books (Being and Time, etc.), and made certain to scrutinize the displays at both. In the political science section at Borders, Mona Charen's Useful Idiots was the only conservative book out of the 12 that were displayed. The first book as you walked in the front door was Dude, Where's My Country?, along with the Clinton autobiography.

Barnes and Noble didn't have a poly sci display, but their non-fiction display was all liberal, Bush-bashing books save for the 9-11 commission report.

How the liberal trolls around here are able to dismiss the wealth of evidence before their eyes is beyond me.

Winston:

Just to be clear, you're saying that (a) City Lights, a tourist attraction, is the end pole of lefty book display, and (b) the similarity between its display and that of Borders demonstrates that Borders as a whole has a corporate policy of Bush-bashing? Is that correct?

You know that San Francisco's a pretty liberal place, right? Gay marriages, and all that? I'm not sure that it's a particularly good place from which to draw national conclusions about bookstore policy.

Let me explicate Winston's comments for you, Tim, since they seem to be causing you difficulty:

1. City Lights is, actually, pretty close to the "end of the lefty pole," as you put it, if we consider that pole to be encompassing all of what can be considered well-known, general independent bookstores (by which I mean those that are not solely and specifically devoted to a particular political cause or literary genre or what have you). It is a "tourist attraction" precisely because disaffected young poets like to take pilgrimmages there and pretend they're Allen Ginsberg. To be quite honest, on any given day the majority of customers are regulars devoted to shopping at independents rather than chains, partly because they expect to find more lefty tomes there than at their corner B&N.

2. Given the nature of this bookstore, it is interesting that the major chain bookstores around the country (judging from Winston's earlier post and those of others who have described their experiences--I don't get the impression that Winston is comparing City Lights to just the Borders in the SF area) tend to have very similar book displays as far as political balance is concerned. Note that Winston does not say this is evidence of a Bush-bashing corporate policy.

3. And finally, to respond to erg, "available" and "prominently displayed" are not the same thing. If a store has created a display of a number of different titles on the same issue and they all are from the same political bent, even though other books, even good sellers, representing other views on that same issue are not included, the display (observe that I emphatically did NOT say "the management/bookbuyer/whoever") exhibits a bias. It suggests, at least, that no attempt has been made to represent more than a one-sided discussion on said issue.

Julia:

I misread it. My bad. Thanks for clearing it up.

I wonder what our conspiracy theorists would accept as evidence AGAINST anti-Conservative book bias. I pass the B& N on 3rd ave. in Manhattan every morning. "Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man" is in the front display window, right next "House of Bush, House of Saud" and Christopher Anderson's anti Hillary book, with an unflattering cover picture is right next to Bill Clinton's autobiograpy, again, in the front window. In another bookstore in Grand Central Station, the same Hillary book is on the same shelf with "Dude, Where's my Country" and P.J. O'Rourke's latest. If there's a bias here, could someone please tell me what it is. If you can't slant book selection and display against conservatives in Manhattan, where can you?

I was under the impression that most books that are prominently displayed in BN/Borders are a result of slotting fees paid by the distributors/publishers. Is there anybody out there that knows whether this is true or not?

'Gee, erg, I guess that's why there's now a Conservative Book Club, so you can actually purchase the books that aren't being sold in Borders and Barnes & Noble.'

And there are plenty of lefty presses as well that print lefty books and allow you to buy them in various forms. Surely this demonstrates anti-liberal bias ?

'Also, I was in both a Borders and a Barnes and Noble yesterday looking for copies of a few of the big existentialist books (Being and Time, etc.), and made certain to scrutinize the displays at both. In the political science section at Borders, Mona Charen's Useful Idiots was the only conservative book out of the 12 that were displayed. The first book as you walked in the front door was Dude, Where's My Country?, along with the Clinton autobiography.'

Clinton's bio has been hugely sold, Amazon had it as its top seller for weeks. It seems like a reasonable book to put up. And Moore's book might have been put up because of the publicity about his movie.

'Barnes and Noble didn't have a poly sci display, but their non-fiction display was all liberal, Bush-bashing books save for the 9-11 commission report.

How the liberal trolls around here are able to dismiss the wealth of evidence before their eyes is beyond me. '

How conservatives are unable to remember the situation of around 2 years back defies comprehension. At that time we had Olsen's books, Coulter's books, Limbaugh's books, O'Reilly's books and others. Clinton and liberal bashing books dominated in bookstores, although liberals were no longer in power. You looked at political books, you'd find maybe one old Franken book. For some strange reason, in that long-forgotten (by conseratives) era, it was not an example of conservative bias by booksellers, it was an example of the market at work.

The situation began to change slowly with the popularity of Moore's book 'Stupid White Men' 2.5 years back. Intiially the publisher asked for it to delayed since it was criticizing the President shortly after 911. It took a while for that book to get popular and it remained on the best-seller lists for nearly a year, convincing publishers and book-sellers that there was market for this book.

The floodgates really burst with Franken's book last year. Fox News did a great job of shooting themselves in the foot by suing him and giving him publicity. Practically all these books that conservatives find so repulsive (Conason, Krugman, Colmes, more Moore, Press etc.) came out in the last few months. The conservatives had the field practically to themslves till then and sure enough O'Reilly, the Bias author, Ingraham, Savage, Charen, Coulter again, David Limbaugh and others pourted out lots of right wing books all through that time, all into last year.

So now we have more liberal Bush-bashing books. Big deal, the situation was quite different as recently as one year ago. Liberals are also out of power and have a better target to aim at too.

The real problem seems to be that conseratives can't really take it when the market turns agains them.

'And finally, to respond to erg, "available" and "prominently displayed" are not the same thing. If a store has created a display of a number of different titles on the same issue and they all are from the same political bent, even though other books, even good sellers, representing other views on that same issue are not included, the display (observe that I emphatically did NOT say "the management/bookbuyer/whoever") exhibits a bias. '

Booksellers are under no obligation to display no bias in their displays. Their responsibility to their shareholders is only to sell as many books as they can. There are indeed more liberal attack books out nowadays, because liberals are out of power and those out of power tend to be angrier and to have better targets. Liberal books are also selling very well -- Franken, Moore etc. were on bestseller lists for months. Clinton's book is very popular (god knows why) and so on.

FWIW, my nearest Borders (Fort Lee, NJ) when I last visited it around 2-3 weeks back had half a dozen liberal attack books in a display, but it also has a book praising Bush (misunderestimation), the anti-Hillary Clinton book by Morris and at least a couple of other conservative books. Liberal books dominated, but conservative books were present as well. I would say its unsmart to display only liberal books in a display, but frankly, I've always seen some conservative books. I think the glut of liberal books will probably die off a little as not all can sell.

But you know whats funny ? What if I were to point to the dozens of conservative talk radio hosts from rush downwards (and I do mean downwards), even in towns like Seattle and New York, and compare with an Air America that started 4 months back on 3 channels and complain about bias ? What if I were to point out that liberals had to go to tthe occasional alternate statiosn like Air Pacifica ? I could bitch and moan about this, and I bet conservatives would say to me that its just the market at work.

Of course, I'm not going to do that, because I do understand its the market at work, just as it is in books.

But all of you might have your heart's desire, and I hope you do. 1-2 years from now, if President Kerry is in office, right wing books attacking him will be found on all bookshelves and liberal books will start fading away without dubya to attack. I look forward to that.

Yes, premium spots (end of aisle placements), central tables, and especially entry to the store require slotting fees in most chains. But even slotting fees wouldn't save you if the book doesn't sell well. The stores all have automated inventory management systems that give them a good idea of sell rate, turnover etc. I suspect that real blockbusters (such as the Harry Potter books) might be able to get away without paying any slotting fees (although they do provide marketing and other funds which are sometimes co-shared with stores).

Most store managers though have some latitude to move books around a little or tailor to local desires.

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