B&N exploring acquisition of Borders

According to the WSJ: "Barnes & Noble Inc., the nation's largest book chain by sales, has assembled a team of executives and advisers to study the possibility of acquiring No. 2 chain Borders Group Inc., according to a person familiar with the situation." Click here to read the rest of the article.

This would be a very dramatic development for the book retail industry. The same article estimates that B&N does about 20-22% of retail sales, compared to 10-12% for Borders and 15% for Amazon.

While it's probably a longshot, it wouldn't surprise me if a deal happens. There's a lot of pressure on retailers right now, and online shopping is changing consumers' buying habits.

Book teaches kids about affirmative action

Take a look at this interview with Tony Robles, the author our new bilingual children's book, Joey Gonzalez, Great American. As one of the first kid's books to be published in both English and Spanish, this illustrated story teaches young people not to judge others by their race, a realization that Joey and his friends come to when their teacher puts affirmative action into practice.

As Robles passionately says in the interview, "...[A]ffirmative action tends to teach our kids that their ancestry is a weakness that needs to be overcome, and affirmative action teaches that they need to rely on special preferences to succeed. I don’t believe that. Affirmative action steals your dignity."

Death toll in Burma could top 100,000

The top U.S. diplomat in Burma says 100,000 people could die as conditions worsen following last weekend's cyclone. Disease outbreaks could worsen this catastrophic tragedy. The country's dictatorship is not helping matters:

The U.S. military has put people and airplanes into position to work on any relief effort, as officials awaited word on whether the Asian nation would accept American help...

[U.S. charge d'affaires Shari ] Villarosa did not sound optimistic... She said lower reaches of the Myanmar regime appear to recognize the magnitude of the problem, but the senior leadership is isolated and has not yet announced a final decision on how to handle outside aid.

Egyptians using Facebook to protest government

The WSJ reports that dissidents in Egypt are attempting to organize a nationwide strike using Facebook. The article says this is part of a larger trend across the Mid East:

The activism on Facebook is part of larger efforts by youths across the Arab world to use technology -- from blogs to cellphone text messages to YouTube -- to challenge their governments and push the envelope on dissent in ways older generations didn't know. In parts of the Middle East such as Beirut and Tehran, local governments immediately jam cellphones if there is civil unrest, to prevent it from spreading. ...

Egyptian officials have taken notice. Tech-savvy Interior Ministry officers browse the social-networking site to keep an eye on anything they may deem a security threat.

This excerpt really captures the double-edged sword of technology. While overall the Internet clearly promotes freedom (a main theme in my book, The PayPal Wars), technology can also be used by oppressive regimes trying to promote their own interests.

Blocking content is an obvious example, and a favorite tactic of dictators. Recall China's recent efforts to block access to YouTube during the uprising in Tibet, or Iran's crackdown on Web access back in 2006. But dictators are also pretty inventive in their efforts to twist tech to their benefit. In this particular case, Egypt is monitoring Facebook to identify dissenters. Similarly, China has convinced many Silicon Valley companies such as Google and Yahoo to cooperate with it by restricting content available to Chinese citizens.

Let us pray that the advocates of freedom -- empowered by technology created through the free market -- stay two steps ahead.

Tragedy in Burma

Early reports suggest there could be 50,000 deaths from the cyclone that hit Burma this past weekend, making it the worst natural disaster since the tsunami in 2004. No doubt the scale and scope of this tragedy has been made worse by the military dictatorship. According to the Times of London:

Burma's junta refused foreign aid after the 2004 tsunami, in which between 60 and 600 of its citizens are reported to have died, but this time the sheer scale of the slowly emerging disaster seems to have forced it to change its mind. "We will welcome help . . . from other countries because our people are in difficulty," said Nyah Win, the Burmese Foreign Minister, in a rare television appearance....

Today private frustration was growing among aid organisations, however, that although the junta has publicly invited assistance, bureaucracy is impeding the granting of visas to allow foreign workers into the country. As delays drag on, living conditions for the victims is getting worse.

Let's hope this topic gets coverage in the mainstream media (especially with the Democratic primaries today). The American people are extremely kind-hearted and generous, and no doubt they will be willing to provide assistance once informed of what appears to be a disaster of epic proportions.

"Why We Left Islam" editors respond to CAIR's attack

Joel Richardson and Susan Crimp -- the editors who collected the amazing stories in our new book, Why We Left Islam -- fired back at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) for the organization's critical comments about their book.

"Even though CAIR wants to convince people that it's a moderate organization, the facts say otherwise," asserts Richardson, who writes using a pseudonym because of previous death threats from Islamic radicals. "The federal government named CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator in an alleged scheme to funnel $12 million to Hamas, and Representative Sue Myrick, R-NY, said evidence suggests CAIR is a front group for the Muslim Brotherhood."

"Evidently, CAIR's ties to Islamic extremists run deep," adds Richardson, who noted that a recent WorldNetDaily investigative report linked 14 CAIR officials to terror investigations. Richardson said that he and Crimp -- who is a noted journalist and author of books on Mother Teresa and the Kennedys -- knew from the start of their collaboration that radical Muslims would go to great lengths to discredit Why We Left Islam, so CAIR's attack came as no surprise.

We've known all along that radical groups like CAIR would attack this book because of the threat to Islam's credibility it poses. You cannot read these powerful personal accounts and be unmoved. Nor can you read this book and persist in believing that human flourishing is possible in an Islamist society.

Assoc. of American Publishers fights law protecting minors from porn

PW reports that the Association of American Publishers has joined with the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and several Oregon bookstores in contesting a state law that "the dissemination of sexually explicit material to anyone under age 13, or the dissemination to anyone under age 18 of any material with the intent to sexually arouse the recipient or the provider." The reason? They allege the statue “burdens the exercise of free expression and creates a chilling effect on the sale, display, and dissemination of constitutionally protected speech.”

A press release from the Oregon chapter of the ACLU contains numerous objections to what they cede is a "well-intentioned effort to target sexual predators." They say the law is overly broad and could catch numerous innocent parties in its web. Such as a Planned Parenthood Peer Educator, or the Cascade AIDS Project for handing out safe sex materials to teenagers. Or grandma, who is now evidently going to be targeted by eager prosecutors for giving her grand kids a book about the birds and the bees.

All of this seems a little far fetched. Does the ACLU really think granny will go to the big house over a law intended to stop predators from luring kids? It seems like fear mongering to me. And it's also a PR effort to claim the moral high ground and distract from the participation of groups such as Planned Parenthood that think they have a constitutional right to have unfettered access to foist their views on children.

I'm disappointed that the Association of American Publishers and the Oregon booksellers got into bed with this cadre. If there are practical issues where the retailers need clarification or were being hit with an excessive compliance burden, they could have sought clarification through other means (or possibly a separate suit) without joining these left-wing groups who are pushing their own agenda. But, then again, the AAP is headed by the outspoken liberal and super-genius Pat Schroeder, so it comes as no surprise...

CAIR attacks our new Islam book

Speaking to the NY Daily News last week, Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, attacked our upcoming book, Why We Left Islam: Former Muslims Speak Out. According to Hooper:

This book is put out by WND Publishing, which promotes hate every day on its extremist anti-Muslim hate site... The editor is a guy who suggested air-dropping pig's blood over Afghanistan. There are 7 million American Muslims and over a billion worldwide who love Islam and practice it peaceably on a daily basis.

Never mind the fact that our company is WND Books, those are some bold claims by CAIR. But before addressing them, I'll quote a couple the description of the book from the article:

WND Books has emblazoned a picture of the prophet Muhammed torn in half across the front of the book, written by British journalist Susan Crimp and Islam expert Joel Richardson, using a pseudonym because he already has a fatwa out against him... Islamists might not be too happy with the book's contents, either. It's filled with first-person stories of former radicals who began to question the Koran, Islam's holy book, and who have changed their lives.

As for CAIR's absurd accusations about pig's blood, Joseph Farah rebuts them in an article on WND today.

A holy Earth Day to you

My apologies for my brief absence from my blog. I was traveling last week and have been under the weather the past couple of days, but it's good to be back home and ensconced behind my keyboard. And just in time for the holiest day on the calendar for millions of Americans.

No, I'm not talking about Passover or Orthodox Easter, days that are set aside by pious believers to worship God and recall His actions to intervene in human history. Rather, I mean a day set aside to worship creation and advocate the suppression of human freedom in the name of a greater good. Or, as most of us call it, Earth Day.

Everyone in the publishing industry (except WND Books, it would seem) is observing the solemn day with proper piety. Publishers Weekly dedicated their daily newsletter to the topic and treated us to important stories such as "Random Reviews its Green Progress" and "Penguin Classics Goes Green With Nature Conservancy." Of course, there is a certain degree of irony for a business built around the destruction of trees to call itself green, but it's also an industry that tilts to the left, so no doubt these enviro-efforts are more penance than PR.

Since the Pope has gone back home to the Vatican, allow me to be your guide to some of the sacred Earth Day observances from around the Web:

• We're treated to a special Google holiday logo for this sacred day. Only very important days, such as Alexander Graham Bell's Birthday on March 3, make the list of holiday logos. (Pedestrian events like Easter need not apply.)



• Major League Baseball boasts a number of Earth Day observances, including the Seattle Mariners' decision to stage "the first carbon neutral game in MLB history." Fans attending the Reds-Dodgers game in Cincy will receive free night lights. (If this will help the batters in Torre's lineup who are hitting under .200 to see the ball, then I support it.)


• The U.S. government has an official Earth Day website. The Feds may not be able to guard our borders, but they do provide us with an indispensable eco-liturgy such as "use the microwave to cook small meals" and "sweep outside instead of using a hose." Thank you, Saint George.

In other news, there is no word how Al Gore and his penguin army intend to spend the holy day.

Publishing venture aims to end retailer returns

HarperCollins is launching a new publishing unit that will aim to move from traditional author royalties and advances to more of a profit-sharing structure where authors get a piece of the bottom line. While innovative for a conglomerate, some independent publishers are already experimenting with this approach. But what's more interesting is that HC says this unit will also attempt to eliminate returns from retailers.

If successful, this could bring about some big changes in the publishing industry. Returns of unsold inventory have been a fact of life for publishers since the Depression era. While giving retailers the right to return unsold inventory for credit surely grants retailers more flexibility in some cases, it also puts a lot of financial risk on publishers. According to a respected industry overview (Publishing for Profit by Thomas Woll), in the 1990s returns of trade hardcover books averaged over 31% of all copies. This makes it very difficult to forecast how well a book will do, and it forces publishers to keep reserves against authors' royalties as a result.

If a conglomerate like HC is able to make headway in developing a no-return model, other publishers would surely seek to follow their lead. This would give the big brick-and-mortar retailers a strong incentive to collaborate on moving away from the current system. I think this would be a winner for many publishers and authors. It could even help retailers, as well. The article notes that "several years ago, Steve Riggio, CEO of Barnes & Noble, said in an interview that he would like to be able to mark down books rather than returning them." This would give retailers more pricing flexibility to maximize cashflow, something they currently lack -- and of course discounted books would benefit consumers.

Only time will tell if this idea is to gain any traction in the publishing industry. I think it has potential, though.

Willey account praised

Michael New reviews Kathleen Willey's book, Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton, in today's edition of FrontPage. As he points out, it is not just a rehashing of past events, but rather a story with significance for the current presidential election.

Thoughts on the Fed trying to clean up its own mess

David Wessel of the WSJ has an excellent column today entitled "Ten Days that Changed Capitalism" that explains the significance of the recent steps undertaken by the Federal Reserve and Bush Administration to address the current financial crisis. To sum it up, Wessel quotes economist Ed Yardeni: "The Government of Last Resort is working with the Lender of Last Resort to shore up the housing and credit markets to avoid Great Depression II."

Wessel certainly makes some good points. It may be too early to tell how all of this will play out. While government involvement in the economy via the central bank or Treasury is generally undesirable and will most certainly have long-run unanticipated consequences, I am sympathetic to Fed Chair Ben Bernanke in one regard. He inherited a mess that his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, played a large role in creating. Greenspan's manipulation of interest rates following 9/11 caused a distortion in the free market, injecting excess liquidity that largely made its way into real estate and set the stage for a bubble.

In a way, it's deja vu all over again. As I wrote in my book The PayPal Wars, we saw the same drama play out eight years ago in Silicon Valley. Currency market "contagion" in the late '90s had been the catalyst for Greenspan's interest rate roller coaster, and tech stocks were the asset class that was taken along for the ride. That bubble burst as rates were rapidly jacked up by the Fed after it had concluded a period of aggressive cutting. Sound familiar?

Wessel makes the point that capitalism might be profoundly changed by this current crisis. And that seems possible. But can the Fed's policy of using interest rates in Keynesian fashion -- to "stimulate" the economy -- really be called a form of capitalism? It seems more like central planning than the Invisible Hand. But I doubt that any of the presidential candidates, and certainly not Hillary or Obama, will cite this crisis as a reason for less government meddling in the economy.

Americans oppose mortgage bailouts

A majority of Americans oppose federal assistance to homeowners who borrowed more than they can afford. A Rassmussen Reports survey indicated that 53% disapprove of Washington taking action, while 29% support it. Also, contrary to the liberal stereotype that conservatives favor big business, the poll suggests Republicans are more likely than Democrats (by 68% to 53%) to oppose bailing out the banks who made bad loans.

It will be interesting to see if this skepticism of federal handouts holds up should the mortgage crisis worsen. Over the past week, investment banks have averaged $32.9 billion per day in borrowing from the Federal Reserve's new emergency lending facility. No doubt Hillary and Obama will be ratcheting up their calls for command economy solutions to address the problem, but hopefully the American people will remain skeptical.

Making our nation proud

Three cheers to the soldiers at Fort Hood for making a sick child's wish come true. You guys are amazing.

A Good Friday meditation

He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53: 3-6)

As the economy stumbles and terrorists bray new threats, take heart, my friends. The world is broken and evil is most real, yet the endgame is in motion. We are actors in this grand drama, but the script has already been written. And the Author penned for Himself the most shocking, unsettling, and important role in the entire story.

China blocks YouTube -- how will Google respond?

In the wake of the uprising in Tibet, reports indicate that China is blocking its citizens from accessing YouTube. According to the AP:

Access to YouTube.com, usually readily available in China, was blocked after videos appeared on the site Saturday showing foreign news reports about the Lhasa demonstrations, montages of photos and scenes from Tibet-related protests abroad.

How will Google, YouTube's parent company, respond? Readers of my blog will recall that I've previously criticized Google and other Silicon Valley companies for assisting Chinese censorship by restricting search results (see here and here). Now that one of Google's most valuable web properties is being blocked, will it stand up to the dictators in Beijing or seek to accommodate them by removing the related videos?

Audacity of hate: Obama and his spiritual mentor

WND reports more disturbing news about Barak Obama's spiritual mentor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr:

The Chicago minister ... said in a January 2006 sermon at his alma mater, Howard University, "America is still the No. 1 killer in the world. … We are deeply involved in the importing of drugs, the exporting of guns and the training of professional killers."

Speaking at the Washington, D.C., school's Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel, Wright said, "We started the AIDS virus. … We are only able to maintain our level of living by making sure that Third World people live in grinding poverty."

And apparently this is not the only instance in which Wright has blamed the United States for manufacturing the AIDS virus. This comes on the heels of yesterday's revelation that in a 2003 sermon Wright urged his congregation to say "God damn America." Wright has also drawn fire for giving a humanitarian award to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, and for saying that America brought the 9-11 terror attacks upon itself.

When asked about Wright's "G-damn" sermon yesterday, Obama rebutted, "...I think it's important to judge me on what I've said in the past and what I believe." Which, of course, is true. Obama's beliefs are what matter. But Obama is a candidate who is trying to remain a tabula rasa upon which American voters should project their own hopes and aspirations; we cannot say for certain what all of his beliefs are. This begs the question: to what degree to Wright and Obama see eye to eye on this issue? Does Obama share his pastor's apparent disdain for the country he now seeks to govern?

Only God knows what is in Obama's heart, but his ties to Wright are worth considering as we attempt to learn more about this political newcomer and presidential front-runner. Rev. Wright has been Obama's pastor and spiritual mentor for two decades. He married Barack and Michelle, and baptized their daughters. Obama's second book, The Audacity of Hope, was inspired by Wright, and Obama himself told the Chicago Tribune last year that Wright was his "sounding board." And Wright has a formal role on Obama's campaign. Politico's Ben Smith reports that Wright serves on the campaign's African American Religious Leadership Committee.

Without a doubt, Wright is an influential part of Obama's life, both private and public. Even if Obama does not agree with his mentor that the U.S. is "the No. 1 killer in the world," creator of the AIDS virus, and deserving of damnation, he obviously must not consider Wright's worldview to be too offensive. How else can one explain the role he's given Wright in his life? It's not ignorance. It's incomprehensible to assert that glimmers of Wright's worldview were not visible to Obama over the past 20 years. (One doesn't choose a "sounding board" because he stays silent, and the reverend is not exactly hesitant about voicing his politics from the pulpit.) So even if he did not directly hear Wright drop "G-damns" on America, Obama surely heard him voice the beliefs that served as the basis for those condemnations. To assert otherwise, you'd have to assume that Obama is either lying about his ties to Wright, or he has no idea of the beliefs of his advisors.

So Obama must've been at least aware of Wright's extreme and hateful beliefs, yet he did not consider them problematic. And Obama's defense that Wright is like "an old uncle who sometimes will say things that I don't agree with" rings hollow. If President Bush had ever mused about appointing someone like David Duke to his campaign, surely the outcry would have been rightfully deafening, and it would've been the end of Bush's political career. Or consider a real-life example from earlier this week. Geraldine Ferraro had to quit Hillary Clinton's campaign because of her assertion that Obama's ethnicity benefited him at the polls. No one has made a convincing argument that Ferraro herself is a racist, but the Obama campaign charged that the comment was. The ensuing fracas compelled Ferraro to step down.

Obama may very well conclude that he needs to have Rev. Wright follow Ferraro's lead, but such a public repudiation seemingly would just be for show, given that Obama has sought counsel in private from an extremist for 20 years.

Not that Rev. Wright's opinions sound dissimilar to Michelle Obama's. It was widely reported that last month the candidate's wife proclaimed to a Milwaukee audience that "for the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback." Later that day she told a Madison crowd, "For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country … not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change." These repeated statements prompted Peggy Noonan to ask, "Are the Obamas, at bottom, snobs? Do they understand America? Are they of it? Did anyone at their Ivy League universities school them in why one should love America? Do they confuse patriotism with nationalism, or nativism?"

The questions still stand, Senator Obama. We, the people, await your response.

"The campaign of soft jihad"

FrontPage ran an important article yesterday calling out the danger of Islamofascists abusing multiculturalism to bring about "sharia creep" or "soft jihad" into Western institutions. The game plan is that Muslims push for seemingly harmless ad hoc rule changes to accommodate their religious practices at places such as universities, hospitals, and swimming pools. But as Richard Kimble of The New Criterion is quoted as explaining, this tactic is not about tolerance: "Traditional jihad is waged with scimitars and their contemporary equivalents, e.g., stolen Boeing 767s, which make handy instruments of mass homicide. Soft jihad is a quieter affair: it uses and abuses the language and the principles of democratic liberalism not to secure the institutions and attitudes that make freedom possible but, on the contrary, to undermine that freedom and pave the way for self-righteous, theocratic intolerance.”

WFB, you will be missed

William F. Buckley, founder of the National Review, has died at the age of 82.

His numerous accomplishments ("Firing Line," Young Americans for Freedom, New York's Conservative Party, the many bestsellers including God and Man at Yale) defy eulogy. But his legacy is much bigger than his curriculum vitæ .

Buckley was the first post-New Deal articulate voice of mainstream conservatism. Decades before conservatism won its first national election in 1980, Buckley had the vision to "stand athwart history, yelling 'Stop' at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who urge it."

While I never had the pleasure of meeting him, I am sure that I would not have founded World Ahead Media, much less now be a part of WorldNetDaily, without the inspiration of this man.

Thank you, sir. Godspeed.

Pro-choice...on light bulbs

Joseph Farah's column today calls on Americans to resist the effort by Congress to rob us of our right to choose incandescent light bulbs. Few people know it, but late last year Congress passed an energy bill banning the sale of inexpensive and safe bulbs starting in 2012. After that point we will have no choice but to purchase compact fluorescent bulbs, which cost about 6X as much and contain small amounts of toxic mercury. In response to this nanny state measure, Farah unveiled a magnetic bumper sticker to drive the point home:

Trail Thoughts

I wanted to recommend a new daily devotional that I'm enjoying. It is called Trail Thoughts: A Daily Companion for Your Journey of Faith, and it's written by Eric Kampmann, who runs our distribution partner Midpoint. Unlike most devotionals, this one isn't sappy or cheesy. It's thought-provoking and makes no effort to wrap up the Bible into a small package with a cute little bow. Instead, Kampmann focuses on the big picture of Scripture while challenging readers to examine their place in God's world. He chooses a very apropos verse for the introduction:

This is what the LORD says: Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. (Jeremiah 6:16)

That's what Trail Thoughts is all about -- finding that ancient path as revealed by God. If you prefer some happy fluff to end your day or want straightforward "how to" advice, this book probably isn't for you. But if you're looking to be challenged and exposed to a wide array of topics with a biblical perspective, you will enjoy it.

We feel your pain

I don't like listening to her, either.