Inside the Beltway

SQUAWK PATROL

The caterwaul of criticism will rise to fever pitch against one particular conservative goddess in the next 24 hours.

“We’ve already seen the disdain for Sarah Palin which certainly fulfills Carrie Prejean’s observations about a tougher standard for conservative women. It’s sure to get worse this week as Palin launches her book tour,” the Media Research Center’s Brent Baker tells Inside the Beltway.

“Setting the stage, Sunday on ABC, the New York Times’ putative conservative columnist, David Brooks, derided Palin as ‘a joke’ and a ‘talk show host’ as the rest of the men on the ‘This Week’ roundtable piled on, leaving it to PBS’ Gwen Ifill, hardly a conservative, to point out: ‘As the girl at the table, I feel like I can say you cannot underestimate the degree to which women will be drawn to her story’ ,” Mr. Baker observes.

“Ifill’s realization reflects how liberals, who can see beyond their reflexive revulsion toward Palin, recognize Palin’s no joke and could be a very powerful political force.”

YOU BETCHA

Simple says much at times. Mrs. Palin, by the numbers:

7: Number of bookstore appearances this week.

5: Number of TV appearances.

991,735: Number of Facebook “friends”

17,169: Number of followers at twitter.com/SarahPalin USA

4,331: Number of news stories referencing “Going Rogue” on Monday, according to Google.

LAST LAUGH

Whether the hoity-toity book critics like it or not, Americans like their “righties.” Amazon released its top 10 books for 2009, the list topped by “The Last Symbol,” Dan Brown’s sequel to “The Da Vinci Code”.

In second place: Mark Levin’s “Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto”, and in third place “Glenn Beck’s “Common Sense: The Case Against an Out-of-Control Government.”

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