'Going Rogue' by the numbers: Sarah Palin's missing index has been found!

We salute Slate and the New Republic, whose quick-thinking staffers decided to produce an index for Sarah Palin’s bestselling book, “Going Rogue: An American Life.”  Some had speculated that Palin decided not to put an index in the back of her book to thwart the traditional "Washington read," which involves standing in a bookstore searching the index of a newly published tome for your name or the names of friends, enemies and/or frenemies.
   After reading the independent indices, we conclude that authors and publishers must be careful what they stint on. An independent index, it turns out, is more than a simple alphabetical listing of content. It’s a powerful analytical tool, as you will see from our excerpts of both versions:

Baby shower at shooting range 76
Bridge to Nowhere 237
“Captive” of McCain campaign 261
Caribou lasagna 218
“Change,” on originating campaign slogan before Obama 114, 225
Clinton, Hillary, Palin’s non-accusations about whining of 287
Couric, Katie Lack of knowledge about energy issues 207, 273; Low self-esteem of 256; As “lowest rated news anchor in network television 270; Unfair editing of interview with 272-275, 279; Lack of national pride 279

Obama did consider Hillary as VP but Bill Clinton's presence quashed it, Obama ex-aide says

Yes, it's holiday book-buying time in the publishing industry. But before we get to Sarah Palin's rogue book in two weeks, we have David Plouffe's audacious book.

You'll remember him as campaign manager for that also audacious Illinois guy who creamed the Palin-McCain Republican ticket last year, talking about change to believe in and transparency.

Tempting little out-of-context pieces of the Plouffe book, "The Audacity to Win," are beginning to leak out (well, actually, in the book business, they're pumped out by promoters).

Plouffe says he and David Axelrod, now an Obama White House advisor, were surprised how seriously their boss considered Hillary Clinton as his vice presidential running mate over the old Senate guy from Delaware he eventually chose just before the Democratic National Convention in late August.

Plouffe reportedly says Obama insisted her name be on the initial list after the Democratic primaries were settled in early June and kept it there into early August.

But, Plouffe writes, Obama then said to him, "I think Bill may be too big a complication. If I picked her, my concern is that there would be more than two of us in the relationship." Our concern is that this sounds rather stilted for real campaign chatter. But such a thought was also a prominent theme in media speculation at the time: Could the two recent competitors operate together with the ex-prez always in the background?

Judging by the energy and verve the former first lady shows in the State Department job she eventually got, talking politely and firmly to folks all around the world on behalf of the United States and Obama, things worked out pretty well this way.

Come to think of it, though, Plouffe's account conflicts starkly with the latest version that ultimate choice Joe Biden told just the other day, as The Ticket reported here.

At a Democratic dinner in Pennsylvania 10 days ago, Biden said he initially turned down Obama's VP offer. But, Biden recounted, the persistent future president asked him again two months later and Biden finally acquiesced after eliciting a promise that Obama really meant real change.

That version, however, would put Obama's alleged opening offer to Biden somewhere around mid- or late June, when Plouffe has Clinton's name on a longer list with others. Unless somebody is misremembering ...

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: CNN (not the best body language between the future Democratic teammates during the 2008 primary season)

Michelle Obama's gift to lure G-20 spouses to Pittsburgh

What if you gave a party in Pittsburgh, and no one came? (Because, well, it's Pittsburgh.)

That wouldn't look good for President Barack Obama, hosting a major foreign summit, the G-20, there this week.

So how about an enticement, like a free gift? It works on late-night TV. And that's traditional anyway for the host/hostess of these gatherings of elite sophisticated international folks, with all their secure vehicles idling outside while the big shots go indoors away from the tear gas to discuss once again improving the environment. Also our finances.

As comedian Jimmy Fallon will say in his late-night monologue tonight, the main topic of discussion among the foreign leaders is, Why Pittsburgh?

The Obama administration learned a lesson earlier this year during Giftgate, when it presented British Prime Minister Gordon Brown with a toy helicopter and a set of classic American movie DVDs in a format that won't work in Britain. Thanks for stopping by.

Handing out Pittsburgh Terrible Towels would require knowledge of American sports or, worse, Pittsburgh teams, and that would be, well, terrible.

So First Lady Michelle Obama settled on giving some china to the spouses. Here's how the White House describes the china:

A one-of-a-kind porcelain tea set, White House honey and a honey vase designed exclusively for the occasion of the Pittsburgh Summit 2009. The platinum and purple porcelain design of the teacups is classic and contemporary, and inspired by the gold and purple White House china that President and Mrs. Lincoln used in 1861.

The use of platinum on the saucer symbolizes Pittsburgh’s steel industry roots; the use of purple is the color of the state flower of Illinois, the purple violet, home states of both Presidents Lincoln and Obama. The porcelain is one of a kind and made by a century-old family business in Illinois.

A rose in the bottom of the teacup represents both the official flower of the United States and the American beauty rose, the official flower of Washington. There is a delicate three-flower bouquet that sits in the well of the saucer. It consists of the purple violet, the state flower of Illinois; the mountain laurel, the state flower of Pennsylvania; and a rose, the national flower.

The White House honey produced for this occasion came from the First Beehive, located on White House property near the First Lady’s White House Kitchen Garden.

Also, there's a dinner at John Kerry's wife's farm, with all the Heinz ketchup you can eat.

So would that be sufficient to get you to Pittsburgh?

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: White House

Ted Kennedy successor: It's Paul Kirk

(UPDATE: 1:10 p.m. The Boston Globe has come up with an interesting item: Six things you didn't know about this guy, in case you want to know them now that he's an appointed somebody.)

Paul Kirk -- former staffer to Ted Kennedy, former chairman of the Democratic National Committee -- was the choice by the Kennedy family to succeed the man known as the Lion of the Senate. He may even have been Kennedy's personal choice as the Massachusetts senator struggled against brain cancer and lobbied the Legislature to allow an interim appointment.

Today, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick made it official, naming the head of the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation as the interim senator before a special election in January to fill the vacancy left by Kennedy's death in August at the age of 77.

In remarks following the governor's announcement, Kirk said he hoped to be "a voice and a vote for his causes and his constituents." He promised to retain Kennedy's staff, calling them "talented and hard working." And, pleasing legislators who were reluctant to approve the bill, he pledged not to seek re-election.

After brief remarks by Patrick and by Kirk, the state's now-senior senator, John Kerry,  spoke the longest.

-- Johanna Neuman

Photo: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library

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Mrs. Paterson to Mr. Obama: Butt out

Embattled New York Gov. David Paterson has a wife named Michelle too, and she came out swinging today at the Obama White House.

Paterson became governor after Eliot Spitzer resigned amid a prostitution scandal. With his poll numbers down and still-popular former New York Mayor Rudy Guiliani lurking in the wings to challenge Paterson, the White House sent word to Albany that perhaps Paterson could fall on his sword for the party and just forget to file his re-election papers.

Today, in a series of interview with the Big Apple's panting news media, New York's First Lady Michelle Paige Paterson said it was wrong for the White House to get involved.

"David's the first African American governor in the state of New York and he's being asked to get out of the race. It's very unusual and it seems very unfair," she told the New York Post. "I never heard of a president asking a governor not to run ... I don't think it's right."

During a trip to upstate New York on Monday, President Obama told Paterson, according to Michelle Paterson, that he was "a little chagrined about how the White House handled the message."

The person who delivered the message -- New York Democrat Gregory Meeks -- said today he only laid out the case for retirement but didn't push. "All I was doing was telling a friend what the issues are that are out there," the Queens congressman told the Daily News. "It's up to him."

No matter how clumsy the message delivery system was, maybe Mrs. Paterson has a point. Maybe Obama should stay out of Paterson's backyard and worry about his own poll numbers.

-- Johanna Neuman

Photo: New York First Lady Michelle Paige Paterson. Credit: James Keivom / New York Daily News

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Edward Kennedy's sons say his memoir held surprises

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A memoir written by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy hit bookstores this morning. And to promote it, his eldest sons hit the morning talk shows.

The book, "True Compass," reveals details about the senator's life that even they didn't know, his sons told NBC's "Today" show and ABC's "Good Morning America." Among the revelations were confessions about Edward Kennedy's failed marriage, his pain over the deaths of his three brothers, and his role in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne at Chappaquiddick, Mass.

Rep. Patrick Kennedy told NBC's Matt Lauer that the incident at Chappaquiddick motivated his father to work hard his entire life to atone for his mistakes.

“I think he spent his life trying to work to make up for his failings,” Patrick Kennedy said.

In 1969, Edward Kennedy drove off a bridge into a pond at Chappaquiddick, a small island off Martha's Vineyard. The young senator swam to safety and left his passenger, Kopechne, in the car. Kopechne, a young campaign worker, died there. 

In his memoir, Kennedy wrote that his actions that night were inexcusable.

"I made terrible decisions," he wrote. "Atonement is a process that never ends."

Kennedy's sons said the late senator, who died last month, rarely revealed his emotions to his family. But in "True Compass," he opened up about how he dealt with the assassinations of his brothers John and Robert in the 1960s.

Of Robert F. Kennedy's assassination at a hotel in Los Angeles, the late senator wrote, “My mind went black."

"Life and politics went on," he wrote. "But not in the same way. Not for me. I was shaken to my core.”

The senator said that he was traumatized by the assassinations, and was startled by sudden noises -- such as fireworks or rifle volleys at military funerals -- for the rest of his life.

-- Kate Linthicum

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Ex-N.Y. gov Eliot Spitzer, once caught up in prostitution ring, eyes comeback

He's back.

Once known as Client 9 in an indictment that busted up a prostitution ring, then New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer was identified as the man who paid $4,300 for a Mayflower Hotel rendezvous with escort Ashley Dupre. When the news broke, he resigned his office as governor.

That was in March of last year. Ever since, he has worked in his father’s real estate firm. More recently, he has started to burnish his credentials as a financial expert -- you may recall that Spitzer, as New York attorney general, terrorized Wall Street executives by threatening corruption prosecutions. These days, he's making occasional appearances as a commentator on cable news shows and writing for Slate magazine. Also going to Yankees games with his wife Silda, seen with him in the photo above at the  Aug. 25 Texas Rangers game. Sort of Rehab 101 for politicians chased from office by scandal.

Now, according to the New York Post, Spitzer is eyeing either a run for state comptroller general or a challenge to New York Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand, appointed to fill out Hillary Clinton’s term.

Calling Spitzer “the hooker-happy Democrat,” the Post quotes friends as saying that the former governor is citing recent polling that shows him more popular than the man who replaced him, his onetime lieutenant governor David Paterson.

For the record, Spitzer – who was never charged with a crime -- disavows any intention of running. Sort of.

"If by politics you mean running for office again, I've a hard time seeing politics as a career. I wouldn't want to put my family through the agony," he told Vanity Fair magazine in its July issue. "But that doesn't mean I can't participate somehow in the public debate about the issues."

Still, says the Post, a lot of those around the former governor figure it's only a matter of time before he returns to the ring. "There are people around him who want to see him [in office]," one unnamed source told the tabloid. "He sees himself there too. He loves to be in the limelight."

-- Johanna Neuman

Photo credit: Associated Press

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Vicki Reggie Kennedy: lawyer, widow, next U.S. senator from Massachusetts?

Time Magazine has called her “The Woman Who Saved Ted.”

Now, though she has said she is not interested, pressure is mounting on Victoria Reggie Kennedy to save his agenda -- serving as interim senator from Massachusetts until January when a special election is planned to fill the seat held by her husband, the late Edward Kennedy.

 Connecticut Democrat Chris Dodd, one of Kennedy’s closest friends in the Senate, said on Sunday that "whatever Vicki wants to do, I'm in her corner. She brings talent and ability to it, and to fill that spot I think is something the people of Massachusetts would welcome. We could certainly use her in the Senate."

The marriage of Ted Kennedy and Vicki Reggie in 1992 was a union of two political dynasties, the Irish Catholic Kennedys and the Lebanese Catholic Reggies.

Vicki’s family hailed from Crowley, La., where her father, Edmund, was a longtime judge, banker and political insider and her mother, Doris, was a former Democratic National committeewoman – and the only member of the Louisiana delegation to cast a vote for Teddy Kennedy at the 1980 convention.

Many credit Vicki with steadying Ted Kennedy politically and personally and more recently, with organizing his treatment for brain cancer. “It was as if the good Lord had sent her,” former Sen. John Warner, a close friend of Kennedy’s, told Politico.com.

Less known is that she was also a political confidant – critical in his 1994 reelection against a 47-year-old multimillionaire named Mitt Romney. Ted Kennedy was facing a well-funded, viable opponent. Things looked grim.

Vicki Kennedy, a corporate lawyer, was suspicious of Romney's claims that he had created a lot of jobs as a venture capitalist and urged the campaign to investigate the more likely outcome in takeovers: mass layoffs. The resulting ads turned the race around.

In his last days, Ted Kennedy urged the Massachusetts Legislature to change the state’s law so that a caretaker senator could serve in Washington, a Democrat who could help President Obama enact healthcare reform. Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick has signaled his support for the idea, and the Democratic-majority legislature shows every sign of going along too.

As for Mrs. Kennedy, she has eschewed the political spotlight – until now, when political insiders such as Utah's Orrin Hatch are urging her to reconsider.

"I think Vicki ought to be considered,” Hatch said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “She’s a very brilliant lawyer. She’s a very solid individual. She certainly made a difference in Ted’s life, let me tell you. And I have nothing but great respect for her.”

 If she does serve, Vicki Reggie Kennedy might bring a needed sense of irony to the job.

 In recalling her courtship with Ted Kennedy, who was 22 years her senior, Vicki Kennedy told biographer Adam Clymer that the senator mentioned his low approval ratings – then in the mid-40s -- over dinner one night. Her reply: “Oh, wow, I’ve never gone out with anybody whose approval rating wasn’t at least 48.”

-- Johanna Neuman

Photo: Reuters

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Jenny Sanford says you-know-who is a you-know-what

South Carolina’s moved-out First Lady Jenny Sanford has been seeking help and support from her pastor -- and is spending some quality talking time with a therapist.

And what she’s discovered, according to reports of an interview in the upcoming September issue of Vogue magazine, is that her estranged husband is an addict.

That’s right: Gov. Mark Sanford might as well face it, he’s addicted to love. Remember earlier this year when the South Carolina Republican was not off traipsing the Appalachian Trail on nude hiking day but was actually in Buenos Aires doing something else with a female e-mail friend there?

In the Vogue interview, Jenny Sanford compares his out-of-control lust for Argentinian Maria Belen Chapur to the compulsions of an alcoholic or someone who can’t stay away from the XXX channels. 

“Over the course of both pastoral and marriage counseling," Jenny Sanford is said to have said to the magazine, "it became clear to me that he was just obsessed with going to see this woman. I have learned that these affairs are almost like an addiction to alcohol or pornography. They just can’t break away from them.”

Uh-huh.

Sanford moved out of the governor's mansion last week, and her astute husband, showing a keen grasp of the obvious, allowed as to how his political days are over.

In Vogue, Jenny Sanford goes on to say: “It never occurred to me that he would do something like that,” and that when she and the gov first met, there was more the warm glow of camaraderie than the wild flames of passion. 

She understands the desire to escape the pressures of living in the spotlight: “I’d like somebody 5,000 miles away I could e-mail. It’s not exclusive to men, but I know that isn’t realistic.”

She’s open to salvaging her marriage: “All I can do is forgive. Reconciliation is something else, and that is going to be a harder road. I have put my heart and soul into being a good mother and wife. Now I think it's up to my husband to do the soul-searching to see if he wants to stay married. The ball is in his court.”

She’s feels bad for the other woman: “I am sure she is a fine person. It can't be fun for her, though I do sometimes question her judgment. If she knew the newspaper had those e-mails back in December, why did she want him to come in June? But I can't go there too much. All I can do is pray for her because she made some poor choices."

Pray for her? Really?!?

Just once, it’d be great if one of these women who’s been dragged through the media circus by her unfaithful partner were to say something along the lines of, “Yes, I still love him. Yes, I’m hurt and angry and stunned. Yes, I want to club him and his chippy with this baseball bat. Yes, this bat. The one I’m holding right now.” You know you want to hear that, too.

And by the way….Vogue? This is where a woman betrayed goes to unburden her soul? Tucked between the fragrance ads and the breathless exuberance over the fall clothing trends?

Guess so. The issue hits newsstands next week. Cue the Robert Palmer soundtrack...

-- P.J. Huffstutter

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Photo: Associated Press

At last, Bill Clinton speaks out about that angry Hillary video

You no doubt remember the Ticket item earlier this week on Hillary Clinton visibly bristling at a public forum in Africa when a translator passed on an audience member's question as "What does your husband think?" instead of "What does your president think?"

Watch this video now:

Don't mess with HRC, right?

When she said it, her husband, the ex-president, was celebrating his birthday in Vegas, you remember, the wild Nevada city where the current president said Americans shouldn't go to spend taxpayer dollars.

Anyway, today the folks over at CBS' "Inside Edition" got an exclusive interview with Bill Clinton about the episode. And rushed over a news release.

Here it is:

Inside Edition’s Les Trent: “Have you seen the video from Africa?”

President Clinton: “No, I haven’t.”

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Associated Press