Atlanta Journal-Constitution Covers Boortz’s Crusade
A new article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, “Sales of Boortz book spike as interest in fair tax increases,” is somewhat significant if only because this is Boortz’s hometown newspaper — a publication he criticizes from time to time on his radio program.
While unflattering towards him as a person, the article seems fair enough overall, and includes a sidebar with an accurate distillation of the FairTax’s objectives.
It provides some interesting background about Boortz and the new book:
Boortz, 60 and a fixture on Atlanta radio for more than half his life, is doing all he can to pump up sales of the new book. For weeks he has promoted the book on his nationally syndicated radio show, which airs locally on his home station, WSB-AM. Since the book came out, he’s been rushing around the Southeast urging listeners and crowds at book signings to get on board.
His 4 million weekly listeners — 480,000 of them in metro Atlanta — make for a national audience significantly smaller than that of Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh. Now Boortz has the kind of book credentials those bigger-name talkers enjoy. He’s expecting to get some mileage out of it, winning converts for the tax plan and perhaps persuading more radio stations to carry his show, though he says that’s not why he wrote the book.
By the way, a Georgia congressman co-authored “The FairTax Book,” but that’s in finer print on the cover. In fairness, Boortz often gives credit to the congressman, John Linder (R-Ga.), a longtime friend who for years has unsuccessfully pushed legislation that would switch the federal tax structure to a national sales tax. Boortz says he has backed federal consumption tax ideas for more than 20 years.
As the authors tell it, the idea for the book bubbled up when Linder’s wife suggested the two men stop yapping about the tax and start writing.
Boortz put on hold another book he had been working on — “Somebody’s Gotta Say It” — which he hints might include an entire chapter about The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, a publication he enjoys skewering. Cox Enterprises, the owner of the Journal-Constitution, also has a controlling stake in Cox Radio, which owns WSB.
And this information about how Boortz and Linder approached writing the book:
On “The FairTax Book,” Boortz and Linder each wrote sections and then swapped their work for the other to fix.
“Neal’s streams of consciousness were not entirely accurate,” Linder says. “[And] I would write stuff that was pretty damn boring.”
Boortz says he tried to persuade the publisher, ReganBooks, to make his and Linder’s names the same size on the cover. But the talk show man in him understands. “More people know me than him,” Boortz says. “My name will sell more books than his.”
See the full article for more information.
