Yesterday, the Huffington Post dipped its toes into the world of progressive publishing by launching its own books vertical.

PBC is proud to partner with Huffington Post on this project, and today our chairman, Gov. Dean, and CEO, Elizabeth Wagley, have a post on the site that makes a strong argument for a robust infrastructure to support progressive authors and ideas:

Conservatives have long understood the power of books, not only as smear bombs but as weapons of ideological domination. Mounting their counter-offensive over the past three decades, they placed books at the center of their plans for promoting right-wing ideology. So a quarter-century after The Other America came Charles Murray’s Losing Ground, a broadside attack on government action against poverty and discrimination. The Murray tome represented a deliberate plan by executives at the Olin, Bradley and Smith Richardson foundations, who knew that money invested in creating, publicizing and distributing books would have an explosive impact in the war of ideas.

Publication between hard covers lends validity to ideas and thinkers like no other medium, even for the most outlandish proposals and ideologues. The late Michael Joyce, who headed both the Bradley and Olin Foundations and was known as the “godfather” of modern right-wing philanthropy, once explained: “Books are the way that authors put forth more substantial, more coherent arguments. It follows that if you want to have an influence on the world of ideas, books are where you want to put your money.” The same principle applies at the grassroots, where consumers vote with their book-buying dollars to promote politicians and pundits as well as their ideological preference.

That is why progressive consumers and organizations must become just as avid as conservatives in buying and supporting their favorites. Books represent a critical front in the war of ideas and a means to ensure that we keep progressive ideas and values at the center of the national debate.

The launch of Huffington Post Books is timely.  Democrats may dominate in DC, and conservative thinkers may argue that their own movement is intellectually bankrupt, but conservative authors are more popular than ever.

The  San Francisco Chronicle recently reported on this phenomenon.  Focusing on the upcoming release of Sarah Palin’s memoir, Going Rogue, the Chronicle noted that Palin’s  presales have catapulted her book to #1 on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, ahead of even Dan Brown’s latest pop thriller.  What’s more, Palin’s book enjoys the company of a number of other conservative books that dominated the best seller lists in September, including new titles from Glenn Beck and Michelle Malkin:

These are boom times for conservative authors.

Michelle Malkin’s “Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks and Cronies” spent weeks at No. 1 on The New York Times nonfiction list. Sales have been strong for Dick Morris’ anti-Obama “Catastrophe” and the reissue of “The Five Thousand Year Leap,” by W. Cleon Skousen.

And Sarah Palin may top them all.

[...]

“Movement conservatives are voting with their dollars to endorse the values they believe Sarah Palin represents,” says Twelve publisher Jonathan Karp, who has published books by McCain and by a liberal favorite, the late Ted Kennedy, whose “True Compass” came out last month.

“In a similar way, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin and Mark Levin provide an opportunity for ideologically motivated consumers to see their views validated. It’s the political equivalent of attending a Grateful Dead concert. Pure and simple, it’s market democracy.”

Birthers, Tea Baggers and conservative activists of all stripes are out there in force, validating the fringe ideas of people like Beck and Palin.

For 30 years, the conservative movement has subsidized its authors, and driven their ideas to the center of the public debate.  As Governor Dean argues, if the left is to effectively push back, and keep those ideas on the margins of public discourse, where they belong, we need to mimic the conservative movement and vote with our pocketbooks.

It’s high time that progressives established an infrastructure to support progressive authors that can match that of the Right.  We welcome Huffington Post and their contributions to building that platform and supporting progressive authors and ideas.