John McCain’s campaign manager Steve Schmidt (right), told Politico that charges about him in Sarah Palin’s new book are “made up.”

Schmidt, Palin writes, was “grim-faced” and “cool,” and tried to pin the campaign’s troubles on what he claimed was Palin’s post-partum depression, and even went to so far as to try and dictate her diet.

According to excerpts…, Palin “took in his rotund physique and noted that he used nicotine to keep his own cognitive connections humming along.”

“I’m a forty-four year old, healthy, athletic woman raising five kids and governing a large state, I thought as his words faded into a background buzz. Sir, I really don’t know you yet. But you’ve told me how to dress, what to say, who to talk to, a lot of people not to talk to, who my heroes are supposed to be and we’re still losing. Now you’re going to tell me what to eat?”

Palin complains in the book about McCain’s aides smoking,  about Schmidt using “the f-bomb” in front of her child, Piper, and about being kept from talking to the press aboard the campaign plane.

“Aboard the campaign plane I was within twenty-five feet of reporters for hours on end. Headquarters’ strategy was that I should not go to the back of the aircraft and talk to the press,” Palin wrote, according to an excerpt that appeared Friday on the Drudge Report website. “At first this was subtle, but as the campaign wore on, [campaign aides] Tracey [Schmitt] or Tucker [Eskew] would call headquarters to request permission, and someone in DC would respond, ‘No! Absolutely not—block her if she tries to go back.’”

Funny that at the same time she complains about being kept from the press she says she was “pushed” to do the Katie Couric interview. Palin says campaign adviser Nicole Wallace (right) “pushed for Katie Couric and the CBS Evening News” because “Katie really needed a career boost.” Former campaign strategist John Weaver disputes this characterization.

“Sarah Palin reminds me of Jimmy Stewart in the movie ‘Harvey,’ complete with imaginary conversations. All books like these are revisionist and self-serving, by definition,” Weaver wrote in an email to POLITICO. “But the score-settling by someone who wants to be considered a serious national player is petty and pathetic.”

Palin’s account is also disputed by former McCain campaign manager Mark Salter (right).

Reflecting on the first set of interviews Palin did as the GOP vice presidential nominee, Salter said that the sit downs were “discussed and agreed to by senior members of the campaign staff in consultation with the candidate” and that Wallace did not choose either the journalists or the outlets Palin spoke to.

“Nicolle Wallace, along with others, was tasked with helping the Governor prepare for some of her interviews. She did not decide which interview requests the candidates would accept. Nor was she tasked with securing the candidates’ agreement,” Salter said.

Sarah Palin says she doesn’t believe in evolution, as pointed out in the New York Times review of her book.

Elsewhere in this volume she talks about creationism, saying she “didn’t believe in the theory that human beings — thinking, loving beings — originated from fish that sprouted legs and crawled out of the sea” or from “monkeys who eventually swung down from the trees.” In everything that happens to her, from meeting Todd to her selection by Mr. McCain for the Republican ticket, she sees the hand of God: “My life is in His hands. I encourage readers to do what I did many years ago, invite Him in to take over.”

During the 2008 presidential campaign she was at odds with McCain adviser Steve Schmidt on the issue:

“But your dad’s a science teacher,” Schmidt objected. “Yes.” “Then you know that science proves evolution,” added Schmidt. “Parts of evolution,” I said. “But I believe that God created us and also that He can create an evolutionary process that allows species to change and adapt.” Schmidt winced and raised his eyebrows. In the dim light, his sunglasses shifted atop his hear. I had just dared to mention the C-word: creationism. But I felt I was on solid factual ground.

However, in 2006, Palin said both evolution and creationism should be taught in schools.

Karl Rove believes President Obama bowing to the Japanese emperor is “inappropriate,” saying the bow is part of the president’s “world-wide apology tour.”

George W. Bush, however, seemed a bit more intimate with the world leaders with whom he consorted:

Isn’t it the Republicans who tell us they love the troops more than us anti-American liberals?  But it’s GOP Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, also a physician, who is obstructing a health care plan for veterans.  The legislation, which has bi-partisan approval (with the exception of Coburn), would provide long-term home health care for the wounded.

The urgently needed legislation consolidates more than a dozen improvements in veterans’ health care — most notably a new assistance program for family members who wind up providing lifelong home nursing to severely disabled veterans. These vital caregivers — who sacrifice careers and put huge strains on their own mental health — assume an obligation “that ultimately belongs to the government,” Senator Daniel Akaka, the bill’s chief sponsor, properly notes.

The measure also expands benefits for women veterans who suffered sexual trauma on duty, extends veterans’ care in rural areas, tightens quality control at V.A. hospitals, and ensures that catastrophically disabled veterans will not be charged for emergency services in community hospitals.

The omnibus legislation drew unanimous committee approval. But Senator Coburn objected to quick floor passage, demanding that the five-year, $3.7 billion cost be offset with immediate budget cuts. The senator’s argument rings hollow in the face of veterans’ suffering and the world of deficit budgeting brought on by his party’s tax cuts and zealous war investments.

But do they worry about budgets and costs when it comes time to send our treasure off to war?

Would he have chosen her to be his running mate, then?

Alexis Hutchinson, an Army Specialist, is being told either go to Afghanistan or be court martialed, even though she was told she’d be granted extra time to find care for her 11-month-old son.

Hutchinson, of Oakland, California, is currently being confined at Hunter Army Airfield near Savannah, Georgia, after being arrested. Her son was placed into a county foster care system.

Hutchinson has been threatened with a court martial if she does not agree to deploy to Afghanistan on Sunday, Nov. 15. She has been attempting to find someone to take care of her child, Kamani, while she is deployed overseas, but to no avail.

Hutchinson is scheduled to fly to Afghanistan where she would face a special court martial. She could wind up with a sentence of one year in jail. Hutchinson is not a conscientious objector trying to avoid service but a woman whose family can’t care for her child because of their own health issues,  genuinely trying to find proper care for her son.

Family members of 9/11 victims make the case for observing our Constitution and how our criminal justice system should be the vehicle to achieve justice. (h/t Mediaite)

When President Obama bowed to the Saudi king he came under fire, and now he is experiencing the same disdain from the right for bowing to Japan’s Emperor Akihito.  Of course, it was lack of respect for other cultures that diminished America’s standing in the world during a previous administration.

Senator Joe Lieberman gave Sarah Palin support and encouragement during the 2008 presidential campaign, according to her new book (h/t The Plum Line).

She does single out some who during the campaign offered support and encouragement, specifically Sen. Joe Lieberman, a close friend of McCain. Prior to a key debate in which the prep advice was becoming overwhelming, Lieberman urged her to “Be yourself,” she writes. Sen. Lieberman then added: “Don’t let these people try to change you. Don’t let them tell you what to say and how to think.”

Palin takes a shot at Katie Couric:

“I have had better interviews,” Palin writes, noting “I choked on a couple of responses, and in the harried pace of the campaign, I mistakenly let myself become annoyed and frustrated with many of her repetitive, biased questions.”

But rather than take responsibility for her performance in that interview, she plays the victim:

…she believed it was cut in such a way as to purposely make her appear uninformed and out of touch. She had been told that the interview experience would be “mellow,” while focusing on “balancing motherhood and my life as governor.” Instead, she writes, she was victimized by a strategy designed to show her in the worst light.

“When I saw the final cut, it was clear that CBS had sought out the bad moments, and systematically sliced out material that would accurately convey my message,” she writes. “The sin of omission was glaring.”

The book’s dedication gives a shout-out to patriots, freedom, soldiers, and war with a dedication to “all Patriots who share my love of the United States of America. And particularly to our women and men in uniform, past and present–God bless the fight for freedom.”

While the right would have you believe that the families of  those who lost loved ones on 9/11 are horrified by the decision of Attorney General Eric Holder to conduct trials for alleged terrorists in civilian courts, many families support the move.

“If you’re afraid of terrorists, then they’ve already won. It’s poetic justice,” said John Feal, who lost half his foot at Ground Zero and now is pushing to help other survivors of 9/11. “Bring ‘em to New York, and hang ‘em from the Statue of Liberty.”

“It is too bad there are no federal death chambers in New York City,” said Kenneth Specht, a former FDNY lieutenant.

“This allows for justice to come full circle,” Specht said. “Though the attacks against this country, against this city, were planned on the other side of the world, and [9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik] Mohammed was captured in Pakistan, he will face justice in the city that bore the brunt of his hate.”

“I don’t know what took them so long,” said Glen Kein, a former emergency services cop who spent 700 hours at Ground Zero.