Authorized Iraq Study Group Report Hits Stores Wednesday

By Carmen 

The Associated Press reports that the only authorized edition of the Iraq Study Group Report, issued by the panel headed by James A. Baker III and Lee H. Hamilton, will be published by Vintage Books in paperback next Wednesday, December 6 – the same day President Bush and congressional leaders are to receive the bipartisan committee’s recommendations. “We’re thrilled to be publishing such a landmark report and will produce it with record speed to be sure it’s available to readers on the day that it makes news,” Anne Messitte, executive vice president and publisher of Vintage Books, said Thursday. The book will retail at $10.95, though the print run is still undetermined.

“I think interest in the Iraq report depends on what’s in it,” said Barbara Meade, co-owner of Politics & Prose bookstore in Washington. “I think it will sell better if there’s some dividing up of the blame for how we got into this in the first place, instead of just having scenarios for improving the situation.”