Regnery Publishing

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Unfit for Command, published by Regnery Publishing.

Regnery Publishing, located in Washington, D.C., is a publisher that specializes in conservative books that they characterize on their website as “contrary to those of 'mainstream' publishers in New York.”^[1] The company has been a division of Eagle Publishing since 1993.

1 History
2 Controversy and criticism
- 2.1 Ben Domenech
3 Publications
- 3.1 The Politically Incorrect Guides
4 Notes
5 External links

[edit] History

It was founded in 1947 as Henry Regnery Company by Henry Regnery, and was originally located in Chicago, Illinois. It originally had a close affiliation with the University of Chicago, and published books for the Great Books series at the University, which were primarily classics. The first book published by Henry Regnery Company was the The German Opposition To Hitler by Hans Rothfels, who was a close friend of Henry Regnery. Among the first well-known books it published (in 1951) was God and Man at Yale by William F. Buckley, Jr..

In the 1970s Henry's son, Henry F. Regnery, worked at the company; he was killed in a commercial airliner crash. In the 1980s, Alfred S. Regnery, the other son of Henry (Henry F. Regnery's brother), took control of the company. In the 1990s, the Regnery family sold the publishing company to Phillips Publishing, which put the book publishing company into its Eagle Publishing subsidiary. Eagle Publishing also publishes the weekly, Human Events. Alfred Regnery has subsequently left his post as President of Regnery Publishing to become the publisher of the conservative American Spectator magazine. He still holds a seat on the Board of Directors. Pat Sajak is also a member of the board. Alex Novak, son of political columnist Robert Novak, is director of marketing.

[edit] Controversy and criticism

Regnery has become noteworthy, apart from actual authors of its books, because of its unusual penchant for political controversy with a high profile on the national stage. It recently launched a series of books titled "The Politically Incorrect Guide to" [multiple subjects), deliberately confronting the assumptions of the nation's elites, sometimes negatively described as political correctness. Former Regnery officials have described its marketing strategy as getting its conservative books condemned by the New York Times, generating very large sales to conservatives as a result.

In June 2004, Regnery agreed to publish Unfit for Command by former Swift Boat Veteran John O'Neill and veteran author Dr. Jerome Corsi. Television advertisements about Presidential candidate John Kerry's criticisms of U.S. soldiers and his own military record in Vietnam were unveiled nationwide at about the same time as Unfit for Command was released, creating shortages of the book in bookstores nationwide. The book exceeded 1 million copies in print.

The Kerry campaign demanded that Regnery cease publication and distribution of Unfit for Command, claiming inaccuracies in the book about John Kerry's war record and anti-war activities at home. Regnery responded by offering to print and distribute a reply book by John Kerry, suggesting "Winter Soldier" on the same subject matter which Kerry authored in the 1970's.

In describing Regnery's position in the publishing world, Nicholas Confessore, then writer for the liberal American Prospect, said,

Welcome to the world of Regnery Publishing—lifestyle press for conservatives, preferred printer of presidential hopefuls, and venerable publisher of books for the culture wars. Call it—gracelessly but more accurately—a medium-sized, loosely linked network of conservative types, with few degrees of separation and similar political aims. Just don't call it a conspiracy.^[2]

Regnery has published books by authors such as Newt Gingrich, former Republican Party Chairman Haley Barbour, Barbara Olson, and Ann Coulter.

Carl Ernst, an academic scholar of Islamic studies, claims that the Regnery Publishing is 'promoted and supported by right-wing organizations, who are perpetuating a type of bigotry similar to anti-Semitism and racial prejudice.' For example Ernst complains that Robert Spencer, whom Ernst views as a Islamophobe, publishes some of his books through Regnery. ^[3]

Regnery Publishing has put out many controversial books. For example, in The Secret Life of Bill Clinton (1997), its author British journalist and former Washington Bureau Chief of the Sunday Telegraph Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, "manages to connect the president to everything from 1997's Oklahoma City bombing to Arkansas's drug underworld to the mysterious death of White House aide and longtime Clinton friend Vince Foster, and, of course, to Paula Jones."^[4]

[edit] Ben Domenech

In 2006, Regnery editor Ben Domenech resigned under pressure for repeated plagiarism, even though this occurred in his writing outside of his Regnery duties. Domenech was first accused of appropriating a chapter from P.J. O'Rourke's 1990 book "Modern Manners" for an editorial in The Flat Hat, a weekly student newspaper at William and Mary.^[5] O'Rourke denied Domenech's claim that the humorist had granted permission to use his words, adding that he couldn't recall ever meeting the college student. ^[6]

Domenech resigned from his editing duties at Regnery Publishing on March 21, 2006. ^[7] ^[8] Wonkette subsequently cited an unnamed source at Regnery who said that the Post affair gave Regnery convenient cover for getting rid of a poor performer who neglected his editorial responsibilities to make connections and advance his political career. The source alleged that he displeased Michelle Malkin by removing a 27-word passage from her book Unhinged ^[9], but Regnery production staff denied this, saying the omission was a "layout error" and not Domenech's fault.

[edit] Publications

Books published by Regnery include:

Aldrich, Gary. Unlimited Access. ISBN 0-89526-454-4.
Horowitz, David. Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left. ISBN 0-89526-076-X.
Davis, Mark and Tyrrell, Emmett. Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House. Regnery Publishing, 2004 ISBN 0-89526-067-0
Evans-Pritchard, Ambrose. The Secret Life of Bill Clinton Regnery 1997, ISBN 0-89526-408-0
Malkin, Michelle. In Defense of Internment: The Case for "Racial Profiling" in World War II and the War on Terror. ISBN 0-89526-051-4.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks. 1996 reprint: ISBN 0-89526-710-1. Translated with an introduction by Marianne Cowan.
Nugent, Ted. God, Guns & Rock and Roll. Regnery Publishing, Inc. (September 25, 2001) ISBN 0895261731 (316 pages)
Olson, Barbara. Hell to Pay: The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton. ISBN 0-89526-274-6.
O'Neill, John E.; & Corsi, Jerome E. Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry. ISBN 0-89526-017-4.
Patteron, Robert. Reckless Disregard: How Liberal Democrats Undercut Our Military, Endanger Our Soldiers, and Jeopardize Our Security. ISBN 0-89526-086-7.
Schlafly, Phyllis. The End of an Era. ISBN 0-89526-659-8.

[edit] The Politically Incorrect Guides

Regnery Publishing created the bestselling Politically Incorrect Guide™ (P.I.G.) series to tackle a variety of topics in our society—issues that they believe have been hijacked by politically correct historians, academia, and media. They are not meant to be exhaustive, but rather a concise overview containing no more than 80,000 words in each book.^[10] The PIG to American History the PIG to Islam, and the PIG Guide to Science have been bestsellers.

Spencer, Robert The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (And the Crusades). 2005. ISBN 0-89526-013-1.
Woods, Thomas. The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History. 2004. ISBN 0-89526-047-6.
Bethell, Tom. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science. 2005. ISBN 0-89526-031-X
Lucas, Carrie L.. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Women, Sex and Feminism 2005 ISBN 1-59698-003-6
Wells, Jonathan. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design. 2006. ISBN 1-59698-013-3
Kantor, Elizabeth. The Politically Incorrect Guide to English and American Literature. 2006. ISBN 1-59698-011-7

Not Released

Johnson, Clint. The Politically Incorrect Guide to the South: (and Why It Will Rise Again). 2007. ISBN 1-59698-500-3
Christopher C. Horner. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming: (and Environmentalism). 2007. ISBN 1-59698-501-1

Regnery is a sister company of the conservative newspaper Human Events.