Ed Rollins doesn’t like Arianna Huffington. We know this. We also know that Ed Rollins got $ 1 million for his new book in part because he decided to attack Arianna Huffington — even though he worked for her husband’s senatorial campaign in 1994 and collected a great deal of money from it.
We know she is intending to sue Rollins for libel. We know, further, that Rollins hasn’t returned any of the money he made from the Huffingtons to the Huffingtons, despite his great disgust with them and his pleasure at his own client’s defeat.
But was this outrageous behavior really necessary? At a CNN party on the night before the convention, Rollins’s 22-year-old assistant aggressively approached Mrs. Huffington bearing a copy of Rollins’s book, Bare Knuckles and Back Rooms. An inscribed copy. “To Arianna, with love from Ed,” read the inscription.
“Ed really wanted you to have this personally,” the aide said. To her great credit, Mrs. H. remained cool. “I really don’t have my hands free,” she said. “Please give it to my assistant Terrell.”
“No,” the aide replied, “Ed insisted I give this to you personally.”
“Well, I appreciate that,” Arianna calmly returned service, “but I wouldn’t know where to put it at the moment. Terrell will take it.”
Finally, the aide relented, handed the book to Huffington’s assistant, and left.
“That’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen,” said one onlooker. Others could not really disagree.
