Track Palin to Mom: 'Don't Let the Jerks Get You Down!'
In "Going Rogue," Sarah Palin says son advised her not to quit as Alaska gov.
Nov. 14, 2009 -- Before Sarah Palin resigned as governor of Alaska, her soldier son Track tried to talk her out of it, she reveals in her new memoir "Going Rogue."
"Are you going to let those idiots run you off?" Track Palin asked, according to the book. "You can't tap out!"
But the book suggests Sarah Palin resisted the advice of her son, who was serving in Iraq, in an attempt to shield her family from the media.
"He said, 'I know you, Mom. You want to protect us. You want to say, "Screw this, I won't put my family through this."' Track did know me," Palin writes.
Get ready to see a lot more of Sarah Palin in the coming days. "Going Rogue," which has been topping Amazon's lists for weeks now, is officially in bookstores Tuesday. But ABC News was able to purchase a copy of the 413-page memoir Friday -- and Palin herself sat down with ABC News' Barbara Walters for a series of interviews.
Tune In: Barbara Walters sits down with former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin for a five-part series that will begin airing on "Good Morning America" Monday, Nov. 17.
Even before its publication, the book has prompted controversy over its behind-the-scenes campaign trail details from her stint as the 2008 GOP vice presidential pick.
In addition, Palin describes how she arrived at her subsequent decision, also controversial, to give up the Alaska governorship despite her son's advice, which was: "Don't let the jerks get you down!"
"His view was that you don't quit. You don't violate your contract. There is pain, you push through it, you stick it out," she writes. "Then he brought it home: 'No dishonorable discharge. You only leave if it's honorable -- that means you move up to something more worthy.'
"Then it was my turn," she adds. "I asked him if he thought protecting Trig and his sisters was 'more worthy.' I asked if fighting through the bull so that I could reveal truth and fight for what is right for our state and our country was 'more worthy.' I asked if breaking free of the bureaucratic shackles that were now paralyzing our state was 'worthy.'
"I finally said out loud what I knew I had to do," she writes. "'I'm not a quitter, Track,' I finished. 'I'm going to fight. And that's the point.'
The book is not all politics. Palin writes about everything from moose eyeballs to her love of books, the importance of family, and how just before McCain chose her as his running mate, she was growing "impatient" with politics.
"Going Rogue" is titled after a term Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign aides used to use to describe Palin, the 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee, when she didn't follow directions. The term was further popularized by Tina Fey, who portrayed Palin on "Saturday Night Live."
