This is delicious. An open letter to CPAC is appearing on numerous conservative websites:
Ann Coulter used to serve the movement well. She was telegenic, intelligent, and witty. She was also fearless: saying provocative things to inspire deeper thought and cutting through the haze of competing information has its uses. But Coulter’s fearlessness has become an addiction to shock value. She draws attention to herself, rather than placing the spotlight on conservative ideas.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2006, Coulter referred to Iranians as “ragheads.” She is one of the most prominent women in the conservative movement; for her to employ such reckless language reinforces the stereotype that conservatives are racists.
At CPAC 2007 Coulter decided to turn up the volume by referring to John Edwards, a former U.S. Senator and current Presidential candidate, as a “faggot.” Such offensive language–and the cavalier attitude that lies behind it–is intolerable to us. It may be tolerated on liberal websites but not at the nation’s premier conservative gathering.
The legendary conservative thinker Richard Weaver wrote a book entitled Ideas Have Consequences. Rush Limbaugh has said again and again that “words mean things.” Both phrases apply to Coulter’s awful remarks.
They just don’t get it, do they? Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter are the same visible, high profile, symptom of the problem with what is modern ‘conservatism.’ Throw in Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Dinesh D’Souza, and the rest, if you still don’t understand.
CPAC and the ‘conservatives’ can do their best to attempt to extricate themselves from the mess that is the current Republican party, but it is little more than a transparent run from the mess they, in large part, created. It was the self-styled ‘conservatives’ who pushed Terri Schiavo. It is the self-styled ‘conservatives’ who want to blame everything on immigration and liberals. It is the self-styled ‘conservatives’who use gay bashing and gay marriage as election year issues every year. It is the self-styled ‘conservatives’ who think supporting the troops means Purple Heart band-aids mocking John Kerry and claiming that “just a few bad apples” are responsible for the Abu Gharaib mess. All those things and more find ample support at the members of CPAC- look at the blogs who attended.
The problem isn’t that Ann Coulter said what she said- because in all honesty, the notion that saying an offensive word can get you into rehab is, in and of itself, pretty funny. Were it just a play on past political correctness, it would have been very humorous. But it wasn’t, and the reason her comments are a problem is that the majority of the ‘conservative’ movement is dominated by people who think there is something wrong with homosexuality and that there are few things worse than being a “faggot.”
And let’s be real. While some in the crowd were apprehensive when she made the remarks, perhaps recognizing the political difficulty this would create, a good number applauded. Ann Coulter is, at this point, a known quantity (especially after the raghead remarks last year), and she delivered what they knew she would deliver. Where were the complaints in advance of her appearance?
There were none that I am aware of, and this is just damage control. An open letter isn’t going to solve the real problem with the conservative movement. And hell, the authors can’t even write this letter without sniping at liberal websites. Ann Coulter is not the problem- she is a symptom of the problem.
Full disclosure- I used to like Coulter and still like reading Coulter in one sense- as a cranky SOB, I do enjoy people who manage to piss off that many people. It is Rush’s one good quality in my opinion. One good trait (in my opinion) does not, however, undo the damage they and those like them are doing and have done to our politics.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
As someone else has noted, years ago the keynote speaker before CPAC was Ronald Reagan. Now, it’s Coulter. Talk about declining standards…
Tim F.
Next year, Randall Terry will kill a hostage.
Jake
When you have to quote a man who uses words to make fun of the disabled, thou art in deep doo-doo.
I thought the letter was funny in a Look at the Rats Run sort of way. I’m not sure if anyone buys this bout of the vapours, including the person[s] who drafted the letter. The radicals who have taken over the conservative movement can’t disavow Ann or D’Souza or the rest of the Shock Jocks. They’ve whittled their base down to the basest of the Republicans and this is the sort of shit that appeals to that crowd. Are they going to feel remorse over a little finger wagging and pointing (at the lefties)? Sure, right after I give the mAnnequin from Hell a big wet kiss.
p.lukasiak
personally, I think that Andrew “Dice” Clay had his stomach stapled 10 years ago once his career went in the toilet, had a sex change, and started a new career as Ann Coulter. Same initial….
The Other Steve
I’m not aware of Ann Coulter being tolerated on any liberal websites.
I’m curious though. Why now? Coulter was fired from the National Review years ago for saying far worse. She’s been all over talk radio, the television and such since then. Every year she appears at cult gatherings like CPAC and says far worse.
So why now? Why do conservatives start distancing themselves now?
Did the butt kicking November finally wake them up to the fact that Americans are fucking tired of their style of politics?
The Other Steve
Naw. Clay was kind of funny. Coulter is just insulting.
chopper
wow, they got us there. us liberals, always calling people we don’t like ‘fags’ and ‘ragheads’.
Steve
Every time Coulter makes one of her controversial comments, there seems to be a pattern where all the conservative blogs scurry to denounce her, but every single comment section fills up with people going “No way!” “Ann was right!” “Why have you gone over to the dark side?” The cheering audience at CPAC is of a piece.
I personally don’t care if the Republicans all love her. That’s their decision. But what bothers me is how you can simultaneously say all these offensive, out of the mainstream things and yet remain a mainstream figure. Fluffy nonpartisan sources like the Today Show will still invite you on to make those zany controversial comments of yours. It just makes no sense why the vast mainstream of moderate America wouldn’t simply leave her to one side where she belongs, and if people on that side choose to cheer, then fine.
Tsulagi
I think what the 28%ers don’t get is that they are the joke now. Their party too. A bunch of brain-dead incompetents who will hold congressional investigative hearings less than 24 hours after a nipple is flashed on TV and debate whether it should be taught in schools dinosaurs were Adam and Eve’s pets 6,000 years ago.
They’re a joke, and they’re pretty much making their party in their image. Coulter’s remark? Just another little reinforcement of that.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
For a perfect example of the action/reaction described above, read this, and the resulting 235 commentssuch as:
cd6
You Moonbats just can’t handle that Ann Coulter tells it like it is.
The MSM should spend less time focusing on Ann Coutler’s WORDS and more time focusing on John Edwards’ clearly undeniable FAGGORY.
cd6
As a follow up, I think we should spend less time pooh-poohing Ann’s choice of words, and should look at the SUBSTANCE of what she said.
Note that not even John Edwards came out to clearly say “I am a heterosexual.” Clearly, the onus is on him to prove he’s straight, possibly by doing his wife while Nancy Grace looks on with a camera crew.
The Left is just bitter than Ann Coulter told John’s little secret. Next thing you know, we’re going to learn all about all the 16 year old Puerto Rican boytoys Johnny E must have locked up in his closet. That would be typical of the hypocritical left: dishonest to the core.
dreggas
Coulter and Limbaugh and the rest are the face of the republican party at this point period. The republicans used to brush aside limbaugh as being just a “entertainer” then they realized people were becoming “ditto-heads” and they tacked toward Limbaughs ideology. Then along come the Malkins and the Coulters and the Republicans tack towards their racist and bigoted message, why? Because it got out the bigot and racist votes, it got their “base” out. The base were the hard core ideologues, religious nut-jobs, and bigoted racist assholes spread across this country.
They got just what they wanted out of these people and now it’s coming back to bite them in the ass when they wanted to look like they were inclusive and friendly. In the end it didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know, the underbelly of the republican party, the so-called base, is the most intollerant of them all.
But rather than show that underbelly for what it really is the so-called “conservatives” use projection and take all that is wrong with their movement and their base and cast it onto their opponents because they won’t face the facts that they are still in the dark ages.
This is what the republican party has turned into. A craven cabal of talk show hosts and shrill columnists who appeal not to what makes America great but to the most base of our tendencies, they appeal not to our intelligence, for surely our intelligence would be insulted. They appeal to our fears and to our emotions, our anger. They give us “enemies”, rather than saying we need to work on us they tell us it is the fault of someone else, the gays, the minorities, the liberals. They tell us it is anyone but us to blame.
There is no party of “Reagan” anymore, what once was the idea of the shining city on the hill has now been strip mined by greed and corruption and left to fester as nothing more than a swamp of the most vile gasbags serving over a desolate land and appealing to our darkest thoughts.
Zifnab
Ew ew ew ew ew! Listen, I’m all for a good bit of conservative commentary and I’m definitely about a good joke (plug for Daily Show!) I get as big a kick watching South Park rip on George Cloney emitting “smug” and San Fransiscoians sniffing their own farts as I do watching Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson make out in cartoon form on Family Guy. (Man, I think I might be watching too many cartoons). But Coulter and Limbaugh aren’t just insulting, they’re boring. Every time I get tired of Indie Pop and NPR, I flip on some talk radio, and its the same sad shtick each and every fucking time. “Blah blah, Liberals suck. Blah blah, I hate California. Blah blah, Nancy Pelosi, blah blah, gays, blah blah, mexicians, blah blah, they want to take our freedom!” “What’s that caller? An on air-blowjob? But I’ve already received, like, three of them in the past hour. Well… ok. Yeah, that feels nice. You’re a great American.”
It’s just soooooooooooooo lame. And that’s before you get to the apolorea. Highlight of Limbaugh’s career – “I’m tired of carrying water for these guys!” Funniest thing he ever said.
dreggas
Have to agree with Zifnab here. I see coulter’s stupid column show up in yahoo opinion near daily but just can’t bring myself to click on it. Believe me I will be the first to be non-pc when it comes to humor and have told my fair share of what the PC police would call “tasteless” “out of line” jokes but her and Mr. I took a trip to trinidad with a pocketful of viagra but didn’t use it while I was there Limbaugh cross the line from bad taste into vile stupidity.
Richard 23
John Edwards Feeling Pretty.
Towards the end you see him fluffing his hair gazing loving into his cute little compact makeup mirror. Like a nervous girl before her big date.
But he’s not gay. And even if he were, it’s not a bad thing.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
Richard,
Does vain now equal teh ghey?
Teak111
She must be about to release another book. Who cares. John sounds like Daily Kos after the 2004 elections, when they would rag on the dems for being out of touch on defense and Iraq (which I (a dem) still think they are). We’ve come to a postiion where niether party is worth a damn. Currently, the GOP is in decline but the Dems will soon follow. What needed in both parties are smart people, but smarts and politics don’t seem to mix these days.
numbskull
dreggas, you seem to be saying that Reagan was all about the shining city on the hill. Uh, who made up the Cadillace-driving welfare queen of the projects?
No, this appeal to the lowest common denominator by Republicans started a long, long time ago, about the time that LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act of ’64…
maf54
Let me recommend going into rehab for alcohol abuse.
Jake
I don’t think the target audience is ready for intense analysis the Federalist Papers.
dreggas
Don’t get me wrong, I know full well what a fucktard Reagan was just look at what happened to people with AIDs in the 80’s back when it was a “gay disease”. I meant that more sarcastically in the sense of talking about this country with the lofty idea of being some shining city on the hill when they’ve pretty much tarnished that image for a long time. I personally can only speak from the 80’s to now since I wasn’t around prior to the 80’s. The rhetorical point of the shining city on the hill was to take one of their sacred cows and proceed to butcher it for them.
dreggas
To add to the above Reagan was, at least in public, somewhat gentile in his speech and did not sink nearly to the level that George Bush and company have, at least not from what I have seen. However with the ascent of the “moral majority” (a complete oxymoron if ever there was one considering they were nothing more than a hate fest which they justified with the bible) during Reagans tenure I would say it really started going downhill from there. Again I can’t speak of what happened pre-80’s at least not from personal experience.
Zifnab
See, I’ll give that funny points. It’s a touch subtler than screaming “fag” in a crowded theater. Why couldn’t they have played this at CPAC? At least then they could have had an excuse to laugh.
Should be working
The comments on Town Hall are interesting, I think merely agreeing with something that might possibly be (oh no!) “liberal” — or, in this case objecting to something that “The Left” ™ objects to — is on par with High Treason to much of their commentariate.
Tsulagi
That video was funny!
But at least John Edwards, son of a poor miner, combs his own hair. Manly. Unlike a certain beady eyed silver-spoon brat who has hired help do that.
Actually, if Bush combed it himself, I could really see him fucking that up too. Even Trump would laugh at him.
RSA
No one could imagine a guy who colors his hair and uses makeup being the President of the United States. . .wait, what am I saying? Being a Democratic President of the United States, maybe.
Richard 23
Ali-G interviewing Newt Gingrich. I think Brownback should do this. It’s a good way to expose the youth to the conservative message in a way that bypasses their liberal brainwashing. Yo peeps, this here’s Sam my man Brownback.
But who is this Ali-G fellow though? Is he with Al-Jazerra?
chopper
“ask for the ‘onion loaf’.”
Steve
Oy! The word you are looking for is “genteel.”
Nikki
Uh…no…it isn’t. You’ve got an interesting sense of humor there, John.
John Thullen
“Rush Limbaugh has said again and again that words mean things”
Yes, when he compares Chelsea Clinton’s looks to a dog’s, it means he will do anything and say anything to get his tax rates cut.
When Ronald Reagan referred to the shining city on a Hill, he meant he would do and say anything to get his tax rates cut.
When Ann Coulter calls Edwards a “faggot” and Marc Levin of the National Review calls Alec Baldwin “buttboy”, it means they will do anything and say anything to get their tax rates cut … and that they hate gays and would harass them on the streets like Nazi punks harassed Jews on the streets in 1934 Germany if they can do it via a speech to like-minded shits like Richard Vigurie and ilk, or via a telephone call-in to a talk show. Remember, Nazis had the courage to harass gays and Jews in person.
When conservative websites display faux outrage at Coulter’s remarks, it merely means that her words might mean that the sorry denizens of those sites might not receive further tax relief from their hated government if even one percent of the country is turned off by the Republican Party and votes for the Democratic candidates.
Words mean something.
dreggas
no one said I could spell everything right.
Da Bombz Diggity
Ann Coulter has been nothing but consistent, ever since she gained popularity, much like Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh. I remember shortly after the first time I heard Ann Coulter on television, she was invited to my college by the republican students. Now, I feel the same way now as I felt then. I don’t have a problem with republican speakers. I just have a problem with racist, homophobic, disrespectful, and hateful speakers (who call themselves republican). When Coulter came to my college, she offended my friends who were of middle eastern and south east asian decent. Many students walked out of the auditorium or argued with her during question and answer period. The same racist terminology she used then is the same that she uses now. She is entirely predictable and as an invited guest to CPAC, she represents their hateful views. If to be a republican means to be a racist, then I want no part of it. I have said many times that holding conservative political views has been co-opted and redefined by the popular individuals in the republican party as racist, homophobic, and hateful views. We need civility in debates and in politics. Civility can only be achieved when people take a more socratic approach to thinking and ditch the wildly uncontrollable sporadic bursts of unintelligible rambling that has no experimental basis. Politics should not be a breeding ground for fringe philosophical beliefs. When today’s popular republicans enter the debate, this dog-eat-dog politics becomes more and more insurmountable with the real issues and debates being shoved under the carpet.
Richard 23
Maybe this is a photoshop, but I wouldn’t be surprised. It is CNN and all. And a moonbat website.
CNN caption: “Ann Coulter’s Ugly Crack.”
Nice double entendre there, CNN.
Rome Again
Oh yes, that’s delicious. Thank you so much John. My only qualm, Coulter is NOT an SOB, she’s got the wrong equipment for that. Therefore, she’s just a cranky bitch!
dreggas
prove that the “equipment” wasn’t installed after the factory built equipment was removed and she wouldn’t be an SOB right now the jury would be out ;)
Mike
So John, are you finally admitting that this is the reason you keep Darrell around?
If so, then I don’t understand this next bit.
Do you not see the damage people like Darrell are causing to our politics? Are you willing to let them destroy the village to save it, as it were?
ThymeZone
And I love you too, man!
dreggas
I would posit that the public is starting to become as numb to the smear tactics of these idiots as they are to the color coded terror alert system. Idiots like those mentioned are actually doing more harm to the republican party than the politics overall (save for those in control). Of course they are feeding their rabid base (something they like to project onto Dems) and making the base oh so important. Well the base is just like Coulter et al. so let them go ahead. They can continue to shoot themselves in the foot which is what it appears they are likely to do.
Pooh
Political Chemo, if you will.
jdw
Ann Coulter, I would call her a whore but I don’t want to insult prostitutes.
The longer Republicans make her their cheerleader the more elections they will continue to los.
So I say hooray for Ann Coulter and the republican gang of bigots. Keep it up and show the rest of America what the republican party is all about, bigotry, intolerence and hatred. Good for you.
dreggas
An excellent comparisson. The cancer was there and has simply spread and is rearing its ugly head, the end result is not pretty but that’s what the republicans get for nurturing the cancer vs. treating it with large amounts of radiation.
Rome Again
Hilarious, but I don’t think so. I think she just got her father’s adam’s apple, that’s all.
Hey, I got my father’s bushy eyebrows (My eyebrows were reminiscent of Brook Shields when I was a teen), it can happen.
ITD
I’m sure this has been said, but I just can’t get over the nuttiness of the RW trying to make some sort of point about… something by going after liberal pottymouths. Well, first of all, pottymouth is an art. (Like the time my dad called my grandad “The Prick of Misery,” when he lost a hand of cribbage. I’m still laughing about that.)
So, what I can’t stop thinking about is the plain fact that it’s scarier when the RW gets ugly, because they put their money where their mouths are. Not only do their elected officials get up on the house floor and talk about hanging people, they actually hang people when they get the chance. (Gay bashers, bomb throwers, lynch mobs, snipers, militias, torturers, teen boot camps, assassinators, catch the wetback by the toe games… what am I missing?) But somehow they have a point to make in exposing liberals as more likely to respond to this lifestyle obscenity with vulgar language? What is that point, exactly?
dreggas
Oh not saying it can’t but if anything she is the scarecrow from the wizard of oz’s love child most likely. For all her talk of tofu loving liberals she looks like she should eat a steak or 20.
bpower
Imagine what she’ll have to say in 4 or 5 years to produce the desired effect. Can’t wait :P
dreggas
Actually maybe not so incrdible. Heck even George Will is in on this and what better inside source than another winger?
dreggas
Will that be before or after the aliens land in Washington? Of course if the Mayans and the Chinese I Ching is right we have about 6 years left until irrevocable doom hits so it might be moot anyway.
Wilfred
Oh. But when she said raghead and vomited out anti-Muslim bigotry did anybody give a shit? Of course not. I think it was Leo Rosten who defined a kike as “a Jewish gentleman who just left the room.” This is what the Christian right thinks about anybody but their own in-bred moron tribe. They’ve always been a bunch of racist, gay-baiting, Jew hating gangster scumbags. The only reason they show any remorse is because they believe they have a shot at the gay vote and gay people have become big political donors – otherwise gays are the people who’ve just left the room – Muslim-Americans never even get into the building.
Rome Again
Isn’t anorexia nervosa more a female thing?
dreggas
Eating disorders in general tend to be a female thing of course this is a direct result on popular cultures insistance on a barbie doll figure and other such crap I won’t go into at the moment.
Then again knowing some Transgendered people the onse who transition M to F do tend to try for the ultimate in model figures, ie stick thin.
The Other Steve
Modern Republicans have no ideology other than being against Liberals.
It does not matter if Liberals stand on the side of truth, justice and the American way. Repulbicans are opposed to it.
DougJ
I’ll tell you my problem — it’s not that Ann Coulter called John Edwards a “faggot”, it’s that in the world of Howie Kurtz and David Broder, some anonymous blog commenter using the word “cocksucker” is a bigger problem than Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh calling for the execution of Bill Keller, etc. etc.
That’s what I find strange. Ann Coulter _is_ funny sometimes — this isn’t about her, not to me. I don’t like her and I think a lot of what she says has no place in a reasonable public discourse. But that to me is secondary to the bizarre double standard that exists.
Mr. Furious
What the fuck is that shit?
Show me the liberal website that tolerates calling people “faggots.”
This is a job for Darrell if ever ther was one…
Baby Jane
Moonbat intolerance is destroying American values.
The Other Steve
and here I thought liberals were intolerant.
Darrell told me so.
Teak111
This administration really is a kangaroo court, third world government and all that that implies. Its as if a great corporation (maybe Proctor and Gamble) were taken over by a third rate CEO who stacked the boardroom with cronies intent on making money selling rightwing dreams while slowly sinking the company sock to nothng. I would invest in Amer only because it would be a good value and the crap CEO will be out the door soon. What we need is a smart leader/CEO, GOP or Dem, who knows his/her shit. 08 can not come fast thte enough.
Krista
Should they be shouting it from the rooftops?
I just think it’s pretty telling that the twenty-three-percenters see absolutely no middle ground between hardcore political correctness and being an offensive idiot. It’s pretty emblematic of the black-and-white mentality that so many of them display. Anything other than being offensive and hateful — well, that’s just being a PC pansy liberal. You just want to sit them down and very slowly and clearly explain that no…it’s called “having basic manners”. There’s nothing particularly “liberal” about not wanting to be a bigoted jerk.
Should be working
I actually got curious and watched Coulter on Hannity and Colmes… basically, she (and Sean Hannity) seem to conclude that everyone who attacks (i.e. disagrees with) her is a ‘typical liberal’. So I guess Hugh Hewitt is now a moonbat???
Andrew
I found that Broder’s writing to be suspiciously similar to the narrative found here.
Otto Man
Look, liberals, when a major conservative pundit like Ann Coulter calls for the bloodthirsty assassination of leading reporters, judges, and politicians, it’s clearly a joke. Only a humorless dhimmicrat wouldn’t get the humor.
But when hellokitty48 uses the word “shit” on Daily Kos, well, that is the end of Western civilization as we know it.
ThymeZone
Doug, nobody but other beltway types and blogosphere navel-gazers gives a flying fig about Broder and Kurtz.
They are about as relevant as Anna Nicole Smith.
Maybe less.
Rome Again
Perhaps that is what Bill Maher found attractive about her. Tain’t no liberals that will do anal, I guess.
Andrew
Perez FTW!
Punchy
I’d SOOOOOOOOOOO do Ann Coulter.
Richard 23
BooBooKitty would never say that word.
Rome Again
Perhaps, but what happens the next morning?
Andrew
Have you seen Species?
DougJ
That doesn’t sound gay.
Rome Again
ROTFLMFAO!
Richard 23
I’d so do Natasha Henstridge.
I’d SOOOOOOOOOOO consider shaking Ann Coulter’s hand.
jake
Are you familiar with the phrase “Coyote Ugly”?
Perry Como
Wear a glove. You could catch something.
DougJ
Apropos of doing Coulter, I thought this was funny:
Punchy
Apply the bandaids to her sore elbows and knees.
DougJ
Maybe true of Broder but not of Kurtz — he mixes in enough good reporting with his shillery that people tend to take him seriously.
Randolph Fritz
“I do enjoy people who manage to piss off that many people”
And this is part of how they pulled you in. Maybe, um, you need to look a bit more closely at this?
Richard Bottoms
Co-opted my ass.
From the days of the National Review editorializing on the side of segregation, to Goldwater opposing the Voting Rights Act, to Reagan supporting South Africa’s apartheid regime, to gay basing, to Ann Coulter this weekend, there is not shred of decency in the conservative movement nor has there ever been.
John Cole converted only after the bile and horror of what he once supported became so overwhelming he couldn’t stomach it anymore.
But in his heart and most likely in yours and others you long for days when you could grind liberals down for such foolish views on torture, the environment, and governmental competence.
As the dead stack up like cord wood and the injured rot in neglect, you can continue to comfort yourself believing that it was not always so, that somehow Bush has betrayed your ideals and the conservatism isn’t really just a stinking corpse.
Fuck conservatism.
Fuck Bush.
Fuck the GOP, every last one of them.
Sirkowski
I just puked a little in my mouth.
mclaren
“Conservatism” has mutated into openly calling for the murder of liberals. How did we get to this point? What drives these people? How is it possible that 1/5 of the population of the United States consists of raging sociopaths?
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/coulter_in_her_.html
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2007/03/normalizing-crazy-by-digby-glenn.html
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/03/02/cpac/index.html
It’s not just Ann Coulter. It’s the entire hysterical lynch mob misnamed CPAC:
Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) got the crowd cheering early in the day. “I have been called — my kids are all aware of this — dumb, crazy man, science abuser, Holocaust denier, villain of the month, hate-filled, warmonger, Neanderthal, Genghis Khan and Attila the Hun,” he announced. “And I can just tell you that I wear some of those titles proudly.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/02/AR2007030201619.html
Wow. Just…wow.
This isn’t “politics.” It’s a howling lynch mob screaming for the murder of their neighbors and their children and their friends.
That has nothing to do with “politics.” It’s a call for genocide. The CPAC isn’t a political entity anymore, it’s in Pol Pot territory.
The article bizarrely claims:
Ann Coulter used to serve the movement well. She was telegenic, intelligent, and witty.
Hwo does calling for the murder of people you disagree with “serve the movement well”? How does that work?
What is “witty” about publicly advocating the deaths of people whose opinions you don’t like? Is there some new definition of the term “witty” I haven’t heard in the Oxford English Dictionary?
Ann Coulter isn’t “witty” and she hasn’t been “useful” and she hasn’t changed.
“We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too, otherwise, they will turn out to be outright traitors.” — Ann Coulter, 2002 CPAC
How is that different from 2007? Ann Coulter has been screaming hysterically for the murder of people whose political views she doesn’t like ever since she started. She shrieked red-faced and apoplectic for the deaths
of people whose political opinions she disliked in 2002, and now in 2007 she’s shrieking red-faced and apoplectic for the deaths of people whose political views she dislikes:
“The only thing we need to decide is the method of execution [of liberals]” — Ann Coulter, interview at KSFO radio station, 2007
Ann Coulter has repeatedly urged the murder of people who disagrees with her:
“I prefer a firing squad, but I’m open to a debate on the method of execution.” — 12 July 2006 syndicated column “NY TIMES: Better Dead Than Read”
Moreover, there’s nothing new about hate-drunk Republicans eagerly calling for the murder of people whose political opinions they disagree with — Ronald Reagan was the original hatemonger. Reagan was the first member of the Republican party to openly call for the murder of people whose political opinions he disliked:
In 1967, Bonzo’s co-star called protesting students “brats,” “freaks,” and “cowardly fascists.” And when it came to “restoring order” on unruly campuses he urged:
“If it takes a bloodbath, let’s get it over with. No more appeasement!” — Ronald Reagan, 7 April 1970, one month before the Kent State massacre of unarmed students by National Guardsmen on 4 May 1970
In the aftermath of this mass murder, Bonzo’s co-star declared his remark was only a “figure of speech.” He added that anyone who was upset by it was `neurotic.'”
Bonzo’s co-star was the original lynch mob agitator in American politics. A figure of evil, Reagan was constantly drunk with hate, maddened by anyone who dared state political opinions different from his:
“A Hippie is someone who walks like Tarzan, looks like Jane and smells like Cheetah.” — Ronald Reagan, 1981
Bonzo’s co-star makes Ann Coulter look mild. Father Coughlin was an amateur compared to Reagan.
“Facts are stupid things.” — Ronald Reagan, 1988
“Why should we subsidize intellectual curiosity?” — Ronald Reagan, 1988
“One problem that we’ve had, even in the best of times, is the people sleeping on the grates, the homeless who are homeless, you might say, by choice.” — Ronald Reagan, 31 January 1984
“Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal.” — Ronald Reagan, 1976
“Trees cause more pollution than automobiles do.” — Ronald Reagan, 1981
“Unemployment insurance is a prepaid vacation plan for freeloaders.” —
Ronald Reagan
Source:http://www.cs.umb.edu/jfklibrary/e081280.htm
Ronald Reagan was the most venomous hatemonger in American political history. The poison that dribbles from the mouths of Ann Coulter and Rush LImbaugh and Michelle Malkin started with Bonzo the chimp’s co-star, whose public call for the murder of antiwar protestors gave us the Kent State massacre in 1970.
By what demented stretch of self-delusion can any sane person call Ronald Reagan’s hate-maddened diatribes “genteel”…?
How is publicly urging the murder of unarmed children ny national guard troops “genteel”?
Is there some new definition of the word “genteel” I’m not familiar with?
And why is anyone surprised or appalled by Ann Coulter? She’s the logical end result of Bonzo’s co-star. How has anything in the Republican party changed since Bonzo’s co-star first publicly urged the murder of your children in 1970? Reagan agitated for the murder of Americans whose political views he didn’t like in 1970, and Ann Coulter publicly urges the murder of Americans whose views she doesn’t like in 2007.
You tell me — what has changed?
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Me too, she’s purty.
Does anyone else think that Ann Coulter’s life is basically an elaborate, long-term spoof? Someday, after she retires, she’ll let us all in on the joke, and she’ll be remembered as one of the greatest artist/pranksters in American history.
I fervently believe this. It makes life in America substantially easier to endure if you write off the 23% as disgruntled ex-Dadaists out to embody some sort of new wave of early 21st century absurdism.
Frank
Krista- “There’s nothing particularly “liberal” about not wanting to be a bigoted jerk.” Sad. I can’t believe you haven’t learned better by now.
jenniebee
Yep, it’s all of a piece. They wear the stars and bars, but they don’t want it caught on film. Same thing with Coulter – they get a thrill from vituperating vicariously through her, but back off as soon as folks outside their little cabal start paying attention to it.
I had a dream a few months ago in which Bill O’Reilly, Geraldo Rivera and Rush Limbaugh revealed that they were actually a performance art group called Ce n’est pas un Creep. They had been trying to find what they called “the fourth Beatle” and had auditioned Jeff Gannon, Mark Foley and Ted Haggard, but couldn’t find anybody who could stay in character. They were closing down their act on the grounds that Rivera’s revelation of troop movements and Limbaugh’s drug use and sexcations had achieved a pinnacle of art they didn’t think they could top, and because the Colbert Report was making them lose count of the joke’s meta-levels.
In the press release, O’Reilly was quoted as saying: “Of course, I knew all along that it was a loofah.”
Punchy
Not so much as my view that she sits at home, drinking her one meal a week, and simply saying to herself:
“OK, how far can I take this? What, exactly, is the limit to what these righties will let me say? I’ve said “ragheads”, “faggot”, insulted Muslims in every way possible, insulted Islam, called Clinton gay….hmmmm….”
And tomorrow, she stands in front of the CPAC crowd in blackface holding a burning cross and calls Obama a n#gger–and the whole crowd erupts in a standing ovation.
Welcome to The New Republicans.
ThymeZone
Yeah, but all three of those people live in the same nursing home in Virginia.
ThymeZone
Oh no, Obama is not really black, you know.
metalgrid
To be fair, it’s quite evident that Democrats will throw gays under the bus the moment the Arab-American vote begins to outgrow the gay vote, just like how gays are currently thrown off the bus when African-Americans begin to throw a hissy fit.
Then again, you have Dinesh “I have more in common with terrorists” D’Souza extending the olive branch to the misogynistic, homophobic Muslems, so I’m gonna have to say that last part of your statement is a bit off too.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
But what if it wasn’t really a dream?…
I remember reading a New York Times story about her a couple years ago that basically said she’s nowhere near as bigoted in person, so this is also a possibility. Really, the two aren’t mutually exclusive.
Same as The Old Republicans.
dslak
There’s a difference between the Stars and Bars and the Confederate Navy Jack.
I would take the claims of crypto-racists who wave around the Navy Jack that they are just “being proud” of their heritage if they were intelligent enough to be using the actual Stars and Bars. Instead, they use a symbol that was delibrately used during the period of desegregation to symbolize Jim Crow. Either they’re ignorant of a very obvious aspect their heritage, in which case they can hardly credibly claim to be proud of it, or else they’re lying in order to cover their racism.
mrmobi
Nice rant, McLaren.
I would only add that Reagan ignored the AIDS pandemic, deregulated everything, busted the air traffic controllers union and, in general, was asleep the rest of the time.
I believe he was, in many respects, our first corporate president. Groomed by GE for eleven years. The perfect mannequin to occupy the office of POTUS while others took apart the country.
But at least he was witty. Wittier than man-Coulter, anyway.
These are some of the reasons why he was, for a time, the least popular living ex-president.
mrmobi
Oh, one more thing. Nothing has changed. John Cole’s hope that his party gets “sent to the woodshed” for 10 or 15 years is going to come true, at least as long as they embrace hate rhetoric, deny science and encourage the establishment of a religious state.
All Democrats should support people like man-Coulter. We should do our part to make sure that she is the face of the Party of Torture.
Zifnab
I thought that was because he had Alzeheimers. The Republicans dumped him in a nursing home with the rest of their parents.
Halffasthero
I read Rightwingnuthouse and am always surpised to see someone who actually takes the time to articulate his disgust at people like Ann so well. The problem is that he and “the right” have put up with her and figured she was “helping” to get the base out as someone here pointed out. Whether Rick himself believed it or not I don’t know. The point is that she is basically what someone cleverly described as a “controversy slut”. The fact that she was acting like one and it was serving the Republicans in helping to cower the dems made her a worthy product to promote. In the end however, she lives for being controversial and couldn’t give a damn what people think of her, right or left.
I read one post from another Republican who I thought I would copy here from Captains Quarters comments section – hope he/she doesn’t mind:
I don’t see that we have resorted to killing each other but I see his point that this is where this leads. I was also thoroughly impressed by the fact that he worded this so well. A lot of people here like to put down Republicans and clearly, after the last 6 years of anabling GWB, they deserve it. But don’t make the mistake that they are ignorant and uncaring. They just have a different point of view.
And that is the point of my post. Ann is basically trying to make a buck and the mistake the Republicans have made is that they went to bed with her thinking she was serving thier cause by putting a light to the “evil” liberals/Democrats. In truth, she a bomb thrower and doesn’t care who gets hurt as long as there is money in it for her. Whores like her charge a price and the Conservatives, not the Progressives are now finding that they are paying for it. Worse yet, they can’t cut her off. Reading the other posts, there is an endless supply of people will cheer her on. And that makes her the gift that keeps on giving to the left. That also is what is making life a nightmare for people like Rick (Rightwingnuthouse) and Ed (Captains Quarters).
ThymeZone
I really don’t get the outrage at Coulter. Limbaugh has been doing this schtick on the radio every day for years. Absolutely outrageous, hateful vile shit, and hardly a peep is made.
Why do people think we lefties go after these motherfuckers with such energy? Because they SUCK and have always sucked.
So now Coulter is the poster girl for Righty hate. Big deal. There have been plenty of purveyors of this crap for a long, long time. She isn’t the first, or the best, and won’t be the last.
grandpa john
Come on folks, Ann is just being a good capitalist, therefore all her actions are to serve one purpose, the self promorion of Coulter. The whole act is to increase the sale of books and to increase speaking fees.
See the suprise on the faces of some of the wingers as they realize that coulter really doesn’t give a shit about their ideas and ideology but to make herself the center of attention and steal all the oxygen from the room, much as she just did. And note that most of the wingers who are criticizing her are doing so for that very reason , not because they actually disagree with here vile, bilious rhetoric
The Other Steve
Actually, Carter deregulated everything. Reagan got the Teamsters vote in 1980 because he promised if he won he wouldn’t deregulate trucking, like Carter promised to do. Of course he reneged on his promise anyway, and deregulated trucking.
Frankly, I think Reagan is not really a corporate President, but rather the first example of the modern Republican who takes credit for the good work of others, and lays blame for his own fuckups.
I’m not a super critic of Reagan, but generally I think unions do more harm than good.
sglover
You forgot to mention National Review’s never-ending campaign to show the good side of Generalissimo Franco, while he was alive. One of the more difficult PR operations in American history — but they never shirked!
As long as I’ve been alive, there’s always been a lot of hate at the core of “conservatism”. (My folks subscribed to National Review before and during the Nixon years. I grew up reading it.) People like Coulter are only a more blatant and vicious manifestation of a mindset that Republicans have been pandering to for decades. Richard Nixon and Lee Atwater each knew the type well, and both cultivated it.
Real Americans — those of us who give a damn about our country’s best traditions — need to hang this around the necks of these neo-Peronistas: The Republican Party IS Ann Coulter. Ann Coulter IS the Republican Party. Never let them weasel away from the equivalence.
OhReally
The ability to make people mad at you is a quality that virtually every teenager masters — usually without the slightest effort. Thus, it is neither special, nor worthy of admiration. Fortunately, most teenagers grow up. Coulter has simply made a career out being a nasty adolescent.
mrmobi
Well, TOS, I think Ronnie was a god-damned idiot, and I also think that if it wasn’t for union organizers, you and I would be working 80 hour weeks with one day a month off, if that.
You have fallen for the propaganda of the “globalization” cabal.
Since you think unions do more harm than good, can I assume you think that TSA workers should not be allowed to organize?