..so, how'd it go?I am in southern California (aka northwest Aztlan) -- but here is a report from www.gainesville.com:Anyone have a report from Geekville?
Apr 5, 2006
Fiery Coulter lambasts liberals, shows support for war
By JEFF ADELSON
Sun staff writerLiberals are "traitors," "cowards" and "idiots," the fiery conservative commentator Ann Coulter told a nearly full house at the University of Florida's Phillips Center for the Performing Arts Wednesday.
Ann Coulter speaks Wednesday at the
Phillips Center for the Performing Arts.
(JARRETT BAKER/Special to The Sun)
And that's just as she was warming up.
In a 30-minute speech, Coulter shifted rapidly between topics as she tossed out barbed one-liners about prominent liberals for an audience of more than 1,000 people, skewering politicians, media personalities and academics.
"A college campus is the last place you should send someone to teach them American values," said the syndicated columnist and author.
While the hour-long question-and-answer session following the speech showed that there were both conservatives and liberals in the audience, the amount of applause seemed to suggest a majority embraced Coulter's views.
Accent, UF's student-run speaker's bureau, paid about $32,000 of its $370,000 annual budget for Coulter's speaking fees, travel and lodging.
In perhaps one of the most controversial statements in a night filled with them, Coulter said even actions as "horrendous" as the genocide in Rwanda would not merit American intervention. However, she noted that the Iraq war was justified by concerns about Saddam Hussein's desire for weapons of mass destruction and his destabilizing influence on the Middle East.
"There were plenty of reasons to get rid of Saddam and none to keep him," she said.
Much of Coulter's material was familiar from her appearance at the Alachua County Republican Executive Committee's Reagan Day Black Tie and Blue Jeans Barbecue in October. And many of the audience's questions harkened back to some of the more controversial statements she has made in the past.
In response to a question about whether Islamic beliefs could be problematic in the creation of an Iraqi democracy, Coulter repeated what has become perhaps her most controversial comment.
"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity," she wrote shortly after Sept. 11, referring to countries whose populations expressed joy about the attacks.
Such a policy would bring the country more in line with American values, she said, crediting American beliefs in equality to Christianity.
Coulter also differentiated between people she considers "wrong" because of their opposition to the Iraq war, such as Pat Buchanan, from people she said were traitorous, a category she suggested included most of the Democratic Party.
The support of Buchanan and other conservatives for other issues, such as the use of Guantanamo Bay as a detainment center, showed they were not anti-American, she said.
Tessa Fughum, a UF sophomore, said she enjoyed the speech and agreed with many of Coulter's views.
"It's good to hear somebody who's that intelligent and is able to talk about what is going on," she said.
Jeff Adelson can be reached at 352-374-5095 or adelsoj@gvillesun.com