Ann Coulter: Witty or Reckless? A Critique of her book: 'Adios, America'

American Thinker ^ | 08/15/2015 | James Arlandson

[SeekAndFind]

Ms. Ann H. Coulter’s book, ¡Adios, America! The Left’s Plan to Turn Our Country into a Third World Hellhole, is provocative, to put it mildly.

Let me first acknowledge some of her key points.

• Yes, there is a crime problem.
• Yes, we need to deport criminals.
• Yes, we need E-verify.
• Yes, we need to secure our borders, even with a wall or fence, wherever feasible.
• Yes, we need to enforce the immigration laws already on the books, like requiring the ones who have overstayed their visas to get it straightened out (they make up the majority of illegals).
• Yes, American-born citizens in the Hispanic community vote Democrat (see below, for a long-term, peaceful, intellectual solution, which Ms. Coulter does not provide or at least one that I can find).
• Yes, Los Angeles will one day go broke, but then so did Detroit, and so will a lot of cities and counties.
• Yes, she has wit.

Now let me cover just a few of many troubling aspects to her tome and then lay out three representative counterexamples.

Ms. Coulter implies that culture remains static for four hundred years, with little or no change. Culture is a main theme. The descendants of the East Anglians who moved to Massachusetts are college educated, while the Scots-Irish in Appalachia are more likely to appear on TV shows like "Cops" (pages 143-44). Witty or Reckless? Either way, no word on the countless Irish who immigrated to Boston.

Next, one point of contention goes to the media coverage of crime, which is a main thesis in the book. Apparently Ms. Coulter’s friends in Los Angeles say the news doesn’t report the identity of the suspect

[mountainlion]

Reckless: OBAMA, Clintons, Kerry, Boner, McCain...

[sauropod]

bfl

[9YearLurker]

A sadly argued, misguided critique. Coulter presents lots of stats as the backbone of her argument, though she fleshes it out with examples.

The writer thinks he can come up with a few counter examples, as if the exception doesn’t prove the rule and the ability for the cream of the illegal crop to function in his college classes somehow counter Coulter’s stats and argument.

[Awgie]

The author, like some many other “wordsmith's” seeks attention and validation for his “insightful eloquence.”

Complete with nuance and self assigned gravitas he dices and splices the meaning and implications of AC’s book...boring and useless verbage.

While I am sure he is a very nice person, my advice to him is, “get out of the way, you are in a heavy cons ruction area. You might get hurt.”

[webstersII]

Lamest article from AT I’ve ever seen.

[Carl Vehse]

While there are other factors, culture is a key. Those who can adapt to (what used to be) the American culture (and its Christian moral basis) are more likely to succeed. Those who retain inferior or defective subcultures are much less likely to succeed even with the entitlements they may get.

The demonicrat subculture is a cancerous disease that has infected the American culture and needs to be surgically removed.

[RedHeeler]

Now, that’s funny! Is that you, magoo?

[bgill]

Since when did she get back into FR’s good graces? I don’t forget and don’t forgive. She’s still and always will be adios-ed in my book.

[TangoLimaSierra]

...requiring the ones who have overstayed their visas to get it straightened out (they make up the majority of illegals).

This I kinda f'n doubt.

[Pelham]

Maybe if this stupid sonofabitch James Arlandson had watched SoCal transform from America to the 3rd World in front of his eyes he wouldn’t think culture was unimportant.

But that’s no excuse for American Thinker’s decision to print his drivel.

[x]

Why not both? The author says as much, "Yes, she has wit," so shouldn't he have had the title changed?

The idea that early settlement still affects regional character goes back to David Hackett Fischer's Albion's Seed. I doubt he'd say that regional or ethnic characteristics never change, just that there's a lot of continuity.

It would be possible to come up with a better critique of Ann's book than this one. It would have to be. Would it really be worth it, though?

Ann Coulter is an entertainer who manages to tell much truth through her provocations, but most of her readers probably realize by now that they can't take everything that she writes literally or seriously.