Screed (Is Coulter doing a disservice to Conservatives?)

Spinsanity ^ | 6/30/03 | Brendan Nyhan

[kms61]

You must have confused me with someone else. I don't particularly care for Coulter's style--that's just a personal preference and has nothing to do with ideology--but I never "quibbled" with her content.

[Luke21]

Dwight Eisenhower nominated Earl Warren and William Brennan to the Supreme Court, both far left liberals who ruled and terrorized this country for decades. He wasn't a conservative.

[DPB101]

her painting with too broad a brush as traitors anyone who had or has positions opposed to Republican policy.

Never heard her say that. She goes after Democrats for not cleaning known Soviet agents out of the party. That is more than legitimate. Imagine if a Republican administration were packed with Nazi agents and Republicans ignored it and demonized anyone who brought the subject up. Think the Democrats would not hold the entire Republican party responsible?

When Clinton National Security Advisor Anthony Lake was asked by Tim Russert if Alger Hiss was a spy, Lake replied:

"I've read a couple of books that certainly offered a lot of evidence that he may have been. I don't think it's conclusive."

Hiss was a Soviet agent and Lake darn well knows it. The lies of the Democrats have to be stopped. More power to Ann for trying to stop them.

Btw...Peter Jennings also tried to clear Hiss. When Hiss died Jennings reported that Boris Yeltsin said KGB files cleared Hiss. That was flat out untrue and Jennings later "clarified" his statement.

[xm177e2]

In one bizarre case, she misrepresents the reasons for Carter's Nobel Prize, stating that it was awarded "for his masterful negotiation of the 1994 deal [the Agreed Framework with North Korea], though, in candor, he got the prize for North Korea only because the committee couldn't formally award a prize for Bush-bashing, which was the stated reason." (p. 233) But the Nobel committee's award announcement cites the award as recognizing Carter's "decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development," of which North Korea was only a part. In the presentation speech at the Nobel ceremony, his work on the North Korea issue was not even mentioned.

This is listed as one of the "five factual claims that are indisputably false." Is this really "indisputably false?" Is it perfectly inconceivable that the Nobel Peace Prize committee was less than completely forward about their true intentions?

[Freedom4US]

We instead do better making well thought out, well reasoned arguments that disarm liberals on the basis of the facts.

I admire your liberal (in the classical sense of the word) and noble attempt at the high road, but conservatives have been de facto out of power since the days of Herbert Hoover. Today, virtually all our universities are unabashedly "liberal", virtually all newspapers with the exception of the Wall Street Journal, all of hollywood and associated entertainment industries, and whole swaths of city governments across the nation. Miss Coulter isn't doing anything from a rhetorical standpoint that the "liberals" haven't been doing since the 1960's, except she cites her sources and while she is possibly guilty of a fair bit of hyperbole it in no way diminishes the real gist of her claims - and the "liberals" know it. That's why we see the above, hastily penned screed. Miss Coulter beats them at their own game - she's trained as a lawyer, intelligent, went to all the right schools and yet she's not a shill for them. This, I think, is the real reason for their vitriol.

[Freedom4US]

And frankly, for all of the nitpicking, I don't see much in the way of anything substantive to complain about.

That was my impression as well. They are very worried, apparently. I became interested in the McCarthy era years ago and decided we'd been sold a bill of goods by the left. They have never came clean about Alger Hiss, Harry Dexter White, the Rosenburgs and all that, to them it's just an article of faith that they were all "railroaded".

[axel]

Simp Bump

[Freedom4US]

I *think* Eisenhower said putting Tom Clark up for SCOTUS was the dumbest thing he did as president. (Ramsey's dad), later, Ramsey was appointed attorney general of the US as part of a deal to get Tom to step down during the Johnson administration. But Earl Warren, there's a piece of work.

[PeaceBeWithYou]

Got any more ad hominems you'd like to sling?

Why? Did you run out?

Just search thru the archives under Coulter, I'm sure you can find some more your fellow travelers have slung at Ann.

[TLBSHOW]

THIS IS WAR AGAINST LIBERALS.........

Ann is correct and just fine in my book........

[Jimmy Valentine]

I am reading he book "Treason". I disagree with you. Her book is well researched and footnoted. Her language is polished, if pointed and unsparing of her targets feelings.

Al Franken is a relatively unlettered, supposedly recovering drunk, who though nominally a comedian, never to my knowledge uttered or wrote a funny line in his life. His writing is turgid, and his rants unsupported by fact.

The only comparison between the two is that they are opposites.

Regards,

[Nick Danger]

I wonder how successful she is at converting neutrals or opponents...or does her acid style even drive some people away

The world is not so simple as "our guys, their guys, and the people in the midddle." It's a spectrum, and no matter where you are on the spectrum, there are going to be people slightly on either side of you who will find you convincing. People farther away on the spectrum -- in either direction -- will think you are a nut. You can't worry about that.

Suppose Ann Coulter is not trying to convince liberals of anything. She is instead a munitions manufacturer for the vast right wing conspiracy.

The wall-to-wall blanket liberalism that smothered this country for decades left a lot of people who leaned conservative almost ashamed of their beliefs. Around the office, they wouldn't say a word about their politics. All the jokes, all the TV shows, the whole zeitgeist was pushing leftward all the time.

The problem for conservatives was, there was no good ammo. Rush Limbaugh has done the most, I think, to provide Joe Everyman Conservative with the ammo he needs to hold his own around the water cooler. Limbaugh has since been joined by many others. It's a different world out there, and the liberals are reeling.

One of the liberals' big icons has been Joe McCarthy. There has always been a sizeable number of people running around saying, "Psst... McCarthy was right," but for 90% of the culture, the term "Joe McCarthy" has come to mean "Mysterious bad guy in the 1950's who persecuted people." So Joe McCarthy has become a handy cudgel that liberals use to silence anything they don't like. "You sound like Joe McCarthy, that's just more McCarthyism." He's a meme.

We need to knock down some of their memes. McCarthy has been a useful one for them. When all the shouting dies down, the lasting effect of this latest book will be that the "Joe McCarthy meme" has been fuzzed up in the minds of lots of people. Some may not believe a word Coulter said, but they know there's another side. Memes become useless unless their meaning is transmitted instantly; any fuzz at all about what they mean, and they aren't memes anymore.

So on that level it doesn't matter whether Coulter convinces anyone with this book. She provides ammo that Joe Everyman can take to the water cooler, and she sows doubts in liberal minds that they can use Joe McCarthy as a conversation stopper.

There's a third thing. She makes liberals go berserk, which is fun to watch. We see pontificating liberal columnists writing, "This loudmouthed b*tch is not engaging in civil discourse like we do." Heh.

[alnick]

In a few places above Nyhan definitely proves that Coulter misled her readers by a deliberate misuse of quotes.

Does he, or is he lying? I don't know. I'd like to see someone from the right address some of the claims of this author. Who's to say that he isn't doing in this article the very thing that he's accusing Ann of doing.

I'll reserve judgment until someone with some credibility addresses these. I wouldn't be surprised to see Ann's version proven correct.

[lonestar]

But as a spokesperson for conservatism she is too often too harsh...

It's an attention getting device, IMO. Why do you think she gets the attention she gets? She doesn't do what she does to be ignored.

[dark_lord]

The best that can be said about this article is it is better than Richard Cohen's slam against Ann -- from what I can tell he didn't even read her book before dissing it. Beyond that, I say this:

(1) Ann swings for the fences. And like Babe Ruth, sometimes she misses. Sometimes teeth grittingly so. The bottom line is that her book is far better footnoted than the vast majority of political screeds.

(2) The technique that she uses as she slams the DemonRat party and liberals in general as traitors is rhetoric! The fact that she is over the top with it is a good thing. The DemonRats have used this tactic for years. Heck, they have Communists way out front, then the Socialists can claim they are "moderate" because, hey, they're not Communists! Then the liberals can claim they're really quite conservative, because hey, they're not Socialists! Which explains why they call us far right wing -- because you see, from their perspective they are quite conservative, you know.

(3) She is right. Notice how this weenie quoted the definition of treason but then ignored that as if it was obviously slanderously wrong and then commenced nitpicking. The bottom line is this: have the DemonRat party and liberals a track record of "adhering to [the] Enemies [of the United States], giving them Aid and Comfort". (The definition of "adhering" in this sense is: to give support or maintain loyalty.) The short answer is -- yes. Have they "adhered" to the enemies of the United states? Yes. Have they given aid? Yes. Have they given comfort? Yes.

They are guilty, GUILTY, GUILTY!!!!!

[general_re]

Dwight Eisenhower nominated Earl Warren and William Brennan to the Supreme Court, both far left liberals who ruled and terrorized this country for decades. He wasn't a conservative.

Just after leaving office, someone asked Eisenhower if he'd made any mistakes in his presidency that he sincerely regretted. Eisenhower's reply? "Two of them, and they're both sitting on the Supreme Court, goddamn it..."

[TLBSHOW]

She doesn't do what she does to be ignored.


......BUMP........

and the rats live in fear of Ann Coulter

[The_Media_never_lie]

For years, she has infused her syndicated columns with cheap shots and asides directed at targets like President Bill Clinton, the American Civil Liberties Union and Hustler publisher Larry Flynt (among many others).

If these were cheap shots she sure had sleazy targets! I love the way the author lumps these three together. So appropriate! Birds of a feather, I do believe. LOL!

[thegreatbeast]

Right on, Mr. PI. Where did anyone ever get the idea that Ann was about attracting new members into the conservative sphere? The idea is silly.
Ann Coulter is a natural treasure, saying things that many agree with but no one else has the stones to say. When your enemies fly your planes into your skyscrapers it IS (original usage here) time to offer them a chance to convert to your beliefs or give them an expedited ticket to meet Allah. That is a perfectly logical and humane response to what occurred on September 11th. Yet in this country pundits were haemorrhaging over Coulter's supposed savagery.
Another fact is that international Communism was having its way with the agencies and offices of our government since the beginning. You must read what the Venona papers say. And the evidence is to be found elsewhere too. We were had. Big time.
We spent billions on the world's most secret project, the atom bomb, when billions were real money, and the science and the secrets were going right out the back door.
Read your history. And then tell me Ann Coulter dissembles.

[TLBSHOW]

Kids fear Ann Coulter

"Mommy, make the scary lady go away." Those are the tearful words of Kaylee Brodkin, 7, of Gary, Ind., who for the last five days has been awakened in the middle of the night by terrifying nightmares - nightmares featuring television pundit/author Ann Coulter.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/940443/posts?page=