The Trouble with Treason (David Horowitz regarding Ann Coulter)

Frontpagemagazine.com ^ | 7/8/03 | David Horowitz

[habs4ever]

FYI...

[FreedomPoster]

>>This I think is the crux of Horowitz's problem with Treason.

I agree with you on this, but the problem is that even though there are some who aren't traitors, they choose to associate closely with so many that plainly are, and they get lumped together. I'm thinking names like our own ousted Jihad Cyndy McKinney, Sheila Jackson Lee, anyone defending Sami Al-Arian, etc.

[Alberta's Child]

Understood. Which made Ho Chi Minh no different than a substantial portion of the population of France.

[Sicon]

"That's Horowitz's point: she says nice things about JFK in the book, then attacks him in an interview with Chris Matthews--on the same points.

Maybe there was more to the interview than what was included in Horowitz's piece, but looking at it, it was Matthews who brought up Kennedy, and Coulter at no point in the exchange said anything remotely resembling an "attack" on Kennedy. All she said was that he was a weaker president than a Republican would have been.

So, what exactly are you talking about?

[Stingray51]

Right, Horowitz is misconstruing the term "liberal" by describing JFK and Truman as such. In many ways, esp. in terms of big government and interventionism, Dubya is arguably more liberal than either. Coulter is talking about liberals, past and present, as the term is used today.

[HISSKGB]

Didn't Truman arrange for North Korea to be donated to Russia?

[Redleg Duke]

I like David, but he has a basic problem here. By today's standards, Harry Truman, Jack Kennedy and LBJ would be flaming conservatives.

The liberal scum that now comprises the leadership of the Democrat Party hang on to these "dead white men" as icons, but in reality, the present politics of the party would drive these men away.

[HISSKGB]

Why should we be more tolerant of communist sympathizers than Nazi proponents?

[dalereed]

"I,too don't like the word treason used as a blanket condemnation of the Democratic party"

The systematic destruction of our Constitution through legislation passed by democrats and "moderate Republicans" and liberal controled courts in my mind is treason!

[MHGinTN]

If Ann had used the qualifier 'current crop of liberals' David would have endorsed her book wholeheartedly! ... And rightly so

[gop212]

bump

[rattrap]

read later bump.

[MEG33]

"Why should we be more tolerant with communist sympathizers than Nazi proponents?"Because we see pictures and hear survivors of Hitler's hell and the horrors of Stalin and Mao don't get through.The Media has also been responsible.You know the Communists are romanticized because they have good intentions!

[Steel Wolf]

Ah, you're right about Cuba, I had my revolutions switched. Gimmie a break, it's late here. ;-) Anyway, back to contaiment -

Containment was a terribly risky and ineffective policy. Rather than nip the global communist revolution in the bud we chose to play defense. This cost a hundred million more lives that would have been lost crushing Stalin at the outset. We also spent forty years with the threat of nuclear annihilation looming.

Containment allowed the USSR to pick off their targets, and steadily increase the number of satellite, communist, or sympathetic nations. The concept of rollback was abandoned early on, so once a country became communist, it stayed communist.

The wars we fought during containment were uniformly disasterous, because they weren't supposed to win. The best Vietnam or Korea could have ended with was a tie, because that outcome had been required by Washington. Containment wasn't about retaking lost ground, only holding onto what you had. This forces a 'win-lose' mentality where 'win' really means 'tie'.

It wasn't until Reagan, who's policies were a dramatic break from simple containment, that we were able to force the hand of the Soviet Union. Rather than try and maintain the status quo, he called them the 'evil empire' and aggressivly built up our military to bring pressure on them.

Containment is the philosophy of 'Don't hit me, or I'll try and block you', as opposed to 'Don't hit me, or I may hit back'. It failed us for decades, in a long and well documented fashion.

[jammer]

Right. Hisskgb, we won't refight those battles, but I would say that the Pentagon Papers themselves are where we, or at least I, learned that. I'm not a liberal, Communist, or fellow-traveler (in fact, I believe we WON that war in Vietnam--lost the peace--but am the only poster I've seen that maintains that position), but I am more inclined to agree with Alberta's Child that nationalism came first with Ho.

[Romulus]

The idea of Coulter as Swiftian is risible. Ann Counter is the Rev. Al Sharpton in drag.

[Poohbah]

All she said was that he was a weaker president than a Republican would have been.

After praising him to the gills in her book. She never said he was "weaker." Yes, saying that he was a weaker president is an attack. It may be a justified attack. However, it doesn't match up with what Coulter allegedly wrote about Kennedy.

[boris]

I just ordered a copy--and one for my raging liberal brother.

It sounds as if she missed the "X" ring. She should have concentrated on the modern Democratic party and selected "pre-modern" leftists.

There is plenty of evidence that modern Dems are anti-American, anti-Constitution, anti-Capitalist, anti-freedom, and anti-human. She could easily fill a book with those.

--Boris

[Scenic Sounds]

By failing to draw a clear line between satirical exaggeration and historical analysis, by refusing to credit the laudable role played by patriotic, anti-Communist liberals like Truman, Kennedy and Humphrey, Coulter has compromised her case and undermined her attempt to correct a record that desperately needs correction.

I think this criticism misses the point. Ann is selling a ton of books from what I hear. Who thinks she could do so with a book designed only to create a tedious, careful and thoughtful "record"?

Horowitz, if anyone, certainly understands the need for hyperbole and exaggeration.

I haven't read Ann's book, but I'm sure it's a real corker. LOL

[RobRoy]

If you were to examine the records and speeches of most famous liberals from 40 or more years ago, you would probably count them as what we call a "conservative" in our current culture.

People are getting wrapped up in semantics. A liberal today, is not what a liberal was 40 years ago - or 200 years ago.