Posted on 08/02/2003 7:26:04 AM PDT by DPB101
Watching Ann Coulter promote her new book on television is like driving by a bad car wreck. It's horrible and ghastly, but, somehow, you can't help but look.
That's probably why I've been stopping periodically along the channel-flipping superhighway to hear what this supposedly serious political analyst has to say (not, of course, because she's blond).
I even sat and suffered through the sorry spectacle of Coulter being interviewed by Bill O'Reilly, both striving with some success to sound slightly sensible.
Coulter makes terribly tasteless, hateful and provocative comments about her political adversaries, then, never changing her doe-eyed, slyly smiling demeanor, claims she was only joking.
I saw Coulter address a group of conservative woman, an event broadcast on C-SPAN. Fielding predictably softball and fawning questions, Coulter said things like "The Democratic Party has got to go."
She and her audience also claimed "prettiness" as a political virtue, with Coulter saying college-age Republicans are better looking than their Democratic counterparts, and a questioner congratulating her on maintaining her good looks throughout her promotional tour.
The main thrusts of Coulter's book are that Democrats have consistently advocated policies that adversely affect America's interests -- and thus are "traitors" -- and that Sen. Joe McCarthy was a terribly misunderstood patriot unfairly accused (by all those "liberal historians," of course) of conducting a witch hunt against normal Americans he thought were Communists.
I haven't read the book, and don't plan to.
But having sat through several of her TV interviews, I haven't heard much more than name-calling and divisive revisionist history.
The 2000 election results and the nearly evenly split Congress render Coulter's thoughts on Democrats particularly ridiculous. If she's right, we are a nation half-full of traitors. If that were true, it would be a miracle that the government even functions at all, that the U.S. Capitol and state houses across the country haven't been burned to the ground.
Or at least the 50 percent of the population consisting of traitors would take some palpable action to overthrow the government or do explicit damage to the country. Maybe we liberals practice a subtle form of treason.
The only interesting nugget of an idea Coulter's so-called analysis brings up is the difficult position in which dissenters find themselves during times of war.
I don't think it's a coincidence that this book is being published during the conflict in Iraq, because in this environment it's much easier to believe that Democrats -- the main critics of the war -- don't have American's best interests in mind.
The logic, however twisted, goes like this: Democrats are against the war, therefore they want the war effort to go poorly to prove their point, therefore each death of an American soldier is a positive thing for their argument.
Unfortunately for Coulter, this country has come a long way since Vietnam, and people on either side of the Iraq debate do not doubt their political adversaries' love of America. It is now accepted by most reasonable people that Democrats and Republicans, pro-war and anti-war, liberal and conservative, all have the best interests of the United States in mind. We just have different ideas of how to get there.
Coulter is as fascinating as a car wreck, but represents a destructive vein in American politics. Instead of searching for common ground, she's trying to demonize half the American population.
We'd all be better off to skip the rubbernecking and keep driving.
Dan Meisler, news editor of The Daily Telegram, can be reached at :
meisler@lenconnect.com.
Pay no attention to the fact that Democrats smear conservatives routinely Slander and viciously Treason--and that this very article is a smear.
Unfortunately for Coulter, this country has come a long way since Vietnam, and people on either side of the Iraq debate do not doubt their political adversaries' love of America. It is now accepted by most reasonable people that Democrats and Republicans, pro-war and anti-war, liberal and conservative, all have the best interests of the United States in mind. We just have different ideas of how to get there.
This, of course, was also true in the Vietnam era. The author disengenuously throws this statement out there, in some desperate attempt to salvage the image of present-day liberal pacifists, who oppose this country protecting itself with anything other than words.
I'm afraid of what I'd see if I looked in that mirror.
You think this country should defend itself with words?What kind of kinky fascist are you?!
</sarcasm>
I get the impression that this effing dolt kind of missed the part where O'Reilly made a fool out of himself over the HUAC-McCarthy non-connection. But then, he later confesses to having learned his "history" at the knees of red-diaper baby "liberal historians". ;-)
The main thrusts of Coulter's book are that Democrats have consistently advocated policies that adversely affect America's interests -- and thus are "traitors" -- and that Sen. Joe McCarthy was a terribly misunderstood patriot unfairly accused (by all those "liberal historians," of course) of conducting a witch hunt against normal Americans he thought were Communists.
I haven't read the book, and don't plan to.
"The liberal historians told me what to think about McCarthy long ago, and I'm not going to believe my lying eyes."
But having sat through several of her TV interviews, I haven't heard much more than name-calling and divisive revisionist history.
Interesting that Ol' Double-Digit IQ here can tell that Coulter's book is "revisionist history" without reading the book. I'm glad our side has all the guns. ;-)
I guess I must not be a "reasonable" person because I believe that the RATs are traitors and the only "interest" they have in mind is their own. If liberals "love" America, they have strange ways of showing it.
About the only true thing I found in this article was that Ann's name is actually Ann Coulter.
According to a poll recently published in the NYT, less than 25% of Americans self identify themselves as democrat.
That's not "half" or "nearly half" or "any where close to half"
Ann Coulter is right that in my lifetime, the democrat party has not been on the side of my country.
This statement is demonstably wrong on several points. We have repeatedly seen the leaked DNC talking points where they will keep the economy down for political gain (at the expensive of the nation and Americans).
Also, the antiwar protestors in the streets weren't "peace" protestors. They support the Palestinian was (including the use of suicide bombers). The protestors were communists and anarchist-socialists. They seek to tear down the government (and constitution) and replace it with a socialist wet dream fantasy. The black flagged anarchists made themselves very visible at the protests.
This red diaper baby needs to sell his lies someplace else, the truth is out.
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