Well Okay ;)
Wolf
Posted on 06/14/2006 9:48:34 AM PDT by suspects
I know, I know. Ann Coulter is Satan.
She's vicious. She's outrageous. She is not to be tolerated. I understand.
But I have a quick question for you: Have you actually read her book?
I mean, as you're gathering your ropes and lighting your torches and looking for a well-placed tree limb, don't you think you should take an hour or two and, you know, read what Coulter actually said?
"But Michael, who would ever read such filth? Such hateful extremism! She's a witch! Burn! Burn!"
And so goes the debate with the American Left...
Call me crazy, but before I joined prominent Democratic lawmakers around the country demanding that Godless be banned from book stores (the dunking stool and public stocks will be waiting for Coulter at the Paramus, N.J., Barnes & Noble next week), I'd want to know what is in the darn thing. Based on their writings and public statements, it appears that not one of the would-be book banners has done so.
"Why waste our time, Michael? She's just a bomb-thrower. A name-caller!"
True, it's hard to take seriously people who describe their political opponents as "stupid," "ugly" "vile," "viperous," "rabidly hateful," "foaming-at-the-mouth," "sub-human," or who suggest they go kill themselves. But Ann Coulter didn't say any of these things. No, these are comments from media outlets like the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Ad Age magazine about Ann Coulter.
The London Times even labeled her the "Bitch Goddess of American conservatives." I guess they were offended by all that name-calling.
The editorial invective rolls across Coulter like a muddy river from the maw of the mainstream media. However, what the London Times and New York Times and, alas, the Charleston City Paper are unlikely to do is actually review Coulter's book. And the one thing the hair-pulling liberals shaking with rage on talk TV refuse to do is confront the actual arguments Ann Coulter presents.
The Coulter cranks scream over two sentences in Godless about the "Jersey Girls," those four hyper-political, media-hungry 9/11 widows Coulter shames by quoting them accurately. Meanwhile, there are 281 pages of arguments, insults, and outrageous-but-on-point invective that raise issues worth debating. Plus footnotes.
Did angry Democrats join forces with the "Witches of East Brunswick" to politicize the 9/11 Commission for personal satisfaction and political gain? Shouldn't people spreading the idiotic fallacy that George W. Bush was responsible for the World Trade Center attack be criticized, even if they lost loved ones on that horrific day? Did these women cheapen the legacy of 9/11 as they appeared in Democratic campaign ads and pushed Democratic talking points on Larry King?
Ann Coulter says "yes." She's got pages of arguments and cheap shots to back it up. Whatta you got?
Oh, sorry, I forgot. You're a liberal. You don't read books you disagree with. You ban them. That's why you're so much better than those mouth-breathing evangelical morons who elected Bush.
Reading Godless means no longer being able to declare sainthood for pseudo-spy Valerie Plame or her hapless, fourth-rate hack of a husband, "Ambassador" Joe Wilson. (Coulter's recounting of Wilson's failed foreign service career, culminating in his post as Ambassador to Gabon, is hilarious.)
Reading Godless means facing the fact that the American Left has abandoned the principle of self-government and now opposes the very idea of democracy when it comes to abortion, the definition of marriage, and the operation of "public" (insert ironic laugh here) schools. She also reminds us that, before 1860, Democrats were also proudly "pro-choice" on the issue of slavery, too.
Coulter's opponents avoid all this by simply refusing to fight. She comes out swinging, they come out whining. Unfortunately for them, the facts aren't going to change, the arguments won't go away, and 500,000 people are going to read her book. When they're done, they'll be smarter, she'll be richer, and you — my book-banning, name-calling, debate-avoiding liberal friends — will have done more than Coulter ever could to prove her point.
Is Ann Coulter mean? Is she nasty? Maybe, maybe not. But the question normal people will be asking is "Is she right?" My advice to you would-be "Ann"-nihilators would be to stop whining and start reading.
The really executive summary:
Yes, you can ping me. However the only "fits" I have seen here are the ones that our very own AC has caused to leftwingnuts.
Oh, so you at least read the chapter titles.
I've read the book, Skippy. The word "squirrels" appears in the first line of page 230. Happy now, or are you going to issue any more unfounded implied slurs based on your wild and false presumptions?
Did you actually read the book?
Yes, which is why I'm commenting on it. Sheesh, did the average IQ around here suddenly drop in the past week or something?
Did you also look into any of the 65 footnotes sited in those chapters 8-10?
Yes and I've acquired copies of most of the cited references, and I'll be heading to the downtown library to get the remaining few in the next couple of days. It's the final task I need to take care of before I wrap up my critique.
By the way, Coulter grossly misrepresents the contents of many of her citations, and I'll be documenting that as well. Deal with it.
Would you like to be pinged to my results, or would you rather remain in the dark as to how badly she has violated the trust of her fans? If the latter, check my tagline.
Also, if anyone else wants to be pinged to it, send me a Freepmail and let me know.
It's odd that you would state the value of "a LITTLE caution" while you and your buddy keep jumping to false conclusions about me based on nothing whatsoever other than your own snotty presumptions, and implying slanders that are completely unfounded.
Care to start acting like adults for a change?
Too bad you missed the fits thrown by three anti-evolutionists when I gave them a taste of one of Coulter's documented falsehoods from chapter 8 on an earlier thread. They freaked out and tied themselves in knots trying to "excuse" her clearly false claim, flung insults in every direction, etc. It was funny as hell, and a lot of people chimed in with "what is *wrong* with these folks?" posts after watching their antics. You're bound to see a lot more of that on the thread that's going to a far more comprehensive list of other false and misleading claims by Ann Coulter on that topic.
I'd give you a link to that hilarious exchange, but the thread was yanked (due to another anti-evolutionist entirely libeling someone else -- he's been subsequently banned). I have the posts archived if you'd like me to Freepmail them to you, but the formatting will get all mangled (Freepmail doesn't support HTML) and I'm not sure how easy it would be to read without the links, italics indicating who wrote what, indents indicating quoted material, etc.
That's very kind of you to offer anyway. I will ping then a number of creationists who never "freak out and have fits" that i know of, is that okay?
Hi silverling!
Wolf
Of course. As the old saying goes, "a lie travels around the world before the truth has a chance to get its boots on", so the more exposure the corrections can get, the better.
:) please update your rabies shots.
Outstanding article. Thanks Michael Graham. Thanks for posting, suspects.
First, Coulter is not a private citizen in the sense I think you mean it. She is a media celebrity and as such, is considered a public person. If, for example, she wanted to sue someone for libel or slander, she would be considered a public person under the applicable laws.
Second, in selling her political opinions, Coulter attempts to lead people to her views. As a pundit, she is what is referred to as "an opinion leader."
Third, I didn't say Coulter is or was an advisor to a president. I said she is the right-wing equivalent of Carville. Equivalent does not mean identical.
So, as to your little sarcastic punch line, it seems I can now throw it right back at you: "Other than those couple of little things and a few others YOUR post was right on the mark."
Here is a transitional for everyone's viewing pleasure (a cute young lady transitional besides). Go to the bottom for a chart showing her position in the scheme of things (hint--about the middle):
Site: Koobi Fora (Upper KBS tuff, area 104), Lake Turkana, Kenya (4, 1)
Discovered By: B. Ngeneo, 1975 (1)
Estimated Age of Fossil: 1.75 mya * determined by Stratigraphic, faunal, paleomagnetic & radiometric data (1, 4)
Species Name: Homo ergaster (1, 7, 8), Homo erectus (3, 4, 7), Homo erectus ergaster (25)
Gender: Female (species presumed to be sexually dimorphic) (1, 8)
Cranial Capacity: 850 cc (1, 3, 4)
Information: Tools found in same layer (8, 9). Found with KNM-ER 406 A. boisei (effectively eliminating single species hypothesis) (1)
Interpretation: Adult (based on cranial sutures, molar eruption and dental wear) (1)
See original source for notes:
Source: http://www.mos.org/evolution/fossils/fossilview.php?fid=33
Source: http://wwwrses.anu.edu.au/environment/eePages/eeDating/HumanEvol_info.html
Whas this the thread where you opined hopefully if a Freeper had prostate cancer, or was that another one?
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