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You can spin that comment any way you want,

I'm not spinning anything. She was not implying Edwards was gay nor was she implying those husbands were preparing a divorce.

Can you imagine an insurance agent preparing to hand over a death benefit to a grieving spouse

But that's not at all germane as to what happened. They were getting $1.6 million apiece in government money -- to which they had no legal claim --without contest.

But then they said it wasn't enough. At that point, it would have been perfectly appropriate to start asking "what ifs". What if your husband died from some other cause? What if he divorced you? What about military wives who aren't going to get a fraction of what you got in death benefits?

Due to the emotion of the moment, however, these questions weren't asked and, IIRC, they got what they wanted.

Which would have been fine and quickly forgotten. BUT they then got involved in politics. They cited their deceased husbands as giving them authority and started making accusations about others that I think crossed the line of slander.

So Ann wrote what she wrote which was a bit mean but still needed to be said. And it appears to have worked somewhat. The Jersey Girls have piped down quite a bit.

Thank you, Annie!

You know it is funny how people look at the same thing entirely differently:

"I'm not spinning anything. She was not implying Edwards was gay" Sure she was. She could have hammered Edwards about any number of weaknesses -- his ambulance chasing, his Wal-mart hypocrisy, his 2-Americas-while-I-build-a-new-mansion hypocrisy. Any of those things apply directly to Edwards. Yet she pulls this of all things. Why?

"nor was she implying those husbands were preparing a divorce." She was engaging in baseless, inflammatory speculation. It is perfectly fine to question the audacity of these women, it is yet another thing to engage in baseless speculation. There were a lot of Coulter's critics who used those words as an opening to engage in baseless speculation about Coulter's personal life. It could be argued that she invited such speculation, but I wouldn't defend that either.

"So Ann wrote what she wrote which was a bit mean but still needed to be said." She could have said what needed to be said without being mean. Being mean only distracted from her valid points.

"And it appears to have worked somewhat. The Jersey Girls have piped down quite a bit." Again, funny how people perceive things differently. As I recall, the Jersey Girls were running around, campaigning for Kerry, and got very little attention. Most people didn't have a clue who they were. Then, Coulter made her personal attacks and, suddenly, they were a household name and every woman watching The Today Show and The View knew all about them. They made the rounds and were portrayed in a sympathetic light. They may have faded to the point where they were before the Coulter comments, but they've already inflicted their damage. It was a net PR bonus for the left, just as this is a net bonus for Edwards.

When conservatives chose to rise above the smear-through-victim strategy, rather than resort to their level, we did well in the elections. The American people saw the Wellstone funeral for what it was and voted heavily GOP. And, again, when the Jersey Girls were bashing Bush before the 2004 election, along with Moore etc., President Bush didn't dignify their attacks with a petty response. The people saw that for what it was and he got more votes than ever. Now we see the tide has turned against Bush and against the war and it isn't for a lack of fighting back. Certainly there were many factors that hurt the GOP, but I think comments like Coulter's helped to make the GOP look like the bad guys.

"Thank you, Annie!" Yes, thanks, indeed! Keep it up and you can screw up the 2008 election, too. Thank you, Annie!