Those mean spirited liberals (again)

[pecunium]

This isn't really about liberals, unless it's the "liberal press."

Ann Coulter. I keep mentioning her when people tell me about how bad, mean and small minded, liberals are. I mention her because she ought to be poor. Why ought she suffer from a lack of money? Because the vitriol she poisons the national debate with is horrid.

I, of course, am mentioning her today because I just found out she was on the cover of Time. Ye gods and little fishes. I've been in the house all week, so it escaped me. What I've been seeing on the Web implies Time has been painting her as amusing, reasoned, in some way worthy of being on the cover of a national magazine, without being called to account for what she has said.

So what has she said?

Liberals ought to be killed.

That if one has to talk with a liberal (instead of just killing them), the best medium of communication is a baseball bat.

Tim McVeigh's real crime was not dropping his truck off at the NY Times building.

Being Liberal is treason.

That she wished the American military was killing reporters, by design.

That women are too stupid to vote.

That the real question about Clinton was, "whether to impeach, or assassinate."

Those who support her (and we now know that support is in the mainstream... not that most of us doubted it) have been on the side of Iraqis, the insurgents who killed an aid worker (if you can stomach it, the conversation here at Freep, is what I'm talking about. A sample.... "My bet, of course, is that she was so concerned about the decrease in US casualties that she misread the insurgents' orders of the day and forgat to avoid a place where she knew a blast would take place."). Great company she keeps.

On the flip side we hear how evil the Dems are. They actually think judges ought to be allowed to judge. The right is calling for them to be killed. Not just the kooks and the Militia types anymore, but the mainstream. At the recent confab they called "Confronting the Judicial War on Faith" a speaker quoted Stalin (you know, the guy the left is supposed to be guilty of not hating enough) Edwin Vieira, a lawyer and author of How to Dethrone the Imperial Judiciary, went even further, suggesting during a panel discussion that Joseph Stalin offered the best method for reining in the Supreme Court. "He had a slogan," Vieira said, "and it worked very well for him whenever he ran into difficulty: 'No man, no problem.'"

The complete Stalin quote is, "Death solves all problems: no man, no problem." Max Blumenthal in The Nation.

He said it twice. Just in case one has heard his explanation that he wasn't really trying to inspire another domemstic terrorist like Eric Rudolph, another attendee said something more explicit, Before I could introduce myself, he turned to me and another observer with a crooked smile and exclaimed, "I'm a radical! I'm a real extremist. I don't want to impeach judges. I want to impale them!" This was no inbred twit from the back of beyond, no this was Michael Schwartz the chief of staff for Oklahoma's GOP Senator Tom Coburn, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Michael Moore, the present bogey-man used to paint the left as mean-spirited pales to insignificance compared to that. He calls Republicans liars and thieves. Tom DeLay calls him a political hack.

But he didn't call for anyone to kill Bush, he asked us to look at the record and turn him out of office.

On the subject of the Supreme Court... he said they made a bad decision, and called on us to turn out Bush, so that when new appointments were made, someone else would be making them.

Yep, when you compare him to Coulter, the Left sure looks mean.

Comments

[swimmingotter.livejournal.com]

She really said that women are too stupid to vote? I don't understand . . .wouldn't that make her stupid, too? If she's stupid, like the rest of us women--who shouldn't be allowed to vote--why the hell is she on the cover of TIME?

[http://users.livejournal.com/_nymphette_/]

I think you miss the point on Coulter - you're just comparing her to the wrong liberal extreemist. ; )

And come on hon. Her work is the mirror images of hundreds of op-ed peices I could right out of my NYT folder, toot sweet!

The problem is that I think both sides choose to actively ignore the log in their own eye. I don't care if you're bitching about Ann Coulter or Maureen Dowd - they are equally despised for responding to their political opposites with the same attitude directed at them.

I read both of them knowing their are painting caricatures of pure snark - knowing that nfortunately, their fans & their detractors will take thaier words literally, out of context, you name it.

But to use either woman's beliefs or attitudes as an illustration of EITHER party, or even as an 'average joe' of their respective parties, is just plain old stereotyping.

I see so many liberal I respect clinging to sterotypes like this, as though they define anyone who doesn't vote their way - or that the existance of such persons 'on the other side' proves that their own party is not equally distasteful at times.

And that's EXACTLY what happens on the right too!

It makes me sad... There so much that I love about the democratic party, but it just feels wrong to associate myself with it right now. Too many are unwilling to even admit the existence of the same hatred and bigotry in their own ranks - and that was the very same reason I didn't become a republican. I wanted to get away from all the preaching - all the talk about evil and enemies. But it's just the same on the left - only the enemy is my neighbor, parent, samily, friend...

It wasn't like this in the 90's, and I was too young to remember what it was like during the regean years. Is it always like this? I mean, I grew into a woman during the Clinton years - I SAW how the right was! But is it just the habit of the party not in power to claim the other is corrupt, wicked, evil, and dangerous?

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

That is a damned good question.

And yes, she did. She questioned the wisdom of giving women the franchise, because they are too emotional, not really wise enough and lacking in judgement.

Honest.

She's on the cover of Time because she is full of foul sentiments, has television time, write columns which get published, and is, "pretty" and God knows why else. One might think, given the whitewash her views were given, they agree with her, and want her to get a wider audience.

I find her revolting. The lack of repudiation on the part of the Republican Party of people like her is no small reason they aren't able to get my vote right now.

TK

[sethg]

No, no, you see, when Coulter said all these things, she was joking.

What? You didn't laugh?

That's because you're a Liberal and, as we all know, Liberals have no sense of humor.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

OK, where is the moral equivalent of the "hundreds of op-ed peices I could right out of my NYT folder." I want to see them.

Look at your own comparison... When has Maureen Down said the president (any president) ought to be assassinated?

When has she said the Left ought to go and kill republicans? When have those who claim to be following the beliefs of the advisors of the president been convicted of acts of domestic terrorism (a la Eric Rudolph).

The Left denounces the Ward Churchills, but the Right embraces the Randall Terrys; the Steven John Jordis. It calls the actions they take, "deplorable, but understandable."

When the number, the depth and the breadth of those who espouse such views is as great as it it, and when the leaders don't denounce it but rather make apologias, that isn't a fringe problem, it is a moral failing on the part of the leaders, and the led.

TK
What I am doing, and have been doing, is pointing out the difference in how the parties deal with such extremists. The Right is bring them to bed, The threatening tenor of the conference speakers was a calculated tactic. As Gary Cass, the director of Rev. D. James Kennedy's lobbying front, the Center for Reclaiming America, explained, they are arousing the anger of their base in order to harness it politically. The rising tide of threats against judges "is understandable," Cass told me, "but we have to take the opportunity to channel that into a constitutional solution."

They are encouraging it. This is not good.

And no, this is not how it always was. In the past it has been worse. But for the last 30+ years (since Nixon, and the southern strategy) the Right has been doing this, letting the wing-nuts froth, and then talking about "all the people" who are saying things, which then legitimizes those things.

[swimmingotter.livejournal.com]

I was reading online somewhere that she got pissed at the cover, making her look like her legs were 6 miles long and selling her beauty. But, seeing as she's a woman who's lacking in judgement, perhaps she was just being emotional and will get over it in a day or two.

*shudder*

I am so sad to be young in times like these. I'd much rather be at the end of my life, or a small child who doesn't know, because I realise more and more every day that I am one of the people who will be around to clean up the mess that is being made of the world. The Boy is a Republican, and I am so not, we get by. Sometimes it's just more fun to fight it out. I just don't see how anyone in our government can quote Stalin and not think anything of it. What does that say about the country we've become?

[ad-kay.livejournal.com]

See, you're expecting her to make sense! She doesn't write so much as she froths incoherently. IIRC from reading Atrios, one of the major conservative publications--I want to say National Review but I'm not sure that's it--asked her to report from the Dem. Convention. They rejected her copy because it absolutely incoherent. I think they went with Jonah Goldberg's stuff instead.

[mayakda.livejournal.com]

What a bitca. I wish I subscribed to Time, because then I could cancel and tell them why.

Of course the reason she's so popular with neocons are the black leather minis. All those B&D fantasies come to life. Rent-a-dominAnnie.

[cluefairy-j.livejournal.com]

I've seen her on Bill Maher (when he was doing Politically Incorrect - haven't caught her on any of his new show).

She always struck me as one of those women who uses her sex as a way to get ahead in life. "I'll say or do whatever you want if you'll pay attention to me, lover boy..."

From the middle

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

WAy out here, sitting in Iraq, is me, an average Joe. I want my sons to have decent jobs. I need a job when I get back. I'm concerned about my property taxes going higher, becasue we have to pay off huge pensions and the industrial / econimic base in my county is disappearing. At the same time, I'm extremly concerned about the environment around me, because I have a pretty good idea that the world IS getting warmer. I'm fairly well educated, extremely well read, and I can think.

I think ANN Coulter is full of crap. And so is Michael Moore. Both are grandstanding and using shock tatics about valid issues, but what we need is a rational discourse and an effort to solve these problems.

I fear for my country. Let me restate that, I fear for my country remaining a country.

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

But when these mouth pieces are so up in front, they BECOME the party, whether the average joe wants it or not.

Re: From the middle

[http://users.livejournal.com/_nymphette_/]

*applauds*

Re: From the middle

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

Why thank you! I think I'll run for office now, see what pork I can get.

Re: From the middle

[http://users.livejournal.com/_nymphette_/]

Well, we call ourselves Sexy Conservatists, but really, we're just pervy independants who like corruption the right from within. You can have our nomination! ; )

But seriously - the BS on BOTH sides makes me just ill. Coulter is about snark - and most satirists are. People just aren't quite sure how to handle it when it's making fun of the left instead of the usual op-ed whippin' boys.

The likes of Moore scar me far more - because they present themselves as 'factual, reliable' stuff. I rather doubt anyone read Coulter and thinks she's dead. serious. Maybe some do - but I have yet to meet even a rightie that does.

The problem is that the Michael Moore's ARE serious... just not any less full of it than Coulter is.

Re: From the middle

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

I've been accused of sarcam just as bitter (well, maybe not as violent) as Coulters, but she happens to be on a national stage, I'm not. If you're going to be in teh spotlight, you have a social duty to act responsiblty, and moderate you comments accordingly.

I've seen way too much violence (here, and in other parts of the world) to just sit back and laugh at remarks like that, and say, well, she's just kidding. It only takes one fanantic to take her seriously.

Can one be a culturaly conservative nationalistic liberal populist left wing environmentalist liberterian tax revolter all at the same time?

Re: From the middle

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Coulter is about snark - and most satirists are. People just aren't quite sure how to handle it when it's making fun of the left instead of the usual op-ed whippin' boys.

This is you, being an apologist for her. She is not about snark. She is, at the most generous I can be, intentionally writing agitprop. But when everyone says,"oh no one takes her, or the others who sound like her seriously (like say the CoS for a Senator, speaking of impaling judges)," and then make apologias for the Rudolphs, the McVeigh's and the rest. The Randall Terrys who saying killing doctors who perform abortions is just, and that anyone who happens to be in a clinic is allowable as collateral damage, well it seems to me that people are taking her seriously, and those who make excuses for her are enabling that.

It's kind of like making excuses for any other abuser.

TK

[ladymeow.livejournal.com]

Your opinion doesn't matter because you're a woman and too stupid to have an opinion.

Re: From the middle

[http://users.livejournal.com/_nymphette_/]

wow, I am an apologist for Coulter and her ilk?

or any other abuser?

for... disagreeing and considering their manner of op-ed a form of satire?

somehow I missed that leap in logic. This conversation is obviously about things I don't - or can't understand. Ta.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

I think what you're remembering is: USA Today decided it would be neat to have Michael Moore review the Republican convention and Ann Coulter review the Democratic convention. They rejected it, went with someone else.

She'd been rejected from National Review (possibly only their online edition) earlier -- thanks to a column in which she called for forcibly converting all Muslims to Christianity. (As you may remember from your history classes, the conversion of Europe to Christianity meant that there would never again be war in Europe. No, she didn't use that argument....)

Re: From the middle

[kasheesty.livejournal.com]

mmmmm.....pork......

[ad-kay.livejournal.com]

Yes, that was it, thank you! I mangled that pretty good, didn't I?

[mcduff.livejournal.com]

No, it's not the mirror image of NYT op-eds. Your perspective is painfully skewed.

It works this way -- the Left cares about being disliked. The reason the Right so often brings up fringe lefties and tries to paint them as the face of the Democratic Party is that the party moderates will automatically jump on board and try and denounce them, "oh no we're not all like that, oh that's just an extremist point of view," and then have a big argument about it.

The Right, on the other hand, doesn't care. Because if you get upset by what these people write, then you're just being "Politically Correct." For the most part, they don't defend or denounce them, they just quietly give them column inches and airtime and let them say the views that they secretly believe but don't have the clit to say themselves. Better media savvy? Partly. But I don't think that people on the Left wouldn't do exactly the same if the extremists on the Left were actually equivalent, if they said what moderates Truly Believed but didn't want to say.

And that's why Coulter can be successful in the mainstream where those of similar standard on the left remain entirely on the fringes. The right don't care that there are hideously offensive bigots resting in their fold. They are the attack dogs that they use for their own purposes. The Left, crazy bunch of hippies that it is, hates its own extremists as much as it hates those on the Right.

If Coulter's views weren't accepted, someone would say something about her. The Braying Masses would take the collective silence of the GOP establishment as damning, just as they jumped on every left-winger who didn't denounce some university lecturer they'd never even heard of before he was trumpeted as "the true face of the Left." The silence, though, is deafening.

[ad-kay.livejournal.com]

As I'm sure you know, your friend Digby has been making much the same points as you:
"Flame on High"

[ad-kay.livejournal.com]

Found the Salon story abut this:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/07/27/coulter/index.html

[ad-kay.livejournal.com]

Got it in one.