Category Archives: Ann Coulter

Updated: ‘Patriotism, Nationhood, & The American Indian’

America, Ann Coulter

Dr. David Yeagley is a Comanche Indian from Oklahoma, educated at Oberlin, Yale, Emory, Hartt, and the University of Arizona. (He was a special student at Harvard in 1982). He has invited several nationally known conservative and independent writers to offer their perspective on American Indians. His interview with me, here at the Free-Market News Network, is titled “Patriotism, Nationhood, & The American Indian,” and is the first in the planned series.

Update: The interview has now been posted on Dr. Yeagley’s website, BadEagle.com, which means that responses from the American Indian community have been forthcoming. You can follow these here and here—indeed the good folks at BadEagle.com are hip to my deficiencies vis-Ã -vis the law and Indian reservations. In my defense I’ll say that I was asked by Dr. Yeagley to respond spontaneously, not research. That’s what I did.
I am told that Ann Coulter has expressed interest in the topic. That’s a good thing, as Martha Stewart would say.

King Cuts Coulter Down

Ann Coulter, Homosexuality, Media, The Zeitgeist

Florence King leaves most pipsqueak contemporary “writers” standing (they’re syndicated, however, she’s not). The famous misanthrope and recluse saw fit to emerge from hibernation to kick Ann coulter around in a column for National Review. Some other conservatives crawled from under dank rocks and attempted to respond to King’s studied contempt. Here’s a taste of why they failed so miserably:

Coulter’s sexual remarks are at once grim and flippant. Commenting on a psychologist’s plan to teach children about gay sex in a loving way, she said: ‘How can you teach children about anal sex in a loving way? Or any sodomy, for that matter?”
I am not saying that everyone has to be witty and original and overflowing with dazzling bons mots — after all, Coulter is a lawyer and I wouldn’t want to see her let down the side. I am just curious to know why she was content to call Katie Couric “the affable Eva Braun of morning TV.” Couldn’t she come up with something better? How about Simper Fidelis?…
At her best, Coulter writes well, but the chief source of her success is that she is a perfect match for the American ideal: smart as a whip but dumb as a post, educated but not learned, sexy but not sensuous, all at the same time. She would not hesitate to choose a sledgehammer over a stiletto because her instincts would pull her back from what the 18th century called ‘demolishing your enemies without raising your voice.’ She would know that if a writer uses a stiletto, a lot of people might not get the point, but they would definitely get the loftiness that accompanies irony and understatement. And so, knowing that being called an elitist spells ruin, she opted for a sledgehammer and raised the roof instead.
Her timing was perfect, putting her before the television cameras just in time to take advantage of the whoosh. That’s the sound cable news uses to signal each new 15-second segment in a roundup. They report the latest border debacle, then they go whoosh! and start talking about midwestern floods. When they finish the floods there’s another whoosh! and the subject changes to the stock market. Gone are the days when a break was signaled by a soft rattle of the host’s fake papers and a murmured ‘We’ll be back in a moment.’ Now, if a revered philosopher came on a show, the host would say, ‘Hold your thought, Plato,’ and cut to whoosh.
CNN has the loudest whoosh, a harsh wheezing sound so labored that at first I thought it was me. After all, I made my NR debut 16 years ago with a cover story called ‘I’d Rather Smoke Than Kiss.’ But no. The whoosh is television’s way of telling us that we are being swept up and borne aloft on gusty torrents of swirling excitement. To train us to gasp, they walk us through it by gasping for us.
The whoosh needs a blowhard and it has gotten Ann Coulter, a one-woman Hyde Park Corner who, love her or hate her, is saving television from itself by never uttering Guestisms — those gummy little nothings that guests keep saying over and over without thinking until everybody thinks they have said something thoughtful.”

King’s complete column, “Watch Ann Go Whoosh!,” is here. And here is my “Coughing Up Some Coulter Fur Balls.”

Coulter Correspondence

Ann Coulter, Ilana Mercer

As you can imagine, many of Ms. Coulter’s more maniacal followers responded to my rather tame and measured, “Coughing Up Some Coulter Fur Balls.”

As unpleasant as some got, they were never as racist, stupid, statist, and plain loathsome as the prototype, frothing-at-the-mouth left-liberal, epitomized by this character (now permanently blocked).

The left is worse than the right—about that Coulter is right.

There were, however, some lovely notes. I’ll share them with you.

Here’s one from Billy V.:

Dear Miss Mercer:

“I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to read your wonderful columns.

Miss Coulter in a confused, unprincipled woman. But Republocrats and Demopublicans are all just unprincipled rotters. And your writing on this matter is so right on. I can’t believe it but I do, and I thank you for it.

Thank you for the life saver and the rope to pull me to shore.”

Writes Rick from Florida:

“Mrs. Mercer: By pure accident, I ran into some of your comments while reading an article about fathers on the net. Your eloquence, excellent writing, precise and to-the-point observations, are quite refreshing. I tend to agree with your assessment of Anne Coulter. Absolutely no talent [i think she has talent–ILANA], very insipid [far from it–ILANA], and way off on her portrait of the 9/11 widows. My opinion? Vulgar and low. By being number one on the Best Sellers lists, she shows us how far down our country has fallen.
Keep up you great work. You now have another admirer.”

And this from R. R.:

“Ann Coulter has a tendency to incite.

You educate.

Thanks”

Thanks to all for taking the time to write; you made my day.–ILANA

Coughing Up Some Coulter Fur Balls

Ann Coulter, Barely A Blog, Media

“Ann Coulter, I imagine, considers herself an individualist, not a collectivist. Which is why her views on grief perplex. About certain September 11 widows Coulter has written the following: “These self-obsessed women seem genuinely unaware that 9-11 was an attack on our nation and acted as if the terrorist attacks happened only to them.” (Emphasis added.)

Nations don’t grieve; individuals who incur loss do. The nation, following September 11, can legitimately lay claim to the confusion that comes with a loss of a previous sense of security and to the sorrow that accompanies the deaths of compatriots. However, only the immediate relatives of the victims were in fact bereaved. The nation might be shocked, reeling, but only the families of the dead were utterly devastated. With every day that dawns, they alone face the kind of pain the rest of us cannot fathom…

The idea that people not directly affected by a tragedy ought to perform the rites reserved for the bereaved conjures the image of a tribe in the paroxysmal throws of a grief ritual. It’s inspired by the equally primitive specter of Oprah’s televised group therapy sessions, in which every individual’s pain is equally weighted. ..”

My complete column, “Coughing Up Some Coulter Fur Balls,” is here. A section of the column will be familiar to Barely-A-Blog readers.

I must say that the accusation that Coulter is doing things for money is idiotic ad hominem–attack a person’s unknown motivation. It’s an invalid argument. Today on “Hannity and Colmes,” a Democratic strategist alleged just that. What’s more, she carried on as though she had made a startling discovery. How did she know Coulter had written the book only to make money (not that there’s anything wrong with that; in fact that’s one excellent reason to write a book)? Well, the fool replied, “It’s number one on the New-York Times’ Best-Sellers List.” You can’t beat that for a circular argument. She knows Coulter intended only to make money, because she is making money.