Ann Coulter at CPAC

National Center for Public Policy Research ^ | 2-4-07 | Amy Ridenour

[SJackson]

Ann Coulter at CPAC

I'm sorry to see that Ann Coulter once again made certain news coverage of CPAC would be focused upon her instead of upon the conservative movement's goals and principles.

The National Center for Public Policy Research is one of very many co-sponsors of CPAC, and has been for some years. After Ann Coulter's offensive speech last year, we telephoned the organizers and strongly suggested that Ann Coulter's behavior was harmful to, and unrepresentative of, the conservative movement. We said we were considering pulling out our co-sponsorship because of Ann Coulter's "raghead" comment, and asked them to not invite Ann Coulter to speak in CPAC 2007, or, at the very least, only invite her if she was told to can the offensive speech, and explicitly agreed to do so. I had 90 percent decided to stop our co-sponsorship for CPAC 2007, but the sponsor seemed to be taking our concerns about Coulter's 2006 remarks seriously and with what seemed to us to be appropriate sympathy, so the National Center co-sponsored CPAC again this year.

(I am, by the way. under no illusion that CPAC's main sponsors lose sleep over possibly losing the National Center's co-sponsorship. We do pay a fee to co-sponsor, and all the fees paid by all the co-sponsors together do add up to quite a tidy sum, but I'm sure any one co-sponsor is quite expendable.)

As has been widely reported, Ann Coulter not only once again went out of her way to use a nasty epithet, she pushed her offensiveness up a notch, using a word that is even more universally reviled than the derogatory term she hurled last year.

So, CPAC's sponsors either invited Coulter back without first getting her pledge that she would speak without using demeaning epithets, or they obtained her pledge, and she broke her word.

We'll ask.

It would be better, in my opinion, to not have a CPAC at all than to have one that presents conservatism as a hostile, people-hating ideology. We conservatives have enough trouble overcoming the false things that are said about us without paying for a platform upon which we shoot ourselves annually in the foot.

Some of my past commentary on Ann Coulter can be found here and here.

Here's a roundup of other conservative (and moderate) commentary on the Coulter situation:

"With Friends Like These... (re Ann Coulter)," JonQuixote

"CPAC is Shocked--Shocked!--by Ann Coulter's Remarks," Jon Swift

"Coulter Screams for Attention, Again - Losing Whatever Supporters She Still Had," Patterico

"Ann Coulter Doesn't Speak For Me," Wizbang

"Coulter Said What? (Bumped)," Captain's Quarters

"The Shame Of Ann Coulter," The Moderate Voice

"Ann Coulter at CPAC," Betsy's Page

"Ann Coulter calls John Edwards...," Right Thoughts

"Count Me Out," Lone Star Times

"Ann Coulter Calls John Edwards The 'F-word'," Gay Patriot

"Coulter Needs A Rehab," Riehl World View

"Apologizing for Ann Coulter," MyDD

"On Ann Coulter, John Edwards, and Civility," historymike

P.S. A hostile liberal blogger issues a challenge to conservatives:

Reality: [Ann Coulter] is your biggest star. The people you claim to speak for feel she speaks for them much, much more than you do -- and they're right. She is modern conservatism's id -- she's the one who says what the rest of you would say if you didn't feel it would cost you your standing as reasonable, responsible people.

Want to prove me wrong? You cut her off. You boycott the sponsors of TV shows that still invite her on as a guest. You show up at her book signings and campus appearances and hand out flyers quoting her nastiest bon mots. You boycott CPAC next year if she's invited, and demand that others do the same. Or if you have a problem with boycotts as a matter of principle, at the very least urge your fellow conservatives, on college campuses and elsewhere, to stop extending invitations to her, given the profound harm you say she does to your movement.

But you won't do that, will you? In that case, shut the hell up, hypocrites, and acknowledge that while Coulter may be the bad apple in the family, your door is always open to her.

Well?

[cinives]

In olden days they killed the messenger - that's what a lot of people on here are metaphorically trying to do to Ann.

I say to Ann - keep on talking.

[cinives]

Speakers are representing themselves - not symbols. What a ridiculous comment.

[cinives]

All true. Republicans and seemingly many so-called conservatives are Dem-lite. They all want to control speech.

[ajolympian2004]

slammin' sammy baby must not have seen this thread yet.

[bluecollarman]

Yes, the press is hostile and hungry, but that's no reason for Republicans to feed them.

You still don't get it. You will feed them one way or the other. They have to eat.

Frankly, I don't give a tinker's damn about Republicans. They haven't shown me anything that looks like a back bone. I am a conservative first and foremost. That is something the Republicans are abandoning at an alarming rate.

[Syncro]

"Coulter Cash"

He's got a good hook there!

But what about:

Kilborne Cash: Rifle Crosshairs on a pic of Pres Bush

Carville Cash: Kneecapping

Bill Maher Cash: I’m just saying if he (Cheney about the assassination attempt) did die, other people, more people would live.

Quote from transcript...Barney Frank joking about Cheney being assassinated:

Barney Frank: They said the bomb was wasted. (laughter and applause)

Maher: That’s a funny joke.

Alex Baldwin Cash: Go to his house and kill his wife and children

And the Politicos:

Murtha Cash: Military Cold Blooded Killers

Hussein Obama Cash: GIs’ lives ‘wasted’

John Kerry Cash: Stuck in Irak

OK, yea I did already post this on another thread. But I wanted to tie it in with the cash thingie...

[cinives]

Right - we should all roll over and lick the boots of the politicaly correct and perpetually offended like Trent Lott did. Besides, she didn't even call him a faggot. It's an uproar over nothing.

Did I see hundreds of remarks and reams of newsprint and dozens of articles in the MSM condemning the Dems when the Lurch outed noncandidate Mary Cheney's private life on national TV ? Nope.

[SJackson]

Frankly, I don't give a tinker's damn about Republicans.

Then I agree, it shouldn't concern you at all.

[cerberus]

Try as some might to find some cleverness in her comment, the fact is it was simply a very stupid and not at all clever remark. It appears she cares more about getting attention than she does about the Conservative cause.

Moreover, the fact that Michael Moore, Al Franken and all of their ilk do what they do and say what they say does not excuse it. Why would we want to lower ourselves to that....it's stupid and childish.

[JakeSladder]

Sigh --- political correctness has got every American by the short hairs now. Nobody has the right to complain about the communist censuring strategem called "PC" Holy Crap! Now you've done it. You used the C-word. Now all the 'progressives' will be barking...(sarc/off)

[bluecollarman]

Frankly, I don't give a tinker's damn about Republicans.
"Then I agree, it shouldn't concern you at all."

Good luck on that election thing without us slick!

[o_zarkman44]

"OK, you obviously feel Edwards is a faggot."

I kinda like Breck Boy. Ann can opine what she wants. Many agree, many disagree. And many others are too stupid to pick up on the connotation.

Nobody deserves to physically die regardless of what their political opposition is. But a lot of politicians need to die a political death and the truth is the only way voters know what kind of traitors they are.

Kinda like the comment that it was too bad the Afghan suicide bomber didn't kill the Vice President. That rat headed comment never made the news because the MSM is a bunch of rats as well. Rats attack over the smallest sliver of cheese, but they are about the hardest critters to get rid of.

It is a very different scenario wishing death on someone while wishing another to have a gay ol time.

I have taken credit for many allegedly stupid comments in my life and I am a better man for it.

The truth of the message will remain even after the messinger has been slayed.

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

"She's been placed on Double Secret Probation. One more wedgy this semester and she'll be doing Community Service."

[rambo316]

It's amazing how the idiots forget about the Second Amendment to The Constitution. Ann has a right to speak her great mind. It is also amazing how all the Commies give Ann's commnets all the attention but when that Commie Bill Mahr says that Cheney is better off dead or whatever he said, That gets no coverage.

[Syncro]

Or explaining what she probably meant:

The word faggot is occasionally used in parts of Britain to denote a silly or foolish person

"Fag" was a term used for a junior boy who acted as a servant for a senior boy at Eton College,

Now that fits Edwards to a tee from when he was running with Kerry.

Heck the pictures pretty much confirm that! LOL

She sure has a track record:

On July 27 American Republican pundit Ann Coulter said that the former Vice President of the United States Al Gore was a "total fag", and that former President of the United States Bill Clinton was a "latent homosexual", while being interviewed by MSNBC's Chris Matthews
Coulter caused a major controversy on the community; and gay rights organizations demanded to know the reason why such an offensive usage of the word was permitted by the network.

I taped her interview on the Hardball show and gave her a DVD copy.

From

[bvw]

Well do you want Ann's leg "brocken"?

Do you call a spade a spade, or think that spade is not a PC-term, so use "the black suit that isn't clubs" instead?

[ventana]

Hey, listen. At least she didn't call him a girly man. THAT would have really gone just too far! V's wife.

[berdie]

Well said. I think Ann has enough knowledge and wit to get her point across at an important function without using derogatory language. I think she has plenty of outlets to use her biting wit. Yes, Bill Mahr, Kennedy, Murtha, etc, etc, etc...say things that call for apologies. Her freedom of speech is not in question imo. Her timing is. The MSM will use this to their benefit..and that is just not politically a good thing. Like it or not, a lot of people were turned off by her remark (as amusing as it was).

[SJackson]

Well do you want Ann's leg "brocken"? Do you call a spade a spade, or think that spade is not a PC-term, so use "the black suit that isn't clubs" instead?

No of course not, you brought up breaking Ann's legs.

Spade is fine referring to a card game, spade would not be fine referring to a political opponent. It's not that hard to understand. Personally if I thought Edwards was a homosexual I'd use that term, though I think Ann used it before for Clinton. If you think this wins votes, fine, you're entitled to your opinion. I think it's stupid.

[bvw]

Oh boy ... Ann and CPAC did not feed them! They are voracious omnivores hungry for any bit of CPAC and Ann, or off of any of us ... if they don't get a prime rib cut, they'll settle for a corned toe and call it a short rib.