In Defense Of Ann [Coulter] (Jonathan Falwell On The MSM Ambush Of Ann Coulter Alert)

Worldnetdaily.com ^ | 06/30/2007 | Jonathan Falwell

[silverleaf]

Ann was being sarcastic about emulating Bill Maher’s commentary. Bill Maher was serious when he lamented the failure of terrorists to kill our Vice President.

Ann was a talk show guest- Bill Maher was a talk show host.

Ann was set up. Bill Maher was host in charge of his own program and comments, which were presented as serious political comment, not humor. Ann is being ridiculed because she is being misquoted. Ann has not misquoted anyone in order to ridicule them. There are plenty of real fools out there without having to create a faux fool by willfully or stupidly misquoting them.

I think Ann is up for any battle of wits (assuming she can find an armed opponent on the left, which is looking unlikely).

I can’t blame her for being frustrated by being sandbagged by fools, like this talk show host who set her up for the political expediency of John Edwards .... and who then supported the big media lie about her comments the following day!

Ann refuses to sit back and let pass what many know but are too intimidated to say out loud- that real or claimed “victimhood” should not be used - unchallenged - as a political tool with which any self-serving fool or pious hypocrite can say, or do, any outrageous thing.

[aclusux.com]

Everyone knows the incidences she was drawing from when she made both statements about John Edwards.

I am buying Ann’s book today and sending it to John.

John Edwards
410 Market Street
Suite 400
Chapel Hill, NC 27516

[peggybac]

And the libs want the Fairness Doctrine back.

[lucysmom]

Ann was being sarcastic about emulating Bill Maher’s commentary. Bill Maher was serious when he lamented the failure of terrorists to kill our Vice President.

Bill Maher was host in charge of his own program and comments, which were presented as serious political comment, not humor.

And yet Politically Incorrect was aired on Comedy Central as well as ABC.

I can’t blame her for being frustrated by being sandbagged by fools, like this talk show host who set her up for the political expediency...

Every time Ann gets herself into one of these dustups, I think of Proverbs 26:19.

[Maldarr]

This is how Liberals and Leftists will try to bog Ann down endlessly to explain herself.

They can do this to all Conservatives.
Those that ruffle their feathers.
They(libs and Lefties) have done it before, they’ll do it again.

[Radix]

Well said.

[soccermom]

I’ve been pretty critical of Coulter’s comments about the Jersey Girls and the “faggot” joke. But this is an entirely different case. What she said was completely appropriate.

[soccermom]

I have been, generally, unsympathetic to Ann Coulter when she gets into controversy. But not this time. This time she was clearly and deliberately taken out of context. Anyone with an ounce of intellectual honesty knows the point she was making.

[RonDog]

I’ve been pretty critical of Coulter’s comments about the Jersey Girls and the "faggot" joke.

But this is an entirely different case.

What she said [re: John Edwards] was completely appropriate.

Excellent, soccermom!

Now, perhaps, this short excerpt from Mark Steyn's EXTRAORDINARY analysis can help you understand Ann's position on the Jersey girls:

"...What crackpot argument can't be immunized by the Left's invocation of infallibility based on personal experience?" wonders Miss Coulter of Cleland, Sheehan, the Jersey Girls and Co. "If these Democrat human shields have a point worth making, how about allowing it to be made by someone we're allowed to respond to?"

Now that's a point worth making. As it is, thanks to Coulter cracks like "Now that their shelf life is dwindling, they'd better hurry up and appear in Playboy," even chaps on the right are doing the more-in-sorrow shtick and saying that they've been making the same basic argument as Ann and it's such a shame she had to go too far with her cheap shots because that's discredited the entire argument, etc.

The trouble with this line is that hardly anyone was objecting to the professional widow routine pre-Coulter. Well, that's not strictly true. Yours truly objected. After the Zacarias Moussaoui trial, I wrote:

"The first reaction of the news shows to the verdict was to book some relative of the 9/11 families and ask whether they were satisfied with the result, as if the prosecution of the war on terror is some kind of national-security Megan's Law on which they have inviolable proprietorial rights. Sorry, but that's not what happened that Tuesday morning. The thousands who died were not targeted as individuals: they were killed because they were American, not because somebody in a cave far away decided to murder Mrs. Smith. . . It's not about 'closure' for the victims; it's about victory for the nation."

But nobody paid the slightest heed to this line. For all the impact my column had, I might as well have done house calls.

Then Coulter comes in and yuks it up with the Playboy-spread gags, and suddenly the Jersey Girls only want to do the super-extra-fluffy puffball interviews. So two paragraphs in Ann Coulter's book have succeeded in repositioning these ladies: they may still be effective Democrat hackettes, but I think TV shows will have a harder time passing them off as non-partisan representatives of the 9/11 dead.

So, on balance, hooray for Miss Coulter...

[soccermom]

No, I fully understand Coulter's position on the Jersey Girls. I understand the point she was trying to make. But she could have done it without the personal attacks. The crux of her argument -- that the left uses victims as human shields -- was lost as people, instead, discussed her personal attacks. The fact that you feel you need to explain it today, over a year later, illustrates my point. She undermined her own argument.

[RonDog]

But she could have done it without the personal attacks...

LOL!

That, of course, was precisely Mark Steyn's point. :o)

If she addressed the issue of "using victims as spokespeople who dare not be countered" in the non-confrontational manner that you propose, she would have been ignored -- as Mark and others were.

It was ONLY because Ann was "in their face" that her argument broke through the MSM clutter and won the day.

ANN got battered in the process, but HER MESSAGE got through, where it had not previously.

[soccermom]

I disagree. I recall several people, namely Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh making similar points and O’Reilly got quite a bit of press for his exchange with Letterman, without attacking Sheehan personally.

The fact is, people weren’t talking about the leftist tactic -— they were talking about what mean old Ann said. And to suggest that her attacks were successful because the Jersey Girls were relegated to the “fluff shows” is ludicrous. People who watch the hard news shows are opinionated and informed to begin with. The Jersey Girls wouldn’t have an impact in that venue anyway. People who are predisposed to the left would eat it up and those on the right would not. Instead, they were going all over shows like the Today Show and The View. Suddenly, they were household names in the apolitical homes where clueless people saw them as the poor widows being attacked by Ann.

Furthermore, for all the blather about the leftist tactic of the victim card “finally” being “exposed” by Coulter, it wasn’t a successful tactic to begin with. It didn’t work in 2002 with the Wellstone funeral. In fact, it backfired. The Jersey Girls didn’t help Kerry get elected in 2004. However, when Rush attacked the victim tactic in the 2006 election — and I do think Rush was portrayed unfairly — it was a disaster. Honestly, we would have been better off if we had stood back and let people see that for the shameless tactic it was. Instead, it looked like mean Rush picking on poor Michael J. Fox.

I realize there is no empirical data on the Ann Coulter effect. But the reality is the “victim card” didn’t seem to work pre-Coulter’s comment. The left continued to use the victim tactic post-Coulter’s comment and, it appears, it was successful. And while there is no study pertaining to Ann Coulter, there is a parallel study pertaining to Michael Moore and how those types of personal attacks backfire.

[RonDog]

It appears that we shall have to agree to disagree. :o)

Still, the good thing about Ann -- or Rush -- taking the heat for attacking the Left so aggressively is that the rest of us can then follow through the gaping hole that they have blasted for us -- in some previously impenetrable wall -- without US having to engage in such hyperbole, sarcasm and even "nastiness" ourselves.

And, for THAT they have my respect, and gratitude.

[Bob]

The fact is, people weren’t talking about the leftist tactic -— they were talking about what mean old Ann said.

Actually, they were talking about what they were told she had said, not what she did say, just like the Maher-Edwards comment.

[RonDog]

Actually, they were talking about what they were told she had said, not what she did say...

For instance, here is what ANN said three years ago, from www.jewishworldreview.com:

Jewish World Review Nov. 20, 2003/ 25 Mar-Cheshvan, 5764

Ann Coulter

The party of ideas

With economic growth and name recognition of the average Democratic presidential candidate both running at about 7 percent, the Democrats are in trouble. Unable to rouse more than the Saddam-supporting left with their kooky foreign policy ideas, the Democrats had been counting on a lousy economy. It turns out that, given a choice between "shock and awe" and "run and hide," the American people prefer the former. Now that the Bush tax cuts have already started to kick in and boost the economy, it was beginning to look as if the Treason Lobby would have nothing to run on.

But the Democrats have discovered a surprise campaign issue: It turns out that several of them have had a death in the family. Not only that, but many Democrats have cracker-barrel humble origins stories (BEGIN ITALS)and(END ITALS) a Jew or lesbian in the family. Dick Gephardt's campaign platform is that his father was a milkman, his son almost died, and his daughter is a lesbian. Vote for me!

So don't say the Democrats aren't the party of ideas. As they keep reminding us, their ideas are just too darn complex to fit on a bumper sticker. Consequently, the Democrats can't tell us their ideas until after the election. Instead, their version of a political campaign is to stage a "Queen for a Day" extravaganza — which has special resonance in the case of the Democrats.

Al Gore famously inaugurated the family tragedy routine at the 1992 Democratic National Convention, where his idea of an inspiring political speech was to recount the story of his son being hit by a car. At the 1996 convention, Gore told a tear-jerker about his sister's long, painful death from lung cancer. It got to the point that Gore's family members had to fear any more runs for higher office.

In the current campaign, Gephardt has taken to spinning out a long, pitiful tale of his son's near-death three decades ago...

-- snip --

...At least when Gephardt exploits a family tragedy, he doesn't expect praise for not exploiting a family tragedy. John Edwards injects his son's fatal car accident into his campaign by demanding that everyone notice how he refuses to inject his son's fatal car accident into his campaign.

Edwards has talked about his son's death in a 1996 car accident on "Good Morning America," in dozens of profiles and in his new book. ("It was and is the most important fact of my life.") His 1998 Senate campaign ads featured film footage of Edwards at a learning lab he founded in honor of his son, titled "The Wade Edwards Learning Lab." He wears his son's Outward Bound pin on his suit lapel. He was going to wear it on his sleeve, until someone suggested that might be a little too "on the nose."

If you want points for not using your son's death politically, don't you have to take down all those "Ask me about my son's death in a horrific car accident" bumper stickers? Edwards is like a politician who keeps announcing that he will not use his opponent's criminal record for partisan political advantage. (I absolutely refuse to mention the name of my dearly beloved and recently departed son killed horribly in a car accident, which affected me deeply, to score cheap political points.

I wouldn't want John Edwards to be president, but I think even Karl Rove would be willing to stipulate that the death of a son is a terrible thing.

And, here is what someone calling herself ELIZABETH EDWARDS posted a few hours ago as a comment at cassandra2004.blogspot.com:

A page named for a character in mythology is an appropriate page for the posting above. John never raises the issue of our son, but he has responded to reporter's questions after the 1998 election.

He still never answers questions about him in any political context. We love our boy and like many parents who wear a locket or a child's old watch, John wears Wade's very small Outward Bound pin.

Again, he never calls attention to it himself. John does talk about his family, including Wade and his death in Four Trials, in the context of talking about the work he did for other families and the importance to him of his own family. And finally, no advertisements or commercials were ever shot at the Wade Edwards Learning Lab.

I suspect that there are plenty of Republicans who have lost children and they will tell you that they love their children, as we do, and they wish they could continue to parent them, as we do. And they, like we, can only do one thing: protect the memory that child. I hope that they will ask you to stop, as I ask you know.

If you don't like John's policies, have at him. If you would never consider voting for him, say so; that is fine. No one ever wins with 100% of the vote.

Elizabeth Edwards | Homepage | 07.01.07 - 3:03 pm

[soccermom]

Yeah, I suppose we will. But the bottom line is that, in this case, she was deliberately taken out of context.

[soccermom]

No, in the Jersey Girls case, the full context was presented and Coulter was given a chance to defend it on the Today Show and other shows. She didn't claim to be taken out of context in that instance -- she just kept repeating the argument that victims shouldn't be above criticism. Agreed, They shouldn't be above criticism, but that doesn't explain or justify personal attacks. There is no denying Coulter made personal attacks on the Jersey Girls. The only question is whether or not you approve of that. I don't. But that doesn't mean I won't defend her when she is being unfairly targeted, as she clearly was in this case.

[Teacher317]

Can any Freepers help point me towards numerous examples of hate speech by the left? My office-mate doesn’t believe that anyone on the left is so “hateful” as Ann.

[soccermom]

OK, these are just the ones I have off the top of my head, but I’m sure you can google and find lots more:

Bill Maher — called American bomber pilots “cowards” when comparing them to the 9/11 terrorists. He also wished Cheney had been killed in a foiled terror plot and has said several anit-Christian things, called the conservative admiration for Ronald Reagan “gay”among other things. If you google him, you’ll find a treasure trove of hate.

Alec Baldwin said that if this were the old days we would have stoned Henry Hyde and then gone after his family — to the cheers of the audience. He’s also a routinely hateful guy and I’m sure there is more on him.

Julia Roberts, who, in fairness, certainly has an admirable personal story, has said republicans fall between “repugnant” and “reptile” in the dictionary.

Michael Moore lamented the fact that terrorists had attacked “blue states” on 9/11 rather than “red states” and he called the victims on the planes something like whimpy white guys and said that black men would have fought back.

Oh, and then there are the liberal bloggers hired by Elizabeth Edwards to blog for John who said vile things about the Catholic Church.

Oh, and the hateful things done to Michael Steele — the black GOP candidate from Maryland. Chuck Schumer’s staff illegally accessed his credit records and had a link on their website to a racist cartoon of Steele.

And Harry Belfonte said racist, condescending things about Condi Rice.

Al Franken is also a hateful one, but can’t recall specific examples off the top of my head.

These are just for starters. I’m there is plenty you can find on google, and someone probably has a thread devoted to it on FR. Michelle Malkin had a whole book about it called “Unhinged”, so you might want to google her, too.