Ann Coulter misses the mark RE: Fred Thompson

Leaning Straight Up ^ | October 11th, 2007 | Karl

[Josh Painter]

Those who read here often know I like Ann Coulter. She is frank and harsh but more often then not, right on the mark when she goes after the liberals in America.

But not infallible, as this piece shows. In this article she attacks people who dislike the front runners (Guliani and Romney) for not being conservative enough and are gravitating to Mike Huckabee and Fred Thompson.

I admit that neither of these two are flashy and they are certainly not neo cons, but they are often solid and sensible, and do reflect conservative values. I think that she is missing that in her desire to promote a hardline conservative candidate.

And in Thompson's case, her dislike of him is centrally based on his vote in the Clinton impeachment, and in my opinion, she is cutting off her nose to spite her face...

And had they ALL voted for removal, it would have NOT made a difference, as they were no where close to reaching a 67 vote majority required.

I won't defend his vote, he made the choice as he saw fit. Let him answer to it or not.

But all this deep seated bitterness on her part is useless. So he cast his essentially wasted vote in line with his principles, not her principles. So what? The point had been made about Clinton and all they were going to get had been done. At best they would have failed with 55 votes which is still a failure...

She is playing the same game that Dobson is. If the candidate is not perfect, then run away. In this case Thompson is a viable candidate, and she is so enraged at his not voting to support what she considers the paramount legal issue of the century that she will villify him out of hand.

My exit question to her and Dobson is this: Who would you like LEAST in the Whitehouse? Hillary or Fred?

[carton253]

I know Rudy is for gun control. And if Rudy comes out of the primaries with the nomination, that means, contrary to the huffing and puffing and impugning that goes on here on Free Republic, he has every chance in the world to beat Hiliary. He is leading in the polls... not because the MSM is trying to shove him down our throat. He is leading because to most Republicans, he is the candidate of choice.

[uptoolate]

I think it is telling that during the 2006 race the discussions on these forums about conservative voters ‘teaching liberal Republicans a lesson’ mostly ended up with a statement saying that the general election is no place to teach your party anything, rather it is in the primaries where that is to be done.

The primaries are where we should be looking for the candidate that meets all or the most of the party’s platform issues. It seems that Ann is just pointing out that we have not found anyone who fits this role. We have have playing in to the medias hand by allowing them to start putting all our eggs in the basket of their choosing.

[Brices Crossroads]

“wonderful, conservative man.”

Dole? No wonder you think Romney is the cat’s meow. Your bar for what is and is not a conservative is pretty low. If youth and energy were what the American people wanted, in 1980, they could have chosen the 56 year old Bob Dole over the 69 year old Ronald Reagan. After all, he was a wonderful conservative man. And, remind me, the youthful, energetic vibrant Clinton...He won 2 elections by a plurality. He never got a majority. The youthful Mondale would have clobbered Reagan in 1984. Remind me. How did that one come out?

Which is something Mitt has in common with him. Mitt Romney has run two state wide elections. In the first he was clobbered by the swimmer, right after the Au Bar/ William Kennedy Smith scandal (when he should have been vulnerable) by 58-41.

In the second election, against the redoubtable Shannon O’Brien (who?) Mitt won with 49.77% of the vote to 45% for her. He did not seek reelection, because the polls showed he would have been trounced.

So here is a guy, a real electoral powerhouse, who has run 2 races, been trounced in one, narrowly won by a plurality in the other against a “no name”, and you want to entrust the Republican electoral fortunes to this electoral powerhouse.

[carton253]

Wow, you have this election all figured out, don't you. All dems will automatically vote for Hillary and the squishy middle will break 50-50. Can I borrow that crystal ball of yours? It's pretty potent.

If Rubdy is the nominee, then Republicans did vote for him. So, don't say the base will abandon him. It was the base, who showed up during the primaries, and cast their ballot for him.

[cinives]

And when they run into trouble in the Senate confirmation process, how hard will he fight to promote an anti-abortion justice ?

[Ingtar]

Since Ginsberg, Roberts, Thomas, and Scalia are cut from the same mold in Giuliani’s mind, he can even say that with a straight face.

[SlayerOfBunnies]

Lol - obviously Rudy is your pet candidate so you will vote for him.

I’m not saying the base will abandon him - I’m saying he has never had the conservative base and never will. Winning the Republican nomination (if he does), does *not* mean he has the base. It means he got more of the votes cast by registered Republicans (that managed to struggle out to the polls) than the next guy did.

Not all conservatives are registered republicans - I’m certainly not (partly because of Republicans like Rudy) - and for many of us would find it morally unacceptable to vote for a pro-abortion candidate. I don’t need Dobson to remind me that abortion is evil - that is (to me and others as well) self-evident.

I think you will find that many of us can not, in good faith, vote for a man that is in favor of abortion. In addition, I suspect you will notice that many of us will likewise choose to vote against a gun grabber like Rudy.

Be snide and sarcastic if you like. Your last post reveals your apparent lack of counter to the points I (and others) raise.

[LadyNavyVet]

Not true at all. There are plenty of people who vote in the general and never bother to vote in the primary. What the Republican establishment and many Freepers fail to understand is that there are enough social conservatives who will not, under any circumstances, vote for a pro-abortion candidate to tank Rudy. We Freepers can scream at each other all we want that “THAT MEANS HILLARY WINS IT!” but what many don’t realize is that Freepers are much more politically aware than the vast majority of voters and we understand, more than most, who Hillary is and how corrupt and dangerous she is. Most Freepers would crawl over cut glass to keep her out of office. But the average voter who determines elections may not like Mrs. Clinton, may find her mannish, distant, too liberal, but they do not realize and will not be told by the MSM where they get all their news, what an avowed Marxist and how dangerous to the Republic she is.

I homeschool and I live in the very important swing state of Florida. The majority of the people I deal with on a regular basis are social conservatives. There are plenty that dislike Mrs. Clinton immensely, but they will never go against their deeply held religious beliefs to keep her out of office. They believe they will answer for their votes at their judgment, and they will not, under any circumstances, vote for a pro-abort. Period.

That’s something the country club Republican establishment, which barely tolerates social conservatives at the best of times, fails to understand at its peril.

[SlayerOfBunnies]

Dang it all - you put that way better than I did. Good job! :-)

[DesScorp]

I like Ann, and have read her books, but she’s dead wrong on Fred.

[barnicus]

Fred is more pleasant than Hillary

[carton253]

Obviously Rudy is your pet candidate so you will vote for him.

Well, since you know so much, I should just yield to your superior knowledge and that wonderful crystal ball.

The points you raise are the ones that have been raised before. SlayerofBunnies: "If I'm not voting for Rudy, he can't win."

Okay... fine.

[perfect_rovian_storm]

He has NOT made that clear at all. He has said that he will appoint ‘strict constructionists’ and said that he’d appoint judges like Thomas and Scalia. However, when pressed, he says that Ruth Bader Ginsburg is also a ‘strict constructionist’.

He has played around with the definitions so much that nobody can trust a word he says on judges. (Or anything else for that matter.)

Rudy will do whatever he wants with judges and doesn’t give a damn what we think about it.

[Reagan Man]

>>>>>Are we going to find a die hard Conservative? I think not.

There are a couple solid conservatives running, but only one is a viable candidate.

As far as conservatism goes, Fred is the real deal. He's pro-Constitution, pro-Bill of Rights, pro-national defense, pro-limited govt, pro-federalist, pro-tax reform, pro-gun, pro-family, pro-life, pro-private property rights, pro-capitalism, pro-trade, pro-business, pro-entitlement reform, pro-secured borders, anti-amnesty, anti-special rights, pro-freedom, and-pro America. Fred wants to preserve and strengthen American sovereignty, kill the Islamofascists and win the WOT.

>>>>>I would take someone like Rudy, who I disagree with everything he stands for socially over any Democrat out there right now.

Rooty and Hillary are the two liberal frontrunners. Neither one meets basic conservative standards.

[kellynla]

As a fellow Tennessean(even though FT was actually born in AL) and a fellow alumnus of U. of Memphis(previously know as MEM State); I like Thompson BUT...he has not exactly “swept me off my feet” ...his conservative credentials are suspect, his enthusiasm & “fire in the belly” are lacking and he looks like 30 years of bad road(take a look at FT and you’ll see what one too many Jack Daniels will do to your face!LOL)

I like Hunter & Tancredo BUT neither has hit above a “3” on ANY polls...
so the GOP better get a testicles & spine implant and a true blue conservative who can beat Hillarybeast b4 11/2008 or we can all plan on another four years...if not eight years of the Klintoons...and if that happens, we will all have to hit our knees every night that the country doesn’t entirely go to hell in a hand basket!

I have my asbestos PJ's on, so flame away if you so desire. LOL

I'm off to work...have a good one!

[carton253]

Well then... if Rudy wins the nomination, I wonder just who are all those Republicans going into the voting booth and marking their ballots. Let’s see, according to you, they are not the base, the social conservatives, the evangelicals, the politically astute, (which only those on FR seem to be) the red, white, and blue, and the ones who don’t matter to you. So, I wonder just who they were that gave Rudy enough votes to win the nomination. Hmmmmm?

[perfect_rovian_storm]

What you’re saying is reasonable, but you’re not looking at the whole picture.

Rasmussen did a poll a short time ago that said that 27% of Republicans would stay home or vote 3rd party if Rudy was the nominee.

That’s a huge amount to make up for in the general. I don’t believe Rudy can do it. Especially after he is smeared by the ‘9/11 firefighters for truth’ and left without his ‘heroism’ on 9/11 to run on.

Even if half of those people don’t actually stay home or vote 3rd party, it would take a LOT of independent pro-aborts to make up for it.

Even to a lot of pro-aborts, Rudy’s past is pretty icky with support for partial birth abortion, as well as having been endorsed by radical pro-abort groups.

We can all make predictions all day long and none of us have that crystal ball, but I disagree with you that if Rudy wins the nomination that it automatically means that he’s capable of winning the general. Far from it.

[untrained skeptic]

I do want a good, proven, exceptional man.

There are unfortunately a shortage of those among viable candidates.

I think Fred is a good man and an exceptional man. However, he isn't a solidly proven, career politician. If elected, he would have a rough start in office even more than Bush did. In some ways Fred is more polished than Bush was, however he has made some bad mistakes despite good intentions in the past, and it is reasonable that he could fall victim to bad advice in office as well.

However, I think Rudy is far worse. He is proven, and exceptional, but he is not a good man. He put on a good shot of rallying support after 9/11. However, his history before and after that is not conservative, nor does it show respect for the constitution or the rule of law.

Romney is a charismatic, but he seems to be telling people what they want to hear rather than speaking from conviction.

So do we want a candidate who were are pretty sure won't respect our rights or work to constrain government, or do we want a candidate who is conservative, but has made mistakes in the past and appears to have been manipulated due to lack of experience in dealing with Washington politics in the past?

I'd rather go with the good, conservative man, and hope that he has learned from his mistakes.

[carton253]

Slayer, because I dare put forth a theory that Rudy may have strength within the Republican party that may allow him to win the nomination, you get all pissy and call Rudy my pet candidate. Actually, I plan to vote for Fred Thompson.

Lady, you are right. Conservatives may not vote for Rudy. But don't make it absolute. There may be many conservatives that do vote for him.

But, if Rudy wins the nominee (operative word here is if) then that shows that he is the preferred candidate in the Republican party. That means he was able to muster enough strength to nullify what we on FR define as the conversative base. That strength should not be overlooked. That's all I am saying. Now, feel free to disagree with me.

[carton253]

I am looking at the whole picture. What 27% of Republicans say on 10/7 will likely change on 11/8. If you want to make that poll the absolute rule in the election, then please do so.

If you think Rudy's heroism has been dashed, then I will have to respectfully disagree.

Rudy is leading in the polls because the majority of Republicans (today) prefer him. Hopefully, Fred will be able to change that.