[Dec31,1999]

She was fired from the conservative National Review magazine when, in the wake of 9/11, she urged the invasion of all Muslim nations and the forcible conversion of their citizens to Christianity.

National Rewiew is just a PC rag, which is why they fired her.

[Dave Wright]

Having just completed "Treason" I would suggest it is one of the most important books since "The Road To Serfdom". Sullivan misses the whole point about Coulter's exposing the McCarthy myth. Most of what liberals attribute to him was the result of the HUAC hearings and had nothing to do with his Senate investigation of Communists in sensitive jobs in the government which was his committee's responsibility. The Venona cables revealed that, if anything, he was undereporting the numbers and impact. He was demonized for not revealing names out of compassion for the reputations of the accused not because he didn't know them. The last chapter summarizes what I've felt for a long time. Liberals hate America because they hate civilization. In their minds they are gods who should be able to impose their divine will on the ignorant masses. It is a basic psychological impulse in the immature human that most outgrow in early childhood. They can't accept the constraints of the true Creator and His design and think they can do a fairer job.

[PhilDragoo]

American politics has been badly damaged by the scruple-free tactics of those like Moore and Coulter.

Andrew got AIDS from scruple-free tactics.

Andrew, your moral equivalence is an effective emetic.

Now, which of these two will be able to define and spell emetic?

Which one gets Andrew hot?

Cue Seinfeld: Not that there's anything wrong with that.

[shhrubbery!]

No punches are pulled. Ted Kennedy is an “adulterous drunk”. President Clinton had “crack pipes on the White House Christmas tree”. You get the idea.

Uhhh, are either of those statements false, Andrew? No? Then what's your problem?

[Spiff]

Um...why is it that leftists can't get their facts straight?

See this article from National Review Online that explains that Ann Coulter was not fired, but that she severed ties with NRO.

[WaterDragon]

"She was fired from the conservative National Review magazine

Not so, according to a column by Jonah Goldberg. He said they objected to the one column, and Coulter threw a fit and quit.

"....her flights of fancy go back a long way. No punches are pulled. Ted Kennedy is an “adulterous drunk”.

Get real, Sullivan! That description of Kennedy is NO flight of fantasy. The girl Ted killed, while he was DRUNK?

"In Coulter’s world there are two types of people: conservatives and liberals. These are not groups of people with competing ideas. They are the repositories of good and evil. There are no distinctions among conservatives or among liberals."

Sullivan can't have read "Treason", where Coulter talks about Democrats who have swerved to the extreme Left, and those who didn't.

"Liberals are “devoted to class warfare, ethnic hatred and intolerance”. Liberals “hate democracy because democracy requires persuasion and compromise rather than brute political force”.

Those are true statements, hardly indictments of Coulter!

"....by defending the tactics of McCarthy, she actually plays directly into the hands of the left."

It is Sullivan here who rejects "nuances"....McCarthy was an imperfect human being but his charges of Soviet spies in our government were ALL based in fact.

".....shameless hucksters of ideological hate."

Sullivan would have conservatives continue to condemn ourselves to oblivion by "niceness"....which David Horowitz constantly warns us against.

I don't know what Sullivan's problem is, but he's all wet comparing Coulter to the abominable Michael Moore.

[marron]

The left, in turn, has learnt the lesson, which is why the attack dog Michael Moore has done so well.

Does Sullivan believe that if Ann disappeared, Moore would go away? This is hardly the case. Until recently, the left had a monopoly. There was no Sullivan, no Coulter, no Limbaugh, no Fox. No intenet. No Free Republic. Until recently Walter Cronkite could say things no more extreme than Moore and get paid to say it. And no one would refute him.

But those days are gone.

, in the wake of 9/11, she urged the invasion of all Muslim nations and the forcible conversion of their citizens to Christianity.

Not all. Just our enemies. She's right, however impolite it was to say it.

In Coulter’s world there are two types of people: conservatives and liberals. These are not groups of people with competing ideas.

In Coulter's world, Conservatives compete. They are not required to sit still with hands folded while "liberals" re-write history. In Coulter's world, paid liars like Chomsky and the New York Times are confronted and forced to eat their words.

Coulter does not seek to complicate her view of liberals with any serious treatment of the many Democrats and liberals who were ferociously anti-communist. Scoop Jackson? Harry Truman? John F Kennedy? Lyndon Vietnam Johnson?

Sullivan needs to study history. Truman's anti-communism is open to debate... precisely the debate Ann has begun. JFK's anti-communism is completely false. The only room for debate, after considering his betrayal of the Tibetans, the Cubans, his assassination of Diem, his withdrawal of US assets from Turkey in the face of Soviet aggression, is whether he was a traitor, or merely drug-addled and incompetent. As Ann would say, where our national security was concerned, the difference between the two was immaterial. Or, as she might say, if he had been a traitor, what would he have done differently?

As for Johnson, he mismanaged the Viet Nam War. That is his claim to anti-communist fame.

American politics has been badly damaged by the scruple-free tactics of those like Moore and Coulter. In some ways, of course, these shameless hucksters of ideological hate deserve each other.

It comes down to this. Moore is a liar, and it is pretty easy to deconstruct his work. Coulter is telling the truth. So far, every attack on her I have read has focused on her supposed hatred of "liberals" but have not bothered to refute her on any substantive point. They don't refute her because they can't. I know my history as well as anyone, and she is telling the truth. The best her critics can do is complain about her tone, or complain that she says "the Times said..." when she should have said "an editorial in the Times said...".

I am disappointed in Sullivan for this rather unworthy attack on her.

[kuma]

IMHO, the thing that's got Andy all riled up is that Ann is socially conservative as well and probably doesn't subscribe to the notion that the Lawrence case was a big Constitutional win. Ann's opinion would count more.

[GulliverSwift]

I find it rather odd that an article of this length about a relatively unfamous (outside the US) conservative pundit would be published in a British newspaper. Why would any Brit bother reading this? We have no interest in reading about any of their political writers.

[The Electrician]

She was fired from the conservative National Review magazine when, in the wake of 9/11, she urged the invasion of all Muslim nations and the forcible conversion of their citizens to Christianity.

Sullivan is way off base with much of this article. He clearly got this part wrong - if you go back and read the actual quote, Coulter was talking about people who dance and cheer in the streets to celebrate mass murder committed in the name of Islam, not "all Muslim nations". If he can't even get that part right, what chance does he have of getting anything else right? Not a chance...

You can read the article yourself at NRO article: This is War

[xm177e2]

Sullivan is right. Not all left-liberals are communist traitors. Do you think every left-winger serving in our armed forces is a traitor?

[Search4Truth]

# 3 Amazon Top Sellers

Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism by Ann Coulter Average Customer Review: Usually ships in 24 hours

# 89 Amazon Top Sellers

Stupid White Men ...and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation! by Michael Moore Average Customer Review: Usually ships in 24 hours

[liberalnot]

ann is not the "extremist" that the media makes her out to be.

for example, bill handel of kfi los angeles had an interview with her, and he called her "right wing" and "really out there". he was insulting.

she is correct. for example, as late as the early 1980's when i returned to grad school i had a girl friend who said, "ortega and his party are the good guys"! referring to the war in central america. never mind that it was decades after stalin was proved to be a killer.

she's now, of course, a ph.d., and tenured at a university. surprise, surprise.

[TheDon]

[Amelia]

To admit the complexity of political discourse would immediately require Coulter to think, explain, argue. But why bother when you can earn millions by being insulting?

That pretty well sums up Ann Coulter, IMO.

[harpo11]

Beauty and the Beast bump

[Jorge]

I love reading most of Ann Coulter's work...she's sharp, she's tough and entertaining.
But I agree with Andrew that she's a bit extreme when it comes to her attacks on the liberal left....It's one of the things I like about her...but it is extreme.

[Kevin Curry]

Coulter’s modus operandi is rhetorical extremity.

And Sullivan's isn't?

[savagesusie]

Sullivan is definately using the left's usual tactic of calling names instead of dealing with fact. He equates Ann with that liar Moore and that is where HE becomes unbelievable and a lying liberal. He namecalls Moore (rightly so) and Ann (shows his bias)--"shameless hucksters of ideological hate". First of all, Ann hates all communists and rightly so. People who try to undermine this country causes thousands of deaths to US citizens which Ann clearly backs with fact. I point out to Sullivan--there are EVIL people in the world, something that liberals are unwilling to acknowledge. In fact, for some reason, and thoroughly documented by Ann, they are in BED with the EVIL people. I saw her book as rational logic at its best! Sullivan has his own nihilistic reasons for wanting Ann discredited and should be honest about WHY he is criticizing her. Yes, she makes outrageous statements but that is because they are ABOUT outrageous deeds and lies done by Democrats and whitewashed by the press!!!! The statements can be nothing but outrageous unless you try to twist them like the left does. I have found NO current democrats who are knowledgeable about politics who are decent people--if they are knowledgeable and are Demoncrats-- they are evil; but usually they are idiots and trust what some dope like Hitlery says or trusts Moore's and the left-wing media propaganda mill. I will admit that not all are "evil" but if they are not, they are dumb or not interested in politics at all-- thinking it doesn't matter.....which is also stupid. My experience with Democrats has been the same as Ann's and I, myself, was once a "stupid, trusting" Democrat.

[BlazingArizona]

My prolem with this analysis is that the left has long since abandoned the sort of nuanced, repectful dialog that Sullivan claims to be searching for. It uses hysterical ridicule as its normal mode of communication. Now a hot babe comes along who can give hysterical ridicule as good as she gets, and the left can't abide it. Perhaps if they had been willing to concede that maybe - just maybe - George Bush is a human being who is making tough decisions in a war we did not choose to fight, we wouldn't need to use our "Coulter bomb" against them.