The Anchoress
:::Scroll down for update:::
My brother Thom asked that question after reading this piece about Ann Coulter’s latest over-reach.
She’s never been my cuppa, as I have written before. While she is whip-smart, I’ve never liked her because Coulter tends to overdo – she routinely loses sight of boundaries of common decency. She goes too far and discredits herself and the values she says she espouses.
I must say, my skin crawled to read some of her statements. To me she is embodying everything I currently cannot abide in the “conservative movement,” the arrogant presumption of absolute moral certitude (which is ugly, ugly, ugly coming from the left, so honey, it’s not pretty when it’s from the right, either), combined with the sense of over-confidence which is sending so many on the right into a self-destructive Roy Moore/Tom Tancredo plunge off a cliff.
Ed Morrissey, who says he normally likes Coulter has rightly called her the mirror image of Ted Rall and suggests she make a real apology and retract her statements. That would be a start.
AJ Strata is not liking Coulter’s brashness anymore than I am, and his commenters are taking him to task (and immediately, predictably, calling him a ‘closet liberal’) for daring to not appreciate her. Apparently now, if we do not subscribe to intemperate demagoguery, we are not conservatives.
Well, screw that, then. I mustn’t be a conservative. I must still be the classical liberal without a home that I was when I left the Democrats. Watch that demand to lock-stepping, please. It’s got a bad pedigree. It ruined the Democrats.
Rick Moran calls Coulter a Conservative Lout.
As her celebrity has grown – actually since she appeared on the cover of Time Magazine – she has had to make ever more outrageous and off the wall statements in order to maintain her position as a “controversial” commentator. This has often placed her at odds with many of us who, while generally in agreement with much of her critique of American liberalism, nevertheless recoil in horror and disgust at her rhetoric.
She has descended into a black hole of necessity from which there is no escape; where she is forced to please her rabid base of red meat conservatives usually by going beyond the bounds of decency and proper public discourse in order to make a point that could have been made without resorting to the kind of hurtful, hateful, personal attacks that have become a hallmark of her war with liberals.
I wonder if Coulter, like John McCain, Al Gore and Cindy Sheehan, has simply allowed the media attention she has garnered to affect her better judgement?
Moran continues: “This rhetoric is not designed to advance debate or even make any kind of a salient point about the political activism of grief stricken parents like Cindy Sheehan and the anti-Bush September 11 widows. The remarks were designed to hurt other people’s feelings in a deeply personal and entirely inappropriate way. Can you imagine some liberal commentator making similar remarks about Debra Burlingame, sister of Charles F. “Chic” Burlingame, III, captain of American Airlines flight 77, which was crashed at the Pentagon and who is fighting to keep the 9/11 Memorial from being hijacked by the anti-American left? We would be all over that worthy and deservedly so.”
Damn straight.
Sister Toldjah writes, quite sensibly, “Ann, of course, has the right to say whatever she wants – but was something like that right to say? I don’t think so. This isn’t about being uber-sensitive. It’s about there being a better way to get your point across without going overboard.”
Blue Crab Boulevard says he’ll go back to ignoring Coulter, now.
Michelle Malkin has a a reprint of Dorothy Rabinowitz’s excellent take-down of the Jersey Girls written back in April of ’04. Coulter should take note: Rabinowitz made a convincing case without descending to brashness or inhumanity.
Ace of Spades is not happy with Ann, either. But he feels she is defending herself credibly. Sort of. Except for this part: Persuasive. Hey, she’s not one of the country’s foremost polemicists for nothing. But– no. I think the point she’s making — quite valid — is now rejected by persuadable independents because she comes across as the shrill harpy, rather than the Jersey Girls.
Egg-zactly.
I wrote a few days ago that America does not like extremism. Conservatives should KNOW that because they have been reaping the benefit of the left going extreme for some years, now. Unfortunately, heady with a few victories, they are beginning to embrace the same extremism that drove so many of us away from the Democrats. They are believing (quite mistakenly, I think) that the rest of the country is desirous of their relentless drive for ideological purity.
I do not think for a moment that America wants to be submerged into the ugly boiling tar-bath of extreme and hostile rhetoric from either the left or the right. I do not think for a second that America wants to be represented by people who fume and roil and live in a very deluded place where up is down and black is white. But I do think that if conservatives are not careful – if they don’t pull themselves back from the edge – then simple American decency will move voters from right back to left, albeit reluctantly, if only because they do not wish to be associated with what they see as unconscionable hate, and immovable “principals” that oversimplify complicated situations. I don’t think America will like to see a comprehensive plan on illegal immigration fail because the conservatives were incapable of compromising one iota. I do not think America will call that a “victory,” any more than it would call a Dem loss a victory because they “lost by a small margin.”
Conservatives lately are coming off as simplistic, unrealistic, moralistic, angry and pompous. And I’m sure I once wrote that about liberals. My guess is such folk are not going to be invited to lead the nation and will be relegated to the edges along with the Kos folk, where everyone can spit on each other and nothing ever gets solved.
The recipe for disaster is written, and die are being cast. Once more, I’m asking my conservative friends to pull back, pull back from the hoary edge at which they are scratching.
Meanwhile here is an roundup of other stories you might be missing as we overkill this one.
UPDATE:
My, my, I can feel the spittle coming up from some of your emails! Coulter certainly does have her defenders (and, glad to say, her detractors). I did get a thoughtful email from a fellow named Charles, who wrote:
The idea that, by having been present and murdered on 9/11, you have become a hero, or that your family is entitled to special
recognition, has become a mantra for some of the families. Fate, or chance or whatever you call it, placed nearly all of the dead where they were on that day. It’s wonderful that a generous nation provided so much for the survivors but in doing so the quaint notion that because your loved one died on September 11 you are now the sole source of memory and decision making with regard to all of the many issues that surround the event of that day developed.
The Jersey Girls, in particular, have taken it upon themselves to act as spokespeople for “the families”. In doing so, they have taken a rabidly anti-war and pro-Democratic Party stance. In reality, without media promotion, they have no more right to speak for others than does Cindy Sheehan.
I do not find it especially cruel to recognize that self-appointed spokespeople are really not, and that some have ridden the dead bodies of their loved ones to a prominence and importance they might never have achieved had 9/11 not happened.
The point is not invalid, but I think it must be said, in fairness to “the Jersey Girls” that the press has a great deal to do with the impression we have of their having “ridden their grief” into fame and fortune. They are not the only “9/11 family members” who have spoken out on policy matters. The excellent Debra Burlingame, whose brother was one of the slain pilots of 9/11 has done so, as have other 9/11 family folk. All of them have – to one extent or another – “used” the death of their loved ones to get into the bully pulpit and have their voices heard. The difference is that the Burlingame’s and the Long Island firefighter families (for example) who have supported the president’s policies have not been lionized and super-exploited while doing so – the press is not constantly praising them and shoving mics in their faces – and so they seem much less opportunistic than the others. It is the members of the press, who create these media monsters. Chris Matthews had The Jersey Girls on his show literally scores of times, because they were saying what he wanted to hear; what he wanted to promote. Burlingame is much less visible, because she takes a different stand – one which the press does not find interesting.
The fact is if someone on the left, a Ted Rall or someone, used Coulter’s words against Burlingame, or a Gold Star Mother who publically supports the war, it would be reprehensible, and we’d be all over him for it. When someone in grief has decided to exploit that grief politically it is incumbent upon the rest of us to (once their actions have moved beyond grief and into giddy activism) question whether their motives are entirely pure…but it is absolutely necessary that we do so in a temperate manner that does not bring us down into the muck, or take the focus off of the issue at hand. In the end, all Coulter did was discredit herself and make the rest of us look very mean-spirited and grotesque…her valid point is lost in her inflammatory rhetoric; she does that all the time. Ugh.
Having said all that, if there were ever two women who absolutely deserve to go at each other it’s Coulter and Hillary Clinton. Coulter oversteps and Clinton (ever-brave when she is at absolutely no risk to herself) exploits. And Coulter comes back with a right hook that should effectively shut Clinton down. Two women who consistantly leave themselves open for shots to the chin. Coulter, I think – even though I don’t much like her – is still the braver of the two, and she takes round 1. :-) Ding, Ding! Back to your corners, girls and don’t swallow that stuff in your mouths, it’s pure poison; just spit it out.
Flopping Aces (whom I have just added to my blogroll) says yes, Coulter was “harsh” but accurate. John at Verum Serum has a very interesting round up and unusual links.
WELCOME: Instapundit and Andrew Sullivan readers! While you’re here, please look around: We’re also discussing how my little brother has come to admire Sam Brownback, my husband’s burial plans for me when I die, how President Bush’s victories earn scant attention, a CBS series on Teens and Technology, and if you haven’t seen Bryn Terfel in action check out the video.
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