I know I said I wasn't going to write until tomorrow, but I just read a news story that has juiced me up enough to break my self-imposed sabbatical. I try not to get too political here on GMYH because I want to make it fun for everyone -- even Germans, Jeremy -- and I try to keep my political discussions amongst friends over several gallons of beer, ensuring that we forget everything and don't hold anything against each other.
That being said, I just read an article about how borderline Nazi and queen of tact Ann Coulter, in her recent book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism," referred to the four 9/11 widows who spearheaded the campaign that led to the September 11 Commission as "witches." The argument -- if you can call it that -- is that because these widow received millions of dollars from compensation settlements, and (according to Coulter) were "reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis," and -- can't forget this one -- wanted to blame Bush for not preventing the attacks, then the widows (obviously) were "enjoying their husbands' deaths."
Are you kidding me? Enjoying their husbands deaths? What educated person (I'm assuming Coulter has at least graduated high school) would say that? What's next, she denies the Holocaust? Or maybe she'll argue that we should bring back segregation because Russell Simmons is rich? Does she honestly believe that if these four widows had a chance to go back in time and prevent the 9/11 terrorist attacks (and therefore, their husbands' deaths), that they wouldn't? It's not only asinine, it's also devoid of rationality.
Just in case you didn't think she's distasteful enough, she says, "By the way, how do we know their husbands weren't planning to divorce these harpies? Now that their shelf life is dwindling, they'd better hurry up and appear in Playboy." Well, Ann, I guess we don't know if their husbands were planning on divorcing them. Just like we don't know if their husbands were going to come home after work that day and say that they wanted to have another kid, or that they won the lottery, or that they found out they had cancer, or that they murdered 50 co-workers, or that they ran a 4-minute mile on their lunch break. You know why we don't know any of those things, sweetheart? BECAUSE THE GUYS DIED WHEN A PLANE HIJACKED BY TERRORISTS CRASHED INTO THEIR PLACE OF BUSINESS. I'm guessing that's why their widows were so gosh darn "agitated" and wanted to bother the government to figure out why such a trifling event could have happened.
In her book, Coulter also criticizes the widows for making campaign ads for Kerry. I love the hypocrisy. Had these four widows supported Bush, would Coulter call them witches? No, she would praise them as national heroes. And correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't GW have some tacky campaign ads that centered around 9/11?
If Coulter actually desires to be viewed as credible or to be taken seriously, then she shouldn't cloak her arguments -- however feeble and irrational as they may be -- with cheap, shock-jock theatrics. Rather than encourage an educated political discourse between liberals and conservatives (whatever those words may mean these days) she would rather make baseless accusations and disagree with anything "liberal" just for the sake of disagreeing (or maybe for the sake of selling more books). Americans are becoming a bunch of cold-hearted assholes who are told that empathy and sympathy are four-letter words, and it's because of people like Ann Coulter. Our country would be better off without her.
I'd like to hear from the "conservative" GMYH readers to see what you think. Maybe conservatives think she crossed the line, too. I honestly don't know whether conservatives think she is a polarizing figure, but I am curious.
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3 comments:
For the sake of argument, I'll say I'm a conservative, even though labels mean nothing now, after the ideologies have swung so far to the opposite ends of their respective spectrums that the roles are reversed... (it was democrats who used to advocate intervention in foreign affairs, conservatives who worked for isolationism).
Ann Coulter used to be a difficult issue. Before she saturated the bookshelves and quasi-political talk shows, she was far more tempered. Her points were valid enough that they couldn't be ignored, and they sparked legitimate debate.
Though Kerry for his part had absolutely no national security plan--or, if you prefer, EVERY national security plan, and was therefore perhaps the worst, most waxen possible candidate for the Democrats to choose, you're right, it's hypocrisy. But there's an issue embedded in there to gloss Coulter's argument with validity: where's the sense of fucking vengeance in Americans? When our people are killed, why do we blame ourselves instead of those that killed? Some things are simple, some are made confusing when they need not be. Like self-flagellation. Seriously, how fucking sympathetic should we be to a culture that refuses to control itself? It's a thin line (and an expensive gas tank) separating me from advocating for the atomic conversion of the middle east into a sheet of glass...
But since Coulter's rise to million-dollar book sale fame, she has degenerated into nothing more than a common demagogue. In short, she sucks. She is the closest analog conservatives have to Michael Moore. But in the spirit of the American Dream, who wouldn't? She makes millions on college lecture circuits alone--solely because she's a lightning rod. It is no more faire to ascribe to "conservatives" Coulter's views than it is to ascribe to "liberals" those of George Galloway or Michael Moore--or, for that matter, George Clooney.
The worst part about these sorts of characters is that they suffocate any valid arguments that do exist from a given "side" on a given topic.
As an advisory note, I'm generally anti-partisanship. Voting the party line or the party ticket is plainly anathema to intelligent political discourse. That's why I hate people like Coulter, Dowd, O'Reilley, etc. They muddy the truth, they obscure reality by appealing to alarmism and moral panic.
As an example, there are VERY valid, grand, macro strategic reasons to continue on in Iraq. (View a map: Iran has always been the long-term focus, Iraq was just the easiest target (yeah the basis for Iraq was--arguably--a lie, but would America have understood the truth? the result is the same (yes, this is Strauss, Wolfowitz territory)): now, as the leader of Iran, Ahmedinajad (sic) spouts off about his intention to nuke Israel (the only westernized, non-sham liberal democracy society in the middle east) into oblivion--which may spark World War V--they are surrounded on two sides by the American military machine (Afghanistan, Iraq). But you won't hear that in the mainstream media, and not even in some of the polemical material out there. You'll only find it in RAND studies, thinktank papers, DoD strategy statements.
The public is used to sound bytes, they need easily processible information. How is that possible in a conflict with a fundamentally different culture that can only be fully understood with an eye to historical context, taking the purported belligerence of foreign dictatorships seriously, and the reality of threats of nuclear proliferation? "Americans are dying in Iraq" just doesn't quite adequately summarize the issue...
These are the sorts of issues that receive dangerous simplification and end up the topic of demagogues--i.e., Coulter--looking to increase their wealth in Warhol's precious 15 minutes...
Anonymous,
That was essentially the perfect response I was looking for. Good analogy to Michael Moore. I was trying to think of someone on the liberal side that "liberals" don't necessarily like (or find to be a sensationalist), and for whatever reason I couldn't think of Moore. You get an A.
A clarification point: my empathy and sympathy point was not targeted at Americans' feelings toward the war (or vengeance). I meant to say that people like Ann Coulter tell everyone that empathizing with, or sympathizing for, others is (for some reason) looked down upon, perhaps because it's a bleeding heart thing to do. For instance, I would guess that she would argue that we should not have any sympathy for the four widows, despite the fact that they lost their husbands in horrifying fashion, because they used their wealth to press the government for answers about the attack. For some reason, in Coulter's eyes, that makes these widows witches. Don't look for the good, look for the bad. Don't sympathize with a widow trying to figure out why her husband died; instead call her a witch because she's become a (very) minor celebrity as a result of a tragedy. It's almost as if Coulter assumes that everyone has some evil ulterior motive (or for some reason -- probably related to being liberal -- the person should not garner empathy or sympathy from others), and therefore, no one should empathize or sympathize. At least that's what I get from her. That, and she hates liberals.
for whatever reason my server at work wouldn't let me login with the blogger ID yesterday.
A couple of conclusory notes...
Re: the wives pressing the government for answers: Working in government is a thankless job, especially in the national security context. Successes are necessarily confidential and never find their way into the public eye. Never any glory, no recognition, no Dave Letterman asking "so how'd you disarm that dirty bomb? paper clips and chewing gum?" For a movie analogy, I'd liken it to Dustin Hoffman in Wag the Dog after he orchestrates victory in a covert political campaign involving a faked war yelling, "I want the credit!"--and then DeNiro has him escorted away in a limo to sleep with the fishes. No credit, period. In government, perfection is demanded of necessarily imperfect bodies made up of imperfect people. Separation of powers REQUIRES that coordination be nearly impossible. It's in this light that I cannot understand the anger at the government RATHER than the "enemy" of the day. (Not to say this is the wives' position, but it certainly IS the position of others.) How far along the self-awareness spectrum must a society reach to turn its anger inward on itself rather than accepting the indelible inability of cultures to coexist peacefully for eternity, and the intermittent war that cannot be avoided? Blaming ourselves for the attacks of others serves only one useful purpose: to assure we are proactive in prevention of another. Otherwise, it's like saying things didn't work with your ex-wife because YOU couldn't refrain from violent anger every time she blew some random dude--rather than it not working because SHE wouldn't stop blowing random dudes.
Re: public attention span: The Canadian parliament dodged a bullet the other day when the Mounties thwarted an Islamist attack designed to take legislators hostage and start chopping heads until Canada pulled out of Afghanistan. That is a brilliant success. But it will be forgotten by most of the media within a few weeks--just like the government's (if you want, read: "Bush Administration") success in disarming, peacefully, diplomatically, Libya's strongman cum nutjob Muammar Qaddafi. Is government a thankless job...?
As for Coulter, let's not forget that at core she and others like her are basically war profiteers. Without 9/11, without George Bush, would Michael Moore have any money? It's NBA basketball on a pseudo-intellectual scale: "we're all professionals here, let's make some money without getting hurt. Let's put on a great show--obscuring truth is the best way to keep the people hooked."
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