You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
When it comes to the world of conservative columnists, everyone has their favorites. Some people devour the incisive commentary of a Charles Krauthammer or George Will, while others are religious devotees of Mark Steyn's vim and vinegar prose--and, of course, David Brooks has his own following of squishy groupies.
But every week, one of the columnists that I most look forward to reading, aside from those columnists who contribute to Ricochet, is Ann Coulter, if for no other reason than sheer entertainment value.
Coulter is obviously brilliant--but smart people are practically a dime a dozen these days. What makes her writing really great is its devastating wit. The woman is hilarious.
Consider her column today, which takes on Obama--"Nero"--and his State of the Union address:
I missed the middle section of Obama's State of the Union address when I took a break to read "War and Peace," but I gather he never got around to what I was hoping he'd say, which is: "What was I thinking?"
The national debt is $14 trillion, the Democrats won't stop spending, and President Nero gave us a long gaseous speech about his Stradivarius.
I feel so Southern whenever I watch a Democrat give a State of the Union address -- and not just because it makes me want to secede. Consternating the rest of the family, my Kentucky mother always talked back to the TV. I do it only when a Democrat is giving a speech.
And if liberals didn't like Samuel Alito mouthing the words "not true," they should be really happy I wasn't in the House chamber Tuesday night.
All I kept hearing was, "Ann pays more." That's all I ever I hear when Democrats start in with all that "investing."
And when I say devastating, I mean devastating:
The big laugh line was when Nero said mockingly, "I heard rumors that a few of you still have concerns about the health care law." That's called "60 percent of the American public." It's not a joke, and it's not funny.
Here's one: Hey, Obama! Guy walks into a bar in the Gaza Strip. The bartender says, "What'll you have?" But the guy is killed instantly when an Iranian-made CT-28 missile strikes the bar, also killing a woman and small child next door. Get it, Obama? HA HA!
Well, as she has said before, "I like to stir up the pot. I don't pretend to be impartial or balanced, as broadcasters do." And though she's about as conservative as they come, her views certainly aren't always what you might expect them to be. For example, she once called on neocon darlings Bill Kristol and Liz Cheney to resign, and not too long ago, she spoke at a fundraiser for GOProud, the gay conservative group. This is the same Ann Coulter who claimed that a certain uncouth word beginning with the letter "f"--a word which she used to describe John Edwards--"isn't offensive to gays; it has nothing to do with gays. It's a schoolyard taunt meaning 'wuss,' and unless you're telling me that John Edwards is gay, it was not applied to a gay person."
All I'm saying is, if you don't subscribe to Coulter's columns, you really should. There's nothing quite like them.
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Sep '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
My favorite part was this:
Obama said, "We are the nation that put cars in driveways and computers in offices; the nation of Edison and the Wright brothers; of Google and Facebook."
And then the government outlawed Edison's great invention, made the Wright brothers' air travel insufferable, filed anti-trust charges against Microsoft and made cars too expensive to drive by prohibiting oil exploration, and right now -- at this very minute -- is desperately trying to regulate the Internet.
It takes someone who is partisan - and knows why they are partisan, to be able to write and talk like this. You can't care what "they" think. They hate her for a reason - she has their number.
Dec '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
I do like the fact that when Ann goes over the line, she knows how to deal with it. She swings harder. She's like Breitbart in that way. It's something conservatives don't do often or well. Steyn is still my favorite.
The Nero comparison is apter that she addresses here. Nero fancied himself an athlete and great musician. He was neither. Being emperor, he won all of the chariot races and was cheered when he played the lyre. According to legend, when he died, he intoned, "What an artist the world is losing!"
I picture Obama saying something very similar.
Edited on Jan 27, 2011 at 8:07amDec '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Emily, I couldn't agree more with your assessment of Ms. Coulter. I am a Steyn-man myself, but Coulter is funny/witty/entertaining on a level few dream of. I wonder if Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin have permanently supplanted Ann as the media's first or second favorite conservative target?
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Ann Coulter is brilliant, witty, a wonderful writer and a sweetie-pie. It's a devastating combination. She's also brave. One of the left's cleverest shut-up techniques is to hold right-wingers responsible for their jokes as if the jokes were somehow serious. To wit, Ann's crack about John Edwards was about Edwards' girliness and the left's hyper-sensitivity. Only the left's distortions turned it into an anti-gay remark, which it never was. But Ann doesn't care what they do. She's like Rush that way. They wanna go after her for her jokes? She just doubles-down on hilarious.
Jan '11
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
I really can't abide Coulter. She is smart and has a very quick, acerbic wit, but she is also shrill, snide, gratuitous and ultimately counterproductive to the movement she champions. To me she is the antithesis of what Ricochet purports to promote with regards to tone and being persuasive. I'm all for some good red meat from time to time, but Ms. Coulter serves up her dishes completely raw far too often.
Edited on Jan 27, 2011 at 8:17amMay '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
She is fearless and undaunted, and has great comic chops.
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Yes, I wonder that too. The left probably knows better than to go after Ann at this point--she's burned her detractors good one too many times!
May '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Is this a sly introduction before Ann joins the Ricochet podcast? I recall Rob or someone saying she has agreed to be on one of them. I'm looking forward to it.
I'm not sure if I'd rather hear Ann and Mark together on the podcast or Ann and Claire. In any case, I fear for Rob's safety.
By the way, when are you going to be on a podcast, Emily?
Jan '11
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
I'm another admirer of her columns. I don't think she's always right - but she's almost always funny. And the SOTU column was brilliant in that way; she took a speech as formless as cotton candy and got a whole column's worth of entertainment out of it.
Sep '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
"What a con-artist the world is losing!"
Amen.
Jun '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
As you know Emily, I am a huge fan of Ann Coulter's writing --it's about working personality into prose more than political dogma. Sometimes when reading her column, I figure she has found a way to make a prison shiv bleed ink.
"Obama as Nero" --that's about as close to poetry as political prose gets.
And I agree that it takes an off-the-hook sense of confidence and freedom to write like Ann. Her use of one-liners approaches Dorothy Parkers way of taking you off balance in a turn of phrase.
Dec '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Here's an example of a slightly less acid dig at the SOTU by another well-known commentator.
Analysis and the longer clip is at National Review Online's Corner.
Sep '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
BThompson: I really can't abide Coulter. She is smart and has a very quick, acerbic wit, but she is also shrill, snide, gratuitous and ultimately counterproductive to the movement she champions. To me she is the antithesis of what Ricochet purports to promote with regards to tone and being persuasive. I'm all for some good red meat from time to time, but Ms. Coulter serves up her dishes completely raw far too often. · Jan 27 at 8:16am
Edited on Jan 27 at 08:17 am
I was waiting for this type of comment, as I read, in order, the comments, and thought, "Ricochet bills itself as a center-right community, but so far we all seem to adore Ann, who is, um, not center-right by any stretch."
I was expecting more comments like BThompson's. However, the post is still young.
Count me on the "adoring" side of the ledger.
Edited on Jan 27, 2011 at 9:18amMay '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
I don't like her so much on TV -- there's nothing to soften the edge and she always strikes me as too self-satisfied. Even Steyn and Rush can be self-effacing. But Coulter always appears to have a chip on her shoulder which I have found off-putting however justified.
But I find discovering her in print I like her more and more. There is something about that medium that makes her more likable I think. (Maybe it's because you can't see her flipping her hair...)
Edited on Jan 27, 2011 at 10:30amJul '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
I have always envisioned what I would call my Dream Debate...
Ann Coulter and Mark Levin vs. Any Ten Liberals you choose.
Now that would be entertaining!
May '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Thursday is Ann Coulter, Karl Rove day - something I really look forward to. Ann never fails to bring a smile to my face in the morning & help sets the tone for the day. How can the day be bad when you are chuckling over her verbal swords through the heart (civility?) through the course of it?
Of course the day can turn out bad...............but it takes a special effort of evil outside forces.
Jan '11
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
If "squishy" is the official term describing not quite center-right, what is the official term for too much center-right? I would consider Ann center-right. If anything, I would say she is just not politically correct but I wouldn't say she was extreme.
Jul '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Ann has placed herself in the arena, and she gives better than she gets. Obviously, she is at her best puncturing the vanity of the Regime, and I think she misfires on occasion, but she also hits it out of the park pretty often.
As for center-right, I always took that as embracing both, the combined 80%, not some indefinable sliver at the boundary.
Sep '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
Ann Coulter is a smart lawyer and knows the secret of winning a forensic debate with your opponent is to make them angry and lose their cool. I'm amazed that her debate opponents have yet to figure out that's its a tactic. She does it well. Her PC opponents are so prissy these days that its getting easier to make them foam at the mouth and completely miss the thread of the argument.
I agree with Trace that I find easier in print than in person. I'm not sure of the extent to which her public persona is a pose or that's just really her. I also have no opinion on the minor tempest in a teapot surrounding her falling out with NR/NRO
Dec '10
Re: You Gotta Love Ann Coulter
BThompson: I really can't abide Coulter. She is smart and has a very quick, acerbic wit, but she is also shrill, snide, gratuitous and ultimately counterproductive to the movement she champions. To me she is the antithesis of what Ricochet purports to promote with regards to tone and being persuasive. I'm all for some good red meat from time to time, but Ms. Coulter serves up her dishes completely raw far too often. · Jan 27 at 8:16am
Edited on Jan 27 at 08:17 am
Sometimes the art of persuasion is best served with a 2x4 upside the head. Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh and even Sarah Palin are willing to wield that implement to persuade the parts other tones cannot reach.