Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
It’s always must hear podcasting when our good friend Ann Coulter stops by and this episode is no exception. Ann’s new book Adios America: The Left’s Plan To Turn Our Country Into a
Third World Hellhole is as provocative as the title suggests, and the conversation does not disappoint, including but not limited to her choice for 2016 (hint: Doc Brown needs to start warming up the DeLorean). Also, what’s the big deal about inequality?, why Denny Hastert’s indictment is a danger to us all, should there be a non-CoC area of Ricochet?, and yes, we have the balls to criticize FIFA.
Music from this week’s episode:
America by West Side Story
The opening sequence for the Ricochet Podcast was composed and produced by James Lileks.
Muchas gracias, EJHill.
Yes, you should absolutely subscribe to this podcast. It helps!
Help Ricochet by Supporting Our Sponsors!
This podcast is brought to you by Harry’s Shave. For the finest shave at the best price, got Harrys.com and use the coupon code RICOCHET at checkout.
Get premium mattresses for a fraction of the price delivered to your door! Casper is revolutionizing the mattress industry by cutting the cost of dealing with resellers and showrooms and passing that savings directly to the consumer. Get $50 off your first purchase! Go to Casper.com/Ricochet and use the coupon code RICOCHET at checkout.
Subscribe to The Ricochet Podcast in Apple Podcasts (and leave a 5-star review, please!), or by RSS feed. For all our podcasts in one place, subscribe to the Ricochet Audio Network Superfeed in Apple Podcasts or by RSS feed.
Peter, you asked why Reagan only got amnesty after bipartisan support for the general deal. The obvious answer is that the whole deal never truly had bipartisan support. Only the part that was enacted was genuinely agreed to. The rest was lip service.
Thanks for pressing her after she responded with Romney. It’s sad to hear such a bold person dodge.
What answer could there be? A modest nod to Gov. Walker seems reasonable, but what else?
Is not Mr. Robinson right that no candidate will run on anything like the Adios, America platform? I cannot understand why anyone on the right should be smug about that. Well, people who believe in open borders, admittedly, but who else? This constant reproach–you’re not for action, you’re for lamenting!–what does that say except, let’s not talk about what’s going on! Every man, woman, & child running for the GOP nomination is already doing that. Mr. Robinson has found the one writer with some influence on the public who is telling people what’s been going on these last two generations & it is immediately necessary to criticize that work.
Anyway, if we say Coulter dodged on the candidate question, do we not also have to say Mr. Robinson, like every contender for the nomination, is dodging on the immigration issue?
I can’t help but notice that the Ricochet Presidential Polls have not included Mitt Romney. They’re obviously part of the grand conspiracy.
Is there a particular reason why I should take Pataki less seriously than Romney?
To his credit there is no Pataki-care.
Here it is.
Titus, Peter is an interviewer by trade. He pressed Ann on that question like he presses all his guests. He often plays Devil’s Advocate in interviews.
And I didn’t take his tone as pleasure in the state of affairs. His excitement was the usual mix of exaspiration and pleasure in the smart company.
Great podcast, loved it as usual.
Near the end you guys talked about some sort of “Non-COC” zone where the discussion can become, shall we say wilder, not COC compliant etc.
I have been a member of various online forums since getting online in 1996, woodworking, motorcycles, machinist, software, touring, cycling, and arborist, in every instance that a “Tar Pit” as they are often called is instituted on the forum it infects the whole site, the things said and the attacks allowed in the Tar Pit permeate the whole site and soon people are having to go to the Tar Pit to have non-COC rants to get their point across, also the slights and slanders from the Tar Pit are not forgotten in the regular form, and it becomes ugly.
If you make such a zone I will quit Ricochet, as this is a bad idea, a VERY bad idea.
Certainly if people want to have a tar pit discussion they must have lots of places online to do so, please don’t destroy what we have going here with this kind of sewer.
Domo
I don’t have any problems with the pressing on that question or, indeed, any other. As for the matter of tone–I may be wrong–but you do nothing to persuade me, if that’s what you were trying-
Agree with everything Ann said except her obsession with Romney.
I’m not sure he’s as anti-immigration as she thinks. Certainly not in his rhetoric. He wasn’t making any of the arguments Ann is making.
Good point.
Even if somehow he was in sync with what Ann has said, he didn’t communicate it. It’s not enough to be right. Articulation is needed.
Never one to miss a chance to repeat Churchill sayings–he said something about repeating the point again & again–hit the nail on the head, then come back & hit it again & again, & give it another smack for good measure.
Or, of course, ignore the subject almost completely…
I believe this is the quote you allude to:
via http://mentalfloss.com/uk/trivia/27070/10-of-winston-churchills-best-quotes
via http://www.amazon.com/Churchill-Himself-Definitive-Collection-Quotations/dp/1586489577/
via http://www.amazon.com/Edward-VIII-Frances-Lonsdale-Donaldson/dp/0397007655/
That’s it exactly. Miss Coulter seems naturally able to do that. Everyone else has to learn, I guess.
It seems many religious Christians are open borders-types looking for followers (Catholics) or converts (LDS and Protestants) and objects of charity. I include Romney in that group.
There has been some public demand to have Lileks on another podcast; one where the whole focus is Lileks, and there are no segues to be interrupted… we’re waiting to hear back.
I think the religious people who favor open immigration err on the mercy side of the mercy-justice spectrum. IOW, they may be wrong but I don’t think it is a calculated, craven plea for more pew-sitters.
I’m waiting for another The Diner too.
I found Coulter’s statement that Romney did better than Reagan to be absurd. I’m not sure what she means — it sounds as if her point is that Romney in 2012 received more votes than Reagan in 1984 (about 61 million vs. 54.5 million).
As if population growth is irrelevant. Reagan won 58.8% – 40.6%, while Romney lost 47.2% – 51.1%.
By this standard, Walter Mondale (37.5 million votes) performed far, far better than George Washington (who apparently only got about 42,000 popular votes).
Bold != Smart.
I say this every time Ann Coulter is on a podcast; she is not smart. She is a terrible debater; Mickey Kaus ate her for lunch when she guest hosted Left Coast/Right Coast. Every time I see her in public I cringe because I know she’s going to say something I agree at least 80% with, and make that position look incoherent.
I think her proposition is that when Ronald Reagan won in 1980 and 1984 he did not have to deal with 3 decades of illegal immigration shifting demographics of the electorate.
I assume she makes the case in her book.
I don’t know where her 50 million illegal aliens number comes from, but children of illegals born in America become Americans and have American children (most likely). So that’s a whole generation of “legal” children of illegal immigrants that could possibly be skewing the electorate.
( She didn’t mention voter fraud, so I will merely note that it exists and drop a few links [link 1] [link 2] [link 3] [link 4] [link 5] [link 6] )
No.
She says that if Reagan got the same percentage of each demographic group that Romney did, he would have done even better against Carter or Mondale or whomever.
Oversimplifying, Romney did better among whites than Reagan did. It’s just that thanks to open borders whites make up a smaller fraction of the electorate than in the Reagan era.
Give me a break. Make any & all positions look incoherent? Every time? How about her books–would you say the same? I’ll listen to that podcast–I like Mr. Kaus as well. Miss Coulter is not right too often, but I am not sure who is. Conservatives like a lot of people better, I think mostly because wonks & grandfatherly figures who seem wise because they do not make the effort required for democratic politics. Miss Coulter is warlike–or bold, for the kinder, gentler souls. That is a lesson conservatives find it only too difficult to learn.
I have to admit, I agree with Ann that things really are that bad. The only reason I’ve not given up entirely (and started plans to emigrate elsewhere) is the astonishing bravery the GOP has shown on immigration.
Frankly, I think our current immigration policies are going to lead to the breakup of our country. Think the current antiwhite hysteria on the left is bad? Just wait until we’re an unpopular minority. We don’t want to end up like the Soviet Union, fracturing first geographically and then ethnically, with mass ethnic cleansing and even genocide the result.
Mercifully, the GOP hasn’t caved, yet, and with any luck things will change.
I feel like some folks hear self deportation and think, “what are you going to do to them to make them leave? what happens if they dont leave?”
I think even the GOP could learn to get behind the idea of deporting illegal aliens convicted of crimes, at least major crimes. But aside from that, I think the argument here is that once you stop illegal immigration–& all immigration from the third world, maybe–& secure the border, then it will be much easier to deal with illegal immigrants in a humane way without making things worse by attracting further millions. The laws would have to be harsh–no family brought into America, no welfare. If Americans see a few years of success at controlling illegal immigration & the border, a political solution might become possible. Now, there is no such possibility. An insanity–the federal gov’t refusing to enforce the laws–is to be replaced by another–the federal gov’t destroying the laws.
The fix to Ann’s issue is the same way we have fixed all immigration. Let the engine of private enterprise loose and grow the economy like crazy. Once you increase the wealth of the lower and middle classes, they start voting differently.
We do need to stop the rate of growth of illegals, but solving the problem of those who remain is a matter of making America work for them. You want conservative majorities? Give the lower middle class a stake and be the politicians that gave it to them.
I know it sounds way too easy but it is a Conservative solution that can get votes. Growing the pie is always better than taking someone else’s pie.
The political tradeoff for Amnesty (not voting citizenship) should be to rip off the job killing regulations that keep everyone un or under employed. Let’s see the Democrats choke on that deal.
“Here’s the deal, Ms Pelosi. You get amnesty without citizenship in exchange for a repeal of Obamacare regulations, a strip down of the EPA regulations on CO2, Corrections to the ADA, opening federal lands to oil & gas, and a list of many others. The price of amnesty is the rapidly allow much more job creation. ”
Conservatives are lousy at turning an issue from defense to offense.
Why do you think that’s so? Do not Americans think the 90’s were a good time–when they voted for Mr. Clinton?
Fairly vague question. As I recall, no presidential candidate even approached 50% of the popular vote during that era, see short fellow with charts named Perot.
I do not see what difference that makes. Winning is winning–it’s the only thing you really know about elections. Mr. W. Bush did not win more convincingly in 2000! As for Mr. Perot, did he doom the right? How could he get so much of the popular vote if people really reward economic growth? Mr. Bush should have been safe!
Let me attempt to explain the American electorate and economic growth. Voters really do not care about the overall economy, they vote on their own insecurity. When they feel secure, they vote on other things than jobs. Hence, Mr Clinton. The great financial crisis of 2008 actually had little day to day impact on many middle class Americans, or the impact was not immediate but to 401ks and such.
Right now, many feel insecure. Obama promised to fix it and has made it worse for many. or not improved for most. So this will be an election when those who want to work will vote their insecurity about jobs. This cuts across gender and race but not class. Investors in equities, who have been heavily subsidized by the taxpayers and public sector workers will pull for more upper class favoring policies and government jobs. That will be Hillary’s true base.
If her opponent can argue for jobs and growth in the private sector, it will be a win for them in this cycle. It will help if the opponent does not look like they are from the investor class.