EDIT: For our... more sensitive visitors, a polite but thorough takedown of the vile Ms. Coulter by the stylish Mendacious D.
Midday Palate Cleanser
49 minutes ago
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Well, That kind of says it all.
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I hope Chuckles doesn't see that this dude stole his "girlfriend" collection.
ReplyDeleteI would like to see a Throwdown between Mr. Rude Pundit and AG.
ReplyDeleteIt should also be noted that Ms. Inflatable Coulter's wang, there, is not as large as mine, let alone Chuckles'.
Aren't comedians supposed to be funny? This was mildly interesting to see how many ways this guy wouldn't do something, but it wasn't even remotely funny. And even the interesting factor faded after the first minute or so. It's a 20 second joke strained painfully to five and a half minutes.
ReplyDeleteI understand that it maybe resonates better with tolerant liberals who appreciate nuance, but even so-- you guys found this amusing for the entire five and a half minutes? There is no irony-- other than maybe that the dude got about five people to applaud after his rant-- no subtlety, no insight, and no visual humor outside of the obvious "Oh look, the doll he calls Ann Coulter has a huge penis." How droll.
Seriously, did anybody really find this funny? Don't get me wrong-- I am not a fan of Ms. Coulter. I wish she'd shut up and go away. I think she, like this guy, says things simply to get attention and that she does not care if it is racist, bigoted or accurate. I hate the fact that she claims to be a conservative when in fact she is a shameless gadfly whose ten minutes of fame should've been up years ago.
But this wasn't funny. You know who was funny? Lynn Cheney! No, really. She was on The Daily Show last night and she was terrific. Well-spoken, thoughtful and very funny. It was a fabulous and very amusing interview.
No, Nick, it wasn't funny.
ReplyDeleteNeither is Ann Coulter.
Neither is the reactionary, Republican dominated corporate media that continually gives her a soapbox from which to spew her vile, protected speech.
Protected in a way that we don't seem to be able to do for a 12 year old brain damaged car accident victim, recipient of S-CHIP Health care benefits, when he chooses to describe publicly how appreciative he is for a government provided benefit. He and his family have been threatened and harassed and described as 'leeches' ever since.
Attacked mindlessly and stalked by people like Michelle Malkin and other right-wing bloggers who only know hatred and violence, who only understand threats and coercion.
The Rude Pundit directed his anger at a facsimile of a single person, and hits his target because Coulter is incessantly referred to as 'attractive' or 'cute' as if that disguises and ameliorates the bigotry she espouses towards entire groupd of people: Liberals, democrats, Jews, Muslims, African-Americans. The essence of bigotry.
The Rude Pundit is not acting the comedian, and doesn't want you to laugh. He wants you to get ANGRY.
Angry that Ann Coulter is a published Author, and welcomed Guest on show after show.
Angry that a person such as Coulter continues to have a place in our public discourse at all.
Maybe you haven't heard her latest slander against Jews. Maybe you don't think it's horrid. But her right to say such loathsome things also entitles Mr. Rude to scream obscenities at inflatable dolls with dildos and man hands. It's just response in kind. And you don't even have to LIKE it, Nick. But it expresses something that I've felt, ever since being called a Traitor incessantly because I don't support Glorious War.
Tolerance? Nick, you misunderstand what tolerance is. I only tolerate Coulter's right to exist and speak as she does; that doesn't imply that I don't see the right to respond in kind, both by me and other people.
That's not intolerance. That's FREE SPEECH.
the irony of typing a 12,000 word comment to complain about the length of a five minute gag.
ReplyDeleted'oh! And I fell right into His Trap by writing an EVEN LONGER response!!
ReplyDeleteThe trickery!!
Fell into my Evil Trap, BP! Hah!
ReplyDeleteOk, well I'm glad he wasn't trying to be funny. I guess I still don't get the point-- responding in kind really isn't tolerance, BP. It's just not.
Would it be okay for the next Democratic president to abuse executive power as badly as Bush because he did it first? No, of course not. Decry and ridicule Coulter as much as you want-- she richly deserves it.
But this...
It's just venom and he sprays it around freely and upon targets far, far afield from Coulter-- though he does always bring it back to the central target, I grant you. I guess if it serves as a release valve for pent up frustration that might otherwise makes itself known in more destructive ways, than all to the good. But other than that? Sure, freedom of speech allows you to respond in kind, but to me, that just makes you look as stupid and immature as the person that you are venting about. I never said, nor did I mean to imply, that he doesn't have the right to do this-- I just don't get what it is supposed to accomplish. I think it makes him look rather like a Rude Idiot than a Rude Pundit.
I see this little piece of muck as having precisely the same value as Coulter's muck, which is to say, zero.
Tolerance is not responding in kind. And appealing to the lowest common denominator gets you exactly that. Which is a large part of the reason society seems to be spiraling into oblivion these days.
And finally, because I simply can't resist and I do so like to hear myself type-- I wasn't complaining about the length of the bit, Kathleen. I was complaining about the quality of it. Had it been interesting and/or funny, I would happily have watched it for an hour. Had it had a point I would've watched it for the full five and a half minutes and not felt like I just wasted a small, but irretrievable, part of my life.
Ok, really, really finally. How is it constructive and helpful to fight hate speech with hate speech?
I will quickly add: Mendacious D's post was excellent. Everything RP's wasn't. And much more effective, while still not sinking to Coulter's level.
ReplyDeleteBravo! Encore!
I agree with Nick. Being a dope in response to someone else being a dope just means you have two dopes on your hand.
ReplyDeleteI wish people would just ignore Ann Coulter. She's just a clown with a very good marketing strategy. She puts a book out, says some outrageous crud and then everyone talks about it, replays her clips on TV ad naseum and her book sales soar. She knows what works.
We liberals, much like the right-wing (only for different reasons) are going to have to accept that the media is what it is. And try to figure out a way to work around it instead of screaming our heads off to get them to try to change.
They're not gonna. There's too much money in broadcasting crap.
AG doesn't throw down.
ReplyDeleteShe simply kicks in the crotch with steel toed shoes.
Nick, and BG, I actually agree with you.
ReplyDeleteHowever.
Remember Newt's little set of rules? Came out in the late 80's or early 90's? It instructed Republicans to use NOTHING but denigrating terms in describing Democrats or democratic policies, and the Reopublicans adopted them wholeheartedly, enthusiastically.
Tolerance is only for those who deserve it. I applaud MenD's restraint, but we've been using those tactics for twenty years, and fascists like Coulter and Limbaugh just laugh.
They laugh.
They count on Democrats responding civilly, because they know that can counting on Democrats bringing a cup of pudding to a gun fight.
They don't respect civil discourse. The Republican Party knowingly and methodically destroyed the opportunity for civil political discourse.
I never said I was being tolerant. I refuse to be tolerant of the intolerant.
The media became what it is becasue it started mostly conservative, and was browbeat into submission over twenty five years by talk radio and Republican smear merchants screaming 'Liberal Bias!' anytime an unflattering article pops up. They still do that, by the way.
I do believe that unless we (and when I say we, Nick, I realize that you are mostly okay with the way media is working out) want to completely abandon this field to the Right, the only option is to hold the media's feet to the fire and at least force them to be ACCURATE, through things like Media Matters, Crooks and Liars, and letter writing pressure, yes, screaming our heads off.
BG, Coulter doesn't go away that's the beauty of the tactic. They roll out an intolerant harpy to screech some repugnant vile things, and if she is called to task, they say 'Hey! Where's the TOLERANCE, liberals? Where's the FREE SPEECH?' But they never, never repudiate her or cast her from the news shows. Even Nick there, while he said he doesn't care for her, never condemned the abhorrent things she says.
And thus, the Overton Window is again inched Rightward. And I'm not going to stand for it. I'm happy to use reasoned argument where it works and the opponent is willing to be civil, but down in the trenches, with the Dittoheads and the Savages and the Becks and the Malkins and the Freepers and the Coulters, it's knives out, baby.
now THAT'S the kind of attitude I'm talking about AG.
ReplyDeleteOk. How 'bout this? Cuz The Skimmer totally agrees with you and we have this discussion all the time.
ReplyDeleteWhat's the only thing we have that indicates how the majority feels about things in this country?
Polls.
And the polls say that the majority of Americans are disgusted with Congress right now. What do they have? A 13% approval rating or something like that?
So, that means that the majority of Americans really aren't being swayed at all by the garbage that comes flinging from the Right -- or won't be if we on the Left manage to stoop as low as they do.
What we *really* need to do is put ALL THE PRESSURE WE CAN on the Democrats who were elected to DO WHAT THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS WANT THEM TO DO.
*****ALL CAPS BECAUSE I'M BEING LOUD ABOUT THIS!!!!******
We need leadership. And we ain't got it right now.
There have always been Ann Coulters and Rush Limbaughs in politics in one form or another. They're not going to go away.
And I *think* this country actually had leadership at one point.
Sadly, *that* seems to have gone away.
Spot on BG.
ReplyDeleteYou know the problem with bringing a knife or gun to a fight, BP? A lot of blood gets spilled on both sides. And people not actively involved in the fight think, "Tsk, such a waste. Pity they couldn't have taken all that wasted energy and done something useful with it."
I'm not advocating taking a bowl of pudding to a gun fight-- that would be rather stupid. Though a very visually effective analogy. I'm advocating pointing out that there are a bunch of thugs down the alley with guns and shining a bright light on their pretense and thuggery. And then offering an actual, honest-to-goodness appealing alternative to thugs.
It can work-- Dr. Steve Kagen in Wisconsin's GB congressional district defeated his primary opponents and then his Rep. opposition by being positive and by vowing to pursue change.
The trouble with going toe to toe with the Newt Gingrich's and Karl Rove's of the world is that in the process of flinging all that... mud, you get covered in the... mud yourself. Which is my problem with the RP's little rant. It d/n make me angry-- it will only make those who already wholeheartedly agree with him angry. It made me wince at his vulgarity and almost immediately pigeonhole him as a leftwing nutbag whose opinion is worth absolutely nothing. He is exhorting the choir while those in the pews are watching him and thinking, "This is the alternative?"
Yes, Ann Coulter is offensive, abusive and should not receive any of the media coverage she gets. She's a turd and her work is a bigoted, racist miasma of warmed over stupidity from generations past. She too is only exhorting the choir and I would happily consign her to knitting alpaca wool on a Montana farm with Karl Rove were it within my power.
But responding to her filth in kind does not help. It might make you feel a little better for a short period, but in the long run it makes people like me-- and I hate to break it to you, but I am the demographic both parties need to appeal to (which is to say, I vote, I read and I am perfectly willing to cross party lines)-- have to choose between the lesser of two evils. Which is really unfortunate because I would REALLY like to vote for someone I thought would actually be a good president, or senator, or congressman. As would most of us moderates.
As to the media-- well, no, I am not fairly happy with where it is at right now. I will be posting on precisely that subject shortly (and no, it won't be just a "LEFTWING BIAS!" rant). But I've babbled too much already and this gives me a chance to blatantly plug my own blog:
But first, Nick and BG, you have to do something about the THUGS.
ReplyDeleteNormally, this would be the place where you say moderate Republicans have to replace the radical fringes that have taken control of their party.
But that doesn't seem to be happening, now does it? Scooter libby gets pardoned, Cheney is rushing headlong into attacking another country, Congressional Republicans are united in obstructing any legislation, far more than any previous Congress...meanwhile Limbaugh, Coulter and Malkin continue to use their pulpits to come closer daily to inciting violence. People like Cheney and Rumsfeld, who caused enough problems the FIRST time they were in public positons, continue to re-animate like Freddy Krueger.
After the thugs are disarmed, de-fanged, de-wormed and detained, we can talk about the alternatives. But until then, they continue to make it impossible to discuss.
Last week was all caught up in flag pins and Edwards hair. Again. This week, it's whether the parents of a twelve year old accident victim are sufficiently prostrate and impoverished for the kid's brain damage to be treated.
I don't see where Democrats being civil for the last twelve years has made any impact either in the opposition, or in this mythical 'middle moderate ground' you supposedly represent, Nick.
Now, I have little problem with replacing Republicans en masse with Democrats. Along the way, maybe we can get more Dems like Feingold and fewer like Lieberman.
Americans say they respect tolerance. But Americans also like to see someone defend themselves. Removal of thugs like Limbaugh and Coulter from public Discourse is a proper defensive goal, and I think it has been adequately demonstrated that we're gonna have to get our hands dirty to do it. Mr. Rude is one end of that front, and MenD is another.
I'm somewhere in the middle. I prefer to challenge Man-Hands and Viagra-Boy to a tag-team Cage Match, alternating High School Rules debate with rounds of full contact no holds barred sparring. I pick Al Franken as my partner. In any case, Coulter has no place on my TV hawking her tomes of hating drivel, and Limbaugh has no place on Armed Forces Radio, spreading his drug-addled misinformation among the patriots in our armed forces, who are not allowed to see or hear opposing viewpoints.
I don't see where Democrats being civil for the last twelve years has made any impact either in the opposition, or in this mythical 'middle moderate ground' you supposedly represent, Nick.
ReplyDeletethat says it all.
I am le tired.
ReplyDeleteWould someone please get me an Absolut martini, straight up with 3 olives?