More proof that Ann really isn't the sharpest knife in the shed...(see video)
http://minor-ripper.blogspot.com/2006/12/ann-coulter-gets-owned.html

Well, Orwell had an interesting essay entitled "Politics and the English Language" which always useful to revisit.

And, really, Coulter's comment was pointless name calling. It just gave more attention to Edwards than he deserves, and now generates sympathy.

Way to go, Ann.

Gerard, I have no objection to Coulter spewing out whatever she wants to spew. What I object to is her doing it at that venue.

Thanks for that, Gerard. I was beginning to think I had been transported to some bizzarro universe where conservatives hate free speech, too.

Fausta, I understand your frustration because it was like handing some grenades to your enemies and telling them to chuck them back in. Still, the stepping it back to the venue doesn't quite satisfy the overall point. When you invite someone to speak, they speak. I've seen the stuff about "We warned CPAC" and the letter writing campaign to CPAC saying "Never Again." All fine and all good and all as it should be. Still, it is not my central point. In a way, Coulter here is quite beside the point. Still the Edwards campaign does seem to be getting both the left and the right into the barrel by turns doesn't it?

I have been rereading GK Chesterton lately, and this post smacks of his biting wit. We could use another Chesterton these days, but a Van Der Leun will do.

Because we commonly accept the eternal drifting stupidity of mankind, one derogatory term will never, ever be politically incorrect. Understandable discourse could not stand its absence:

Blonde.

And as a lifetime member of that club, let me thank you all for your consistent and profitable stereotyping. Ann is no doubt laughing all the way to the bank. Hit count payments alone on this non-issue will keep her in Jimmy Choos forever. For the clueless among you, Ann will tone down her language and turn to some other form of outrage precisely 60 seconds before the maximum profit opportunity for doing so. And 60 seconds before any real damage is done to her career.

Let's be practical, shall we? When gays can laugh at "faggot" and blacks can laugh at "nigger" the way Ann laughs at "blonde", our race and sexual identity problems will be over. And it's never going to happen unless the rest of us, like tough-love parents of a willful child, insist on it.

Straight white Christian males cheerfully accept a hurricane of discrimination, abuse, name-calling and smears every day; and yep, they're the better for it. It's time to expect other minorities to toe the mark.

Jihadists want to kill us all and, by Gerard's count, 100,000 people waste their time obsessing over the use of naughty words in a holy place. Mr. Blair would indeed be unsurprised.

If you listen closely, from behind the "cornsilk curtain" you will hear the soft giggling of the voluntarily underestimated. On the blonde scale, which is in fact the strictest code of all, the only technical error Ann committed was to generate a very small amount of sympathy for Edwards among the terminally weepy and the perpetually outraged. And who cares about them, anyway? If they were a majority, Mr. Ketsup would be president now.

I give Ann a 9.8 for this one. Well played, Ann!

Under no circumstances should our real thoughts be spoken lest they curdle the pap
Our real thoughts should be spoken, for sure, and I'm certainly doing my part.

From the bloggers' point of view (speaking as one who was there and first thought I'd heard wrong when she said it), here's the situation:
The blonde uses the venue to make it all about "me, me, me!"
While at the same time, there plenty of speakers who did have a lot to say, among them John Bolton, who go totally ignored.
That's why I joined in the Open Letter.

Let the blonde speak her real thoughts everywhere she wants, and make as much money as she possibly can. But find someone else for the podium at a major political convention.

Spoken as a brunette,

Well, okay. No disagreement there. But certainly the organizing committee at the conference had some idea what they might get by making Coulter a speaker, correct? And it is equally certain that having Coulter as a speaker was widely thought of to be a "draw" for the conference too, correct? And given the conference and the blonde in question it cannot be a surprise that what was said would be all about "me." Correct?

Anyway, this is all much of a muchness of which there has been already much too much.

And again, the pain and suffering of the Right after they were forced to fall on Coulter's grenade, is not to the point of the post.

"Anyway, this is all much of a muchness of which there has been already much too much."

...ado about hilarious!

Am I the only former history major old enough to remember when faggots were items used to burn people at the stake? (Yes, I know that's an ironic association in the present context).

I couldn't agree with you more. And as nice as Fausta is, I think she exhibits a lack of understanding of the First Amendment.

I was trained as a reporter many years ago by a bman who later founded the First Amendment Center. If he taught me one thing, it was how few people truly understand the FA....(as in First Amendment. Any referece to FA..ggot is purely intentional.)

Anyway, he taught me that people really demonstrate how little they understand the FA when something comes along like Ann's remark at CPAC last weekend. People collapse in hysterical horror at such unmitigated free speech demanding retractions, apologies, resignations etc, rather than just walking away, not buying the book, turning to another channel or turning down the sound.

Whether she should have said it in that venue is a totally separate issue. Fact is, she did say it. Frankly, I find sometimes find Ann over the top and therefore don't pay as much attention to her as a result.

But evidently many others do and give her great power.

I was actually rather shocked by Michelle Malkin's interview with Sean Hannity today telling him Ann would have offended her children, had she brought them and implying, therefore, that Ann shouldn't have said it. Come on. This was a grown-ups conference and didn't need to be child-proofed.

Anyway, what is it with our culture? Are we in a giant regression? Why do we give so much of our power away so quickly to things outside of ourselves that displease us? Why let ourselves be increasingly controlled by the slightest infraction? We're becoming a nation of whining, braying weenies on all sides of the political spectrum.

I honestly think politcal correctness may be the death of this country yet, probably posing a greater threat than Islam.

Finally, once upon a time, I had a piece of politcal art work--a multi-media collage-- censored in an environmental art show Jackson, Wyoming. Anyway, a very famous movie star's sister saw it at the patron preview party and demanded the executive director take it down, as it stepped on the toes of some of her good friends and drinking buddies whom she said would be offended. On the spot, he weanied out and obeyed her commands for political correctness (even though he had told me earlier it was his favorite piece in the show...by this time I was on another continent.)

Anyway when this all came to light and the newspapers called, I gave the following quote, something to the effect: "This organization has the right to censor or reject my art work for good reason, or for no reason at all. It's their First Amendment right, though I question their decision. However, it is also my FA right to find a venue that will show my art so that anyone who wants to see and bid on it can.

Of course, it was the talk of the town and shown in a studio where many more people saw it than would have otherwise. And a copy of it ran on the second page of the newspaper. I got offered much more money than I ever dreamed possible. I gave the profits to another organization and a good time was had by all.

I should have donated a portion to the FA Center.

God bless America and those who still have the poor taste to offend us and show us what grand freedoms we must be eternally vigilant about.

If this is too long, you know, use your FA scroll and delete keys.

"We're becoming a nation of whining, braying weenies on all sides of the political spectrum."

Has been promoted to the top of the post.

You said it for me too, Webutante. And no one with a particle of wisdom and a few minutes to spare would scroll past your posts. You're always worth reading and getting better all the time.

Very well done indeed.

Golly gee..... Thanks Mom.

And remember: The First Amendment doesn't guarantee we'll never be offended....rather it assures us we most certainly will.

Bring it on.

Are we as a country Man enough for the First Amendment anymore?

Now it's the venue. Free speech, don,t make me laugh. The RIGHT what a bunch of moroons as Bugs Bunny would say.

"We're becoming a nation of whining, braying weenies on all sides of the political spectrum."

We are ALL faggots now.

This was unexpected?

If you don't want political theater, don't invite David Horowitz.

If you don't want over-the-top rhetoric, don't invite Ann Coulter.

The funny thing about both of them is that they use two of the time-tested weapons of the Left against the left, and it drives them right out of their little collectivist minds.

Thank you for not joining that shameful bunch of cowards who sent that embarrassing letter while masquerading as "conservatives", accepting the left's definition of speech.

One of these days the right will understand that we have been losing the culture wars for quite some time and that while we may not agree with the left's goals their methods of fighting work very well. I propose that we adopt their methods to our principals...

Just as I am willing to forgo my morality to administer torture to the enemy so that we can win the war and my children not face the war. I am willing to adopt the odious tactics of the left to finally win the war of culture so that my children will not be slaves to the idiocy that defines the left.

While in games it is ok to say that it is not whether you win or lose that matters, it is how you play the game. In war it isn't how you play the game that matters, but whether you win or lose. We are at war with the left....Coulter is one of our shock troops. I denounce those who denounce her.