HAS AMERICA JUMPED THE SHARK?
By C. William Boyer
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis."
Ann Coulter's got me wondering if we as a nation and a people haven't crossed some event horizon into a new world because I've gotta say, it's getting harder to understand my fellow Americans. Why must we hate the other so much?
It seems to me that these last few years, the country has begun to divide into two tribes with two distinctly different perceptions of the world, hostile each to the other. The Ann Coulter drama has put this into perspective.
"I've never seen people enjoying their husbands deaths so much."
To me, that's an ill-considered, repugnant and vicious statement. Imagine yourself, just imagine, being the person on the receiving end. The shock you'd feel at the words themselves, the deep hurt, the revisiting of all the pain you felt when it happened, and the shock you'd feel that someone would have the insensitive audacity to utter such.
"How do we know their husbands weren't planning to divorce these harpies?"
This sort of the thing is FAR outside the bounds of proper political discourse. It is corrosive to America itself. And yet, it's important to note that a considerable number of Republicans are defending it. (On a personal note, I talked with several Republican friends of mine about this in the last three days, and it's tracking 2 in 3 they support Coulter.)
On the June 7 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, Fox News contributor Sandy Rios stated that Coulter's "words are laser-focused on the truth," comparing them to "Holocaust pictures" that "we have to see ... to understand what happened." Rios also compared Coulter's words to a "clarion wake-up call," and "cold water" that -- in O'Reilly's words -- "wakes you up." Rios further praised Coulter's "gift of words and imagery," calling her "unique" and "frank" and adding that "she plays an important role."
Coulter's words are laser focused on the truth? That's a problem I have with so much of the Right, the fact that they're FACTUALLY wrong. First of all, in Truth-Busting, these women weren't happy they're husbands died. The "harpies and witches" weren't about to be divorced. Liberals aren't Godless--- blacks vote overwhelmingly for Democrats and blacks are overwhelmingly the most religious ethnic group in America--- followed by Hispanics, the second most religious and who also vote significantly more often for Dems than Republicans.
Factually incorrect and outright lies creating Hate-Myth.
Rios echoed Coulter's attacks on 9-11 widows, claiming incomprehensibly that just because they "lost their husbands in an accidental bombing [emphasis added]" that "does not give them license to then criticize the commander in chief." Rios also stated that "we're living in a time where a lot of people enjoy the death of their loved ones" and that "people are making a lot of money off the death of their loved ones," calling this "a culture that probably needs to be exposed."
If people who have genuinely suffered a loss like the 9-11 widows cannot criticize the "commander in chief", then who can? I think, for people like Coulter and Rios, the answer is that No One can criticize. I really don't think I'm inaccurate saying people like these two endorse the notion of a Republican dictatorship or shackled press, feeble Congress and co-opted Supreme Court and where subversive groups like the New England Quakers for Peace are surveilled (true story).
On the June 7 edition of MSNBC's Scarborough Country, Republican strategist Jack Burkman defended Coulter's statements "[a]ll the way," asserting that Coulter "understates the point" and is "telling the truth." Burkman added that the 9-11 widows -- whom he compared to anti-war protestor Cindy Sheehan -- "exploited commercially" the deaths of their loved ones, that they had "breathlessly ... stepped just into the fame thing," and that "before the bodies are cold, they're out selling and trying to make money."
People, if one side really thinks another likes their loved ones dying, if one side really DID like it's loved ones dying, if one side believes the other gleefully made money off their loved ones burning alive, then we have got a major problem as a country. If things keep up like this, if we can't even establish a common bond of common decency by saying SOME THINGS are beyond the pale of politics, then it's time to divide the country along Red and Blue lines. Because, quite frankly, I don't want to live in a land of people like Ann Coulter. Her people may feel quite comfy living in HateLand, but I do not. And I WILL do what it takes to avoid that, be it Civil War or the Highway. And it we don't watch it, things might just evolve along the lines of the former.
I leave you with a question of mine and with one last quote by departing Republican House Majority Leader Tom Delay.
How long can this country survive when one half hates other half so much?
And the quote:
"Departing Congressmen like to reminisce about the 'good old days' of political harmony and across-the-aisle camaraderie. I can't do that. For all its faults, it is partisanship - based on core principles - that clarifies our debates, that prevents one party from straying too far from the mainstream and that constantly refreshes our politics with new ideas and new leaders . . . . It is not the principled partisan, however obnoxious he may seem to his opponents, who degrades our public debate, but the preening, self-styled statesman who elevates compromise to a first principle."
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis."
Ann Coulter's got me wondering if we as a nation and a people haven't crossed some event horizon into a new world because I've gotta say, it's getting harder to understand my fellow Americans. Why must we hate the other so much?
It seems to me that these last few years, the country has begun to divide into two tribes with two distinctly different perceptions of the world, hostile each to the other. The Ann Coulter drama has put this into perspective.
"I've never seen people enjoying their husbands deaths so much."
To me, that's an ill-considered, repugnant and vicious statement. Imagine yourself, just imagine, being the person on the receiving end. The shock you'd feel at the words themselves, the deep hurt, the revisiting of all the pain you felt when it happened, and the shock you'd feel that someone would have the insensitive audacity to utter such.
"How do we know their husbands weren't planning to divorce these harpies?"
This sort of the thing is FAR outside the bounds of proper political discourse. It is corrosive to America itself. And yet, it's important to note that a considerable number of Republicans are defending it. (On a personal note, I talked with several Republican friends of mine about this in the last three days, and it's tracking 2 in 3 they support Coulter.)
On the June 7 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, Fox News contributor Sandy Rios stated that Coulter's "words are laser-focused on the truth," comparing them to "Holocaust pictures" that "we have to see ... to understand what happened." Rios also compared Coulter's words to a "clarion wake-up call," and "cold water" that -- in O'Reilly's words -- "wakes you up." Rios further praised Coulter's "gift of words and imagery," calling her "unique" and "frank" and adding that "she plays an important role."
Coulter's words are laser focused on the truth? That's a problem I have with so much of the Right, the fact that they're FACTUALLY wrong. First of all, in Truth-Busting, these women weren't happy they're husbands died. The "harpies and witches" weren't about to be divorced. Liberals aren't Godless--- blacks vote overwhelmingly for Democrats and blacks are overwhelmingly the most religious ethnic group in America--- followed by Hispanics, the second most religious and who also vote significantly more often for Dems than Republicans.
Factually incorrect and outright lies creating Hate-Myth.
Rios echoed Coulter's attacks on 9-11 widows, claiming incomprehensibly that just because they "lost their husbands in an accidental bombing [emphasis added]" that "does not give them license to then criticize the commander in chief." Rios also stated that "we're living in a time where a lot of people enjoy the death of their loved ones" and that "people are making a lot of money off the death of their loved ones," calling this "a culture that probably needs to be exposed."
If people who have genuinely suffered a loss like the 9-11 widows cannot criticize the "commander in chief", then who can? I think, for people like Coulter and Rios, the answer is that No One can criticize. I really don't think I'm inaccurate saying people like these two endorse the notion of a Republican dictatorship or shackled press, feeble Congress and co-opted Supreme Court and where subversive groups like the New England Quakers for Peace are surveilled (true story).
On the June 7 edition of MSNBC's Scarborough Country, Republican strategist Jack Burkman defended Coulter's statements "[a]ll the way," asserting that Coulter "understates the point" and is "telling the truth." Burkman added that the 9-11 widows -- whom he compared to anti-war protestor Cindy Sheehan -- "exploited commercially" the deaths of their loved ones, that they had "breathlessly ... stepped just into the fame thing," and that "before the bodies are cold, they're out selling and trying to make money."
People, if one side really thinks another likes their loved ones dying, if one side really DID like it's loved ones dying, if one side believes the other gleefully made money off their loved ones burning alive, then we have got a major problem as a country. If things keep up like this, if we can't even establish a common bond of common decency by saying SOME THINGS are beyond the pale of politics, then it's time to divide the country along Red and Blue lines. Because, quite frankly, I don't want to live in a land of people like Ann Coulter. Her people may feel quite comfy living in HateLand, but I do not. And I WILL do what it takes to avoid that, be it Civil War or the Highway. And it we don't watch it, things might just evolve along the lines of the former.
I leave you with a question of mine and with one last quote by departing Republican House Majority Leader Tom Delay.
How long can this country survive when one half hates other half so much?
And the quote:
"Departing Congressmen like to reminisce about the 'good old days' of political harmony and across-the-aisle camaraderie. I can't do that. For all its faults, it is partisanship - based on core principles - that clarifies our debates, that prevents one party from straying too far from the mainstream and that constantly refreshes our politics with new ideas and new leaders . . . . It is not the principled partisan, however obnoxious he may seem to his opponents, who degrades our public debate, but the preening, self-styled statesman who elevates compromise to a first principle."
posted by C. William Boyer at 10:07 AM
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