June
2007
Mouthpieces Coulter and McBride make GOP look Mean and Shallow
They’re a couple of “go to” people when it comes to supporting the Republican party line and can always be relied upon to spout the GOP talking points but does it serve their party to have them as GOP spokespeople?
You would have to exist in a vacuum to not be able to see their agenda but they can be just plain mean. Consider what some of them have found to be fun and whimsical comments.
Locally, former talk show host (better labeled “defrocked radio priestess” by blogger Jim Plaisted) Jessica McBride (Bucher) thought the murder of a young girl was fair fodder in a poor attempt a humor. McBride may have been removed from her talk show but she continues to run a popular GOP blog with an unapologetic fan base.
On the national political scene, Ann Coulter thought it was funny to say on national television that she wished that John Edwards had been killed by terrorists and wanted Edwards’ wife Elizabeth to
Coulter’s comments criticising a 9-11 widow and even mocking the physical appearance of Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and name of candidate Barack Obama are way over the top. They show Coulter’s willingness to use slime for her own self promotion.
So how has the GOP’s conservative base handled Coulter’s slimy comments? They’ve rewarded her by buying up her recent book and vaulting it to the best seller list. If that’s doesn’t show their approval for Coulter’s despicable lack of decency and morals, then what does? It sends a clear message — GOP supporters are willing to reward slime and they are willing to embrace her values.
But what values are those, and what message are they sending to their children? Any thinking person can draw the same conclusions — the GOP base has embraced cruelty and shallow hateful messages in the mockery of those they don’t believe in.
Hatemongering is not new but to see a mainstream party embrace hate as a political tool should disgust anyone who believes in the hope and pride of being an American. Hopefully people of all political leanings and backgrounds will begin to turn their back on these mouthpieces of hate.
I’ll end today with a poem by Pastor Martin Niemöller.
ShareWhen the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
Jim McGuigan
Jim McGuigan
C’mon! Those goons are not GOP spokespeople any more than Bill Maher is a Democrat spokesman. And what Coulter actually said was this: Maher has previously publicly stated he wished Cheney had been killed in a terrorist event. Coulter then said seeing as how there was no media reaciton to Maher’s statement, she might say something similar about Edwards in the future rather than call him a fag, because clearly that is beyond the pale. Of course she was being sarcastic.
This is all about as important as Paris Hilton. Hatemongering…get real.
Jessica McBride is married to a formerly important person. She used to have a radio show on in the middle of the night which no one listened to. Now she doesn’t.
She is not Ann Coulter. She is trying to be Ann Coulter.
Ann Coulter writes books and makes money and is lionized by a small portion of the right wing in this country. Way back when there were a lot of young right wing women vying for the role of blonde firebrand. Young right wing boys would pull down their pants, close their eyes and imagine discussing the horrors of Clinton’s blow jobs with a naked Coulter, Fitzpatrick, Ingraham, and yes, George Will. No one who cared about the world took their mumblings seriously.
And no one does know. Most of these people have faded to oblivion (I remember one had a cool eye patch but not which one) because their shtick got old. And Coulter went to outrage.
And the left responded. And still responds. I read your post and then went to see what McBride says. When you engage her you publicize her. We are all familiar with the Pastor’s quote, but let me suggest a different analogy. When the Klan has a rally and people go and throw rocks at them, the Klan gets a lot of publicity and attracts people who might not even know they exist. Since their true purpose is not political but only personal (the publicity), they win. And that’s why they keep marching. (And no, I am not suggesting she is in the Klan or racist- its an analogy).
If you ignore them, they go away.
I appreciate the instinct. McBride (like Coulter) is a disingenuous, inconsistent, and shallow publicity hound. She is easy pickings. But she is not important, and I think we should just let her fade away. Republicans of actual import are writing and saying stupid stuff all the time (I think all our talk show goofballs write stuff down on occasion). Fight the power, not the cheerleaders.
No, Geo, that is not what Bill Maher said. You could look it up — in a reliable source, not the sort of source you are relying on that is only feeding you lies.
who cares what maher said/didn’t say. that is hardly the point. coulter interprets maher’s tiptoing to the line of obvious implication (wishing cheney dead by assassination: http://www.nypost.com/seven/03062007/gossip/pagesix/pagesix.htm) the same way many others did, including friends of Maher’ss. In reaction to this and criticism she received for saying it’s impossible to discuss Edwards without using the word “faggot,” coulter scores more shock points by referencing maher’s publicly expressed opinion about cheney and hypothetically applying it to edwards. If maher said nothing wrong, neither did she.
As I said, maher, coulter, whatever…they’re all playing the same game. why pay attention? The only good maher show was Christopher Hitchens flicking off Maher’s audience and telling Maher and guests what a stupid waste they are if Bush-is-Dumb jokes are their primary response to any discussion of Islamic terrorism, etc.