Gore’s remarks were a monstrous and willful distortion of the facts motivated by sheer viciousness. What he did was far worse and did far more damage than anything Ann Coulter has ever done or said. The fact that you fail to recognize this speaks poorly of your intelligence and integrity.
You’re a cretin on about three separate levels; there’s no percentage in continuing talking with you.
Daniel
Well. Thank god you’re brilliant then, right?
Couldn’t bear not hearing any talking.
The fuck are you on about? Someone
- Brings up a specious comparison
- in order to avoid taking responsibility for the poison in his group, and
- refuses to provide evidence of any relevancy of the comparison,
so I dismiss him as a cretin. What you’re saying looks to me like a sentence and a half chock full of non sequitur, too.
I’m not saying I’m brilliant. I have no idea who you’re saying couldn’t bear not hearing any talking, or whether you mean that that person could bear hearing talking, or what that person has to do with anything.
I am saying that:
- The comparison between Al Gore’s speech and Ann Coulter’s speech is cretinous;
- Trying to avoid taking responsibility for the poison in your own midst by claiming that other people are also poisonous is cretinous; and
- Refusing to provide evidence to back up one’s assertions is cretinous.
That’s a cretinous Gordian knot that resists untangling, so I’m not going to bother.
Daniel
Good. 
I am not so sure this is true.
I am outraged at Al Gore for his asinine remarks in Saudi Arabia. I’m also outraged at Coluter. While I don’t believe the remarks are deserving of precisely the same level of outrage, it’s fair to say they both belong in the file drawer marked “Outrage,” if not precisely in the same folder therein.
You, on the other hand seem to be suggesting that you’re NOT outraged at Coulter, but that you are outraged at Gore, and that this is acceptable because the audience to whom you direct your rhetorical comment is NOT upset with Gore, but is upset with Coulter.
Is this a fair summary?
If it is, then we’re not in the same place, you and I. I’m pissed at both Gore and Coulter.
You?
Concerning “factual and objective” documentaries:
The simple truth is that NO film-- factual or sheer fiction – ever gets made without expressing a point of view. That POV may be profound, silly, specious, incisive; it may be crystal-clear, muddled, subtle, blatant. But the very act of selecting what to show and how to show it requires the exercise of human judgment, the choosing of X to make one point rather than Y to make another. No documentary is devoid of human judgment in the shaping of the story it tells.
One don’t need a voice-over proclaiming the message, either. One of the greatest documentary-makers of the last century did nothing more than point his cameras at the topic he was examining and let them roll, acquiring months’ worth of footage, with his subjects fully aware of his presence, then editing that footage to the essence of what had been observed. His cinema-verite films are considered masterpieces. His first has been described thus: “It is a stark film and the most realistic and honest statement that I have seen on” its subject.
SA, I invite your attention to Frederick Wiseman and Titicut Follies.
I have been making a serious effort to ignore Coulter as completely as possible ever since she made some particlarly stupid and mean comments about Canada some time ago. I frankly have little idea what she’s been up to ever since then, as I’ve decided that she simply does not deserve my time and energy–or, for that matter, my outrage. Like Cindy Sheehan or Michael Moore, I just want her out of my life (or at least, out of my awareness) as completely as possible. In other words, so far as I’m concerned, she’s an unperson.
Gore, however, is a former vice-president, and many people around the world will give his words and attitudes much greater weight than Coulter’s, so he has far less right to indulge himself in venomous maliciousness. Neither has any business behaving like a petulant teenager, but Gore has even less so that Coulter. His remarks in Saudi Arabia–in which he more or less said there was an ongoing Kristallnacht against Arabs and Muslims in the States–reveal an ugly attitude about not only the Republicans but America and the American people that can only be described as deranged hatefulness.
So, no, I don’t feel outrage by Coulter because I’m trying not to feel–or think, or perceive–anything about Coulter at all. Gore’s stupidity and viciousness, however, are much more serious because they are likely to do much more damage. Coulter is relatively easy to ignore. Gore isn’t.
Don’t know if that answers your question or not, but it’s what I’ve got at the moment.
If the Pubs are smart, they’ll get a tape of Gore’s remarks and run them constantly during the next election. Does this imbecile have even the vaguest understanding of how much damage he’s done not only to his country but to his party??!?
What did Gore say? What was the EXACT quote? I’m not attacking or defending him until I know. I really want to know. Meanwhile, as far as I’m concerned, anyone who defends Coulter’s bullshit hatemongering in any way, for any reason, and by any method is a fucking moron and a mouthbreathing, inbred asshole.
There’s a perfectly good thread discussing GOre’s comments. I think it’d be best to continue the discussion there, instead of trying to start from scratch with it here.
Polecat, your idea that Coulter is irrelevant is pretty clearly wrong. She was the most popular speaker at an event that (as near as I can tell) is a pretty influential one in Republican circles. She’s helping to normalize racism, religious bigotry, and the advocacy of political violence in her party. That’s specifically repulsive and is in a category by itself.
Comparing it to what Gore said is ridiculous: even if Gore’s speech is harmful (an idea that, based on current evidence, I reject), it’s harmful in a wholly different fashion. It’s possible to be outraged at one and not the other without being influenced by partisan politics.
Daniel
Seconded. Lest we forget, Coulter was also an invited speaker at the 2004 Republican National Convention. Apparently the Republican party endorses her views enough to invite her on stage to whip up the party faithful.
Maybe you shouldn’t be ignoring her, Lonesome Polecat. Maybe the fact that a woman who jokes about killing her political enemies, regularly, is consistently invited to espouse her views at major political events for the Republican party is perhaps worthy of your attention.
Now I understand. Gore was talking about dialogue, democracy, stuff like that. I definitely noticed that the original “article” (to be very very generous) came from NewsMax, and that NewsMax made a oint of NOT including any direct quotes.
Thank you for the cite re-direct. So then, Anyone who is trying to apply equivalency between Gore and Coulter is a god damn liar. Nuf said.
Actually, I don’t find THAT to be the bothersome part of her. If nothing else, the fact that you use the word “jokes” indicates that it’s pretty clear that she is not actively endorsing murder. That’s a case of horrifyingly poor taste, not anything worse. What bothers me is her constant derision towards every single liberal person, and her accusations of disloyalty and America-hating. It’s key to our society’s ongoing functioning success that people realize that those that disagree with them are still patriotic and intelligent and reasonable people. Coulter is working against that belief, and that is inexcusable.
Plus, she’s a big fat liar. But in THAT, she differs from other pundits only in a matter of degree.
Oh, and I’m not crazy about the aforementioned death-jokes. But they aren’t he numero uno issue, at least for me.
Please educate an ignorant Brit: is Miss Coulter popular as a speaker because she’s a good and engaging if not entertaining speaker, or because people more or less agree with her?
How is that situation even remotely comparable?
Let’s see:
(1) Unelected pundit writes book claiming that every liberal hates America, book becomes best seller
(2) Former vice president travels to large economic conference, gives speech criticizing US policy, speech is basically accurate (modulo some argument over the word “indiscriminate”), most people haven’t even heard of it
Somehow I don’t see the parallels. Not that that means that I have proved that Coulter is worse than Gore. If in your value system the absolute most important thing, paramount above all others, is that one never criticize the US on foreign soil, well, Gore indisputably did that. So, in that case, Gore’s actions would be worse. All I’m saying is, you are trying to make these two things equivalent, and they are not. They aren’t even close. They aren’t even similar.
I haven’t been able to find a full transcript of the Gore speech anywhere, just the excerpts from Yahoo. This version emphasizes his criticism of Iran, however:
Anybody disagree with that?
The Arab News (the House of Saud’s Fox News):
[quote]
“The 21st century has to be a century of renewal, and our ability to overcome these kinds of cycles of disrespect and violence is the key to making it a century of renewal,”…“Unfortunately there have been terrible abuses and it’s wrong,” said Gore, adding that there were people even in the current Republican administration who have worked to protect the human and civil rights guaranteed in the US Constitution, and to expose abuses that have occurred following the Sept. 11 attacks. He also criticized the thoughtless manner in which visas for Arabs are now handled.
Lest anyone think this was The Al Gore Show:
The forum certainly appears to have been focused on getting outside views on what SA should be doing to prepare itself for the future, doesn’t it?
So, Lonesome Polecat, why do you hate the Constitution?
And do you have any idea what Gore actually said other than what you’ve been told second-hand by Fox and Newsmax et al?
My impression is that she’s popular because she’s controversial and confrontational. Conservative groups get her to come speak on campus precisely because they know some of the campus lefties are likely to show up and make enough of a fuss to disrupt the proceddings, and the right-wingers can then fold their arms across their chests, stick their noses in the air, and say, “Do you see what they’re really like?” It may make a good show, but it’s only slightly more respectable than a donkey show in Mexico. America simply does not need more belligerence in its political dialogue these days, and this woman seems to have built both her speaking and writing careers on needless and extreme belligerence.
It’s possible that that’s part of the reason, but in this case I think it’s clear that CPAC invited her for other reasons. I suspect that she taps into people’s dark thoughts, the ones that they don’t normally voice. That, by itself, can be okay: comedians always do that. The problem, I think, is when she normalizes it, makes it okay to spew such venom, and when people encourage her to do so.
If Richard Pryor had built his comedic career around talking about how white people are traitors and how racist cops ought to be met with shotguns to the face, he’d be in the same boat as Ann. Pryor was a comedian that confronted our darker thoughts, but managed to make them ridiculous in the process and thereby defuse them. That’s why he was a good comedian, and why Ann is a repulsive demagogue.
Daniel
For starters, she’s a skinny blonde with nice boobs. She has a gift for saying what the lowest common denominator amongst the republicans wants to hear. She’s sex and anger wrapped up in (some would say) an appealing package. That’s the secret of her popularity.
