AP's article starts like this:
RALEIGH, N.C. - Elizabeth Edwards pleaded Tuesday with Ann Coulter to "stop the personal attacks," a day after the conservative commentator said she wished Edwards' husband, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, had been killed by terrorists.
AP also points out that Coulter was just picking up on Bill Maher's remarks about VP Dick Cheney, which didn't seem to upset the liberal left at all.
"If I'm going to say anything about John Edwards in the future, I'll just wish he had been killed in a terrorist assassination plot," Coulter said Monday, picking up on remarks made by HBO's Bill Maher. Maher suggested in March that "people wouldn't be dying needlessly" if Vice President Dick Cheney had been killed in an insurgent attack in Afghanistan.
I am sensing a double standard here....
AmericaBlog blatantly lies about this here:
If you or I said this, we'd be arrested. And we certainly wouldn't be given TV time on ABC, NBC or any other show than FOX. Why did NBC let her on the show after this? Why would anyone? This woman is the biggest book seller, biggest TV personality, and biggest public speaker of the Republican party. She represents everything that has gone wrong with that party, and the reason why so many of us have left it.
I am sure John Aravosis knows that Bill Maher was not "arrested" for his comments about the VP, yet he tries to tell his readers "If you or I said this, we'd be arrested"?
Now, if Mr. Aravosis doesn't know that Bill Maher was never arrested for that remark, I will apologize for calling him a liar, but somehow I think he is aware of that fact.
Outside the Beltway makes this point:
Of course, Bill Maher said the same thing about Dick Cheney and he’s free — and on television — too. People are allowed to say incredibly disgusting things so long as they aren’t actually inciting people to commit crimes. And she’s allowed on television because she gets ratings. I couldn’t tell you who was on “Hardball” any other show in the past month; everyone’s talking about Coulter, though.
THAT is my point. She brings these shows better ratings and makes people talk and the shows that invite her to speak, get noticed more.
Now, a couple of points.
First, Elizabeth Edwards must know that when someone has thrown themselves in the political arena, they are going to get verbally attacked... it is the nature of politics, an ugly nature, but it is what it is.
Secondly, Ann Coulter is only second to President Bush in her ability to cause the liberal left to completely flip out in reaction to Coulter's outrageous remarks, and the only reason she takes second place to Bush is because of Bush Derangement Syndrome. ( Can you believe Wiki actually has a meaning for that phrase?)
Sister Toldjah makes one of the best points that I have seen:
But isn’t it mildly ironic that Mrs. Edwards chides Coulter for her inflammatory rhetoric in spite of the fact that her husband’s campaign hired some of the most foul-mouthed inflammatory bloggers in the leftosphere, and wanted to keep them even after supposedly ‘just finding out’ through other bloggers and pundits just how crude and offensive they were, using terminology that makes Coulter look like Mary Poppins? He demanded ‘assurances’ from them, of course, that they would keep it clean on his blog but that said nothing about their continued insults and highly inflammatory and crude language used on their own.
If you do not read Sister Toldjah on a daily basis, now is the time to bookmark her site, it is great.
But I digress, so back to my points....
People watch Coulter just to see what her latest outrageous remark is going to be, everytime she is on a show and makes one of her famous "attacks" that shows ratings go up, her books sales skyrocket and everyone s talking about the show for days on end, sometimes weeks.
This is why she keeps getting invited back on... simple capitalism.
When I see Coulter on my television, I cringe, but I don't change it, because it is like a trainwreck, you don't want to see people die, but you cannot take your eyes off of it for some reason.
I have often disagreed with much of how Coulter says things, even when I agree with her underlying points, she is crass, rude and downright nasty sometimes, but one can never accuse her of holding back what she is thinking, out of "political correctness".
In the meantime, Elizabeth Edwards did Ann a huge favor by calling in and speaking to her, she sold more books for Ann Coulter,the blogosphere is also selling more books for Coulter with every post about this incident and Ann Coulter is laughing all the way to the bank.
I may not exactly like Coulter but I will say, in a world where political correctness is getting people killed and stopping us from speaking the truth for fear of "offending" someone, Ann Coulter certainly is a breath of fresh air, even when she is wrong, at least she isn't sooooo scared of offending that she neglects to speak out at all.
[Update] Sort of related and sort of not related, but Chris Matthews said something on the show and mediabistro's FishBowl calls him out on a baldfaced lie:
On yesterday's edition of Hardball, Chris Matthews made the claim that Ann Coulter was the first person to mention the names Anna Nicole Smith and Paris Hilton on his show:
MATTHEWS: I'm just asking a political question. How long can he stay in the field with this war? How long can he keep it up?
COULTER: I think--I don't--I do not get the sense that--your question--a long time because I do not think the country is burning with anti-war fervor. Except on your show, every night we hear about Anna Nicole Smith and Paris Hilton.
MATTHEWS: Well...
COULTER: If the country were so worried...
MATTHEWS: You are the first person to mention...
COULTER: ... about this war...
MATTHEWS: ... those names on my show.
COULTER: I'm sorry...
A cursory search of recent Hardball transcripts, however, shows a different picture.
On the June 14th edition of Hardball, the name Paris Hilton was uttered by John Kerry, Ron Christie and Pat Buchanan.
On June 11, Jenny Backus mentioned the hotel heiress.
And on June 8, Matthews himself mentioned the name some nine times during an entire segment dedicated to the socialite's legal woes.
Shame on you Chris for lying to your veiwers, over and over and over again.
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