Battered Conservative Syndrome
Dafydd ab Hugh offers a persuasive defense of Ann Coulter. Money quote:
Coulter argues — and I completely agree — that by using their grief as a club to batter their opponents into silence, they have willfully and irrevocably forfeited the right ever again to use it as a shield.
RTWT.
UPDATE: Doc Rampage and John Hawkins have more.
June 9th, 2006 at 10:54 pm
If only Ms. Coulter had said what Dafydd ab Hugh said. Instead she said: “These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling (sic) in their status as celebrities and stalked by griefparrazies. I have never seen people enjoying their husband’s death so much.” Hardly Dafydd’s well-reasoned criticism.
We need a new word, “Coulterism”. “I have never seen people enjoying their husband’s death so much”. Unassailable. Who can say how many people she has seen enjoying their husbands’ deaths to any degree? Half-truth to one-twelfth truth, invective and innuendo are the bulimia poster girl’s stock in trade.
June 9th, 2006 at 11:42 pm
No question, Dafydd said it more eloquently. But both made precisely the same point.
June 9th, 2006 at 11:44 pm
No, they didn’t.
Coulter was a bitch for saying they were enjoying their husbands’ deaths.
Ab Hugh said nothing so offensive.
June 9th, 2006 at 11:51 pm
“Was a bitch” vs. “said nothing so offensive” goes to how they said it, not what they said. Besides, when these shrews bask in their tragedy-induced celebrity, why shouldn’t someone call them on their obvious enjoyment of something no decent person would enjoy?
June 10th, 2006 at 2:43 pm
Maybe Ted Rall had a valid point under there somewhere in his Terror Widows cartoon. But the way he made the point branded him as an utter asshole in my mind, for all eternity.
You can’t separate points from the way they are made.
June 10th, 2006 at 6:59 pm
I agree Rall is an asshole, but mostly for reasons other than that particular cartoon, which I’ve not seen. My understanding from third-hand accounts is that Rall made a similar point to Coulter’s in reverse, but with a major distinction: Rall attacked random, unnamed 9-11 widows based purely on his own speculation about how they were supposedly going to act in the future, while Coulter attacked the Jersey Girls for what they had actually done, and are continuing to do now. Big difference.
June 10th, 2006 at 7:34 pm
Maybe you should look at the cartoon. I’ve linked it on my site; here is a link. He pretty clearly singles out Lisa Beamer and Marianne Pearl. (Danny Pearl was the most (and perhaps only)famous victim of a throat-slicing at the time.) And he was clearly criticizing them for their past conduct: Lisa Beamer’s in appearing on Larry King more than once, and Marianne Pearl’s for calling a press conference.
What do you say now?
June 11th, 2006 at 3:10 pm
OK, I read the cartoon and still think you’re stretching. Here’s why:
To find out whether your “Rall of the Right” analogy has any real merit, I guess we’ll have to wait a bit longer. Jimmy Carter’s not at death’s door, but he is getting up there in the years, so the chances of him dying while Coulter still has a column are better than even. When he goes (or when Bill Clinton does, or any intervening Democrat President, whichever comes first), then we’ll both read the next four columns by Ann Coulter very carefully. If any of them contain speculations that the Dearly Departed Dem is turning a “crispy brown,” or anything remotely comparable to that, then I will concede that Coulter is indeed the Ted Rall of the right. If she doesn’t, you’ll concede that your analogy was a bunch of crap. Deal?
June 11th, 2006 at 3:49 pm
No deal. Too restrictive. I’ll watch all of her writings, not just her next four columns, and I won’t be surprised a bit if she gloats over Carter’s death. I’m sure you and I will have a spirited argument over whether her comments are “gloating” or just pointing out defects in his character and record.
But whether she does or not will prove nothing concerning the present controversy. She was wrong to say what she said, pure and simple.
I believe that there are plenty of valid criticisms of the Jersey Girls. I believe that nobody should be able to use their grief as a shield against criticism, or to puff up their opinions and make them worth more than everybody else’s.
That said, when someone says that relatives of the victims of 9/11 are “enjoying” the victims’ deaths, I find that reprehensible — regardless of the critic’s future inappropriate criticisms or lack thereof. And that applies to scumbag Ted Rall or scumbag Ann Coulter.
And I find it utterly fascinating to watch certain conservatives twist themselves into pretzels defending, not just her general criticism of the Jersey Girls’ behavior (which is valid), but her specific comment that they are “enjoying their husbands’ deaths” (which is a revolting comment that I believe all commentators on both sides of the fence should be criticizing).
June 11th, 2006 at 4:14 pm
As would be, I suspect, any deal that required Ann Coulter to actually act in any manner justifying your comparison to Ted Rall.
… While Rall’s infamous comment surfaced mere days after Reagan’s death, on a blog entry since couldn’t contain himself long enough to save this pearl of wisdom for his next regularly-scheduled column. By stipulating to the next four regularly scheduled comments, I already have my thumb on the scale, in your favor. That period could be extended slightly, but to demand a look at “all of her writings” is to rig the bet so that you can never lose. Ten years after Carter’s death, I could say “OK, Patterico, time to finally own up to the fact that your Rall analogy was crap,” and you could truthfully reply “No, I haven’t lost that bet yet – who knows what the next column will say?” Nice try, though.
If we have to debate that, she hasn’t done anything remotely deserving of your Rall analogy. If she did, there’d be no debate over the fact that she gloated, only over whether such gloating was warranted. Seriously, does anyone, anywhere on the political spectrum, be he Rall fan, a Rall-hater, seriously dispute that Rall’s “crispy brown” comment constituted gloating?
It’s not nearly as pure or simple as you suggest, but never mind that now. The issue is not whether Coulter’s statement was wrong – we can talk about that later – but whether it was wrong enough to justify your comparison of her to Ted Rall. Big difference.
And it also apparently applies regardless of whether or not it the statement is true?! Do you seriously doubt that the Jersey Girls act as though they are enjoying the notoriety they’ve received for no reason other than their husbands’ deaths? I don’t. I do, however, believe that Rall’s similar allegations against Marianne Pearl and Lisa Beamer were. When comparing Rall to Coulter, the accuracy (or lack thereof) of their respective charges has got to count for something.
And I find it equally fascinating to watch other conservatives twist themselves into pretzels not only to attack that statement, which is understandable, but to equate Ann Coulter with Ted Rall, which is insane.
June 11th, 2006 at 5:19 pm
She didn’t say that. She said they are enjoying their husbands’ deaths. Big difference.
This is why Doc Rampage’s analogy of a sandwich falling to the floor (a post you praised) is simply deficient in logic, because the parallel doesn’t work. Doc R. says he can enjoy a sandwich despite the fact that it has fallen to the floor. But that’s not the analogy. The analogy is saying he can enjoy the *fact* that it fell to the floor — or, to tweak the other side of the analogy, the Jersey Girls could enjoy their notoriety despite the fact that it results from their husbands’ deaths.
I wouldn’t have had an objection to Coulter’s saying they are enjoying the notoriety resulting from their husbands’ deaths. That is most definitely not what she said. She, and you, are smart enough to know the difference.
June 11th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
No difference at all, unless you read the original comment to mean they enjoyed their husband’s deaths at the time they occurred, as opposed to enjoying milking their deaths for all their worth now.
Your point about the disconnect in Doc’s logic is taken assumes they would have received the sandwich anyway. I took it to mean there was a causal connection between the sandwich falling and the generic “you” enjoying it (e.g., someone else inadvertently dropped his sandwich and abandoned it, and “you” scooped it up and ate it).
June 11th, 2006 at 6:44 pm
Plenty of difference. Saying that they are enjoying their husbands’ deaths, as opposed to the notoriety that comes with it, implies that they are glad their husbands are dead. There is a difference between saying someone is enjoying their husbands’ deaths (what she said) and saying that they are enjoying something resulting from it.
June 11th, 2006 at 8:52 pm
Ann’s statement as penned is indefensible. Those of us more generous to her than Patterico assume she does not literally mean it–that she means they are enjoying the fame resulting from the deaths. Be that as it may, Patterico already dislikes her, which he is entitled to do, and I doubt one “nice” thing she said would make him change his mind. By the same token, I already like her, and this one wince-inducing statement doesn’t change my mind. I also assume that if anybody were to ask her outright: “Do you really want Justice Stevens to be poisoned? Do you really wish Timothy McVeigh had blown up the NYT building?” she would have no intelligent choice but to say, “No, of course not, but–” and the woman is undoubtedly intelligent. I also agree with Pat that she is intelligent enough that she should have used the difference between “enjoying the deaths” and “enjoying the fame resulting from” to make her point. If somebody does ask her those things, and my assumption is far wrong, I might have different comments to leave.
But how about Xlrq’s point that “Ted Rall of the right” is stretching? I never heard of Ted Rall before this Coulter thing started. I have since looked at the cartoon. Then I did a cursory search on (I believe; this was last night): ted rall cartoon widows. In the first two pages of Google results, there was only one mainstream outlet condemning the cartoon–NYT Digital, of all people, saying they would no longer run his work. Good for them. But where was Matt Lauer interviewing Ted Rall to call him out? Where was the outrage from his peeps on the left, comparable to the outrage Ann has gotten from the right this week?
This suggests something besides the usual MSM evenhandedness. It suggests that Ann Coulter is more well known than Ted Rall. Could this be because, burning rhetoric aside, there is more merit to a larger portion of her arguments than Rall’s?
Honestly, back when Let’s Roll came out, I got a little queasy when I saw the displays. I have always thought it was in somewhat poor taste to come out strong like that in the spotlight of a personal tragedy. But Ted Rall’s cartoon made far less of an actual point than Coulter’s paragraphs and subsequent defense–the whole thing, mind, not just that one damned line. It *is* in poor taste to enjoy a limelight based on widowhood. But it is far worse to tell others that they have no place commenting on what you say because you are a widow and they didn’t lose anybody. Rall was pointing a finger at the former, scathing and probably largely unjustified. Coulter’s point was larger and more merited, but because she had to tack on that last sentence, her point is obscured by the yuck factor.
I hate that she said it the way she did. But as I said over at P’s, she makes it her business to cross the line. Of course you’re entitled to dislike her, but it doesn’t make her arguments unfounded.
P.S., Pat, I would lay some money that she will never say that either Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton is burning in hell. Ted Rall can $#@! $#@.
June 12th, 2006 at 1:52 pm
I’m not jumping in to defend Coulter, but, even assuming Coulter implied these women are happy their husbands died (as opposed to their enjoying their new-found notoriety), what makes Patterico so sure that this is not true? I don’t know them, so I can’t say Coulter is right, but, along those lines, how can someone who doesn’t know the four women argue that Coulter is wrong?
June 12th, 2006 at 4:31 pm
And do I have Dafydd’s argument correct: Coulter can’t be criticized because that would require using the widow’s grief which they have forfeited the right to use?
June 12th, 2006 at 5:03 pm
OK, OK, Patterico, it wasn’t an exact analogy, or intended to be (I didn’t even intend it the way Xrlq read it). The point was just that you can continue to enjoy yourself after bad things happen and that this doesn’t mean you are glad that the bad thing happened.
That analogy was just one small point in the post, I don’t know why you insist on focusing on it.
June 12th, 2006 at 5:03 pm
Close – it would mean Coulter shouldn’t be criticized on that basis. If you read the comment as hyper-literally as Patterico does, i.e., as a claim that the Jerky Girls all jumped for joy on 9-11-01 over the fact that their husbands were dead, then presumably Coulter could be criticized on that basis (not for “violating their grief,” but simply for making a stupid, unsupportable claim).
June 12th, 2006 at 6:25 pm
Patterico has continued to assert a basic equivalency between Coulter and Rall. I wish Patterico would more specifically quantify his opinion, by ranking Coulter and Rall on a moral-reprehensibility scale of 1 to 100, 100 being most reprehensible.
Care to take up the challenge, Patterico?
June 12th, 2006 at 10:47 pm
What Xrlq calls reading Coulter hyper-literally, I call criticizing what she actually said. This was a careful formulation on her part, designed to infuriate. She has been called on it and has refused to back down. I’ll not apologize her for judging her based on what she actually said, rather than on what her defenders wish she had said.
June 12th, 2006 at 11:15 pm
“I’m not jumping in to defend Coulter, but, even assuming Coulter implied these women are happy their husbands died (as opposed to their enjoying their new-found notoriety), what makes Patterico so sure that this is not true? I don’t know them, so I can’t say Coulter is right, but, along those lines, how can someone who doesn’t know the four women argue that Coulter is wrong?”
This strikes me as a loony-toons argument. How the hell would she know that? How dare she say it? And the defense is — hey, we don’t know, but *maybe* she *could* be right???
June 12th, 2006 at 11:46 pm
“Ann’s statement as penned is indefensible. Those of us more generous to her than Patterico assume she does not literally mean it–that she means they are enjoying the fame resulting from the deaths.”
Anwyn:
When you write something in a book, that you know will be quoted, and you refuse to back down when criticized for it — then it makes it pretty hard to argue: “Well, gee — that’s not *exactly* what I meant.”
Such arguments might fly for an off-the-cuff statement, or a blog comment — maybe even, to a lesser extent, for a blog post (especially if there is a quick apology). But for something written in a *book* expected to be read by many thousands? And no apology or clarification of the wording?
Nope. She gets judged on what she wrote. And it was utterly inexcusable — no matter how many excuses folks like Xrlq try to make for her.
June 12th, 2006 at 11:55 pm
June 13th, 2006 at 12:05 am
Has she backed off the statement? Really? How about a link? If she has made plenty of clarifications, give us a link to one.
June 13th, 2006 at 12:06 am
OK, what’s sauce for the goose …: “This broad, Ann Coulter, is a millionairess, lionized on TV and in articles and blog discussions about her, revelling in her status as a celebrity and stalked by wingnuts looking for her autograph. I have never seen anyone enjoying the deaths of the 9/11 victims and the grief of their families so much.”
June 13th, 2006 at 12:17 am
Quite true, and right on point. I think she is enjoying the deaths of the 9/11 victims far more than the Jersey Girls are.
June 13th, 2006 at 12:20 am
Patterico:
If what Coulter said was not true, then she ought to be criticized and condemned for that.
If, however, her comments were factually accurate, then criticism of Coulter must rest on an alleged breach of etiquette, that she unnecessarily hurt the feelings of another person (in the same way a guest at a dinner party ought not declare loudly to the table that the food was terrible.. even if it was).
Since I don’t normally see you refraining from criticizing and making comments about others because their feelings might be hurt, I assumed your criticism of Coulter must be based on a belief that what she said was factually inaccurate… and I was simply inquiring how a LA based prosecutor would know that those four NJ women did not ‘enjoy’ their husband’s deaths as Coulter has alleged they have.
As I said, I don’t know how Coulter would know that to be true… but, at the same time, the majority of those complaining about Coulter (you, Captain Ed, Hugh Hewitt) don’t know for sure that it isn’t true, that those women didn’t enjoy their husband’s deaths. If Coulter had a track record of making things up, then I might not be inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt…. but she hasn’t, so I am.
June 13th, 2006 at 12:25 am
She has a track record of making asshole comments, is what she has a track record of.
You think she has some special insight into the brains of the Jersey Girls that you and I don’t have?
Of course not.
She is just making comments based on their public statements. And her comments are complete asshole comments.
You lose anyone close to you in the last 6 years, Steve? OK, how’s about I assert you are enjoying their death? You can deny it (as the Jersey Girls would of course deny Coulter’s accusation), but how is anyone else here to know that for sure?
June 13th, 2006 at 12:28 am
[...] Commenter nk had an excellent comment on Xrlq’s blog: OK, what’s sauce for the goose …: “This broad, Ann Coulter, is a millionairess, lionized on TV and in articles and blog discussions about her, revelling in her status as a celebrity and stalked by wingnuts looking for her autograph. I have never seen anyone enjoying the deaths of the 9/11 victims and the grief of their families so much.” [...]
June 13th, 2006 at 12:37 am
Steve,
Just look at the language she used and that I paraphrased. “Broads”, ok, she’s calling them “pregnant cows”, it’s disrespectful but we can immediately see that. But then it gets worse. Where the f-word did she get the “revelling” from? The last time I revelled was at my brother’s wedding. “I have never seen anyone enjoying the deaths … ?” Perfectly true, in my case. Probably perfectly true and unassailable in her case. Who can call her on whom she has seen enjoying anyone’ death? Before New York Times v. Sullivan it was called innuendo and was actionable. I call it dishonest and disgusting.
June 13th, 2006 at 1:33 am
nk, your translation would annoy me, but not because it crossed some tenuous line of good taste, rather because it would be grossly unfair. If you think that Coulter’s statement was grossly unfair to the Jersey Widows (I don’t), then you would be properly annoyed at it.
To me, Ted Rall isn’t a slimebag just because he says mean things. He’s a slimebag because the mean things he says reveal a slimebag attitude. He despises what is good and defends what is evil. How he says it is only a distraction.
By contrast, Ann Coulter defends what is good and despises what is evil. And if she is too harsh in her criticism of what is evil, well, at least she’s funny –another difference between her and Rall.
June 13th, 2006 at 2:03 am
In other words, she is an asshole — but she’s *our* asshole.
June 13th, 2006 at 2:18 am
Has she backed off the statement? Really? How about a link? If she has made plenty of clarifications, give us a link to one.
Here you go.
June 13th, 2006 at 2:24 am
Are you going to make me watch the whole video, or are you going to just tell me what she said?
June 13th, 2006 at 2:34 am
Okay, I am watching the video now. I haven’t seen the whole thing, but I see she is backing off her statements at the beginning, without admitting she is doing so.
I’ll keep watching. If she admits that she misspoke, that will be one thing. If she tries to recharacterize her statements (and that’s what it looks like so far), then she is just another damn coward.
June 13th, 2006 at 3:15 am
I was off watching Dr. Who when you asked for what she said. But I see over at your place that watching it served you well. :)
June 13th, 2006 at 3:33 am
Patterico:
You DON’T know that she isn’t right. You may not like it, but you DON’T know. ’nuff said.
June 13th, 2006 at 7:01 am
NK:
… is complete bullshit, when hurled at an unrelated gander. Simply turning an accusation around on the original accuser is lame-on-steroids, as Patterico would almost certainly have quickly noted if you had done so to advance just about any argument except “Ann Coulter sucks, so there!” I’m sure Patterico would appreciate this in a second if a defense lawyer were to use that line of reasoning against him in court: “Oh yeah, how do you know my client did it? For all we know, maybe you did, ya big fibber. Nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah!”
And Bill Gates is a millionaire, so what?
You have got to be fucking kidding me.
Which ones? Most of the ones I’ve read are either highly critical of her, or acknowledge her greater point while expressing regret that she chose the words she did to make it. At least two normally sensible bloggers are even going so far as to compare her to Ted Rall!
There’s nothing generally wrong with reveling in your status as a celebrity. There is something very wrong with reveling in your status as a celebrity, if the entire basis of that celebrity is your husband’s death. Refresh my memory: which family member of Coulter’s died a violent, painful death to make Ann Coulter famous?
If you want to scream out the message “I’m a raving lunatic with nothing of value to say,” I can think of few better ways to accomplish that than to use the word “wingnut.” Contrary to popular left-liberal dogma, there are two wings, and no shortage of nuts on either (or in between, for that matter).
Yes, we all know Ann Coulter was a complete unknown prior to 9-11-01, at which point she managed to hijack other people’s tragedies to become famous. Prior to reading this “excellent” comment, I had been under the impression that “I know you are, but what am I?” had ceased to be a functioning argument tactic since graduation from junior high. I guess I was wrong.
Here’s a question for Patterico, who started this whole discussion not merely by criticizing Coulter, but by comparing her to Ted Rall, got on my case for saying “nice post” about a long blog entry that made several points, and now praises NK’s comment, which makes one spectacularly bad one, as “excellent.” Is there any argument against Ann Coulter that is so bad, you won’t endorse it? Or are back in Harriet Miers territory, where every argument against X is a good one?
June 13th, 2006 at 8:36 am
Coulter offered up her opinion that these women are enjoying their husband’s deaths and provides us with her reasons for that viewpoint.
One group of detractors claims she is wrong, that these women did not in fact enjoy their husband’s death, but they don’t offer any evidence in support of their position. The second group also doesn’t address the underlying claim, but take Coulter to task because they feel it was impolite on her part to say what she did.
One may or may not agree that Coulter has support for what she said… but, at least she seems to have spent time looking into these women… which is far more than Patterico did for his hypothetical in #28, where, presumably, he wouldn’t have any evidence or knowledge of my reaction to back up his claim that I enjoyed the death of one close to me.
If one feels Coulter is wrong on the facts, then the burden is on them to prove her wrong. True, there are arguments that are so silly that one not need to spend time rebuttinig… but since it is not unheard of for some women to enjoy their husband’s deaths, I don’t think that this is one of those situations.
Just like “I know you are, but what am I?” doesn’t pass muster, neither does saying “you’re wrong” without backing it up suffice to win very many arguments…. even if one throws in a bunch of “asshats” and “assholes”.
Patterico, you have to prove your allegations in court. You normally do a great job of backing up your claims and viewpoints on your blog. Why the reluctance to take Coulter on to the facts of whether these women have enjoyed their husband’s deaths?
June 13th, 2006 at 9:54 am
Xrlq,
I happen to agree with you on the use of “wingnut”. That’s why I used it. What should I have substituted for “griefparazzi”? As I pointed out in my comment to Steve, “broads” is ad hominem but at least it’s honest ad hominem. “Millionares”, “revelling in celebrity status”, and “enjoying … deaths” is pure demagoguery. Pulling on the emotional strings of the audience with loaded phrases which sound like argument but when parsed are seen to be irrelevancies and half-truths and attacks on the messenger instead of the message. Sure, you can poke holes in my parody all day long. That’s because it is a parody. Moreover, in the context in which it was made, it does not have the poison Ms. Coulter’s remark had in the context in which her remark was made.
June 13th, 2006 at 10:12 am
NK, your point is taken about “wingnut” but the remainder of the criticism stands. Coulter wasn’t bashing the broads for being millionaires per se, nor for basking in celebrity per se, etc. – she was bashing them for shamelessly profiting from the 9-11 tragedy. Is it attacking the messenger? Sure, but in this case, such an attack is warranted. These women weren’t hired because they are eloquent spokeswomen, but because they are cynical shrews who are willing to use their husband’s deaths to their own advantage. That’s why your parody is not just a parody, but a bad parody.
June 13th, 2006 at 9:56 pm
[...] This echoes a similar comment made by Steve Sturm, another apparently serious person who made the following statement on Xrlq’s site: I’m not jumping in to defend Coulter, but, even assuming Coulter implied these women are happy their husbands died (as opposed to their enjoying their new-found notoriety), what makes Patterico so sure that this is not true? [...]
June 13th, 2006 at 11:25 pm
An excellent parody.
Coulter’s actions in ginning up a controversy over this — how is that anything but shamelessly profiting from the 9-11 tragedy?
June 14th, 2006 at 12:25 am
Ya know how at some blogs, the rules say “no politics” or some such? And then some jerk won’t play by the rules and brings up his lefty windbag junk? And I just have to sit there and let it go by because otherwise I’d be a rulebreaker? It sucks.
That’s how it’s not profiting from 9/11. She didn’t start it. We can argue all day long, and have been, about her insulting words, but saying that she’s profiting from 9/11 is just silly. I’ve conceded your major point all along, that it was a terrible thing to say, but you don’t back down one bit even after saying you’d have been okay with it if she’d just said “enjoying the fame” and those words subsequently coming out of her mouth. I can tell from the way you bulldog along that you’re probably a hell of a lawyer, Pat, but my stars, you’re nearly as good as Ann at never giving any quarter. Keep it up, because I suspect it’s what makes you good at your job and at blogging, but you’re not getting me this time. She says what she means and she stands or falls by it. And I’m not throwing her under the bus yet. Period.
June 14th, 2006 at 12:28 am
P.S., let’s talk a little semantics. Do you think 9/11 is properly called a “tragedy?” For the people it happened to, it certainly was a personal tragedy. But it seems to me that the event itself empirically was more of an atrocity, in that it had agents with purpose who committed it. I think calling it a tragedy downplays the role of the perpetrators and is a semantic injustice.
June 14th, 2006 at 12:46 am
I understand the point, but for the people it happened to, it was a tragedy. The better word to encapsulate the entire event for the public is indeed “atrocity.”
Saying that Coulter is “shamelessly profiting from the 9/11 tragedy” is a little right-back-at-ya, I’ll admit it. Look, like a lot of people, I have mixed feelings about the relatives pocketing millions from 9/11. I think it’s an example of how Big Government always has to Solve Everyone’s Problems — and if government *hadn’t* thrown money at the relatives, a critical mass of idiots would have complained that the government was “doing nothing,” and those in power might have suffered.
So they threw a few hundred million of your dollars and mine at the problem, to save their political hides.
We’re increasingly a nation of witless, dependent nincompoops. (Boy, I sound pretty tough for a guy who can’t even put his kids’ swingset together, huh? At least I’m not asking the government to do it for me!) We rely on the government for everything, and the multi-million-dollar payout to various widows is one example.
But I guarantee (almost) every one of them would give up the millions, and yes, even give up the soapbox — just to have their loved one(s) back. Not *everyone*, of course; some people don’t love their spouses much. But almost all of them. I bet (despite the darker suspicions of many of my more cold-hearted commenters) that this observation is even true of the Jersey Girls!
And, however wrongheaded and occasionally hateful they and Sheehan can be — don’t you think *some* of it is motivated by what happened to their loved ones? Yeah, they were probably all lunatics before. But *some* of their attitude is maybe attributable to the deaths of their loved ones, eh? Don’t you think? *Some*?
June 14th, 2006 at 12:58 am
I am *not* a part of that crowd cropping up here and at P’s Ps in the last 24 that made the awful suggestion that the people wouldn’t give up the money, fame, whatever, to have their loved ones back. Let me be clear about that: that’s despicable. But it’s also a fur piece down the long road from what Coulter said. I’m not complaining about them getting money and a soapbox. I agree that a lot of them felt they needed to speak up about what happened. I don’t dispute their right to speak. Ann disputes their supposed right–of four of them–to tell others to shut up. I know you agree with her on that point. So we’ll have to take our agreement on those points and let the rest go, eh?
June 14th, 2006 at 1:02 am
Sure.
But Ceballos had a First Amendment right to . . . oh, never mind.
June 14th, 2006 at 8:52 am
The book isn’t about 9-11. While I’ve not read it yet, I can just about guarantee that the bit about the Jersey Girls was far from the only “I can’t believe she said that” zinger that had the potential to spark a controversy like the present one. While it’s reasonable to assume she knew there’d be some sort of controversy following the book, it’s not reasonable to assume that she knew it would center around the Jersey Girls in particular, or even 9/11 in general.
Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. Like you, I don’t doubt for a minute that almost all families of 9-11 victims would gladly give up everything to have their loved ones back. I also don’t doubt, however, that almost all families of 9-11 victims have exhibited a hell of a lot more class than the Jersey Girls have. Are we talking about the same “almost?” I don’t know!
June 14th, 2006 at 10:54 pm
“The book isn’t about 9-11.”
Well, then, that proves she’s not profiting off this controversy arising out of 9/11!
Funny, I thought her spewing outrageous comments relating to 9/11 was designed to sell more books, making her more money. But since her book isn’t about 9/11, we can pretend that’s not the case.
June 15th, 2006 at 12:01 am
Bleah. Jumped the shark, this has. The way this came up in the first place was that she wrote it down in the book and Matt Lauer asked her about it. Seems to me nobody would have known without reading the book had not the media asked her about it–thus throwing completely out the window the idea that she wrote it in there to profit from 9/11.
June 15th, 2006 at 1:14 am
Yeah, she never figured anyone would actually bring it up.
June 15th, 2006 at 1:55 am
Which would facilitate her selling more books–how?
Oooh, this logic thing is fun after all!
June 15th, 2006 at 3:38 am
As Xrlq sometimes says, you fell into the sarchasm.
June 15th, 2006 at 7:00 am
In the spirit of fake-but-accurate, Patterico’s sarcasm was probably correct. In a recent interview she was asked if she expected the professional 9/11 widow bit to spark a major media controversy, and she said no. Per the interview, she did expect there to be a huge controversy surrounding something in the book – there always is – but she had no idea it would be this, in particular.
Of course, Patterico will say she must be lying about that, since the reception she’s got from the media (not to mention Patterico himself, though for some reason he didn’t come up in the interview) for everything else she’s written over the years has been sweetness and light. But of course Ted Rall isn’t lying now, when he claims his infamous cartoon was about “media figures” like Ted “Olsen,” despite all examples from the original strip being female, and none dropping any hints of having any fame prior to 9/11.
June 15th, 2006 at 10:30 am
Sarchasm, that’s funny. I’m climbing out now … and Xrlq, sorry, but there was also a bit in the cartoon, or another one like it, about 9/11 widow meets 9/11 widower and a prenup … blah blah.
And Pat, Xrlq’s right, you’re reeeeaaally reaching when you go from “she wrote this bit and knew it would be controversial” to “she’s using it to make money out of 9/11.”
June 15th, 2006 at 2:16 pm
Right, that was the last panel of this cartoon. However, it was presented as a prediction of the future, not of what any of the “terror widows” (not -ers) had done up to that point. As an added bonus, the strip is devoid of any references whatever to Ted Olson, or to anyone else you or I had heard of prior to 9-11. Rall’s just bringing him up now to score some sympathy with Democrat partisans who are still made at Olson for helping Bush steal the election in ’00.
June 15th, 2006 at 5:53 pm
Aha, gotcha. :)