Ann Coulter

In Demonic, Ann Coulter examines how mob mentality damages causes of social change (using the works of Gustave Le Bon as a base), her prime example being the horrors of the French Revolution. However, she then blames "liberals" for all mob thought and action, sending her argument right into the mud pit of name-calling and snide commentary.

Apparently, liberals (meaning all Democrats throughout time, because party interests apparently never shift) are the sole cause of all mob mentality in show more America. Republicans are reasoned and reserved, but Democrats? A bunch of angry, irrational, rabble-rousers. What makes for such a stark difference? Well, Republicans respect law and order and believe in God.

Coulter creates a fact-based argument that liberals are Godless, communist-loving heathens who want to kill your babies and force you to have premarital gay sex with as many partners as they deem fit... if by "fact-based" you mean a series of quotes from the media and certain individuals who happen to call themselves Democrat (a term, like Republican, that has lost all significant meaning over the years). Add to that tagging in the acts of every disturbed individual from John Wilkes Booth, to Charles Manson, to Timothy McVeigh (all card-carrying liberals, according to Coulter), and there you have it, Democrats are the party of Lucifer (this is actually the argument she makes in the final chapter, I'm not even kidding).

The main issue I have with this book, other than rejecting the overall premise, is that denying that conservatives (or Christians in general) are exempt from any sort of mob mentality denies that they are just as human and just as capable of being misled. Of course, that kind of admission could cost her book sales and TV appearances, so best not. Shall we note the lack of mention of the Salem Witch Trials? No mob mentality there, surely.

Reading past her attempts at vilifying the vast majority of my friends and family (liberals all) with blanket statements meant to rile her base, her main complaint seems to be with the media (but only the "Liberal Media"). If the premise of this book had been that the media can often lead to the baiting of the mob, I would wholeheartedly agree with her. I stopped following TV news because of the fearmongering engaged in almost nightly by most presenters. Unfortunately, Ms. Coulter is just as guilty of fearmongering and inciting a potential mob mentality in this very book (and numerous TV appearances) when she claims that liberals are going to destroy America and conservatives need to "overreact." (That is the final line of the book, by the way)

The real problem with this book and others like it, from either side of the aisle, is that the two party system has turned into a shouting match of "our side is better than your side, nyah, nyah, nyah." It's almost impossible to tell moderate left from right anymore and those on the fringes of each party are so crazy, nobody wants anything to do with them (unless it'll really piss off the other guys). The real solution here is to dissolve the two existing parties and start over with something new (this idea will only add fuel to Ms. Coulter's fire of a "liberal attempt to destroy the existing, working system," but c'est la vie). Actually, why not return to something old? When Washington was first elected President, there were no parties, and even when the parties did first form, the rule was that the guy with the most votes became President, runner-up was VP. Let's try that. You have to admit, it would be interesting.

Also, while both Democrats and Republicans yell at each other about who is better, they forget that Jefferson's original party was called the "Democratic-Republicans." So hey, maybe those names aren't really working the way you want them to.

I just wonder what would happen if the only side to the argument was the American side with a healthy difference of opinion intended for rigorous debate, you know, like the Founders envisioned.

Oh, and in the unlikely event of Ms. Coulter actually reading this review, and your editor is still looking for those commas, you can probably find a few extra right here in this review (I often feel I overuse them, but perhaps not). show less

Американските „либерали“ са една особена порода животни - те нямат нищо общо с класическия европейски либерализъм от 19 в., чието название произхожда от френското liberte – свобода – те са просто левичари, социалисти и са избягали много, много далеч от свободните идеи на show more либерализма. Политическото ляво в моментае либерално що се отнася до секса и наркотиците (тва им го признавам), но във всичко останало иска да контролират живота на останалите хора…

Студентчета-марксисти с рядка брадица, които се възхищават на Троцки и Сталин. Агресивни еко-талибани, взривяващи джипове или поне тормозещи хората, каращи такива. Вегани-фанатици, смятащи че са по-морални от останалите хора, защото не ядат месо. Богаташки синчета, заклеймяващи капитализма, докато купуват поредната фланелка с Че Гевара с кредитната карта на тате. Радетели на „политическата коректност“ под формата на пряка цензура. Феминистки, занимаващи се с реклами на бира, но не и с истинските проблеми на страдащи жени. Примерите за дразнещите проявления на „либерализма“ във всекидневието са безброй.

По всички тези и други социални, икономически и други въпроси, левичарите разсъждават от самопровъзгласената си позиция на морално превъзходство – която обаче в повечето случаи не е истинската морална позиция, а е популистката позиция, позицията на първичната емоция и немисленето. Повечето хора не споделят шантавите им идеи, но или поне малко им симпатизират, или дори да не са съгласни с тях, не защитават достатъчно енергично различното си мнение – било за да не се конфронтират, било именно заради илюзията за моралност, с която левичарите парадират.

Ан Коултър обаче не се свени да се конфронтира и да нарече нещата с истинските им имена. Тя безжалостно разбива обвивката на морална извисеност на левичарските идеи и ги разкрива като това, което всъщност са - печалните резултати от прекалено високо самомнение и чиста суета. Изключително е забавно да се наблюдава как всеки досег на идеите на левичарите с логиката и аргументи предизвиква неразрешими психически конфликти у тях, което води до доста грозни, смешни, агресивни и/или жалки реакции, на които съм бил свидетел (и за мое забавление – обект).

Съвсем нормално, Ан Коултър е синоним на Сатаната за всеки американски „либерал“ – а тази й книга е апогея на изобличаването на левичарската глупост. show less

The danger, of course, of naming a book Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right, as Ann Coulter has done, is that you're inviting people to check out your own accuracy. And, unfortunately, in Coulter's case, that was a big mistake.

That's why The Weekly Standard, right wing but with integrity, panned the book.

Let's start with the very title. Coulter named it "Slander," but, of course, what she means when speaking about the media, whether print or electronic, is "libel." Sloppy? Just a show more preview of things to come.

Coulter slams "liberal" newspapers for using the term "Christian right" and "religious right." She says that shows the evil of the mainstream press. But she's so lazy that she never ran a Nexis search on the term. If she had, she'd realize that The Washington Times uses the same term all the time.

Coulter contends that Maureen Dowd attacked Tom DeLay for his religiosity in a June 20, 1999, column. In fact, the object was Al Gore. Sloppy? Par for the course.

I'm not going to go into Coulter having to backpedal on her charges against Katie Couric, even on the puffball kind of interview she was subjected to on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor on July 11, 2002. More serious is how incredibly lazy she was in putting this book together. She laments on the hard time George W. Bush got in campaign 2000. A Nexis search for 1999 and up to the election in 2000 reveals that The New York Times had two stories mentioning Harken Energy. Gee, that was probing! No major newspaper investigated Bush's 1976 DUI conviction in Maine until a smalltown paper broke the story late in the campaign. They were just as lazy -- well, just as lazy as Coulter! Who did a story on Bush's being AWOL from his Air Guard commitment for a 17-month period in the early 1970s? Well, except for The Boston Globe, no one uttered a peep until days before the election. The "liberal" media certainly didn't put Bush under the same microscope as Bill Clinton, whose Vietnam woes surfaced early in 1992.

But then the well-funded right-wing media network isn't interested in exposing Bush's faux pas. Oops! Coulter maintains that there is no Richard Scaife-funded media machine. She'll be writing next that the world isn't round.

That's why she conveniently left this episode out of her book: In February 2001 at a media panel, Paul Begala noted that, on Nexis, he "found 3,641 stories about Bill Clinton 'dodging the draft' ...and there were 49 stories about Bush and the National Guard."

A lot of people think Coulter twists facts. She does, of course, counting on the fact that most people don't have access to Nexis to double-check her sources. But, mostly, she's too lazy to research and, therefore, relies on her own prejudices to fill out a book.

Do women get a harder time about looks in the media, as Coulter contends? Of course, they do. But it's been N.O.W. and Ms. magazine who make that point -- not the Independent Women's Forum that gave Coulter her start. An IWF, by the way, that's funded by none other than that non-existent right-wing conspiracy. show less

I consider myself moderate, and know decent conservatives who are truly concerned about the state of affairs our government is in and want what is best for people without being religious bible-thumpers or the like.

Unfortunately, Ms. Coulter is not one of these sane conservatives. Some of the things that come out of her mouth just befuddle me. One thing that stuck in my mind is how she said that the best way to solve the problems in the Middle East is to force everyone there to convert to show more Christianity.

... Really? Really? And yet this woman has plenty of followers who just love and agree with her. This is not the only wacky thing she says in this book... read this book as a joke to laugh at the things she says... or just shake your head in sadness that someone could believe such stupid and hateful things. show less