NY Times profiles a very sad Ann Coulter

By Dan Brooks in Public Discourse 7 Comments

Ann Coulter pauses briefly because she thought she heard a strain of music, far away, sung to a little girl who doesn't live here anymore.

During this country’s innocence (Thriller—2008 A.D.,) Ann Coulter could reasonably be called the most unreasonable commentator working. The woman who titled two books about liberals “Treason” and “Godless” could once be relied upon for the most incendiary quotes and the most absurd exaggerations, but the climate of discourse has changed. Coulter, like O’Reilly, finds herself a weak sister in conservatism’s Thanksgiving dinner of nutjobbery, overshadowed by such relentless word-combiners as Glenn Beck and Michele Malkin. Suddenly, she is only middling crazy. Worse, her hyperbolic shtick has become standard not just for conservative commentary but for conservative politics. In a country where Joe Wilson screams that the President is a liar while he is addressing Congress, what is an Ann Coulter, exactly? The answer, at least as suggested by this profile in the New York Times, is “weirdly lonely and sad.”

Continue reading

Once Again with Tony Perkins

By Dan Brooks in Public Discourse 5 Comments

"Not even a little bit. Never. Not once. Why do you guys keep asking me this? Is it my lips? I know I have expressive lips."

Perhaps you’ve heard, but yesterday a district court judge issued an injunction that stops the enforcement of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, thus A) ending decades of homophobic discrimination in the US military and B) reminding everyone that Congress isn’t the only damn branch of government. Tony Perkins is pissed. The Family Research Council President and lifelong crusader against gay rights, who is definitely not a homosexual, said in a public statement that “once again, an activist federal judge is using the military to advance a liberal social agenda.” First of all, I hope this doesn’t interfere with Mr. Perkins’s research. Second—”once again,” Tony? Let’s look at previous instances of judges using the military to advance a social agenda.

Continue reading

“The ultimate in complete agreement:” Glenn Beck and the John Birch Society

By Dan Brooks in glenn beck 1 Comment

We’ve expended more than a few words around here trying to fit Glenn Beck into history—as an heir to Father Coughlin, for example, or more broadly as a populist in the mold of that Great Commoner, William Jennings Bryan. We’ve also tried to fit Beck into history the way you fit the cat into a carrier before taking him to the vet, trying to map his peculiar understanding of the American narrative or at least figure out where it come from. Those two lines of inquiry may just converge on the John Birch Society, as this interesting overview in the New Yorker suggests. Props to Mose for the link. In June, after Beck made a presentation on Communism in America, an essay on the John Birch Society website praised it as “the ultimate in complete agreement between the Beck and JBS presentations of American history.”

Continue reading

Friday links: Finally! edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 2 Comments

Certain events so confirm our worldviews that we can’t believe they didn’t happen sooner. Their actual occurrence seems almost like an afterthought, so thoroughly have we already integrated their essential meaning into our subconscious. In preparation for a weekend we’ve been anticipating since Tuesday, today’s link roundup is about the things that finally happened—comeuppances gotten, riddles solved, and least charitable assessments confirmed. It’s Friday morning, the now is happening, and Combat! blog is poised at the place where hindsight and foresight meet. Behold, the majestic links!

Continue reading

Polls show O’Donnell hosed for November

By Dan Brooks in Tea Party 1 Comment

Republican Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell, making that face that certain people learn to make instead of a smile

If elections in the United States were decided by comparative media coverage, Christine O’Donnell would be Supreme Overlord by now. As it is, a new poll conducted by Fairleigh Dickinson University finds Christ-Od trailing her opponent, Chris Coons, by 17 points. If the name of that university sounds familiar to you, it’s probably because it’s the one from which O’Donnell falsely claimed to graduate—you know, back when that was the most alarming thing we knew about her. God, the irony is sweet. That’s irony, right? I don’t even know anymore.

Continue reading