Ann Counter: comedienne

[Lurker]

The second quote is indeed lame...not on a par with wishing liberals and Muslims to be murdered, but lame.

As someone who actually read Franken's books, I can easily attest that this McCain quote is comepletely out of context. Luke, I am gravely disappointed in you since the VERY NEXT LINES in the book are

Big laughs. It's called irony, and whatever TV, radio, and print correspondents may say, they love irony.

Franken clearly respects McCain a great deal. Quit taking quotes out of context and making him appear that he does not. I expect better from "skeptics".

Lurker

 

[Mark]

As someone who actually read Franken's books, I can easily attest that this McCain quote is comepletely out of context. Luke, I am gravely disappointed in you since the VERY NEXT LINES in the book are

Franken clearly respects McCain a great deal. Quit taking quotes out of context and making him appear that he does not. I expect better from "skeptics".

Lurker

I am shocked as well. That's the kind of out-of-context b.s. I expect from Rush Limbaugh, not Luke.

You'd think if the Left were as evil as the Right make us out to be, they wouldn't have to resort to such blatant dishonesty. Surely the truth would serve. But I guess not.

 

[RandFan]

You'd think if the Left were as evil as the Right make us out to be, they wouldn't have to resort to such blatant dishonesty. Surely the truth would serve. But I guess not.

Your allusion to disliking both sides equally is slipping.

 

[Lurker]

Matter of fact, since I have the book here in front of me, I will quote the whole section for Luke.

So I like John McCain

Anyway, I'm doing the White House Photographers Dinner and I go into my little McCain riff. "Hey, I like John McCain. And I really think he's courageous. I mean, his stance on campaign finance reform and tobacco. Wow. That takes guts. But this whole 'war hero' thing - I don't get it. I mean, as far as I'm concerned, he sat out the war. I mean, anyone can get captured! Am I wrong, but isn't the idea to capture the other guy?"

Big laughs. It's called irony and whatever TV, radio, and print correspondents may say, photographers love irony.

Franken then goes on to explain how a op-ed piece misquotes him (like Luke did) and takes the irony out of his delivery to make it look sincere. Franken ends up talking to the editor of the paper who is surprised when he learns that his exec editor had added comments to the op-ed piece to do this.

Lurker

 

[Tricky]

Noone will come near their table at the GOP convention because there is a big sign saying they are for less government spending.

I think it was something like "We don't want our taxes going into a black hole.."

 

[BPSCG]

To the fact that Coulter is not using satire, but just really, really stupid, racist jokes.

She thought she was being funny. There's no hint of anything funny there. At best, it is lame. At worst, it is horribly insulting.

Unlike Franken's response, which was not bad at all.

Is it okay if a beaner* makes Mexican jokes?

Reason I ask, I saw a Carlos Mencia special on the tube the other night. Part of his gig went as follows (more or less - quoting from memory...):

"All these people want throw the Mexicans out of the US and build a wall on the border to keep them out... I gotta ask you, who the (bleep) do you think is going to build the wall if you throw all the Mexicans out? What you have to do is get all the Mexicans to build the wall and make sure they're on the other side when they finish it. Then they'll go, 'Hey, what the (bleep) happened?'"

So is it okay for a beaner* to make Mexican jokes, but not a white chick?

* And if the term "beaner" offends you, see the show before you scream at me - it was called "Carlos Mencia - No Strings Attached." Then you'll understand.

 

[RandFan]

I like Coulter, I like Franken. Coulter can be damn funny and sharped tongue. She is at times inappropriate and even to the point of being beyond the pale. For those that want to condemn her that is fine. Her passion for her politics seriously impairs her reasoning abilities and she has been caught many times guilty of public stupidity. But I like sacred cows gored. I find that she can do this quite well and cause me to laugh. Perhaps there is something missing in my character that I should laugh at Coulter and not heed the opinion of so many and think she actually has something to offer from time to time. Life's a bitch. Yeah, so is Coulter. For the record, I like and listen/read to Rush Limbaugh, Al Franken and many others. I don't care for Hanity or O'Riely but I do listen to them occasionally.

What I love most perhaps is sitting there thinking how pissed of someone who takes themselves so seriously is getting when they hear what is being said. Like I said, I love it when sacred cows are gored even if it is down by some nit wit. I don't think Coulter is a nit wit though. She is capable of some really good stuff. Sadly is is overshadowed by her often lunatic rants. In the end speech in and of itself is good. Lot's of it is better.

I like what I like. I'm smart enough to recognize the dysfunctional logic and propaganda. I take the pomposity of these ego maniacs with a good measure of salt.

My 2 cents.

 

[Luke T.]

I'd like to be even handed here, but Al Franken---disagree with him all you like---is still a very intelligent person. Ann Coulter is a lying, stupid, hypocritical bimbo.

"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."---Ann Coulter

Written September 12, 2001, the day after 9/11, in response to the death of someone she knew.

In context:

It's "Ted and Barbara" just like it's Fred and Ginger, and George and Gracie. They were so perfect together, so obvious, that their friends were as happy they were on their wedding day. This is more than the death of a great person and patriotic American. It's a human amputation.

We don't need long investigations of the forensic evidence to determine with scientific accuracy the person or persons who ordered this specific attack. We don't need an "international coalition." We don't need a study on "terrorism." We certainly didn't need a congressional resolution condemning the attack this week.

The airport kabuki theater of magnetometers, asinine questions about whether passengers "packed their own bags," and the hostile, lumpen mesomorphs ripping open our luggage somehow allowed over a dozen armed hijackers to board four American planes almost simultaneously on Bloody Tuesday. (Did those fabulous security procedures stop a single hijacker anyplace in America that day?)

Airports scrupulously apply the same laughably ineffective airport harassment to Suzy Chapstick as to Muslim hijackers. It is preposterous to assume every passenger is a potential crazed homicidal maniac. We know who the homicidal maniacs are. They are the ones cheering and dancing right now.

We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war.

 

[Mark]

Written September 12, 2001, the day after 9/11, in response to the death of someone she knew.

In context:

Which just goes to show that even in context her comments are idiotic and ill-informed. You're on pretty thin ice here, Luke.

 

[Luke T.]

Which just goes to show that even in context her comments are idiotic and ill-informed. You're on pretty thin ice here, Luke.

Arguing the moral superiority of Al Franken over Ann Coulter is like arguing the rosy bouquet of a three day old corpse is superior to the rancid aroma of chickensh*t.

Seriously.

 

[Mark]

Arguing the moral superiority of Al Franken over Ann Coulter is like arguing the rosy bouquet of a three day old corpse is superior to the rancid aroma of chickensh*t.

Seriously.

Laughable. Seriously.

 

[Mark]

Let me put it this way: you know my feelings about Bush; Coulter makes him look like an intellectual giant.

 

[Cleon]

Arguing the moral superiority of Al Franken over Ann Coulter is like arguing the rosy bouquet of a three day old corpse is superior to the rancid aroma of chickensh*t.

Seriously.

Wow. You really believe that. I'm honestly surprised at you, especially considering that it's been fairly well established that some of your cut-and-pasted criticisms were out-of-context (and therefore dishonest).

Seriously.

 

[Nyarlathotep]

I don't read Franken or Coulter, because I don't particularly care to read a bunch of partisan idiocy, unless one of them makes a comment so stupid that it gets reprinted here or on the news. But I do happen to think COulter is far worse. When Al Franken begins suggesting that we begin gunpoint religious conversions, or that people should be executed for their political affiliations, or that newpaper offices should be blown up with truck bombs because he doesn't like the papers politics, when he does anything comparable to those things, I'll happily lump them together. Franken is often rude and tasteless towards people who don't agree with his politics, Coulter wants people killed who do not agree with her politics, I don't really think those two things are quite morally equivalent.

 

[pgwenthold]

Franken is often rude and tasteless towards people who don't agree with his politics,

Examples?

I don't get to hear Franken very often, but I don't recall him being very tasteless, and rude is always a matter of perspective.

He gets along well with G. Gordon Liddy, I know, and I don't think they agree much politically.

 

[Cleon]

Examples?

I don't get to hear Franken very often, but I don't recall him being very tasteless, and rude is always a matter of perspective.

His first major political book was entitled "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations." Not that I disagree, and I certainly got a chuckle out of it, but it was definitely tasteless and more than slightly rude.

 

[pgwenthold]

The Rush Limbaugh book was the first that came to mind, but I wonder, was that really a result of "political disagreement"? He has also had his issues with Bill OReilly, but that feud is far beyond politics.

For example, I haven't read the Limbaugh book, but if he has documented instances where Limbaugh used his radio program to promote falsehoods, then the issue is not just "different politics."

 

[Cleon]

The Rush Limbaugh book was the first that came to mind, but I wonder, was that really a result of "political disagreement"? He has also had his issues with Bill OReilly, but that feud is far beyond politics.

For example, I haven't read the Limbaugh book, but if he has documented instances where Limbaugh used his radio program to promote falsehoods, then the issue is not just "different politics."

I suppose it doesn't really matter if he's just rude and tasteless at times, or whether said rudeness and tastlessness is connected to political disagreement.

 

[Nyarlathotep]

His first major political book was entitled "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations." Not that I disagree, and I certainly got a chuckle out of it, but it was definitely tasteless and more than slightly rude.

I was just going to point that out. Plus, though I haven't sat down and read any of his books, I liked him on SNL so I flipped through "Big Fat Idiot" when it first came out, thinking of buying it, and it seemed to indulge in a lot of namecalling in general. It was offputting.

And I quite agree that "rude and tasteless" are matters of opinion. I never claimed otherwise.

 

[Cleon]

I was just going to point that out. Plus, though I haven't sat down and read any of his books, I liked him on SNL so I flipped through "Big Fat Idiot" when it first came out, thinking of buying it, and it seemed to indulge in a lot of namecalling in general. It was offputting.

I've read it. Parts were funny, parts were rude, and parts were interesting. The problem I had with it was that sometimes he was making a serious point using real data, other times he was just making stuff up for a joke, and it wasn't always clear which was which.

And I quite agree that "rude and tasteless" are matters of opinion. I never claimed otherwise.

Oh, agreed, absolutely.