Quote of the day - Ann Coulter - Universal food coverage

Isn't food important? Why not "universal food coverage"? If politicians and employers had guaranteed us "free" food 50 years ago, today Democrats would be wailing about the "food crisis" in America, and you'd be on the phone with your food care provider arguing about whether or not a Reuben sandwich with fries was covered under your plan.

Ann Coulter - 7-22-09

Ann Coulter on Walter Cronkite

In a controlled scientific experiment, Donahue was given his own TV show on MSNBC in the new competitive environment of cable TV. That Boy's ratings are the lowest in primetime TV for any news program. They are so low, Nielsen can barely detect them. One wishes bitterly that MSNBC could give shows to all the other pompous liberal blowhards once forced on the public, like Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite, so we could see how they'd fare with a little competition. Nielsen would not be able to "See It Now."

Ann Coulter - February 19, 2003

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

Despite the fact that Hitler brought "change," promoted clean, energy-efficient mass transit by making the trains run on time, supported abortion for the non-master races, vastly expanded the power of the national government and was uniformly adored by college students and their professors, I gather that liberals don't like Hitler because they're constantly comparing him to Bush.

Ann Coulter - 9-10-2008

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter [Vietnam]

"Enragingly, liberals talk about Vietnam as if it proves something about the use of force generally rather than the Democrats own bungling incompetence in military affairs. Historical accounts of the Vietnam war are incomprehensible because liberals refuse to admit the failure of their own national security strategy. The only important lesson from the Vietnam War is this: Democrats lose wars." -- Ann Coulter, P. 125

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

It is unquestionable that Bush has made this country safe by keeping Islamic lunatics pinned down fighting our troops in Iraq. In the past few years, our brave troops have killed more than 20,000 al-Qaida and other Islamic militants in Iraq alone. That's 20,000 terrorists who will never board a plane headed for JFK -- or a landmark building, for that matter.

We are, in fact, fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them at, say, the corner of 72nd and Columbus in Manhattan -- the mere mention of which never fails to enrage liberals, which is why you should say it as often as possible.

Ann Coulter - June 11, 2008

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter [Obama and Wright]

If it takes Obama 20 years to notice that his pastor is a traitorous, racist nut-job, it will probably take him his full term of office to realize that the U.S. has been invaded and subdued by al-Qaida. Let's just hope President Obama pays closer attention during national security briefings than he did during 20 years of the Rev. Wright's church services.

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

It is an article of faith with the Democrats that they must fool Americans by simulating agreement with normal people. The winner of the Democratic primary is always the candidate who does the best impersonation of an American.

But then, after all their hard work making believe they're into NASCAR and God, some Democrat invariably slips and lets us know it's all a big fake-out. They're like a gay guy trying to act straight who accidentally refers to Brad Pitt as "yummy!"

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter [Jeremiah Wright, Barack Hussein Obama]

Rev. Wright accuses white people of inventing AIDS to kill black men, but Obama's grandmother -- who raised him, cooked his food, tucked him in at night, and paid for his clothes and books and private school -- has expressed the same feelings about passing black men on the street that Jesse Jackson has.

Unlike his "old uncle" -- who is not his uncle -- Obama had no excuses for his grandmother. Obama's grandmother never felt the lash of discrimination! Crazy grandma doesn't get the same pass as the crazy uncle; she's white. Denounce the racist!

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

Bill Clinton is the guy who could never get as much as 50 percent of the country to vote for him. And that was in two presidential elections that the Republicans basically sat out (as they are doing this year).

Ann Coulter - March 5, 2008

William F. Buckley, 1925-2008

National Review founder William Buckley died today.

Buckley was a throwback to the era when the MSM/DNC enjoyed a virtual monopoly on information. I first discovered Buckley in the early 1980's. At that time, I was treated to an almost non-stop barrage of twisted news presentations, distorted facts, repeats of Democrat talking points, etc. from the nightly news and the pages of newspapers. Once a week, William Buckley (and a very few others) would have one chance to rebut the entire MSM/DNC in the confined space of an opinion column on the editorial page of some newspapers. Even though it was hardly a fair fight, Buckley's (and others') few inches of weekly space was more than a match for the daily rants of the NYT, AP, WaPo, John Chancellor, Walter Cronkite, etc. Buckley kept the conservative light glowing until the New Media could begin fanning the flames at the end of the 1980's.

Conservatives born after 1975 cannot fully appreciate what it was like to live in the era before the New Media existed. Buckley was one voice that helped make that era bearable.
















Ann Coulter posts some anecdotes and quotes here, including Buckley's references to Gore Vidal as a "queer" and a "fag."

Michelle Malkin posts more detail.

Joe Sobran shared his memories in May, 2006, when Buckley's emphysema was announced:

Over the years I came to know another side of Bill. When I had serious troubles, he was a generous friend who did everything he could to help me without being asked. And I wasn’t the only one. I gradually learned of many others he’d quietly rescued from adversity. He’d supported a once-noted libertarian in his destitute old age, when others had forgotten him. He’d helped two pals of mine out of financial difficulties. And on and on. Everyone seemed to have a story of Bill’s solicitude. When you told your own story to a friend, you’d hear one from him. It was as if we were all Bill Buckley’s children.

It went far beyond sharing his money. One of Bill’s best friends was Hugh Kenner, the great critic who died two years ago. Hugh was hard of hearing, and once, after a 1964 dinner with Hugh and Charlie Chaplin, Bill scolded Hugh for being too stubborn to use a hearing aid. Here were the greatest comedian of the age and the greatest student of comedy, and Hugh had missed much of the conversation! Later Hugh’s wife told me how grateful Hugh had been for that scolding. Nobody else would have dared speak to her husband that way. Only a true friend would. If Bill saw you needed a little hard truth, he’d tell you, even if it pained him to say it.

I once spent a long evening with one of Bill’s old friends from Yale, whose name I won’t mention. He told me movingly how Bill stayed with him to comfort him when his little girl died of brain cancer. If Bill was your friend, he’d share your suffering when others just couldn’t bear to. What a great heart — eager to spread joy, and ready to share grief!

In another recent column, Sobran compared the careers of Buckley and Ayn Rand (and even Garet Garrett). While I disagree with much of what Sobran has written in recent years (especially about the war), his comparison in that article is interesting to every student of the history of the conservative and libertarian movements:

When Soviet Communism finally collapsed in 1991,
NATIONAL REVIEW felt that its mission was accomplished.
It didn't notice that the America it had set out to save
from Communism no longer existed. Say what you will about
Ayn Rand, I can't imagine her making such a mistake.

This Sobran column contains more details on Buckleys disputes with other conservatives in later years.

I have read several Buckley books over the years, the following of which I endorse:



Ann Coulter has written that this book "proved that normal people didn't have to wait for the Venona Papers to be declassified to see that the Democratic Party was collaborating with fascists. The book -- and the left's reaction thereto -- demonstrated that liberals could tolerate a communist sympathizer, but never a Joe McCarthy sympathizer."



I read "God and Man at Yale" while in college, before I could run to the New Media as a refuge from campus leftism. This book probably provided generations of pre-New Media students with the reinforcement they needed to withstand the barrage of leftism from their college professors.



Many conservatives await a new Reagan to rescue the Republican party from the moderates that now ignore and do not understand capitalism, history, freedom, the rule of law, etc. Before a new Reagan can emerge, I believe we will need a new Buckley - one who will be willing to maintain conservative principles in the absence of access to power and who can energize a new generation of intellectuals to resist the pressure of the modern leftward movement in all major institutions.

The William Buckley that wrote books and published NR in the wilderness in the years before the election of Ronald Reagan provided empowerment is the example that I fear modern conservatives will have to follow in the coming decades.

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

It is because of campaign-finance laws like McCain-Feingold that big men don't run for office anymore. Little men do. And John McCain is the head homunculus.

Ann Coulter - 2-20-2008

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

I note that there were hundreds of POWS in Vietnam. We can't make them all president. If we're just going to pick one, how about one who doesn't want to shut down Guantanamo and give amnesty to 20 million illegal immigrants?

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

Republicans are so shell-shocked and demoralized by the success of the Bush Derangement Syndrome, they think they can fool the voters by nominating an open-borders, anti-tax cut, anti-free speech, global-warming hysteric, pro-human experimentation "Republican." Which is to say, a Democrat.

Ann Coulter - 2-06-2008

Ann Coulter - 4 days to save the Republic

Start watching at about 3:00 and for the next 30 seconds if your time is limited.

Whether you agree with her or not, she is far from alone. This is especially true as far as abandoning the GOP in the general election rather than voting for McCain.

Ann Coulter to vote for Hillary if McCain is the nominee

Here is recent video of Ann Coulter summarizing her reasons for opposing McCain not only in the primaries, but in the general election.




It will be interesting to look at this video in nine months (or in 4 or 8 years). I do not have a prediction as to how this will turn out, but if we review the events of this primary season prior to next primary season, we may be able to stay out of this mess in the future.

Classics of Conservatism - Part XXII - Phyllis Schlafly - A Choice Not an Echo

Previous classics of conservatism.


1964




One disadvantage from which conservatives have suffered for many years has been the need to re-learn recent history over and over again. This problem exists because young conservatives have no way of learning about the past due to the liberal bias of modern education. Modern schools teach that conservatism has no history or core philosophy other than a legacy of racism, oppression and war. Students have no idea that there is a philosophical basis and historical context for such ideas as free markets, lower taxes, national sovereignty, etc.

Students and recent graduates, if they are interested in politics at all, will tend to think only in terms of the headline-of-the-moment instead of the broader context into which an election fits. Younger voters think they are discussing "the issues" if they debate how much government interference in health care is best, how to address "global warming," or what to do about high gas prices.

At the same time, younger conservatives who cannot remember the 70's, 80's or 90's are susceptible to many ideas that would be contradicted by a little memory of recent history. One such idea is that "moderate" Republicans are somehow more electable than conservative Republicans. We are supposed to believe that "independents" will spring out of the woodwork to support a moderate Republican instead of the Democrats' liberal nominee. And this is where we must reinvent the wheel. If new conservatives could remember Gerald Ford, Bob Dole, George Bush I, Ronald Reagan, etc., they would not fall prey to this kind of propaganda. Prior to the new media, there was no way for conservatives to educate each other or pass on the lessons of the recent past. We had to rely on a conservative newspaper columnist whose column appeared once a week or an old book or some other rare source of conservatism to provide an irregular trickle of information that wasn't filtered through the MSM/DNC.

Today, we can transmit facts, history and perspective much more quickly through the new media, especially if such facts include some of the old material that the MSM/DNC used to be able to suppress.

One such treasure trove of facts is found in Phyllis Schlafly's 1964 paperback, "A Choice Not an Echo." In Choice, Schlafly breaks down each Republican primary battle from 1936 through 1960 and shows how establishment Republicans (those with ties to the publishing and banking world) had undermined the choice of the rank-and-file Republicans with false charges (spread through an obliging MSM) of "extremism" and "unelectability."

Among my favorite chapters is Chapter 6, in which she discusses polls - "Pollsters and Hoaxsters" (1944):

The New York Kingmakers realized they could not capture the 1944 Republican nomination either with Wilkie or with the same type of last-minute blitz they had used in 1940. This time they went into action earlier. They discovered and developed a new political weapon: the Gallup Poll. Dr. George Gallup began asking a lot of questions of a very few people, and - funny thing - he usually came up with answers that pleased the New York kingmakers.
The Gallup Poll has been used repeatedly as a subtle propaganda machine to sell the Republicans on the false propositions that the GOP cannot win unless it (1) continues the New Deal foreign policy (Soviet appeasement - Salt) and (2) names candidates who will appeal to the left-leaning Democrats and liberals.

p. 45

A Choice Not an Echo sold millions of copies and was instrumental in wresting control of the GOP back to the grassroots. Even though Barry Goldwater lost by a wide margin that year, the Goldwater coalition was born that year that eventually swept Ronald Reagan into office. As a result of the grassroots organizing efforts and the distribution of various short books such as Choice in 1964, a movement was born. Richard Nixon, despite his faults, was elected in the next two elections by the same coalition. Niether Nixon nor Reagan won by appealing to moderates. [Nixon didn't sell out conservatives until after he was elected.]

Schlafly identifies the people she refers to as "kingmakers." They have a lot in common with the Republican "moderate" kingmakers of today.

In 2002, Ann Coulter wrote about Phyllis Schlafly and Choice:

About the time a young Hillary Rodham was serving as inspiration for the perfect little girl in the Hollywood thriller "The Bad Seed," Schlafly was remaking the Republican Party.

In 1964, Schlafly wrote "A Choice, Not An Echo," widely credited with winning Barry Goldwater the Republican nomination for president. The book sold an astounding 3 million copies. (The average nonfiction book sells 5,000 copies.) Goldwater lost badly in the general election, but the Republican Party would never be the same.

Goldwater's nomination began the retreat of sellout, Northeastern Rockefeller Republicans who hoped to wreck the country with slightly less alacrity than the Democrats. Without Schlafly, without that book, it is very possible that Ronald Reagan would never have been elected president.

For the record, I read my copy of A Choice Not an Echo years before I had heard of Ann Coulter, but many years after the book was published. Original editions of the book were still floating around in the 1980's just as they are today. I promote the book now because it is an election year and Republicans face a choice regarding who to nominate. The cries of "electability" ring throughout the land, as we are told to support John McCain by the MSM/DNC.

Moderates bring the GOP to defeat. The Independents or "undecided" voters are nothing but liberals who are too embarrassed by the Clintons, Jimmy Carter, Al Gore et al. to call themselves Democrats. Such voters did not abandon the Democrats to elect Gerald Ford or Bob Dole and they will not help John McCain in 2008. Instead, they will give us Barack Obama, especially if we provide nothing more than an echo.



------------------------------------
update - January 30, 2007 - See Michelle Malkin today for a preview of how this fall's election will turn out like so many of those discussed in A Choice Not An Echo.

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter [John McCain]

John McCain is Bob Dole minus the charm, conservatism and youth. Like McCain, pollsters assured us that Dole was the most "electable" Republican. Unlike McCain, Dole didn't lie all the time while claiming to engage in Straight Talk.

Ann Coulter - 1-23-08

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter [Mike Huckabee]

Huckabee opposes school choice, earning him the coveted endorsement of the National Education Association of New Hampshire, which is like the sheriff being endorsed by the local whorehouse.

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

Half the English language is becoming the "N-word" as far as liberals are concerned. Words are always bad for liberals. Words allow people to understand what liberals are saying.

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

Decent people shun Clinton, but elected Republicans keep trying to rehabilitate him.

Ann Coulter