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Ann Coulter Crosses the Line

by Conservativity Staff,
Originally Posted: 2/12/2006 7:36:07 PM

Ann Coulter is the inaugural member of the Conservativity hall of fame.  On Friday, at a CPAC convention, she was speaking to a generally supportive crowd, when she uttered the statement: "I think our motto should be post 9/11, ’raghead talks tough, raghead faces consequences.’ "  Michelle Malkin, who was at CPAC but did not attend the speech in question, weighed in with a strong condemnation of Ann’s statement.  I heartily agree with Michelle and join in.  In fact, I strongly urge everyone to click the hotlink and read what Michelle has said.  I could not have put it any better, no matter how hard I tried.

Ann is a person who delights in inflaming our opponents by playing on their hypersensitivity and immaturity.  However, it is one thing to use your commentary to poke at the idiocy of the vast majority of our opponents, and another to use a racial epithet that plays directly into the liberal calumnies of conservative racism.  To quote Michelle Malkin:

Ann’s comment gives cover to smug liberals in denial about their own pervasive bigotry (I’ll show you 100 liberal hate mails and blog posts referring to me as a "gook" or a "chink" or a "filipina whore" for every 1 "raghead" controversy on the right.) Worse, the remarks reduce fundamental debates about national security profiling to epithet-marred, one-line jokes.

Michelle is right and Ann is way, way, way wrong.  She owes every Muslim and Sikh and every other person who may wear a turban or other head adornment an apology.  this kind of talk has no place in an intellectual debate.  This epithet is unsuitable to a woman with such a lush vocabulary.  The use of obscenities and epithets is, at least to me, a sign that a person lacks the intelligence to properly express his or her feelings.  The fact that Ann Coulter used this manner of epithet, even against evil terrorists, is all the more offensive, given her remarkable intellect and lush vocabulary.

Conservatives must be rapid to admit when we act badly, especially when it is in a manner that is indecent, which any ethnic, racial or religious epithet inherently is.  I join the call to Ann Coulter to apologize for the epithet, without mitigation, without excuse and without delay.