Mad Annie Coulter and the state of the Republican Party

Glenn Greenwald captures it well at his Unclaimed Territory blog, in the ironically titled post, Terrible hatred and anger on the left 03/02/07:

So Ann Coulter appeared as a featured speaker today at the Conservative Political Action Conference - the preeminent conservative event of the year - and called John Edwards a "faggot." Her speech was followed by an enthusiastic round of applause from the upstanding attendees.

Last year at the same event, she warned Arab "ragheads" about violence that would be done to them and called for Supreme Court justices to be murdered - and received standing ovations. Everyone knows what a rancid hate-monger she is, yet (or rather: "therefore") she continues to be invited to the highest-level "conservative" events, be drooled on with admiration by presidential candidates like Mitt Romney, and have little right-wing warriors wait in line around the corner to get her signature on their copies of the books she wrote.

In the psychological projection mixed with political polemics that is so common in today's authoritarian Republican Party, the Reps accuse Democrats of being hateful and incendiary - because liberal bloggers sometimes use cuss words in ways you don't normally see in columns by, say, David Broder, the Dean of All the Pundits. Greenwald continues:

But the single most prestigious political event for conservatives of the year is a place where conservatives go to hear Democrats called faggots, Arabs called ragheads, and Supreme Court justices labeled as deserving of murder - not by anonymous, unidentifiable blog commenters, but by one of their most popular featured speakers. ...

This is why I wrote so extensively about the Edwards blogger "scandal" and the Cheney comments "scandal." The people feigning upset over those matters are either active participants in, or passive aiders and abetters of, a political movement that, at its very core - not at its fringes - knowingly and continuously embraces the most wretched and obvious bigotry and bloodthirsty authoritarianism. They love Ann Coulter - and therefore continue to make her a venerated part of their political events - because she provides an outlet, a venting ground, for the twisted psychological impulses and truly hateful face that drives the entire pro-Bush, right-wing spectacle.

Yep, that's today's Christian Republican White People's Party. And Mad Annie is one of their favorite stars.

Tags: authoritarianism, anne coulter, mad annie, republican party