Ann Coulter's Tweet about the 3rd Presidential Debate, October 22, 2012
I highly approve of Romney's decision to be kind and gentle to the retard.
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) October 23, 2012
And . . .
Obama: "Stage 3 Romneysia" - because cancer references are HILARIOUS.If he's "the smartest guy in the room" it must be one retarded room.
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) October 23, 2012
Typical Twitter Response:
.@anncoulter are you out of your fucking mind? What do you gain from spewing hate and bile?
—Brandon Patrick (@BrandonComedy) October 23, 2012
And from Special Olympics Participant Tom Shriver:
Dear Ann Coulter,
Come on Ms. Coulter, you aren’t dumb and you aren’t shallow. So why are you continually using a word like the R-word as an insult?
I’m a 30 year old man with Down syndrome who has struggled with the public’s perception that an intellectual disability means that I am dumb and shallow. I am not either of those things, but I do process information more slowly than the rest of you. In fact it has taken me all day to figure out how to respond to your use of the R-word last night.
I thought first of asking whether you meant to describe the President as someone who was bullied as a child by people like you, but rose above it to find a way to succeed in life as many of my fellow Special Olympians have.
Then I wondered if you meant to describe him as someone who has to struggle to be thoughtful about everything he says, as everyone else races from one snarkey sound bite to the next.
Finally, I wondered if you meant to degrade him as someone who is likely to receive bad health care, live in low grade housing with very little income and still manages to see life as a wonderful gift.
Because, Ms. Coulter, that is who we are – and much, much more.
After I saw your tweet, I realized you just wanted to belittle the President by linking him to people like me. You assumed that people would understand and accept that being linked to someone like me is an insult and you assumed you could get away with it and still appear on TV.
I have to wonder if you considered other hateful words but recoiled from the backlash.
Well, Ms. Coulter, you, and society, need to learn that being compared to people like me should be considered a badge of honor.
No one overcomes more than we do and still loves life so much.
Come join us someday at Special Olympics. See if you can walk away with your heart unchanged.
A friend you haven’t made yet,
John Franklin Stephens
Global Messenger
Special Olympics Virginia
And now, Ann Coulter's Defense, via Alan Colmes Radio Show:
Colmes: What was the deal with that tweet people are talking about?
Coulter: (Laughing)
Colmes: In this tweet which you sent out during the debate on Monday--
Coulter: No, immediately afterwards--
Colmes: (Reads tweet)
Coulter: Yes.
Colmes: You regret that?
Coulter: (Laughs) Do you regret asking me if I regret that? No, of course I don't. Um, my one regret is that I'm not at this moment promoting my book "Guilty," subtitle, "Liberal Victims and their Attack on America." Liberal victims are the biggest bullies of all.
Look, no one would refer to a Down's Syndrome child as, someone with an actual mental handicap, by saying ‘retard.’ Where do you think the words ‘imbecile,’ ‘idiot,’ ‘moron,’ ‘cretin’ come from? These were all technical terms at one time. ‘Retard’ had been used colloquially to just mean ‘loser’ for 30 years. But no, no — these aggressive victims have to come out and tell you what words to use.
Colmes: You may think that it's liberal totalitarianism that is dictating that you can't say that word, but John Franklin Stephens, who is a member of the Special Olympics, he's an athlete, he's an adult who has Down's Syndrome, says he has invited you to join him to see the Special Olympics. He says you're a friend he hasn't made yet, but he hopes he can, and he says that you should understand that life is a wonderful gift and that--
Coulter: I do not need to be told this! I was not making a joke about Special Olympics, the way our President did, by the way. It would be one thing if I said in my tweet a joke about Special Olympics, a joke about Down's Syndrome. No one would call someone with Down Syndrome 'retard'!
Colmes: Well, this person--
Coulter: I call you retard!
Colmes: Well, the word 'retard' is offensive and this guy along--
Coulter: No-No! No, no, no, no...
Colmes: And in fact the Special--
Coulter: You just can't go around announcing that this and that word is offensive. I'm sick of this.
Colmes: I'm, I'm... telling you that people are offended by it.
Coulter: Because liberal victims are bullies, and I--
Colmes: It's not just liberals--
Coulter: You don't tell people what words they can use. I'm not fond of vulgarities, but this attack of the victims. Biggest bullies of all. There's nothing offensive about the word 'retard' applied to the President. It has nothing to do with a mental handicap. It was calling the President a loser.
Colmes: This is not a left-right issue.
Coulter: Yes it is.
Colmes: This is not a liberal versus conservative issue. A rep for the Special Olympics told TMZ 'We're disappointed in your regular use of the word despite our constituents regular appeals to her, meaning you, for compassion.
Coulter: And are they proposing I use 'cretin' instead?
Colmes: They aren't proposing what you should use. They say they will give an open invitation, meaning you, to be invited to an educational meeting . . .
Coulter: How about, as long as they are going to be the word police, I want to know if I can use 'moron,' 'idiot,' 'cretin,' and 'imbecile.' Because it really doesn't make much sense unless they are thoroughly authoritarian and arbitrary. And which words are in and which words are out?
Colmes: You know that some words have meanings and some of them sting. Like certain words for African-Americans.
Coulter: You're not supposed to 'sting' the President. (laughs)
Colmes: You wrote a book on race. You know that thee are certain words that are not to be used for African-Americans...
Coulter: Oooohhhh! This! Now we're gettin' to my book!
Colmes: Yeah.
Coulter: This is what drives me crazy, when all . . .
Colmes: You wouldn't use the 'N-word' to refer to African-Americans?
Coulter: Ahhhh! That's just what I was going to say but you beat me to the punch! Every time--
Colmes: Would you? Would you?
Coulter: I'm answering now. Don't keep saying would you, would you. Every time the Liberals start being the word police, they always say 'you wouldn't use the n-word, would you?' No, the N-word is in its own category. I have a whole chapter on it in my current book, 'Mugged: Liberal Demagoguery from the 70s to Obama."
No, you're not black. That's what I should have called my book "Guilty" - "You're. Not. Black." If you were not held in slavery, if you were not brought here as slaves, held as slaves for hundreds of years, discriminated against by democratic policies of Jim Crow - NO, you can't go around policing what people say.
Colmes: But . . . But . . .
Coulter: You're not Black. Feminists aren't black.
Colmes: But what about people with disabilities who don't like it when you use the 'R-word,' who say--
Coulter: NO!
Colmes: It’s okay for blacks [you claim] to say “You can’t use the N word,”How about people with disabilities who say, “You can’t use the R word?”
Coulter: I would not use any word that was unkind to describe someone who has an actual handicap, mental or physical. I would not do that.
Colmes: But that ‘s what they feel you did.
Coulter: Oh, screw them! That’s what they feel I do. I feel they’re being authoritarian bullying victims.”
(More on audio file at link)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Coulter. Karma. Karma. Coulter.
~ comment by Basel on Huff Post
There is always room in the human heart for HATE. This woman proves it.
~ comment by bmitche on Huff Post
That is just Coultarded.
~ comment by Keyser77 on Huff Post
She is the type of provocateur who pushes nouns against verbs to blow them up and bring attention to herself. She'll die alone, unloved, and unmourned and will wonder why.
~ comment by Tsarrobert on Huff Post
"Authoritarian bullying victims," you can't make this stuff up.
~ comment by imb21 on Huff Post
Ann Coulter isn’t really that ignorant, she just thinks she’s protecting her unapologetic “brand.”
Coulter knows better . . . and is really only burnishing her “edgy” reputation at this point. As a PR move, this looks like a miscalculation, but it is her career, and she’s the one who is going to miss it the most. Alan is absolutely right that this is not a right/left issue, and if it ever was, it ceased being one when former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin rose to prominence, and raised awareness among conservatives about special needs children, and among liberals about ableism. Coulter is miscalculating if she thinks conservatives will simply close their ears to this.
As such, it’s hard to care whether Coulter ever apologizes . . .
~ Tommy Christopher on Mediaite
You have to respect her troll abilities... she saw Michelle Malkin pulling ahead, and she upped her game.
~ comment by Snowspot on Mediaite
...Ann Coulter has gone for the Vain Glorious Burnout and current Republican vogue of Doubling Down in Stupidity.
It's too spectacularly and outrageously good to be believed. Good work in the fine art of alienating the Voting Public.
~ comment by JohnJGuy on Mediaite
Coulter is one of those special empathy-devoid, intentionally obnoxious folks who wake up every morning and ask themselves a simple question:
"What can I do to denigrate, insult, and piss off an entire demographic sector of society today.
~ comment by labman57 on Mediaite
Interview with Piers Morgan on CNN, Friday, Oct. 26, 2012
MORGAN: Why call the president of the United States a retard?
COULTER: Because it's a synonym for loser. We were spending 10 seconds on this or it's going to be another two years before I come on.
MORGAN: Wow, you're threatening me.
COULTER: I'm angry at the word police. I need an encyclopedia Britannica to see which words are appropriate and which aren't.
MORGAN: No, you don't.
COULTER: OK, explain to me why retard is inappropriate.
MORGAN: Because I heard this morning say, what if I said imbecile, idiot, cretin or moron.
COULTER: That was two nights ago.
MORGAN: Right. Whenever.
Any of those words, as you know, has not become in the last decade or so a word that is synonymously offensive to people with disability, and is used in an offensive way about them by people. That is a difference.
COULTER: Do you call people with mental disabilities retards, because I don't. I think that's a nasty thing to do.
MORGAN: A lot of people do, to be offensive. Yes.
COULTER: No, they don't.
MORGAN: They do and you know that.
COULTER: They absolutely do not. And you know they do not.
MORGAN: Of course, you do.
COULTER: No one would call a Down syndrome child a retard. It is synonymous with loser. You know perfectly well --
MORGAN: That's complete nonsense.
Wait a minute. Wait a minute. That's complete nonsense. That's the whole point. The whole point, if you talked to people who worked with Down syndrome children or whatever, they would all tell you --
COULTER: You keep saying this is offensive and you're just wasting time because we only have 10 more seconds on this and we're getting to the next topic.
MORGAN: Says who?
COULTER: OK, it's offensive and you're going to come up with 20 different ways to tell me it's offensive. It's offensive according to whom? Moron, idiot, cretin, imbecile. These were exactly like retard, once technical term to describe people with mental disabilities. Changing the word doesn't change the condition.
I was not referring to someone with Down syndrome. I was referring to the president of the United States.
MORGAN: I know that.
(break)
MORGAN: You called me in the break a sexist misogynist pig.
COULTER: Yes.
MORGAN: Can you explain why? What have I said that's been remotely sexist?
COULTER: Calm down. Oh, it is the conservative --
MORGAN: You were hyperventilating.
COULTER: I'm not hyperventilating. I'm disagreeing with you, which apparently is insulting your teeny tiny male ego. It is the most insulting, condescending, sexist thing to say to a female, generally conservative, who disagrees with you, no, it's my obligation to back down and accept your point. And if I don't, you're not being calm.
MORGAN: I have never heard you back down or apologize for anything. I think when you call the president of the United States a retard --
COULTER: We have moved on from that.
MORGAN: Final point on it. A little part in your brain cell should go off and say you know what, Ann, I just overstepped the mark.
COULTER: OK. Explain to me what -- why that is different, again, from cretin, moron, idiot.
MORGAN: For the same reason that the "N" word has become completely unacceptable, because of the offense it causes to the black community.
(CROSS TALK)
MORGAN: Let me finish my sentence.
COULTER: You can't just say everything is the "N" word.
MORGAN: Let me finish my sentence.
COULTER: Oh, calm down. Calm down.
MORGAN: I would argue the word retard has become equally -- has become equally unacceptable to people with disabilities in America, because it is the one word of all those words -- and I got them all out from the dictionary. It's the one word that has been used for the last decade or so -- yes, it has. You're so wrong.
COULTER: No, it isn't. You can't just go around -- it isn't a better argument to say oh, and broad, that's like using the "N" word, and the illegal immigrant, that's like using the "N" word. And gay, that's like using the "N" word. All you're doing is making a different argument for the same argument.
MORGAN: I have used the argument once.
COULTER: We will tell you which words you can and which words you can't use. Making a joke about Special Olympics is making a joke about something that actually exists. That is what President Obama did. I would not have done that. I would not make a joke about a Down Syndrome child.
Retard is the same as idiot, cretin, moron. It means loser. That's what it's meant for 30 years. And the word police come in five minutes ago and say no, we're going to be bossy and tell you what to do. They're the biggest bullies of all, these self-appointed victims.
MORGAN: My God. You are calling other people bossy. I've heard it all. Let's turn back to "Mugged," your book.
COULTER: Excellent.
