Charles Davenport wrote the following review of Ann Coulter's new book, Dancing with Demons:
“Fifty-two of the fifty-six signers of the American Declaration were orthodox Christians who believed in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, or as they would be known today, ‘an extremist Fundamentalist hate group.’” –Ann Coulter
In order to express their opinions, conservatives for decades have had to overcome obstacles erected by liberals, the alleged champions of “dialogue” and “open discourse.” One who dares defy conventional (left-wing) wisdom is promptly denounced as a bigot, a racist, or a sexist, whose “hate speech” creates a “hostile environment.”
Meanwhile, leftist politicians and pundits condemn conservatives—the Tea Party, in particular—for their alleged belligerence and refusal to compromise. (What the rest of us might call “standing on principle.”) In the daily papers, enlightened journalists deliver pompous, self-aggrandizing lectures on the splendor of cooperation—by which they mean capitulation. They remind us of the heroic deeds of “moderates” and “centrists” who, in times of crisis, demonstrate leadership by promptly abandoning the principles they were elected to uphold, thereby stabbing their constituents in the back. Of course, as far as journalists are concerned, such betrayals are virtuous only when the back-stabber is a Republican.
Readers who long for rhetorical retribution--a politically incorrect, in-your-face, full-throated defense of conservative principles--will eagerly devour Demonic, the latest smoldering masterpiece from Ann Coulter. But, be forewarned: This is not a book for sentimental Republicans who get misty-eyed at the prospect of a “bipartisan compromise” for “the common good.” No, Demonic is a volume for constitutional conservatives who rather enjoy the spectacle of Statists on the receiving end of a sound thrashing.
“Over and over again,” Coulter writes, “one finds the Democrats manipulating the mob to gain power. It is official Democratic policy to appeal to the least informed, weakest-minded members of the public. Their base consists of soccer moms, actresses, felons, MSNBC viewers, aging Red-diaper babies, welfare recipients, heads-up-their-asses billionaires, and government workers—who can never be laid off.”
Coulter’s inspiration for Demonic was the work of Gustave Le Bon, a French scientist who studied mob psychology, and whose 1896 book, The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, was utilized by Hitler and Mussolini as a manual on how to control and manipulate the masses. Modern liberalism, like the mob, is characterized by “simplistic, extreme black-and-white thinking, fear of novelty, inability to follow logical arguments, acceptance of contradictory ideas, being transfixed by images, a religious worship of their leaders, and a blind hatred of their opponents.”
Coulter provides examples, of course: “Democrats would drink Obama’s bathwater. Perhaps it is because they don’t believe in the real God that liberals are compelled to turn so many human beings into living deities.” Here’s another: “President Nixon lied once to the country, not under oath, and his own party demanded that he resign immediately. Bill Clinton lied repeatedly under oath in two depositions and a grand jury inquiry, and yet every single sitting Democratic senator voted to keep him in office.” And another: “In 2008, the Obama yard sign/bumper sticker became a status symbol accessory like a Prius, solar panels on your house, or an adopted Malawian baby.”
One of the most devastating mob actions in world history is the French Revolution, which Coulter reviews in gruesome detail. (“Liberals,” she writes, “don’t like to talk about the French Revolution because it is the history of them.”) Consider the storming of the Bastille, a former armory that, in the 1780s, was used as a jail. A mob descended on the Bastille and captured its commander, Marquis De Launay, who “was triumphantly paraded through the streets of Paris with the people cutting him with swords and bayonets until he was finally hacked to death, whereupon the charming Parisians continued to mutilate his dead body.” Thousands were killed during the savagery of the mob-led revolution.
One of the few prominent Americans who supported the French Revolution was Thomas Jefferson, arguably our most overrated Founder. Coulter gives him no quarter: “In so little esteem did Americans hold mob action, particularly the atheistic French mob, that when Thomas Paine returned from participating in the French Revolution, he was universally reviled, his name written on the bottom of people’s shoes to indicate their disdain. Paine’s only American defender was, of course, Thomas Jefferson, mob sympathizer and father of the Democratic Party.”
It is regrettable that modern liberals are hobbled by an “inability to follow logical arguments,” which means Demonic is beyond their comprehension, as are metaphors: Several months ago, President Obama urged his followers to bring a gun to a knife fight; Ann Coulter’s latest is the equivalent of bringing a sledgehammer to a “rock, paper, scissors” tournament.
Charles Davenport Jr. is a freelance writer in Greensboro, NC. Contact him via e-mail: cdavenportjr@hotmail.com
Demonic: How the Liberal Mob is Endangering America, by Ann Coulter
Crown Forum/295 pages/$28.99
"Liberals don't like to talk about the French Revolution because it is the history of them."
Indeed. I love me some Ann Coulter.
OBTW, Joe, your last post/thread, and my last comment gave perfect example to the "acceptance of contradictory ideas". Spend wheel-barrows of money to save some babies . . . pith and throw others away like discarded lab/pound fodder.
It's all for the children. Except that it's not.
Posted by: Dr. Mary Johnson | August 08, 2011 at 08:54 AM
Good insight, Mary. And of course, the wheelbarrows of money used to save some babies are furnished by the taxpayer, or by future generations; but we are supposed to gleefully accept killing others at will.
Demonic.
Posted by: Joe Guarino | August 08, 2011 at 01:30 PM
It's not "insight", Joe. It's the truth. It's the front lines of medicine - and those practicing on those lines are supposed to sit down and shut up unless they march-in-step with what the mob wants.
Posted by: Dr. Mary Johnson | August 08, 2011 at 05:47 PM