Ann of a thousand lays
BY THOR HESLA

(06/25/99)

Please refrain from exposing us to any more of the hate-filled,
bombastic drivel that Thor Hesla seems to feel passes for humor.

His screed to Ann Coulter abuses her, women in general and the
English language. That kind of misogynistic trash has no place in a
magazine that desires to be thought of as credible.

– Peter Roff

Political Director, GOPAC

Washington

Thor Hesla’s article on Ann Coulter was hilarious and on point! Who in their right
mind would want to date a woman who looks like her (stringy hair,
skeletal physique), talks like her (nasal, snorting, giggling) and thinks like
her (hateful, snide, condescending). She is out of touch with normal
people, doesn’t bother to get her facts straight and has only one thought — a hateful putdown of all Democrats. When she opens
her huge mouth, one expects to see her biting off the heads of little
bunnies, so intense is the hate that spews forth.

– LaVonne Otwell

Marietta, Ga.

I am deeply disturbed by the tone of Thor Hesla’s diatribe about Ann Coulter. She may be a big-time Republican talking head but the tone of his “advice” to her was abusive, offensive and just plain rude.

Do you remember Tipper Gore’s PMRC days? At that time, I remember some band (Mötley Crüe, I think) commenting that what Tipper really needed was to “get fucked really hard” — and that would “solve” her objections to their music.

Hesla’s article reminds me of that event — some man responding to a woman’s opinion by attacking her clothes, demeanor, body or sexual history. I’m truly disappointed. She may be a hardcore Republican but so is my mother. No woman deserves to be attacked in that way, and especially not in public.

– Rebecca Wilson

Ann Coulter has
needed such a review of her antics for a long time. I hope she will heed Hesla’s
advice and get real; many of us find Coulter ignorant and repulsive.
How on earth has she achieved the status that allows her to harangue
everybody on the TV talk shows? Some of her articles in Human Events are
rambling, ambiguous messes and have little point. If she is a constitutional
scholar, then I am Johann Sebastian Bach.

– Mildred Perry Miller

Chattanooga, Tenn.

When liberals are unable to debate ideas, they
attack the messenger. They attack the personal appearance, the family, the
heritage, etc., of any conservative they are unable to debate on even
ground.

Thor Hesla is obviously no exception. “Thor Hesla is a political and event
management consultant,” hardly begins to cover Hesla’s credentials,
meager as they are. It may have been worth mentioning that he works for
Jennifer Laszlo, one of Clinton’s most vocal defenders and frequent talking
head on the pundit shows. One has to wonder if he was attacking Coulter
at the behest of his boss.

– Ted Crider

The struggle for legitimacy
BY LAURA ROZEN

(06/24/99)

Laura Rozen seems to consider the KLA equivalent to the Serb regime in Kosovo
because its members man roadblocks and its supporters fly flags. Very
interesting logic! The Serb government is on a level of nastiness that Rozen doesn’t seem to comprehend There is no equivalence whatsoever between the KLA and the Serb government other than that they are both made up of violent men.

After what the Kosovars have been through, they cannot be expected to react
like American upper middle-class suburbanites. All that can be hoped for is some tentative form of
order and justice. The only force with legitimacy in Kosovo is the KLA, because
they put their asses on the line to fight for the lives of their neighbors and
friends. That, by any standards, has value — particularly compared
with the general tendency of Americans to discount the perennial virtues of courage,
honor and loyalty. The Kosovo crisis could have been averted had Western leaders acted from any
motivation other than sheer cowardice during the early ’90s; if Rozen realized this, she might grow to appreciate young men with courage.

– Christopher Stahnke

Laura Rozen’s article on the KLA was disconcerting and flesh-raising. The article’s sledgehammered point is that the disreputable KLA has tried to position itself in an allied position to NATO in order to gain power. But then, Rozen’s point is to discredit the KLA as much
as possible; her poorly wrought analysis that the KLA doesn’t think we
have a great role is sure to be incendiary for a country that committed huge
amounts of money to enter the fray.

Deciding that the KLA “emerged to provoke” the Serbs, Rozen argues that the only purpose of the KLA’s existence was to incite the now hagiographied Serbs. They were asking for genocide? Curiously deleting all details of Serb atrocities, Rozen slides through the back door an argument that the KLA invoked its own
suffering in order to create international involvement in their conflict. But
does Rozen actually believe that the demonized Albanians hurtled themselves to the bottom of mass graves in order to make Sam Donaldson give a shit?

Rozen suggests the KLA will do whatever it wants, then goes on to give a very specific list of what the KLA would hypothetically do. She seems to believe that the
KLA is far worse than anything Milosevic on his massacring purges could ever
dream up. We’re left at the end with the horror that the KLA has swooped in to
seize power with vengeance and bloodlust in the wake of a dubious NATO
“victory.” Forget the atrocities of the Serbs; forget the deeply nuanced
sides of the conflict; in fact, forget anything except the credible voice of
the lone reporter crying out from a war-torn nation.

– Terry Sawyer

The tyranny of fashion
BY ERIN J. AUBRY

(06/25/99)

What do shoes have to say about you? A brainless question if I
ever heard one. Do you really find it necessary to be affirmed by the random coverings of your body,
or were you just trying to get my hackles up? There are very few
questions you should ask about daily fashion. Question 1: Does it
fit and feel good on your body? Question 2: Does it suit
your personality? Question 3: Is it appropriate for the occasion?

All the other questions — Is it something that
anybody else would wear? Will I see myself walking down the
street and look better in it than other people do? Is my body image
what I want it to be? Is it costly/cheap enough? Will it attract
the kind of attention I’m after? — are ancillary. Forget “fashion”; just get dressed.

– A. Beals

I was a junkie stockbroker
BY BOLT EDSALL

(06/24/99)

The author’s points about the lack of wisdom in extending the
trading day are directly on point, but his reasoning about why the
hours were originally short is somewhat off. Originally there simply was
not the volume to justify being open much longer, and as the volume took
off, the lack of computer power (this was in the ’60s and ’70s) meant
that documentation and verification could not be accomplished without
“artificial” restrictions of the volume — that is, the shorter hours. By the time the
lack of computer power was rectified, the force of tradition had taken
force.

But in deference to the author, perhaps it was a wiser being that designed things — so that the adrenaline junkies who do well in the market have the down time to recharge.

– Milton Christopher

Gobsmackathon!

BY AMY REITER
(06/25/99)

Please explain to me what is so funny about Olga Korbut’s allegations of sex
abuse on the Russian gymnastics team.

I can certainly understand making fun of Spice Girl Mel G’s skin troubles and
other such silly fluff. But to apply the same derisive and disbelieving tone
to Korbut’s account of routine sex abuse is unfair and offensive. Why
does Amy disbelieve Olga? And if what Olga says is true, what’s so funny
about it?

I award a gobsmacker to Amy.

– Lorna Collier

Belvidere, Ill.

I was late to the excellent MarketWatch story debunking the notion that President Obama’s been on a spending binge; I spent most of Tuesday traveling. But after my “Hardball” segment on it Wednesday, Ann Coulter tweeted: “Joan Walsh says that Marketwatch chart is ‘unbelievable’! Why yes it is, in the sense of being untrue.” That’s when I saw that there was shrill but lame GOP pushback on Rex Nutting’s excellent story, from both Coulter and the American Enterprise Institute’s James Pethokoukis. I don’t normally reply to Coulter’s right-wing delusions — I haven’t written a column about her in five years – but since I think Nutting’s findings are a crucial corrective to GOP lying, I wasted my Wednesday night trying to understand the GOP attempt to discredit him. You’re welcome.

Most by now are probably familiar with Ann Coulter’s declaration, when discussing the Herman Cain sexual harassment debacle earlier this week, that “our blacks are so much better than their blacks.” Most probably weren’t all that shocked to hear this sort of race-baiting from Coulter, who’s made a lucrative career dispensing right-wing vitriol. Most probably just ignored her uncouth remarks and moved on.

Still, just in case you were looking for a more complete exegesis of the logic behind Coulter’s statement, Jon Stewart, along with his “Daily Show” correspondents, extended the argument to its logical extreme last night.

Ten years ago, a tragedy brought us all closer together. Last night, Jon Stewart recalled another moment, just two days after, when all the solidarity engendered through a national trauma began to dissipate into the political ether. Opportunists — first Jerry Falwell, then Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, all the “Ground Zero Mosque” people (not to say anything of the folks in power) — began using the memory of that historical moment for their own personal advantage. “The Daily Show” paid tribute:

Ed Schultz targeted Ann Coulter and her recent comments on radiation’s positive health benefits in his “Take Down” segment on Friday night. Last week, Ann Coulter wrote a blog post about the positive health benefits of radiation and made national headlines when Bill O’Reilly scolded her on his show for the shoddy research and inappropriate timing of her incendiary claims. Schultz agreed and took the scolding to the next level saying:

What’s the opposite of fear-mongering? False-sense-of-security-mongering, probably. Or whatever you’d call Ann Coulter’s latest blog post claiming that radiation does a body good:

With the terrible earthquake and resulting tsunami that have devastated Japan, the only good news is that anyone exposed to excess radiation from the nuclear power plants is now probably much less likely to get cancer.