The Coulter Thing

Ann Coulter has been a Romney supporter for a long time, and she's a brawler; it's no surprise that she would come away from the SC primary swinging.

What's unexpected is who she's targeting. Instead of diligently investigating why Newt won, she has turned her acerbic tongue loose on the electorate instead. The very next morning after the primary, she suggested that republicans have become 'the mob' on Fox News, and has implied there and elsewhere that voters are stupid for backing Gingrich just because he can deliver an insult to the MBM. Along with a host of other sarcastic and bitchy slights.

Ann Coulter, November 17, 2004, crowing in victory:

As we wait for CBS to concede the election, Democrats are claiming Kerry lost because Americans are stupid and if there's one thing voters respond to, it's crude insults.

Hm. You don't say. Well, nobody's perfect.

Look; seeing Newt sock the MBM is always fun, but that's not really what resonated the most with me, and I have to assume that at least some of the SC electorate think the way I do, since they are members of my very common demographic (female, white, 40+ y/o, some college, hunchbacked, three large teeth that don't meet anywhere, likes pudding. Understandably. It's frickin' delicious! Also there's the tooth situation).

For me, it was the part where he stood up for work. Where he discussed the essential virtues of work. Nobody does that anymore. It was refreshing. It was important to me to hear someone say it. To hear that someone has a f*cking clue what's going on down here in Realityland. We are out of work and we want it.

This administration seems to think that Americans should view work as a vampire perceives holy water, and nearly every policy out of DC reflects that.

Well, we don't think that way. We're Americans. We want to work. Dammit, we're ready to get back to it. Give us the reins to our own lives, stick your food stamps back in your ass where they came from, and get out of the way. You're killing us.

This message resonates. That's why Gingrich won. Not just the slap at 'the elites,' but the content of the slap. The part where all work is good work and no one should consider themselves demeaned by what is *good.* Yeah, that may have been pre-formulated, and Juan Williams walked right into it. So? It needed to be said. Most of us thoroughly enjoyed hearing it clearly and unambiguously elucidated.

Currently, several of my friends and family are out of work, or underemployed. I've never seen things this bad in my life. Many of my clients who are technically self-employed simply have had nothing to do for the past three years. They are depleting their savings and selling family heirlooms at auction, while they make pocket cash at a department store to get by.

Meanwhile, the OWS crowd is complaining that no one has coronated them with cushy positions and free stuff the minute they got out of college, and resent the implication that they might have to work some menial jobs for a while until they get their stuff together, the way most everybody else in this country has had to for generations.

This is bad. This is real bad. There's an ideological rot in this country, eating away at our vitality and encouraging parasitism and sloth. The only reason Obama has gotten away with implementing his job-killing agenda is because a lot of damn people need to get their heads right. Newt Gingrich put his finger on a raw nerve, and was rewarded for it.

But no, no, Ms. Coulter. That most South Carolinians who voted in the republican primary are absolute chowderheads to not vote for Romney is a much more realistic assumption. You're smarter than all those people. You understand what makes them tick better than they do.

Go with that.

UPDATE: From Reno Dave in comments:

139 I also like Newt's comments about work, and it really disappoints me that Romney hasn't made an equally strong case for investing throughout life so that one can retire at a 15% tax rate on income from qualified dividends and long-term capital gains. I'm serious about this.

CNBC's Jim Cramer on his "Mad Money" program basis a lot of his investing advice on buying and holding stocks, like Caterpillar, that pay good dividends. If people save and invest wisely, they too can gain a good deal of their retirement income from dividends and (hopefully) price appreciation of the underlying stock, which when held over a year when sold, will have the long-term gain taxed at 15%. Even the tax code on dividends favors holding stocks a long time, as dividends on stocks held a short time are taxed at normal income rates, but dividends of stocks held longer "qualify" for a lower rate of 5% - 15%, depending on other income.

And what about people with Roth IRAs, where contributions are made with income already taxed, but withdrawals are tax-free. If I were to save my money in a Roth IRA then retire at 60, start taking money from it and run for office at 62, would I see attack ads saying that I paid ZERO TAXES on that income? That's one of the things that's bugging me about Romney. He's not making a case for there to be MORE people like him.

Emphasis mine. See? There are things Romney can do, that he isn't doing. He needs to find a way to resonate, to discuss why success is good, instead of seemingly being afraid to talk positively about wealth creation- not just his time at Bain, but wealth creation in itself as a GOOD THING, and to inspire people.

Not the voters' fault if he doesn't rise to the occasion.

posted by Laura. at 07:08 PM

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