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Jewish World Review June 23, 2000 / 20 Sivan, 5760

Ann Coulter

Ann Coulter
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Serious Republican candidates don't get serious press

http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- ONE OF THE INJUSTICES of the world is that Democrats can run stupid and insubstantial men for important national offices and no one will ever know. The adversary press will rush to cover up a liberal candidate's gaffes, finish his sentences for him, defend his arguments and provide substantiation for his ludicrous claims.

Republicans, on the other hand, can't even run serious men without the media diminishing them, usually by recycling the media's own sneering attacks on the candidate through unnamed sources, innuendo and reported rumors. Republicans must be portrayed as either stupid or mean-spirited -- preferably both. Consequently, the image of George Bush as an "airhead" -- as The New York Times put it -- is being carefully nurtured and promoted by the media, especially the Times.

In a recent New York Times profile of George Bush's college years, all humans and Lanny Davis are quoted praising Bush for his high intellect. Still the article squeezes in repeated insinuations that Bush is not the sharpest tool in the shed with deus ex machina asides.

Suggesting the existence of legions of unnamed sources and expert opinions, the Times casually refers to anonymous classmates "who frowned on Mr. Bush, seeing him as an airhead party boy." Also, the Times reports that "(f)ew, if any, (Yale) professors seem to have left a mark on him, or he on them."

In a seething rage that Bush does not defer to important Ivy League intellectuals so admired at the Times, the article calls Bush "determinedly nonintellectual," and says he "has resolutely cultivated an anti-intellectualism."

Most preposterous, the article observes: "With his grades and college boards, Mr. Bush might not have been admitted (to Yale) if he had applied just a few years later."

"Might not have been admitted"? He also "might not have been admitted" if he hadn't scored about 100 points higher on his verbal SATs than did Princeton man Bill Bradley. Come to think of it, he "might not have been admitted" if he had died as an infant in the crib. What on earth does that mean? It means that it absolutely galls Northeastern liberals that the Republican candidate for president went to an Ivy League school.

Fortunately for the media, Republican Dan Quayle did not offend their dignity by having attended an Ivy League college. But the press still had to go beyond the facts to ensure that Quayle was not just perceived as a little dim, but as laughing-stock stupid. Though widely circulated and rarely refuted, the story about Dumb Dan Quayle saying he was sorry he hadn't studied his Latin after a trip to Latin American was completely apocryphal.

Meanwhile, it's difficult to come by even the true stupid stories about Al Gore, Quayle's Democratic counterpart in the 1992 election. In 1994, Gore praised Milwaukee for its ethnic diversity, saying it manifested America's national motto: "E Pluribus Unum -- Out of one, many," even though it means the opposite -- out of many, one. He had to ask the curator of Monticello to identify busts of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. He startled Chicago Bulls fans in January 1998 by saying, "That Michael Jackson is unbelievable, isn't he?" evidently referring to Bulls forward Michael Jordan. But Gore is reported to be hampered only by his outsized intellect.

Of course, some Republicans do not find their IQs and compassion under attack. Gov. Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey has been gushed over in The New York Times as the GOP's "New Idol." Whitman's groundbreaking "philosophy" -- the Times has actually called it a philosophy -- is characterized as "sophisticated," "prosperous," "moderate" and "tolerant."

But the thing is, the woman is a half-wit. Recently she responded to a question about whether Bush should have an abortion litmus test for Supreme Court justices by saying this: "I'll tell you something. I have now appointed five of our seven Supreme Court justices in New Jersey, and I never asked a one of them what they thought about a woman's right to choose. ... It would have been inappropriate."

It also would have been moronic inasmuch as New Jersey judges do not determine this country's abortion policy. Presumably Gov. Whitman doesn't ask candidates for the New Jersey Visitors Bureau what they think about abortion either. You wonder if she knows that Roe v. Wade was issued by the Supreme Court of the United States , and her little state court judges can neither repeal nor uphold it.

Like all the other "Whitman Republicans," she's just smart enough to realize that if she cannot rely on her genetic capacities to avoid being called stupid, the only a surefire way to be identified as an intellectual in the press is to be pro-choice.


JWR contributor Ann Coulter is the author of High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Case Against Bill Clinton.


Up

06/19/00: They weren't overzealous this time
06/16/00: Evolution of the strumpet
06/13/00: Actual journalistic malpractice
06/09/00: I did not have sexual
relations with that ... man!
06/06/00: IRS turns Bubba's screw
05/30/00: Too corrupt to be an Arkansas lawyer
05/26/00: Choose liberalism
05/24/00: Violence against coherence
05/22/00: Developmentally disabled Republicans
05/16/00: For womb the bell tolls
05/12/00: Asylum from Georgetown
05/10/00: The truth is out there, even for the clueless
05/08/00: Barbie is a liberal Democrat
05/02/00: Moving the goalpost
04/28/00: The bastardization of justice
04/25/00: How Monica Lewinsky saved the constitution
04/24/00: It's sunny today, so we need gun control
04/19/00: No shadow of a doubt -- liberal women are worthless
04/14/00: It takes a Communist dictator to raise a child
04/11/00: The verdict is in on Hillary
04/07/00: Vast Concoctions III
04/04/00: 'Horrifying' free speech in New York
03/31/00: Campaign finance reform brings out worst in senators
03/28/00: All the news that fits -- we print!
03/24/00: Net losses all around
03/20/00: To protect, serve --- and be spat on
03/16/00: Thank Heaven for the consigliere
03/13/00: Vast concoctions II
03/09/00: The bluebloods voted against you
03/07/00: The Tower of Babble
03/03/00: Vast concoction
03/02/00: Hillary's sartorial lies
02/28/00: You have to break a few eggs to make a joke
02/22/00: I've seen enough killing to support abortion
02/18/00: A liberal lynching
02/15/00: McCain and the flag
02/11/00: The Shakedown Express
02/08/00: To mock a mockingbird
02/05/00: Summing up Campaign 2000: 'Oh, puh-leeze!'
02/01/00: A Confederacy of Dunces
01/28/00: Dollar Bill's racist smear
01/24/00: How high is your freedom quotient?
01/21/00: Numismadness
01/18/00: How dare you attack my wife!
01/14/00: The Gore Buggernaut
01/10/00: The paradox of discrimination law

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