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In all the footage we’ve watched of Ann Coulter making grand pronouncements on television, we could probably count on one hand the number of reasonable things she’s said. And that includes “thanks for having me on the show.” She’s one of these people who disguises her homophobia as humor again and again. So when she took the gender-as-insult route in her latest column attacking Keith Olbermann, and swiping Rachel Maddow along the way, the Countdown host responded in turn.
She writes in her column about Iran’s nuclear capabilities:
Naturally, the most hysterical response came from MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. After donning his mother’s housecoat, undergarments and fuzzy slippers, Keith brandished the NIE report, night after night, demanding that Bush apologize to the Iranians.
[…] Olbermann’s even creepier sidekick, androgynous Newsweek reporter Richard Wolffe, also agreed, saying American credibility “has suffered another serious blow.”
Poor Iran!
Olbermann’s most macho guest, Rachel Maddow, demanded to know — with delightful originality — “what the president knew and when he knew it.” This was on account of Bush’s having disparaged the good name of a messianic, Holocaust-denying nutcase, despite the existence of a cheery report on Iran produced by our useless intelligence agencies.
So: Olbermann is a mama’s boy, Wolffe is a he-she, and Maddow is a dude. Got all that?
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
It had Olbermann placing Coulter in a familiar spot last night: (not) worst person of the world. And he introduced his own gender-based zinger, which, c’mon, you’ve all thought in your head at least once: “All I have to say about Ann Coulter is this. If this guy wants to live his life as a woman I’m going to back his choice up 100 percent. Coultergeist, today’s not worst person in the world.”
Because to defend oneself against grade school insults requires responding with them.
(video via)
terrwill
Rumor has it that Ann Cuntler has a very small cock………
Tommy Marx
Is it just me or has it come to the point where all these news “analysts” report more on each other than on anything else?
Tommy
As much as I hate Ann Coulter, using words related to “male”, “female”, “transgender”, “gay” etc as insults against her really misses the point of why she is a horrible person and harms a completely undeserving group. There is nothing inherently insulting about those descriptive terms, unless you subscribe to the same misogyny, homophobia, racism, and general ignorance that Coulter does. Why indulge her at her own game? (I’ll note that not giving her attention would probably be the best response since she’s an attention-seeking shock jock and a grotesque parody of a human being, but at the same time, refusing to check her might allow her to spread her vileness even more, like an untreated cancer.)
PJR
I agree with both Tommy’s above – it does seem the “analysts” report on each other more than anything else. And, Olbermann is wrong here – he’s just stooping to her level.
RT
I think it’s totally fair in the realm of media sparring, and kind of interesting to hear Coulter’s rhetorical tactics turned around on her, since she uses totalizing ideas of gender difference as her platform of attack, meanwhile ignoring the fact that she doesn’t behave within the expected boundaries of gender she herself vaunts. I would love to hear her response.
dontblamemeivotedforhillary
Tommy nailed it. I always roll my eyes when the ‘Olbermann Left’ reduce themselves to the Republican trough of name-calling. It’s easier to make fun of her crazy eyes anyway and transpose your own monologue onto her apoplectic gestures (with the volume down.) Transphobia should not be a punchline as they are our sisters and brothers, not minstrels and clowns. Shame on you Keith and take a cue from the grace of Rachel Maddow. If we ignore Ann Coulter, can we hear her screeching voice in a deep forest?
Brian En Guarde
She is Elle Driver – to be sure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo8ZM7PyRzU
Cam
My one issue is that insulting her by calling her a different gender seems to be to Transgenders, similar to how gays would feel if she Coulter insulted Oblberman by calling him a “Faggot”. Any TG’s care to chime in and let me know if I’m calling this one right?
CPT_Doom
Oh please, Coulter and Olbermann HATE each other, and it’s not just about politics, it’s personal. Something about them both going to Cornell, but he went through the less-rigorous hotel/restaurant management school, IIRC.
This is just another direct insult to Coulter from Olbermann referring to her much-rumored but never confirmed Intersex status. I don’t think it’s appropriate, in general, to make fun of intersex people, but Olbermann rightly observes this is an issue about which Coulter is hyper-sensitive – given her complete lack of moral character, I have no problem with it, but then again, I reserve the c-word for people as offensive and repugnant as her.
To be utterly fair, though, I would have preferred something less incendiary – perhaps “and this is coming from a woman who spends her entire life looking like a high-priced prostitute.”
Mike in Asheville, nee "in Brooklyn"
He’s a woman?!
romeo
That does look like an adam’s apple. hmmmmmmm.
Anne
I agree with Tommy. Rachel should sit him down for a talk. While Keith has said he has no issues with transgender people, (he has mentioned the high respect he has for a doctor and personal friend who is a transwoman,) so I don’t believe he is intentionally insulting them, he still has used jokes like these with a punchline relying on transphobia several times before this and I really wish he’d stop. He should really know better than stoop to Coulter’s level.
walt
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1o4cNMwWpM
Dirty Ole Man
Ann Coulter is indeed a MAN!
I know because I sucked her Republican Cock!
* I’m going to Hell…yes I know*
Sug Night
NOT true, Terr, Glen Beck told me he couldn’t walk for a week after she fucked him.
Ian
Keith Olbermann can do no wrong.
Before Rachel Maddow, if it hadn’t been for him, we wouldn’t have had an advocate in cable news.
And I don’t see how what he said was insulting. He chose his words very carefully, and made it seem as if being trans is a good thing —which it is.
Anne
@Ian: I wouldn’t say he can do no wrong, but anyway, it seemed to me he was trying to insult her by calling her trans.
ousslander
too bad his ratings are falling fast. I don’t think his attempt at an insult will bother her, she’ ll prob just laugh it off.
SarasNavel
@Tommy Marx:
My wife and I used to joke about the life cycle of big news stories, how you knew the story had reached the end of it’s life once the reporters started reporting on reporting the story.
Looks like we’ve reached that point.
The side issue here, however, is the whole using of trans people as a punchline to a joke. Reading the online comments elsewhere, his statement has spawned huge numbers of, “Coulter is dispicable, Coulter is a tranny, therefore trannies are dispicable” statements of mindset. That promotion is actual damage that he’s caused to us that we have to now go out and refute. So, I’m a little peeved at Keith right now and would like an apology.
Considering Renee Richards saved Keith’s eye back in 1980 & he even thanked her and wished her a happy birthday last year, his insensitivity is perplexing. Of course, she did so pre-transition, so maybe he really does have a degree of ‘phobia. Or he’s just a tiny bit of a jerk with some issues. Or ignorant of the harm he’s done. We just don’t know his motivation and don’t have much to go on for creative speculation.
What we do know is that while he did make that wonderful marriage soliloquy, he’s made jokes at trans people’s expense on a number of occasions. I’d like to know if he’d do the same with other groups and say, end a joke with “gimp”, “fag” “retard”, or “red/yellow/black/whatever” in the punchline -I suspect not. Which makes me wonder how much of what he does is personal belief and how much is just a carefully crafted image…
NAP79
Though I am very liberal, Olbermann is usually as much of a biased infotainer as O’Reilly or Limbaugh. He reports not news, but opinion. Journalism in this country is such a joke. Though I would like to see Olbermann and Coulter duke it out in a loser-leave-town cage match.
joes_brat1
I think the issue is intent. Did Olbermann intend to directly offend a specific target group of people? Hardly! Does Ann intend to offend specific classes of people when she uses words such as ‘fag’, ‘queer’ and ‘homo’? Of course she does!
The other point to be made (which has not been mentioned already) is the fact that the Coulter cult minions went hog-wild with the commentary last night and placed posts on Facebook and Twitter, stating that Olbermann called Coulter a post-op transsexual, which didn’t happen. When I called them out, they responded by calling me a fag, a queer, a homo and a trans hater.
I have to agree with Ian (#16 comment) when he states that Keith was careful to choose his words and the tone by which they were spoken.
Did Olbermann create a slippery slope? Perhaps – but in the whole of his commentary, he was simply trying to point out the absurdity of Coulter’s comments. Keith is a major advocate of the GLBT community and is not about to throw us under the bus for the sake of stoking the fire between him and Ann. If you feel the need to be angry at someone, focus your energies on the Coulter fanatics that have proven to be as vile as their master – if not more so!
Lazycrockett
I think that the bounty that is Ann Coulter, calling her a tranny is bout as lame, weak and simple minded.
terrwill
@Sug Night: You do realize you have permantely etched that scary image forever in my mind!!
: P
romeo
Stepped away from the site for a pb&j. Trying to get up to speed on this. Now Ann Coulter buttfucked Glen Beck for a week? Is there vid? How big’s Ann dick? Did Glen cry?
These are the probing questions we need to be asking!
Jon
This argument is stale and irrelevant.
romeo
Just saw her being interviewed on CNN. That’s definitely an adam’s apple.
missanthrope
“So Is It Fair to Call Her a Man?”
Is it cool to insult someone by calling them gay? No. It turns being gay in an insult and something to be laughed at. The same thing for Anne Coulter and saying that she’s transgender, you’re making transgender people in to a cheap punchline for a stupid joke.
And plus, that joke is just cheap, there’s plenty of other things you could make fun of her for, number one being that she is batshit crazy.
Cam
Speaking of Glenn Beck, my guess is that he’s one of those flip overs that just lays there and goes all passive, looking up at you with big doe eyes waiting to see what you’re going to do to him. My guess is that Ann coulter has worn out SEVERAL strap ons with ole Mister Beck.
terrwill
@missanthrope: No diss to the transgender community here……No one is accusing her of being transgender……… She is a freakin man in a dress!!
bobito
If it were possible to just say “supercilious cunthead” on TV without being bleeped, Keith and the others wouldn’t have to resort to such puerile kindergarden taunts.
Ben
As a trans guy, all I have to say is that insinuating that this woman is trans is an insult to transgender people everywhere.
She is perfectly evil on her own merits… no need to drag her gender into it.
jason
It certainly is fair to call her a man. It might not be mature but it certainly is fair. Fair means getting back at the attacker with the same line of attack they use. As such, Coulter deserves to be called a man.
Ann also has this penchant for long, flowing hair. If she cut it off, it might reveal how truly butch she looks. She’s a butch Rapunzel.
Ben
Also.
In the same way that calling someone a “fag” is insulting because it insinuates that being gay is bad and wrong, calling someone a tranny, or calling a woman with masculine features a “man,” is insulting because it implies that being trans or having some physical traits of the opposite sex (as many trans people do, particularly in the midst of their transition) is shameful, embarrassing, gross, wrong, funny, etc.
Our society already shames trans people in nearly every way it can conceive. Do you really have to compound that by implying that the absolute worst, funniest, most mockable and humiliating thing about Ann Coulter is that she looks like she might be trans?
Sug Night
Yes, I heard Beck cried like a baby….oh, wait….he ALWAYS cries like a baby.
But that bitch did NOT need a strap-on, she’s a full on DUDE! And an ugly one at that (Coulter gets a little woodie every time she sees a bale of hay).
If there IS video of that encounter, I’m too afraid to watch, even though Coulter had her back waxed for the performance (and I heard some other serious man scaping). That footage would no doubt singe my retinas, causing me to miss the next Johnny Weir as Lady Gaga skating routine.
jason
Ben,
I’m not denying that calling Ann a man is “insulting”. The question, however, is whether calling Ann a man is “fair”. I think it is. She’s getting a dose of her own medicine – you can’t get any more fair than that.
SarasNavel
@jason:
“It certainly is fair to call her a man. It might not be mature but it certainly is fair. Fair means getting back at the attacker with the same line of attack they use.”
Jason, by that logic trans people would next need to attack Olbermann by calling him a closeted TV or perhaps a trans man. And that fails on so many levels, the least of which is that it would make us Coulter’s allies by association. After that it really gets weird and wrong.
No, he blew it by widening the scope of his attack beyond Coulter and inspiring masses of anti-trans comments on message boards and blog comments. You see, every time the Coulter-as-a-transwoman meme is used to disparage her, the implication is that she -and we T-folk- are somehow “less than” everyone else. And that hurts everyone that transgresses gender expectations.
brillyo
I think she’s fucking funny. I smile when I see her and laugh when she speaks. I really doubt the idea that she is some kind of conservative hound out for blood (that’s sarah palin). I’d like to hang out with her I bet she knows how to have fun.
Lukas P.
“I hate name-calling, you idiots!”
Kidding.
Really, what the HELL are they arguing about at this point? What I do know is that every second they spend exchanging personal barbs takes the focus off, you know, all the serious issues we face as a country. Why dont Coulter and KO just kiss, fuck, and make up?
Stooping to Coulter’s level doesn’t make KO any more persuasive, although I’ll vouch it does feel good, at first, to fight fire with fire — until it escalates!
Coulter may or may not believe half of what she says, but she has her ratings and adoring fans and gets her thrills pissing people off. Anyone who thinks she will respond to reason, logic and facts by changing her scary views is sadly misguided.
The only way for them to resolve any of their differences is going to be hours and hours of sexual activity together and some fine dining too. When the sexual tension resolves, perhaps they’ll be able speak more rationally…..
harkin
So when Olbermann uses transgender as a humor device he’s in the wrong, but when he says that all the tea partiers are racist it’s no big deal?
Nice
jason
She ought to be known as Mann Coulter.
1EqualityUSA
She said, regarding the widows of September 11th:
“These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis. I’ve never seen people enjoying their husbands’ deaths so much.”
If you look in the right light, you’ll see a little “U” shaped scar by her temple.
1EqualityUSA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpSsv4rBSvQ
tjr101
“She” needs to explain that Adams Apple!
Tylar B
Hillarious. If you don’t find Olberman’s comments funny, then you need to get a sense of humor. C’mon. It’s funny. Stop being so sensitive. I mean…stop being such sensitive girls. There.
Lukas P.
True confession: I had nightmares! After suggesting that Ann and KO could only mend their rift and resolve the +obvious+ sexual tension between by engaging in sex & fine dining, I actually couldn ‘t get that ridiculous graphic out of my head. I was laughing, crying –and sadly– completely celibate for three hours!
That situation has been resolved.
QueerToday
Oblerman missed the mark on this one, resorting to his own transphobia for a little humor.
rudy
Garbage.
Ann Coulter goes beyond what’s in Rush Limbaugh’s dreams. You don’t have to read into her remarks – she out-and-out called John Edwards gay as a slur.
That people suspect she’s too rotten and rude to be a woman has nothing to do with transphobia.
But if you want to put Olberman on a par with the actual enemy, you can stop blaming HRC for our losses.
If you want to know why we lose a lot of battles, look in the mirror.
Otis Criblecoblis
Don’t be ridiculous – Ann Coulter is not a man.
She is a horse.
1EqualityUSA
Horses all over the world snorted and reared up their hind legs today.
schlukitz
I guess calling Ann Coulter a horse’s ass would be totally out of the question then? ;P
GrrrlRomeo
Ann Coulter is a mean person. She’s a jerk. I have no idea how that implies she’s a man.
Because girls are supposed to be nice a submissive. And boys are supposed to be aggressive. And if you don’t follow those rules there must be something wrong with you–like you must be gay or trans.
What is this, 1955?
I’ll get a sense of humor when you get some new material that reflects the decade we are currently in–the one where gay females can serve openly in the military. Oh wait.
jason
Mann Coulter has Anthony Hopkins eyes. Maybe she’s trying to channel Hannibal Lecter. Either that or her tampon is causing her discomfort.
Alexa
GrrrlRomeo, you’re totally off the mark, it’s because of her physical appearance, not her personality, that she gets called a man. Saying that, there is so much else to insult about her that I really wish people would give this stuff a rest. I also wish Olbermann would calm the hell down and stop being the liberal equivalent of Rush Limbaugh, it does his cause no good at all. He comes off as a complete dick.
romeo
@ Alexa: I think Olbermann is generally on the mark. After all, it works like crazy for Limbaugh. Like any good gay person, I appreciate good taste, eloquence and cogency. But we live in a sucky country, and if sucky works then sucky it is.
Ritorna
She want’s to be a bitchy drag queen, and she’s achieved it. I say give her the laughs she craves.
schlukitz
No. 53 · romeo
co-sign.
Olberrman articulately exposes the kooks, quacks and dickheads. And, he does it with class.
That’s a good thing, in my book. ;P
GrrrlRomeo
@Alexa: Ann Coulter doesn’t look like a man to me. Even if she looked like a transwoman, she would still look like a woman…because transwomen ARE women.
As a butch gay girl, *I* look more like a man than Ann Coulter does. And if someone called me a “he” mockingly I would punch them in the face. (I mean intentionally. People do it by mistake all the time.) I’d rather they say what they really meant and call me “dyke” because at least that’s true.
And yes, what I’m saying is Ann Coulter called Olbermann and Wolffe “fags” and Maddow a “dyke” but wrapped it up in some gender coded language. Homohaters think of gay and trans people as one and the same. And they know gays don’t get it–that “fag” and “dyke” have always been meant to disparage gender variance–because we’re too busy trying to prove to everyone that we’re just like straight people and we’re totally different than trans people.
But now they’ve gone to outright misidentifying people’s gender and gays are just “la la la at least they’re not using my identity as a slur.” Wake up, they are.
Syl
I agree with Tommy, mocking Coulter’s appearance or supposed gender is stooping to her level, and reduces transgendered status to an insult. Besides, why bother with the superficial when what’s inside her is so much uglier than what’s outside?