New Global Warming Threat: Hot Air On Iraq

Again a service for our readers in a hurry, Speed Coulter...

Title: New Global Warming Threat: Hot Air On Iraq
Democrats delaying war for no good reason
Senator Byrd is a crook, racist, and windbag.
The media is bad too.
Jim Jeffords is stupid.
Dan Rather is a fake.

Now if you still feel the need to read more, here it is:

New Global Warming Threat: Hot Air On Iraq
by Ann Coulter
October 9 , 2002

DEMOCRATS DON'T THINK it's too close to an election to be switching Senate candidates in New Jersey, but it's definitely too close for a vote on Iraq. All summer, Democrats were huffily demanding that Bush come to Congress for approval before taking any action against Iraq. So Bush comes to Congress for approval, and now the Democrats are indignant he's come to Congress for their approval.

This is no time to vote on a vital issue of national importance! It's an election year.

Or perhaps the decision to go to war deserves serious discussion and some Democrats think that Bush has not yet made a good enough case? If Democratic politicians think a war against Iraq is misguided or not clearly necessary, it is their patriotic duty to say so. A rush to judgement is both wrong and stupid. (Although the truth is most Democrats are probably going to roll over and vote the way Bush wants them to.)

Sen. Bob Byrd, D-KKK, tut-tutted the need for a resolution on Iraq, saying Sept. 11 was "over a year old." What's the big hurry? Why is it so imminent? Why here and now? Why before the election?

But back on Aug. 30, Byrd was denouncing Bush for bypassing Congress before taking action against Iraq. "Congress needs to act and vote," he said. "There needs to be a vote in Congress." Byrd said he had contacted "constitutional scholars, recognized constitutional scholars" and every one -- "to the man and woman" -- said the president was required "to ask the Congress for permission and to get authorization, new authorization to invade Iraq."

There is absolutely no contradiction here, as Coulter must know. In the first quote (chronologically), Byrd was saying that Bush should not be allowed to go to war without a vote in Congress. This is simply standing up for that tattered document, the US Constitution. In the second quote (chronologically), Byrd was saying that he did not feel the threat from Iraq was imminent and so an attack was questionable. In other words, Byrd thought a) if there was an attack, it required Congress' permission (which is legally correct, despite what the anti-Constitutionalists in the Bush presidency seem to think), but b) he did not think the need for an attack had been proven by the Bush presidency.

The vain, ranting windbag of a kleptocrat said Bush should stop reading polls -- "and read this: the Constitution of the United States." (Historical note: President Nixon was so enraged by the Senate's rejection of his Supreme Court nominees, he planned to retaliate by nominating Byrd, so he could really show them mediocre. According to John Dean, Nixon gleefully said Byrd was an ex-Klanner who "has no [qualifications] ...")

It is true that Byrd has the reputation for being a bit on the sleazy side and he was once, long ago, a member of the Klan. I'm certainly no fan of his. However, let us give the pompous old windbag his due: he has a clearer idea of Constitutional duties than does Ms. Coulter. Check out this Byrd quote in a OpEd piece from today's New York Times:
I have listened closely to the president. I have questioned the members of his war cabinet. I have searched for that single piece of evidence that would convince me that the president must have in his hands, before the month is out, open-ended Congressional authorization to deliver an unprovoked attack on Iraq. I remain unconvinced. The president's case for an unprovoked attack is circumstantial at best. Saddam Hussein is a threat, but the threat is not so great that we must be stampeded to provide such authority to this president just weeks before an election.
Why are we being hounded into action on a resolution that turns over to President Bush the Congress's Constitutional power to declare war? This resolution would authorize the president to use the military forces of this nation wherever, whenever and however he determines, and for as long as he determines, if he can somehow make a connection to Iraq. It is a blank check for the president to take whatever action he feels "is necessary and appropriate in order to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq." This broad resolution underwrites, promotes and endorses the unprecedented Bush doctrine of preventive war and pre-emptive strikes Ñ detailed in a recent publication, "National Security Strategy of the United States" Ñ against any nation that the president, and the president alone, determines to be a threat.
Here is the whole New York Times OpEd piece.

So anyway, Bush goes to Congress for a vote and Byrd gets his white sheet in a knot.

In addition to the indignity of having to vote in an election year, Byrd said the resolution on Iraq was diverting attention from important issues. Imminent military action to remove a madman with weapons of mass destruction who watches torture videos for fun and longs for a mushroom cloud over the nation's capital is crowding out the big stuff like naming another building in West Virginia after Bob Byrd.

Saddam is almost certainly not mad, almost certainly does not have weapons of mass destruction (barring a few chemical weapons), and will never have the capability, much less the desire, to nuke Washington. He doesn't like us but he knows what would happen to him if he hit us (which is why he has never had his goons go after America). If we are going to go after purely potential threats, why not hit France or China? They both have weapons of mass destruction. Or how about Pakistan, with its incredibly shaky regime that gave money to the Taliban, our enemies, in the very recent past?

For months and months now, the Democrats have been whining that we needed "more discussion" about Iraq. The insistent demand for discussion tended to leave the impression that these Democrats had something on their minds. But they never had anything to say -- except that we needed "more discussion."

It seems that Coulter thinks that the word "discussion" means "pro-forma debate before we agree with what the President wants." Those Democrats calling for more discussion are doing so because they are not satisfied with the answers they've been getting from the administration.

Then, when the president of the United States gave a speech this week on the topic they all claim to be burning with desire to "discuss," Fox News Channel was the only station to cover it. (Nielsen ratings during speech: Fox: 4.6 million viewers; CNN: 2.6 million viewers; MSNBC 1.2 million viewers. The only thing media executives care about is the bottom line!) I think we can "move on" from the We-Need-More-Discussion argument.

I love paragraphs like this. First, Coulter deliberately tries to imply that the Democratic party is the same thing as the big television networks ("they all claim"). Some Democrats' desire or lack of desire to "discuss" Iraq does not have anything to do with the networks decision on whether or not to cover Bush's speech. You can't logically blame the Democratic Party for what ABC or CBS decide to do (although I realize that Coulter and her ditto-heads are firmly convinced, or at least pretend to be convinced, that the Democrats control the media).

Second, the Bush White House itself refrained from asking the networks to cover the speech. Normally when they want a speech covered, they ask for it. They didn't ask. And here's White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer on the subject of blaming the media: "The White House did not request them to do so, so I think it would have been unreasonable for anybody to suggest that they should have." So the White House agrees with the networks, not Coulter.

As for FOX, they had originally planned to NOT cover the speech but they changed their minds, perhaps because of the delay of the Braves/Giants playoff game.

Even for a naturally gaseous body, Democrats in Congress have outdone themselves with their palaver about Iraq.

All legislatures are full of hot air, but it chills me whenever I hear anyone suggest that their deliberations should be a mere rubber stamp. Our Congress is all that stands between us and an imperial presidency (and I don't mean Bush specifically, but rather that Congress is there to prevent any president from acting on mere whim or personal desire). Real conservatives know this.

Sen. Jim Jeffords, who traded to the Democrats last season (nominally, he's an independent), made the novel argument that Saddam wouldn't use weapons of mass destruction after he has "paid so dearly" to acquire them. As the saying goes, when Jeffords switched parties, it improved the average IQ of both parties.

Which saying is that, Ann? Your own nasty, spiteful, and vengeful statement? I just did a nexis search for "Jim Jeffords" and "IQ" and the only hit that matched was your ugly National Review article from last year (discussed at slight length in AntiCoulter's "Mr. T vs. Ann Coulter"). Calling a man stupid because you don't like him or his positions is playground punditry.

Every single Democrat called Saddam Hussein "despicable." "Despicable" is evidently what Democrats call problems they have no intention of addressing. Republicans should start referring to inadequate arts funding and large class size as "despicable." The kleptocrat ex-Klanner one-upped them on "despicable." He said Saddam was "lower than a snake's belly."

Saddam is despicable, which is no argument for invading his country (the world is filled with despicable leaders).

Liberals pretending to be Americans always make a big show of using hokey expressions.

Now that's really unfair! Byrd uses hokey expressions constantly and quite naturally. He's hokey through and through.

On a single night, CBS' Dan Rather unleashed: "like a tornado through a trailer park," "like a squirrel in a cage," "like a boll weevil through a cotton field," "like a cat in a creamery," "like trying to scratch his ear with his elbow." Returning to his Manhattan roots, earlier this year Rather was on the BBC complaining about "patriotism run amok."

Dan Rather is a born Texan. His father was a ditch-digger (quite different from Coulter's all-American Connecticut lawyer father). Rather's first jobs had him sweating away in that Texas sun for minimum wage. He is famous for not losing touch with his down-home heritage, using folksy expressions, and listening to country western music. I've never liked the man, but one should not deny him his roots. They are real, not pasted on.

This is not, after all, a general media behavior. Neither Peter Jennings or Tom Brokaw are the least bit folksy. (Brokaw is occassionally cutesy, while Jennings is never more nor less than smoothly robotic.)

Lawyer and "True Grit" character Gerry Spence had a million "ooooold cowboy" sayings in defense of Clinton that were utterly incomprehensible but managed to go on and on through six commercial breaks. You almost forgot the president was a felon while lost in a reverie trying to figure out why, exactly, if the rooster was on the roof, the cowboy says you don't harness the filly (or whatever).

The felon himself was constantly promising to do this or that "till the last dog dies." This impressed the New York media deeply. (It's going to be hard for him to keep up with Southern aphorisms from Chappaqua.)

Again, Clinton really is a good-old-Arkansas boy, born to another dirt-poor family. Can it be that these attacks on folksy real Americans like Rather and Clinton show that Coulter is actually one of the snobs she claims fill the Democratic party?

Byrd's invocation of the average American was also highly believable. If you credit Byrd, the concerns of "John Q. Citizen" are identical to the concerns of left-wing academics and Hollywood celebrities. "John Q. Citizen" evidently wants to know: What's this going to cost me? What will happen to our sons and daughters? What will happen when Iraq is defeated?

Ann, I'm a left-wing academic. Byrd has virtually nothing in common with me (we do both breath oxygen). Trust me on this one.

Yes, that's why they're having peace marches in West Virginia, while Malibu and Manhattan are ablaze with war fever. Byrd forgot to claim that "John Q. Citizen" is puzzling over "why they hate us." The average red-blooded American male is just dying to get to the bottom of that one.

Is Coulter really trying to claim Byrd for Malibu and Manhattan? Amazing. As for the supposed massive popular support of the Iraq invasion...

According to the most recent USAToday/CNN/Gallup pole, 53% of Americans favor a ground invasion to get rid of Saddam, 40% oppose such an invasion. Who knew that Malibu and Manhattan contained 40% of the nation's population. (And Coulter should also have the integrity to remember that the pro-invasion support is very soft: a majority of Americans, for example, favor using trying to get UN weapons inspectors in first, think the US needs to try more diplomatic efforts before invading, and think we shouldn't act without the support of our allies. Check the actual numbers at the incredibly useful Polling Report web site.)

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