Coulter Wows 'Em At U Conn No, she wasn't explaining why she appears on The O'Reilly Factor so
much. Instead, she was mocking UConn students for making her job even
easier than it usually is.
STORRS, Conn. -- Conservative columnist Ann Coulter cut short a
speech at the University of Connecticut amid boos and jeers, and
decided to hold a question-and-answer session instead.
"I love to engage in repartee with people who are stupider than I am," Coulter told the crowd of 2,600 Wednesday.
Before
cutting off her speech after about 15 minutes, Coulter called Bill
Clinton an "executive buffoon" who won the presidency only because Ross
Perot took 19 percent of the vote.
Coulter's appearance
prompted protests from several student groups. About 100 people rallied
outside the auditorium where she spoke, saying she spread a message of
intolerance.
"We encourage diverse opinion at UConn, but this
is blatant hate speech," said Eric Knudsen, a 19-year-old sophomore
journalism and social welfare major who heads campus group Students
Against Hate.
It wasn't the first time Coulter has had
trouble at a university speech. In October 2004, two men ran onstage
and threw custard pies as she was giving a speech at the University of
Arizona.
The UConn Undergraduate Student Government paid the controversial
pundit $16,000 to speak -- and DC's own Clare Boothe Luce Policy
Institute kicked in untold thousands as well -- but Coulter lasted only
fifteen minutes before using chants of "You suck, you suck" as an
excuse to cut her speech short and go straight to the Q & A section
of the evening.
Sample Q & A:
One student asked what she would do if she had a child who came out as gay.
Coulter replied: "I'd say, `Did I ever tell you you're adopted?'"
After a half hour of that, Coulter went back to her hotel room,
counted her cash, and licked a Diet Newport for dinner. If she had
better legs, we'd swear she was the new Don Rickles.
TODAY: A tragic day in history, December 8, 1961 is the birth day of Ann Coulter.
Lieberman yesterday: "It is time for Democrats who distrust President
Bush to acknowledge that he will be commander in chief for three more
critical years and that in matters of war we undermine presidential
credibility at our nation's peril."
Murtha today: "Undermining his
credibility? What has he said that would give him credibility?"
MURTHA:Now, you remember, I wrote to the president in September 4th of
2003. I got a letter back in April 6th, 2004. The president didn't
write back. I received a response from a deputy undersecretary --
paints a totally rosy, unrealistic picture, saying 200,000 Iraqis --
now, hear what I'm saying -- 200,000 Iraqis under arms, reconstruction
projects and 70 percent of Iraqis feel -- or 2,200 reconstruction
projects -- 70 percent of Iraqis feel life is good.
The irony is that this was the month with the most U.S. deaths; 137 were killed. But that's what they wrote to me. Then we have Abu Ghraib that very year.
Most politicians "are interested not in truth but in power and the maintenance of that power", the 75-year-old ( Pinter )said.
Politicians feel it is "essential that people remain in ignorance, that
they live in ignorance of the truth, even the truth of their own
lives". "You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical
manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for
universal good."
Referring to Blair's support for the US-led war on Iraq, Pinter
described the "pathetic and supine" Great Britain as "a bleating little
lamb tagging behind (the US) on a lead".
He called for President Bush and Prime Minister Blair to be "arraigned before the International Criminal Court of Justice".
MURTHA: Twenty years it's going to take to settle this thing. The
American people is not going to put up with it; can't afford it. We
have spent $277 billion. That's what's been appropriated for this
operation. We have $50 billion sitting on the table right now in our
supplemental, or bridge fund we call it, in the Appropriations
Committee. They're going to ask for another $100 billion next year.
MURTHA: But the problem is they're just as vulnerable. The biggest
vulnerability we have in Iraq is the convoys. Every convoy is attacked.
When I was in Anbar, at Haditha, every single convoy was attacked that
goes there to bring the logistics and supplies that they need. That's
the most vulnerable part of our deployment.
And if you have
half the troops there, you're going to still have to supply them,
resupply them on the ground and they're going to be attacked.
When
I said we can't win a military victory, it's because the Iraqis have
turned against us. They throw a handgrenade or a rocket into American
forces and the people run into the crowd and they -- nobody tells them
where they are.
I am convinced, and everything that I've read,
the conclusion I've reached is there will be less terrorism, there will
be less danger to the United States and it'll be less insurgency once
we're out.
MURTHA:
And yet the National Guard commander called me and said we need a
billion dollars in the budget to take care of activities like Katrina.
They didn't have radios, today, at four years after the attack of 9/11,
didn't have radios to talk to the regular Army in the United States.
I
visited four bases, or three bases earlier this year -- Fort Bragg,
Hood, and Stewart. The commanders told me the troops going to Iraq,
because of lack of ground equipment, were the lowest level of
readiness. And now when they got over there, they'd get more equipment. We have a $50 billion backlog of equipment that has to be recapitalized and rehabilitated. So you can see, I'm so concerned.
MURTHA: I have had 12 senators call me -- mostly calling about information.
One senator, I said -- you know, they're all running for president --
but to one senator I said, "This is a watershed event for you, Senator.
You'd better get off the middle ground. And that senator did not like what I said.
MURTHA: Well, he was obviously a Democrat. Were they all Democrats that called you?
MURTHA: No, no. They weren't all Democrats. But
one of the other things I said to this one Republican senator, I said,
"You know, I shouldn't have criticized Cheney. He's a good friend of
mine." He said, "My wife loved it."
MURTHA:Now, you remember, I wrote to the president in September 4th of
2003. I got a letter back in April 6th, 2004. The president didn't
write back. I received a response from a deputy undersecretary --
paints a totally rosy, unrealistic picture, saying 200,000 Iraqis --
now, hear what I'm saying -- 200,000 Iraqis under arms, reconstruction
projects and 70 percent of Iraqis feel -- or 2,200 reconstruction
projects -- 70 percent of Iraqis feel life is good. 
