Right-Wing Watch: Ann Coulter's Latest Bigoted Bile Directed At Norman Mineta 3/1/2002
From: Melissa Dorfman or Jason Young, 202-467-4999, both of People for the American Way Foundation WASHINGTON, March 1 -- Following was released today by People for the American Way Foundation: Right-wing pundit Ann Coulter's most recent commentary (http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/coulter.html) accuses U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta of being consumed with hatred for America, belittles his experiences in Japanese-American internment camps during World War II, and appears to imply that she would celebrate if he were killed. "Ann Coulter's recent attack on Norman Mineta is despicable," said People For the American Way Foundation President Ralph G. Neas. "It is outrageous to say that this long-time public servant hates America. But it is unfortunately not surprising, given Coulter's history of similarly rabid commentary. It's a sad and telling fact that this kind of rhetoric earns Coulter folk-hero status among right-wing conservatives and featured speaking roles at events like the recent Conservative Political Action conference." Neas noted that Mineta's career includes a stint in the U.S. Army as an intelligence officer in Japan and Korea. He entered politics as a member of the city council of San Jose and later served as mayor. Mineta served in the U.S. House of Representatives for 20 years, where among many accomplishments, he was a primary architect of the Americans with Disabilities Act. He was President Clinton's Commerce Secretary before joining the Bush administration as Secretary of Transportation. A Right-Wing Watch Online profile of Coulter follows: This time it's Norman Mineta, Bush's Secretary of Transportation, who is under fire from columnist Ann Coulter, who is angry that he has not instituted aggressive racial profiling at airports in the wake of September 11. Coulter begins her Feb. 28 column in Jewish World Review with a reference to the recent beating death of a transportation official in Afghanistan. "According to initial buoyant reports in early February, enraged travelers rose up in a savage attack on the secretary of transportation. Hope was dashed when later reports indicated that the irritated travelers were actually rival warlords, the airport was the Kabul Airport, and Norman Mineta was still with us." After calling Mineta the "only stink-bomb" among President Bush's "dazzling team of advisers," she claims the Transportation Secretary is "burning with hatred for America." She dismisses his long congressional career and service in both Democratic and Republican administrations by saying, "He is given plumb government jobs solely and exclusively because he is a minority." And she mocks his recent references to his internment as a child, which he has used to caution against racial profiling as a response to terrorism: "He has taken the occasion of the most devastating attack on U.S. soil to drone on about how his baseball bat was taken from him as a child headed to one of Franklin Roosevelt's Japanese internment camps....Good G-d! A guard took Mineta's baseball bat as a child, and as a result he's subjecting all of America to the Bataan Death March! Somebody please give him a baseball bat." Coulter's hateful commentary has gotten her in trouble before. She was fired by MSNBC for tasteless statements about the late U.S. Ambassador to France Pamela Harriman and telling a disabled Vietnam veteran, "people like you caused us to lose that war." She was even dropped by National Review after a nasty spat inspired by her comments about the U.S. response to terrorism. In a Sept. 12 National Review Online column, Coulter said, "we should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." But many on the Right appreciate her outrageous commentary and applaud her right-wing credentials. Those credentials include the Federalist Society -- as a college student, she founded the local chapter at the University of Michigan. She also served a stint as an aide to then-Senator Spencer Abraham and as an advisor to Paula Jones' lawyers. She is widely admired by right-wing groups. In 2000, Brent Bozell's Media Research Center presented her with its "Conservative Journalist of the Year" award. The Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute gave her its annual conservative leadership award in 2000 and called her "an exemplar, in word and deed, of what a true leader is." Here's a sampling of what many on the Right apparently find so exemplary: -- "In contemplating college liberals, you really regret, once again, that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals by making them realize that they could be killed, too. Otherwise they will turn out into outright traitors." -- CPAC conference, 2002. See PFAWF's RWWO Report on CPAC 2002 at http://www.pfaw.org/issues/right/rwwo/rwwo.020226.html. -- "God gave us the earth. We have dominion over the plants, the animals, the trees. God said, 'Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It's yours.'" -- Hannity & Colmes, June 20, 2001 -- The "backbone of the Democratic Party" is a "typical fat, implacable welfare recipient." -- Coulter's column, Oct. 29, 1999 |