Conservative commentator Ann Coulter warned white children to not listen to rap music this week after security guards for rapper Nardo Wick, were seen on video punching a fan.

Over the past several months, Coulter has continued to criticize former President Trump as he prepares for his run in the 2024 presidential election. She previously said that he "can barely speak English," and called him a "gigantic baby." She's also been a vocal critic of "woke" books, like Pageboy by transgender actor Elliot Page, and Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

"Once again, I warn white kids NOT to listen to rap. Not only will you get canceled for singing along, but now you also might end up in the hospital in critical condition," Coulter wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Wednesday. "'Rapper Nardo Wick's entourage brutally knocks out fan who asked for a photo.'"

Earlier this week, videos surfaced on social media showing a fan approaching rapper Nardo Wick for a photograph after an event in Tampa, Florida. One of the rapper's security guards is seen hitting the man in the face. Immediately after, another security guard runs over and hits the fan again, dropping him to the floor. The video cuts off quickly before more footage of the incident is seen.

According to WFLA news in Florida, the fan was identified as George Obregon Jr. and the Tampa Police issued a statement on Facebook providing more information on the incident.

"On Monday, November 27, 2023, at approximately 1:17 a.m., following a concert at Club Skye (1509 E. 8th Ave), an adult male victim, attempted to approach the performer for a photo, when individuals who appear to be affiliated with the performer punched the victim," police said. "Detectives are interested in speaking to anyone who witnessed the incident or may have information that would assist in identifying the suspects."

In a statement posted to Instagram on Tuesday, Nardo Wick addressed the incident saying, "I don't condone what happened to my fan George after my show in any type of way, I expressed to him and his mama how sorry and concerned I was that it happened to him, multiple times before anything was even posted or on the internet."

"I sent his mama my number instantly the night it happened. I was even gone make a post to try to find out who he was before his mama text me. I cant [sic] control another grown man actions, I ain't know that was gone happen, and I was mad when it happened. I tried to stop it as u can see in the video, and if somebody got the longer video you can see how mad I was, I love and appreciate all my fans and don't condone in what happened at all dat sh*t ain't gangsta or cool in no type of way," the statement added.

Newsweek reached out to the Federalist Society, where Coulter is a contributor, for comment.

Some X users criticized Coulter following her post, such as user @ijbolzzn who said, "white people will never fail to turn a serious issue around to demonize and be racist to black people you are all so annoying the people who did that to him are horrible people it has nothing to do with their race or rap."

Similarly, X user @metal_gear88 said, "Why would you not warn all kids?"

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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

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Ann Coulter Warns White Kids Not to Listen to Rap Music - Newsweek

Republicans have a certain obligation to act as if everything President Biden does is an assault on American values. His sweeping pardons this week of thousands who were jailed for marijuana possession and announcement that the drugs federal classification will be reevaluated are no exception.

But, perhaps because the nation overwhelmingly believes that cannabis should be legal, and the issue doesnt stoke the culture war like matters of race, gender, and sexuality, the right-wing outrage machine had a mostly quiet reaction to these executive orders. Indeed, over the past year or so, several high-profile Republicans have actively pushed similar efforts. In May 2021, Rep. Dave Joyce and Rep. Don Young, of Ohio and Alaska, proposed to take cannabis off the federal list of controlled substances. And last November, Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina introduced a bill to decriminalize and regulate pot.

The extreme conservatives who did take a stab at condemning Dank Brandon could barely muster a reason to be angry. Sen. Tom Cotton and Newsweeks right-wing opinion editor Josh Hammer both took the line that many of the pardons were going to violent criminals who had pled down from much more serious charges. Neither was able to cite such a case. Ann Coulter, in a short Substack post, simply imagined one.

Meanwhile, the Daily Wire, which has previously run teeth-gnashing coverage on the physical, mental, and emotional problems associated with marijuana, published one straightforward news story on Bidens move toward decriminalization and approximately ten times as much coverage of Tucker Carlson interviewing Kanye West. That outlets editor emeritus, Ben Shapiro, who this year said of weed, The Left really does wish to inoculate us all into submission, did not seem to address the pardons at all.

On Fox News, Laura Ingraham made a very half-hearted slippery slope argument, pointing out that after Oregon legalized pot for recreational use, they also decriminalized possession of small amounts of cocaine, heroin, and meth, which is now punishable by a $100 fine. What exactly is being threatened here? Oregon didnt collapse into anarchy. Its a nice place to visit or live, in fact. And the law couldnt have passed without support from some of the states many conservative voters.

Renae Eze, press secretary for Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas, tried to sound tough and defiant when addressing whether her boss would pardon state-level marijuana offenses as Biden encouraged. Texas is not in the habit of taking criminal justice advice from the leader of the defund police party and someone who has overseen a criminal justice system run amok with cashless bail and a revolving door for violent criminals, she told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram even though Abbott stated earlier this year that he thinks pot should be decriminalized.

No, it looks like the GOPs heart isnt in this fight, and the best a few mouthpieces can do is cycle through the motions. It makes sense: the partys legislators have already seen the writing on the wall, and their constituents desire for an end to the prohibition of cannabis. Few would find any benefit to standing in the way, and that group of hard-liners is rapidly dwindling. Besides, all Biden has actually done so far is expunge the criminal records of several thousand people no longer behind bars.

If the country continues in this direction, when weed finally becomes legal throughout the U.S., there may be no one left to get mad about it.

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Only a Handful of Conservatives Bothered to Phone in Their Fury at Bidens Pot Pardons - Rolling Stone

Pro-LGBTQ Sen. Mark Kelly and Republican nutjob Blake Masters squared off in a televised debate hosted by Arizona PBS last night and nobody was more parched by it than Ann Coulter.

The 60-year-old homophobe spent a good chunk of the hour-long debate thirsting over 36-year-old Masters, who has never held public office before and is trailing Kelly in the polls.

Lets have a look

It started with Coulter immediately gushing over how very tall Masters looked on stage:

A few minutes later, she declared him absolutely the best person running for Senate this year:

Of course, she couldnt just watch the debate without taking a moment to complain about the ASL translators:

As things were winding down, she begged everyone to watch the hour-long debate online then told them to skip the parts that didnt feature Masters:

Then this morning, she logged onto Twitter to urge peopleIN ALL CAPS!to watch the replay of the debate on C-Span RIGHT NOW!!:

Seriously, girl, go back to your stable and rehydrate yourself at the water trough.

Masters is a venture capitalist who is BFFs with gay billionaire Peter Thiel. Hes also a homophobic pile of garbage who wants to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, the SCOTUS decision establishing a right to same-sex marriage.

Related: That time anti-LGBTQ candidate Blake Masters went to the gay wedding of his biggest financial backer

According to hisivoterguide profile, Masters also believes religious freedom must be protected at all costs and that businesses should be allowed to discriminate against LGBTQ people if being gay violates their moral and/or religious beliefs.

And on his Twitter page, he has vowed to push for a federal version of Floridas Dont Say Gay law, saying tax dollars should not fund radical gender ideology and weird sex instruction for children.

With views like that, its no wonder he left Coulter totally dehydrated after last nights debate. Voters, on the other hand, seem to be a lot less thirsty for the guy. According to the latestFiveThirtyEight average, Masters is trailing Kelly by six points.

Related: Just when we didnt think Ann Coulter could get any dumber, she did this

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Ann Coulter was a hot thirsty mess over homophobe Blake Masters during the Arizona Senate debate - Queerty

Ward: Theres a pretty clear trajectory from the 2018 brawl at the Metropolitan Republican Club to Trumps stand back and stand by comment during the presidential debate in September 2020 to, ultimately, the Jan. 6 insurrection. Did anything really surprise you about their role on Jan. 6?

Campbell: I was turning in the final chapters of the book when the original conspiracy charges came down against them, which were not surprising. The 1776 Returns document showed that the Proud Boys didnt just have an outsize role in Jan. 6, but that they may have had a role in planning it, too. Leading up to January 6, the Proud Boys were prepping for civil war, and they were getting super excited for their last stand for Trump.

But I was absolutely surprised that the [other] architects of Jan. 6 would put any sort of trust in the Proud Boys to pull this thing off, because any big event that theyve been involved in over the years has led to mass arrests. The Proud Boys are terrible with their information security, and theyre constantly being watched by the feds and by journalists. So it was absolutely surprising to me, when that 1776 Returns document came down, that they had such a big role in [planning] it.

And then theyve continued to surprise me with their resiliency. A number of people wrote them off after Jan. 6, saying, Oh, the Proud Boys are imploding, or theyre gonna dissolve after this, and sure enough, theyre still in action.

Ward: Early in the book, you cite McInnes claim that Fighting solves everything, and you argue that the GOP more or less tacitly endorsed that point of view when the Republican National Committee classified the violence of Jan. 6 as legitimate political discourse. How much credit or blame, depending on your point of view do the Proud Boys deserve for the GOPs decision to endorse some forms of political violence?

Campbell: I think they have [played] a huge role. I mean, they were showing up at events big and small at the behest of Trump and the GOP grievance machine for years and fighting it out in the street. Over time, the goalposts have been moved to the degree that political violence, as a justified response to the things that the [GOP] is mad about, is totally normal now.

Whats scary about the Proud Boys is that the playbook that theyve helped create under Trump is such that everyday Americans think that they can go out [into the streets] and fight for the things that theyre mad about. Youve got regular people joining extremists at abortion clinics and at Boston Childrens Hospital and at drag queen story hours. Theyre threatening and intimidating people, and theyre looking at the Proud Boys, whose leaders have seen very few consequences until Jan. 6. Certainly, [McInnes] has never seen any real legal consequences for fomenting all of this.

[Look at] Libs of TikTok. All these right-wing loudmouths are looking at the Proud Boys and saying, Hey, as long as I couch everything that Im saying in political speech, I can say whatever I want people can go out and murder, and Im never going to see any consequences for it. And at least legally, thats largely true. So, while you cant say that the Proud Boys are the arbiters of all political violence, you can certainly draw a line between this sort of stuff and these small events [where] theyve been fighting and fighting and fighting over the years. And its not just Proud Boys events anymore where violence happens. Every facet of American life is overrun by political violence now, and I think the Proud Boys are a big part of that.

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Jan. 6 Was Just the Beginning for the Proud Boys - POLITICO

Fiskes exoneration of Clinton enraged the right. At this juncture in history, the paranoid style was enjoying one of its sporadic revivals. On talk radio and in the halls of Congress, absurd theories linking the Clintons to Fosters death flourished. These years also witnessed a rising tendency led by Rep. Newt Gingrich of Georgia, soon to become speaker of the House to gin up claims of ethical impropriety to take down political foes. To Republicans unreconciled to the Democrats return to the White House, Clinton was inherently suspect. And so, that summer, a panel of three judges, led by Judge David Sentelle a protege of North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms, who had been keen to go after Clinton since his election took it upon themselves to replace the impartial Fiske with the very partisan Starr, then working in private practice.

Ken Starr decided to extend his inquiry beyond Whitewater and, in early 1997, he and his team began poking around into the presidents sex life.|Doug Mills/AP Photo

It was an unconventional and consequential choice. For one thing, Starr lacked prosecutorial experience. Despite having been a judge for six years in the 1980s, he was also a known partisan, active in the Federalist Society and conservative circles. Having aspired as a youth to become a preacher, he sold Bibles while in college and taught Sunday school even while on the federal bench. His piety often blurred the lines between church and state. As independent counsel, he would promote stories like one in the conservative Washington Times headlined, Deeply Christian Starr Starts Day Jogging, Singing Hymns.

The biggest problem with his appointment, however, was a major conflict of interest: Earlier in the year, Starr had provided legal assistance to Paula Jones, an Arkansas woman who was suing Clinton over a vulgar sexual advance he had allegedly made to her as governor. Starr even drafted an amicus brief supporting Jones. But Starr didnt disclose those connections to the judges who appointed him, and later he would, against all ethical standards, make common cause with Jones team in his pursuit of the president.

When Starr began his investigation in mid-1994, Clinton seemed vulnerable. Despite passing some landmark legislation, he had failed to achieve his ambitious health care plan and was struggling over foreign policy messes in Somalia and Bosnia. But after November 1994, when the Republicans won control of the House for the first time in 50 years, Clinton found his footing and his fortunes revived. In response, Republicans launched new investigations into various matters and pressured Starr to find proof of Clintons wrongdoing. After several years, however, he couldnt find any, and Whitewater receded from the front pages. Clinton was destined to become the first Democrat to win two presidential elections since Franklin Roosevelt. Starr, it seemed, would have to close up shop.

But then Starr made a big decision to extend his inquiry. In early 1997, he and his team began poking around into the presidents sex life. Doing so might have been illegal, since it lay well outside Starrs mandate as independent counsel. In a few months time, the news of his fishing expedition broke. In a June 1997 Washington Post article, Arkansas state troopers spoke with concern about what was going on. In the past, I thought they were trying to get to the bottom of Whitewater, said trooper Roger Perry, whom Starrs staff had questioned. This last time, I was left with the impression that they wanted to show he was a womanizer. All they wanted to talk about was women. The plunge into sexual politics drew denunciations. Starr chose to ignore the warning lights. Moralism propelled him forward.

As Starr later admitted, his office soon opened a back channel also probably illegal to lawyers for Jones, whose harassment case was proceeding along independent lines. A gaggle of far-right attorneys helping her had learned about the presidents recent dalliance with Lewinsky and passed it along to Starrs staff. These attorneys called the Elves because one of their number, the polemicist-provocateur Ann Coulter, compared them to busy elves working away in Santas workshop then connected Starrs office with Linda Tripp, the Pentagon aide who posed as a confidante to Lewinsky, got her to confess details about the affair and secretly taped their conversations.

Starr made his next momentous decision in deciding to use the affair as part of the impeachment case he was building. In mid-January 1998, convinced that Clinton had lied about his relationship with Lewinsky in a recent deposition in the Jones case, Starr asked permission from Reno to formally expand his probe into Clintons sex life even though he had already done just that months before. Years later, he would admit that doing so had been a mistake. (Someone else should have led the Lewinsky inquiry, he conceded.) But in seeking his expanded mandate, Starr hid from Reno and the three-judge panel those back-channel contacts with the Jones team. Reno authorized the expansion, but when she learned months later about the concealment, she almost fired Starr on the spot.

News of Clintons affair with a former intern, many years his junior, generated a predictable storm of outrage. But in a short time a public consensus emerged that, however tawdry the affair, and however harshly people might judge Clintons character, this wasnt something to remove a president over. Washington pundits, in contrast, felt differently, as did a few well-placed reporters who, relying on a flood of selective leaks from Starrs staff (especially attorney Brett Kavanaugh), kept the story alive for months even as the presidents approval ratings stabilized north of 60 percent. Starrs hovered around 22 percent.

Clinton appeared to retire the whole business on Aug. 17, 1998, when he finally confessed to and apologized for the affair. Most of the public said it was time to move on. But again Starr along with Gingrich and the Republican House leadership refused to let up. With Whitewater a dead letter, sexual politics would be the grounds for impeachment.

During Clintons testimony before a grand jury, all the questions had been about sex, and when Starr sent his impeachment referral to Congress in September, it contained gratuitous descriptions of specific sex acts, pornographic in nature. The goal was to incite new public outrage and, perhaps, humiliate his nemesis. Like the classic small-town preacher who rails against sexual deviance precisely because he finds it so titillating, Starr was even more ardent than some of his advisers in favoring a narrative laced with explicit detail. I love the narrative! Starr told aides who counseled greater restraint.

Despite losing seats in the November midterm election historically an almost unheard-of development Republicans pressed forward with impeachment. Starr made yet another fateful decision by choosing, against precedent, to become an aggressive advocate for impeachment. (In 1974, Watergate prosecutor Leon Jaworski had stayed neutral, submitting a spare factual account and merely suggesting to Congress possible impeachable infractions President Richard Nixon had committed.) Starrs decision infuriated his ethics adviser, Sam Dash, onetime counsel to the Senate Watergate Committee, whom Starr had retained early on to give himself some cover. He was a partisan Republican, Dash later said of Starr. But I really believed him when he said he could push all that aside. Having defended Starr for years, Dash now let it rip, quitting the team and publicly denouncing Starrs decision to openly throw in his lot with the House Republicans.

The Senate is being called to sit as the high court of impeachment all too frequently, Ken Starr piously lamented in then-President Donald Trumps defense. Indeed, we are living in what I think can aptly be described as the Age of Impeachment.|Alex Edelman/Getty Images

It was especially unnecessary because Clintons acquittal was pretty much a foregone conclusion. Even many Republican senators doubted that the charges amounted to constitutional crimes. But the GOP leadership, joined by Starr, pressed on. In the end, of the four charges that the Judiciary Committee reported, two failed to gain a majority even in the Republican-controlled House. The other two were rejected by the Republican-controlled Senate. But if the damage to Clinton was minor, the disruption to the country had been enormous. Starrs decisions over many years to take over from Fiske, to veer into sexual politics, to run with the Lewinsky affair, to make sex the centerpiece of his report which stemmed from his prosecutorial zeal, had helped poison the atmosphere in Washington and deepen the tendency to use sexual behavior as the basis for partisan warfare.

Ironically, it was already becoming clear that many of the presidents antagonists had their own sexual secrets to hide. House Judiciary Chair Henry Hyde was revealed to have had an affair in his 40s, which he tried to downplay as a youthful indiscretion. Gingrich, damaged by the GOP losses at the polls, was overthrown as speaker amid talk that he had been conducting his own extramarital affair. His intended replacement, Robert Livingston, declined the speakership when his past infidelities surfaced. The eventual speaker, Dennis Hastert, was later convicted and imprisoned for child sex abuse. And of course Starrs key aide Kavanaugh who pushed hard to grill the president and Lewinsky about the sexual details of their relationship was, as a Supreme Court nominee in 2018, alleged to have sexually assaulted Christine Blasey Ford while they were in high school. Even Starrs eventual successor as independent counsel, Robert W. Ray, was charged with stalking an old girlfriend.

Amazingly enough, it eventually emerged that Starr too, for all his moralizing, had carried on his own extramarital affair, with Judi Hershman, an adviser to the independent counsels office. More damningly still, Starr had to resign in 2016 as president of Baylor University after it was reported that he had covered up a string of sexual assaults, including rapes, by members of his football team. One victim had even sent him an email, while he was president, informing him that she had been raped. I honestly may have (seen it), he said of her message. Im not denying that I saw it. Her rapist was sentenced to 20 years.

Despite his essential role in the Clinton impeachment, Starr in 2020 not only defended President Donald Trump during his (first) impeachment trial, but somehow managed to summon the chutzpah to impugn the Democrats for bringing charges never mind that the charges against Trump, for conspiring with a foreign government to compromise the 2020 election, were far graver than those against Clinton. The Senate is being called to sit as the high court of impeachment all too frequently, Starr piously lamented in Trumps defense. Indeed, we are living in what I think can aptly be described as the Age of Impeachment.

Perhaps we are living in such an age. If so, the person most responsible for that sad state of affairs is none other than Ken Starr.

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Opinion | Ken Starr: The Man Who Created the Lewinsky Scandal - POLITICO

Will a monkeypox shot stop the danger from having sex with a horny stranger? Gutfeld said to introduce the topic on his June 30 show. He continued that it has mostly infected men who have had sex with other men at parties and, addressing fellow Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, added that the United States has not seen any deaths yet, but just to be safe, Kilmeade, no more sleepovers. Kilmeade is married to a woman; the joke here is that its funny to call him gay.

Gutfeld later asked Kilmeade, who hosts Fox & Friends, how the morning show was covering the issues.

Running from it, Kilmeade responded, before downplaying the symptoms and known number of cases. What is the big deal? Walk it off, were Americans.

The segment also included a pre-taped bit in which a monkey doctor addressed questions at a fake press conference, including one from a character with a stereotypical lisp who asked if the monkey would consider spending a sexual weekend with me in Cabo. Whether intentional or not, the segment drew on the long-standing homophobic idea that HIV/AIDS emerged because of gay men having sex with monkeys.

Back at the panel, Gutfeld teed up Donald Trump senior adviser Lara Trump to mock the subject.

You know, Lara, apparently monkeypox is spread by gay anonymous sex at raves, he said with an inflection that signaled he was saying something funny. What are your thoughts?

Well how long do we have? Trump said in a jokey, over-the-top response.

You know, we are the only show that has been consistently covering this topic almost every week, sometimes every day, even if there are 300 cases, because its just great to talk about, Gutfeld concluded.

The previous week, Gutfeld used almost the exact same homophobic set-up in a panel with Fox News host Emily Compagno.

All right, last question to you, Emily, monkeypox is caused by anonymous gay anal sex at raves, Gutfeld said. Care to comment?

Im OK on that one, Compagno dodged, highlighting her discomfort with the very idea for comedic effect.

Other conservatives comedians got in on the bit as well. At PJMedia, Kevin Downey Jr. wrote an entire blog about what he considers strange sexual practices among men who have sex with men and the spread of monkeypox, and how to address the outbreaks.

Just a hunch, but perhaps we can start by abstaining from group sex with gay men who recently romped around Antwerp dressed as dogs and horses, he wrote.

Much of the overt anti-gay panic among right-wing pundits took place on Twitter.

Right-wing pundit James Lindsay deployed homophobic innuendo to make a confusing point about government control:

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Conservatives' homophobia is putting gay and bisexual men at greater risk of monkeypox - Media Matters for America

Today well talk about how to write the classic New York Times column, using Thomas Edsalls recent Trumpism Without Borders as our example. It must have taken him about 40 minutes to write it.

Edsall blames the populist movements sweeping the globe on the same ills that led to a right-wing takeover of the federal government by Donald Trump. To wit: anti-immigrant fervor, political tribalism, racism, ethnic tension, authoritarianism and inequality. Fascism awaits us unless we keep importing low-skilled immigrants and shipping jobs abroad!

For someone worried about the erosion of democratic norms, maybe Edsall shouldnt be referring to the outcome of a free and fair U.S. presidential election as a right-wing takeover of the federal government. We had an election, pal.

But ever since the 2016 election, theres been a frisson of viciousness to the elites usual contempt for ordinary Americans. Never mind that Trump ended up betraying his voters. The establishment is appalled that the issues he ran on were popular. Five years later, they still sputter in rage, unable to comprehend why Jeb or Hillary didnt end up in the White House.

To explain this calamity, Edsall rolls out all the Timesian cliches about losers being upset about losing. He calls this the ubiquity of loss, as if were talking about a natural phenomenon, like beach erosion.

Trump voters, he says, are people who are angry about:

their inability to achieve a standard of living as high as that of their parents,

the decline of the gender pay gap ... and other types of loss relative to women, and

losing employment and earnings to China and other countries.

Edsall acts as if these things are immutable laws of physics. Actually, they result from the deliberate policy choices of our ruling class to benefit some Americans to the detriment of others.

Specific policy decisions were made to import an endless stream of low-skilled workers. Employers got boatloads of cheap labor, while ordinary Americans saw their wages plummet.

Oh, and if were pretending to care about democratic norms, Americans have voted for less immigration over and over and over again. If anyone in the establishment gives a crap about democratic norms, then why do they keep foisting more immigration on us?

Specific policy decisions were made to explicitly discriminate against white men in order to give jobs to women, simply because they were women.

I give you Kamala Harris (Bidens one job requirement for his VP: must be a woman of color); every police chief in the nation (save a couple of black men); and Kara Hultgreen (who died when she crashed a $38 million F-14 after being continuously promoted despite repeated training failures, because the Navy wanted a female fighter pilot).

What crybabies! These guys resent losing jobs because of abject discrimination against them. Koo-koo! Koo-koo!

Specific policy decisions were made to gut our countrys manufacturing base. Globalist bankers got rich, and the working class got the shaft.

The destruction of American manufacturing wasnt, as Edsall claims, a consequence of trade. (Whos buying our stuff?) International agreements forcing Americans to compete with dollar-an-hour third worlders were a gift to Big Business and Wall Street. They get a larger share of a much smaller pie. Sure, our country overall will make $30, instead of $100. But the 1 percent will get $29 instead of $20!

We dont need Thomas Edsall to psychoanalyze Trump voters in order to understand what happened in 2016. We were at DEFCON 1 as a nation. (And thanks to Trumps betrayal, we still are.)

After 20 years, people began to notice: The elites really do hate us. They really are going to ship our jobs abroad. They really are going to replace us with cheap foreign labor. They really are going to let in hordes of illegals. They really are going to bail out Wall Street and preserve their sleazy tax loopholes.

Faced with a choice between the toxic left and country club Republicans, when a complete psychotic came down the escalator, people thought, He might just mean it! (That was a miscalculation.)

The elites screw over ordinary Americans, then to salve their consciences, they call the poor saps racists. They get to maintain a system that benefits only them and at the same time feel morally superior to the people whose lives theyve ruined. Its win-win all around!

Americans dont care about the gender pay gap, climate change or international institutions. They deserve whats coming to them!

Ann Coulter is a syndicated columnist.

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Ann Coulter: Why are they so angry? | Opinion | marshallnewsmessenger.com - Marshall News Messenger

Every revolutionary movement needs a martyr and it appears that the MAGA revolution has finally found one for itself.

Ashli Babbit, the Jan. 6th insurrectionist who was shot by a security guard as she climbed through a broken window just a few feet away from members of Congress,is Donald Trump's Horst Wessel, the German brownshirt who was murdered in 1930 and turned into a martyr by the Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels. Trump himself is making the case for Babbit, having mentioned her in every appearance he's made in the last week.

At his recent Florida rally, Trump wondered:"Who shot Ashli Babbit? We all saw the hand... Now they don't want to give the name." At hispress conferenceon Wednesday in which he announced his laughable "class action" lawsuit against the Big Tech companies, he went a little bit farther saying, "there were no guns in the Capitol except for the gun that shot Ashli Babbitt. And nobody knows who that man were...the person that shot Ashli Babbitt right through the head, just boom. There was no reason for that." Then this past weekend he went all the way, describing the insurrection as a love fest and Babbit as an innocent victim in an interview with Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo:

Bartiromo took the ball and ran with it, saying that Babbitt climbedoutof a broken window (as if she was trying to escape the vicious gunman) after which both she and Trump speculated that the officer who shot Babbitt was part of a Democratic official's security detail, casually mentioning Chuck Schumer in the process. The implication was obvious: the Democrats shot Ashli Babbitt for no good reason. The fact that we have all seen the footage of the shooting is irrelevant: We can believe them or we can believe our lying eyes.

Over the weekend, Trump appeared at his second CPAC conference in five months this time in Texas. (Salon's Zachary Petrizzo deliveredthesedispatchesfrom the event.) Trump gave his usual speech, to a notably more excited crowd than the last one in February in Florida. He's barely able to keep from announcing to his adoring fans that he's running again and they are all clamoring for him to do it. And it's clear that he will be running to avenge his bogus claims that he actually won the election. The Big Lie will never die.

It all sounds bizarre but when you talk about this stuff in the context of CPAC, it is really not all that crazy. Sure the violent insurrection gives their standard reckless rhetoric a feeling of urgency that wasn't there before, but if you look back you can see that's been there for decades.

Back in 1973 when the American Conservative Union (founded in 1964) first started holding these get-togethers, the GOP was in terrible disarray in the wake of Watergate and far-right organizers saw an opportunity to reshape the party in their conservative image. They invited Ronald Reagan to give the first keynote and the "New Right" never looked back.

CPAC has always been used as a way to take the temperature of the party activists and in that way, it's very instructive. The straw poll that's taken every year (or now, every few months, apparently) has not always been predictive of the party's nominee, but it shows what ideas and issues most excite the base. It's almost certain that the feedback loop between this group and the right-wing media guides the party as much as party officials and pollsters do. For the first quarter-century, the conference was an ideological gathering designed to promote the conservative movement agenda of anti-communism, small government, strong military, Christian Right values, low taxes, etc. But with the rise of the right-wing media first talk radio, then Fox News by the turn of the century, it became much more of a right-wing celebrity spectacle that sought to shock the political media, which loved to cover it since it was always held in DC. (This is the first year they've ever held the event outside of DC.) In fact, for the past 20 years, CPAC was basically the same circus that Trump took on the road for his beloved rallies. During the Bush years, politicians showed up and there were panel discussions of issues but the stars of the show were people like Ann Coulter, who pretty much made her name at these events. And they said things which, looking back, make January 6th seem inevitable.

At the 2002 meeting, Coulter said, "we need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too, otherwise, they will turn out to be outright traitors." A few years latershe made news againwith another notorious speech:

On Democrats: "Someday they will find a way to abort all future Boy Scouts."

College professors: "sissified, pussified." Harvard: "the Soviet Union." John Kerry: the other "dominant woman in Democratic politics."

Her post-9/11 motto: "Rag head talks tough, rag head faces consequences." For good measure, she threw in a joke about having Muslims burn down the Supreme Court with the liberal justices inside.

Then came questions. A young woman asked Coulter to describe the most difficult ethical decision she ever made. "There was one time I had a shot at Bill Clinton," Coulter said.

She meant that literally. Meanwhile, down in the bowels of the hotel hosting CPAC, they sold merchandise with adorable sayings such as "Happiness is Hillary Clinton's face on a milk carton" and "Rope. Tree. Journalist. Some Assembly Required." At the next year's event, Coulter said, "I was going to have a few comments on the other Democratic presidential candidate, John Edwards, but it turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word 'fa**ot,'" and when she was rebuked for saying it, she called it "speech totalitarianism."

There is nothing new under the right-wing sun.

In recent years, some of the acts were scrapped. Coulter was not invited in 2015, and in 2017 the right-wing provocateur Milo Yianopoulos wascanceledwhen it was revealed that he had made positive statements about pedophilia. They were no longer needed anyway. The show was by then dominated byDonald Trump who had made his first big political splash there in 2013spreading the "birther" lie, which the attendees ate up with a spoon. And while Coulter climbed her way back to CPAC this weekend, participating on an obscure panel going onabout immigrationand making grotesque racist statements, as usual,her act doesn't shock anymore and nobody cares. Who needs Coulter anyway when you have Trump?

Heather Digby Parton, also known as "Digby," is a contributing writer to Salon. She was the winner of the 2014 Hillman Prize for Opinion and Analysis Journalism.

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Trump cranks it up at CPAC: Why raising the spectacle of right-wing madness right now is so scary - Salon

Radio personality Rush Limbaugh pumps thumb after being awarded the Medal of Freedom by First Lady ... [+] Melania Trump after being acknowledged by US President Donald Trump as he delivers the State of the Union address at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on February 4, 2020. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN / AFP) (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

Influential yet controversial talk radio pioneer Rush Limbaugh passed away at age 70 on Wednesday. In a career spanning nearly 40 decades, Limbaugh transformed talk radio and politics alike.

He had been diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer in January 2020, and just days later was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by then President Donald Trump during last year's State of the Union address.

"Rush Limbaugh: Thank you for your decades of tireless devotion to our country," President Trump said during the address.

Since the launch of "The Rush Limbaugh Show" in 1988, Limbaugh became arguably one of the most beloved yet polarizing figures in American media. Beginning with just 56 radio stations, his show grew to be the most listened-to program in the United States. Limbaugh's passing comes just a week after another equally divisive media figure, Larry Flynt, passed away and the reactions on social media highlighted the divide in our country.

Across social media on Wednesday, Limbaugh's supporters hailed his efforts to support conservative causes, whilst his critics only saw the worst in the radio talk show host.

Fellow conservative commentator Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) was among the first to react to the news of Limbaugh's passing, "So sad. The Super Nova of American conservatism is dead. R.I.P. Rush Limbaugh"

Likewise, commentator Lou Dobbs (@LouDobbs) hailed Limbaugh's lengthy career, "Broadcast Legend Rush Limbaugh has died. His legions of fans will miss him, and his powerful and bright contribution to our national dialogue is a treasure that will endure for decades to come. Rush Limbaugh, a great American, dead at 70.God bless you Rush."

Many on the right side of the aisle in government expressed their feelings on Wednesday afternoon. Among those was Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) (@RandPaul), who tweeted, "RIP to a legend and a patriot, Rush Limbaugh. Not many people can say they revolutionized and stayed at the top of an industry the way he did. My condolences to his family."

Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) (@MarshaBlackburn) posted simply, "Rush Limbaugh was an inspiring and important voice for the conservative movement. He will be missed dearly. My sincere condolences to the Limbaugh family."

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (@mikepompeo) shared his thoughts on what Limbaugh brought to U.S. politics, "Rush Limbaugh made conservatism popular with the entire nation and revolutionized conservative media. He will be missed by all of his 'ditto heads,' this one included. Our country has lost one of its most important voices. Sending prayers to the Limbaugh family."

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) issued a statement on Twitter:

Little Respect

Not unexpectedly, many critics of Limbaugh expressed glee at the talk radio icon's passing with hate filled comments. If Limbaugh was divisive in life, the reactions by many liberals of his death on social media certainly were clear.

There were also attempts at humor at the passing of Limbaugh, and clearly he wasn't afforded any respect by some. That included comedian/writer Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) who posted, "It's easy to make fun of Rush Limbaugh right now, but it's important to remember that he also brought a lot of people a lot of joy by dying"

A similar joke was offered by writer/historian Natalie Shure (@nataliesurely), "However you feel about Rush Limbaugh, you've gotta admit that he's dead"

Video gaming streamer Mike Migdall (@ItsMigdallTime) took the joke perhaps a bit too far, "Phew! thought Rush limbaugh was trending because he was alive"

Writer Mitch Benn (@MitchBenn) was more direct, "If you can't think of anything good to say about Rush Limbaugh, that's because there isn't anything good to say about Rush Limbaugh."

David Axelrod (@davidaxelrod), senior political commentator from CNN, offered, "Whether you loved him or hated him-and there are very few people in between-Rush Limbaugh was indisputably a force of historic proportions. Over the past three decades, he did as much to polarize our politics as anyone and laid the groundwork for Trump and Trumpism."

But perhaps J. Charles Stanley (@JCharlesStanle1) summed the news of Limbaugh's passing best, "Say what you will about Rush's politics, but he definitely was highly successful in building his brand."

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Reaction To Passing Of Rush Limbaugh Trends On Social Media - Forbes

Comedy Central hosts Roasts of various celebrities, especially those whove been involved in a scandal recently. The insults are usually things said in jest about the recipients of said insults and are a fun way of allowing celebrities to let off steam about the person on the hot seat.

When Comedy Central decided to host the Roast of Rob Lowe in 2016, they didnt anticipate that an unexpected guest would outweigh Lowe with the number of insults they received. Pundit Ann Coulter got so much heat it was almost cringy to watch. Among those who insulted Coulter was renowned singer, Jewel. Read on to find out what Jewel had to say about Coulter.

The musician was born in Utah, but shortly after, her family moved to their Alaska homestead. Jewels parents divorced when she was eight, and she moved in with her father. She and her father lived at a house that was far away from town, and she spent most of her time exploring the outdoors. Jewel performed in bars around the town and sometimes would perform with her father. After receiving a scholarship to a Michigan Art School, she moved and learned how to play the guitar. She began songwriting at the art school. She then moved to California and began playing in coffee houses.

The talented singer was discovered during one of the days she was playing at a coffee shop. She got signed to Atlantic Records and released her first album in 1995 called Pieces of You. The album, however, didnt break even. Her big break came when she curtain-raised for Bob Dylan in 1997, and her song Who Will Save Your Soul got massive airplay. Although the album was met with lukewarm reviews, it made it to the top 4 on the Billboard charts.

Jewel is known for her vulnerable lyrics and sweet melodies. However, in 2003 the songbird released a pop-sounding album, which was a stark contrast to her previous sound. Fans and critics didnt like the album and criticized her a lot saying that she had strayed too far from her catchy melodic and folksy sound.

RELATED: What Is Singer-Songwriter Jewels Net Worth?

Aside from making music, Jewel also doubles as an author and actor. She has starred in various movies such as Framed for Murder: A Fixer Upper Mystery and Concrete Evidence: A Fixer Upper Mystery. In both of these movies, Jewel plays a contractor and investigator called Shannon Hughes.

In 2016 Jewel was invited to the Roast of Rob Lowe to provide a musical approach to the event. She had met Lowe when the two were to film The Lyons Den. She appeared for one episode of the show and the two remained friends. During the Roast session, the singer performed a parody of her hit song, You Were Meant for Me. In the piece, Jewel joked about being the 16-year-old who was having sex with Lowe in his 1988 sex tape. Other people who were on the show included Pete Davidson, David Spade, and Ann Coulter.

Coulter is known for her unfiltered and often offensive comments and views about anything not Republican. She is a well-known Conservative pundit who doesnt hold back from being the devils advocate. Coulter is famous for her hateful views, racist comments, and false and exaggerated claims about historical events.

During the Roast, many people seemed to have aimed most of their insults toward Coulter, which seemed to make the pundit visibly uncomfortable. Many of the insults aimed at Coulter used sexist tropes and misogynistic language. However, singer Jewel seemingly stole the show when she said, As a feminist, I dont agree with whats being said here but as someone who hates Anne Coulter, Im delighted, a statement which the crowd applauded.

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Jewel Hates Sexist Jokes But Will Let It Slide When Theyre Aimed at Ann Coulter - Showbiz Cheat Sheet