“Godless”: Satan Publishes a Book

Think nothing strange happened yesterday?  Think again.  Ann Coulter released a new book, and of course it included some over-the-top nonsense bashing the 9/11 widows as being "self-obsessed" and "reveling in their status as celebrities"…

Ann Coulter is known for saying outrageous things, such as "Sen. Joe McCarthy was an American hero" and we should conquer all of the Islamic countries in the Middle East and make the people "convert to Christianity"… but this takes the cake:

"These self-obsessed women seem genuinely unaware that 9-11 was an attack on our nation and acted… as if the terrorist attack only happened to them.  They believe the entire country was required to marinate in their exquisite personal agony.  Apparently, denouncing Bush was a part of the closure process…

"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by griefpaparazzis.  I have never seen people enjoying their husband's death so much."

That is low, even for Ann Coulter.

Of course, the objective of all this is to allow her to take over the headlines for a week or two, a pattern that she has established with her other books, by starting out with something shocking enough to outrage a lot of people.  Oddly enough, she actually has a fan base, of people who really believe that the statements she makes are logical and credible.  I used to think most of what she said was so ridiculous that it was funny, but it doesn't take much for her to start spewing some truly vile things:

• • "Liberals become indignant when you question their patriotism, but simultaneously work overtime to give terrorists a cushion for the next attack and laugh at dumb Americans who love their country and hate the enemy."
  • "Even Islamic terrorists don't hate America like liberals do.  They don't have the energy.  If they had that much energy, they'd have indoor plumbing by now."
  • "My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is that he did not go to the New York Times Building."
  • "The problem with women voting… is that.. women have no capacity to understand how money is earned.  They have a lot of ideas on how to spend it…"
  • "Liberals love America like OJ loved Nicole."

 It is really scary that there are people out there who can't see through Ann Coulter's shock tactics.  I find it hard to believe that she actually believes the things that she writes.  No one could be that coldhearted, all in the name of being "conservative".  Her statements always tend to be erratic, as if she talks just to hear herself speak.  And whenever she is asked to back something up with fact or logic, she starts in on the tired tactic of "liberal bashing", even if she is talking to a fellow conservative.  She tends to come across as being less than sane.

This is a woman who stops short of saying that Hitler was a hero.  Maybe one day she'll write a book about that.

Daily Dish

 

• Now that Britney has banished him to the basement, K-Fed has a lot more time to read what his MySpace friends actually think of him.  [BWE]
• Dan Brown has been accused of plagiarizing everything but the Bible.  [PopWatch]
• People need to stop complaining about The Da Vinci Code, because worse things have been published, like Christopher Hitchens' "history of the blowjob" in Vanity Fair.  [Jossip]
• Interview with Darryl Stephens of Noah's Arc.  [Rod 2.0]
• Speaking of Noah's Arc, the show seems to be using The L Word's strategy of adding more characters than the writers can create storylines for.  [Rod 2.0]
• Jennifer Garner is the second person reported to turn down work related to the upcoming Dallas feature film because JLo is connected to it.  Maybe Garner has to comfort hubby Ben Affleck after his nightmares about his long-running publicity stunt relationship with JLo.  [The Bosh]
• Heather Mills-McCartney's former partner in porn is already jumping at the chance to cash in.  [Celebitchy (Link includes pictures that are NSFW)]
• Which is better?  A D-List movie star, or a C-List cable TV star?  [IDLYITW]
• Are Paris and Nicole faking their feud?  [Nova Slim]

The Opposite of Progress: Luda’s Beef with Oprah

If Texas cattlemen couldn't handle a beef with Oprah (sorry for the pun), just what makes Ludacris and Ice Cube think they can?

I won't even include 50 Cent here, because, as his name implies, he is famous for offering some random opinion (which rarely makes any sense) on just about anything. 

Ludacris has complained that Oprah dissed him on her show.  Bill O'Reilly did the same thing, but we haven't seen Luda embarking on a campaign to speak out against him. 

When he first mentioned the episode in an interview with Angie Martinez on NY's Hot 97, he said that he had been upset by the way that Oprah had treated him, but he would just let the matter pass, because, really, why bother complaining about it?  It's Oprah.  And it was her show.  End of story. 

Or so we thought.  Ludacris obviously changed his mind after a few months.  And now Ice Cube has joined in the fray:

The Are We There Yet? star followed in the footsteps of fellow rappers turned critics Ludacris and 50 Cent, telling FHM magazine that Stedman's better half has unfairly kept the arbiters of thug life off her airwaves.

"I've been involved in three projects pitched to her, but I've never been asked to participate," the 36-year-old told the magazine in its July issue. "For Barbershop she had Cedric the Entertainer and Eve on, but I wasn't invited. Maybe she's got a problem with hip-hop.

"She's had damn rapists, child molesters and lying authors on her show. And if I'm not a rags-to-riches story for her, who is?"

The fact is that it is still Oprah's show.  Oprah has been challenged by many people, and yet, she still has the upperhand, because at the end of the day, she is the one who runs things in her studio, and she has the final say on who appears on her show or not.  Why is this such a big thing, anyway?  Beefs are typically held against a fellow rapper, all in the name of garnering publicity for a new album release.  Most rappers rarely take the time to look outside of the world of Hip Hop to complain about anything; and now that a few prominent artists have decided to stop counting their money long enough to notice that there actually are some people who don't worship them and everything that they do, they have decided to take on a person who has never really had much to say about them.

Oprah has had plenty of opportunities to criticize Hip Hop and some of the negative aspects of the music and the culture, but surprisingly, she has never really done that.  Instead, she has focused her efforts on trying to do positive things for her viewers and for other people (her humanitarian work is an example). 

So, Oprah may not like Hip Hop.  Why does she have to?  Oprah is not taking any unit sales away from these high profile artists, and she is not diminishing their box office returns in anyway, so why pick on Oprah?  Are Luda, Ice Cube, and others trying to get people to boycott Oprah, just because she supposedly "has a thing against rappers?"  Boycotting is only really effective when the object of the boycott has been responsible for some sort of tangible suffering.  You can criticize Oprah, but you can't deny that she has done amazing things for millions of people. 

How many would-be Oprah bashers in the Hip Hop world can say that they have done the same?

Random Ruminations

• America's Next Top Model – 30 minutes of Tyra worship + Janice Dickinson = The Janice Dickinson Model Agency.  [The Bosh]
• These people will be sorely disappointed.  [Pop Culture Junkies]
• Victoria Beckham is reportedly eager to give Katie Holmes some post pregnancy weight loss advice– which will most likely be her list of personal plastic surgeons.  [Biggest Celebrities]
• Teri Hatcher offers tips on the cheapest breast lift on record.  [Defamer]
• Girlfriends: the one Sex and the City clone that actually worked.  [Slate]
• Lindsay Lohan still hasn't learned that there is a big difference between being a movie star and being an actor.  [Movie Blog]

News and Nonsense

 

• JLo is still learning that one of the disadvantages to being married to someone who is as painful to look at as Marc Anthony is that people will stop looking at her too. You could call it being ugly by association.  [Celebitchy, Defamer]
• Who wants to spend enough time at a gas pump to watch TV?  [Adrants]
• David Copperfield could use some tips from Michael Jackson for his next magical stunt of attempting to impregnate a woman without having sex.  [Female First]
• The L Word keeps adding characters, because a show always becomes more interesting when you have more people to deliver cheesy dialogue.  [Hothouse]
• Ziyi Zhang to star in a live-action version of Mulan.  [Movie Blog] 
• Alan Greenspan's memoir will probably sell a million copies before it's even written.  [PopWatch]
• Interview with Piper Perabo.  [London Times]