Vivek Ramaswamy Impressed By Gutsy Ann Coulter Insulting Him To His Face
We're not kink-shaming anyone here.
There are two very important jobs entrusted to those in the GOP who are not heterosexual, cisgender, WASP men. The first is to be a “good sport” when other conservatives insult you directly to your face. The second is, in case of scandal, to be ready at a moment’s notice to go on the news to talk about how Democrats are the real racists/sexists/homophobes/whatever.
Vivek Ramaswamy has mastered both. Surely you all fondly recall when, after a white man took a gun with a swastika emblazoned on it and killed three Black people in a Dollar General and then killed himself, leaving behind a trove of obscenely racist writings, Ramaswamy dutifully made the rounds, talking about how he still believes white supremacists are not real, how we shouldn’t politicize this obviously politically motivated crime, and how, of course, Democrats are the real racists. For, uh, reasons.
Recently, he had an opportunity to demonstrate how skilled he is at the first job, when he invited Ann Coulter on his TRUTH podcast (because everyone has a podcast now).
Ramaswamy opened the show with a plaintive monologue about how there are two kinds of nationalism: ethnonationalism, which people see as the bad kind, and “civic nationalism,” which he sees as good, and which is the kind of nationalism he believes conservatives want.
Then he brought on Coulter, who right off the bat said he was very articulate, adding that she couldn’t say that if he were a Black American, because people think that’s racist. Which, you know, it is.
Soon after, she told him that while she agreed with him perhaps more than other candidates who were running for President this time around, she would not have voted for him, because he’s Indian.
“We’ll get back to that,” she said, before embarking on a rant about how it’s stupid not to do things just because Hitler did them, arguing “Hitler had soup. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have soup. Hitler loved dogs. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t love dogs!”
Of course, it is worth noting that neither soup nor dogs factored into the Holocaust or WWII in any major capacity. Nationalism, on the other hand, was definitely one of the major points. I imagine things might have turned out a bit differently if Hitler’s primary goal had been to make the world’s most delicious potato soup.
At this point, Coulter brought out the old “Everyone’s allowed to be proud of their heritage but Anglo-Saxons!” saw, and Ramaswamy just let her run with it. She went on and on about how other groups are allowed to do this, especially at soccer games. She remarked about how Venezuelans are proud to be Venezuelans, Mexicans are proud to be Mexicans, oddly noting that they are proud of their countries at these games, not of being “Hispanics.” Odd, because what she wants to celebrate is being “Anglo-Saxon.” Or, specifically, being a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant.
The Anglo-Saxons, as far as I am aware, do not have an official soccer team.
There is a reason why asking “Why can’t white people be proud of being white?” is, in fact, racist as hell. Because what people are celebrating when they are celebrating their heritage is not the simple fact of it, but rather their food, their culture, their language, their art, etc. As far as I know, no one is stopping Ann Coulter from golfing or watching a marathon of Arrested Development while eating Beef Wellington or wearing a sweater tied around her neck. That is fine! Where it gets weird is where she and others just want to celebrate “generally being white,” in a world where white people still have the most privilege.
But she went on and on about how WASPs are the “template” American and therefore the real Americans, and all the presidents have been at least part English, which is why, I assume, she would not vote for Ramaswamy. Not template-y enough!
Then she started getting real weird about Catholics and how Catholic countries will never be successful because they think God likes poor people, whereas Calvinists understand that you’re supposed to work extra hard so you can be successful to prove that you are one of those that God predestined to go to Heaven. Because being rich is how you know God loves you.
She also claimed we’ve only had one Catholic president, which means she’s either forgotten about JFK or Joe Biden, the actual current president living in the White House at this very moment, who is Catholic.
Oh! And she claimed that while the early colonists let Jewish people vote, they didn’t let Catholics vote because they knew they were only loyal to the Pope. This is incorrect. Catholics were barred from voting in five colonies and Jewish people were barred in four. People were terrible all over, and that’s partly why it’s kind of hilarious that anyone pretends the United States was really founded on religious freedom. Rhode Island was founded on religious freedom, in that it was literally established by Roger Williams as a place where people could practice any religion they wanted, but that is about it.
In a tweet promoting the interview, Ramaswamy literally said that “Coulter told me flat-out to my face that she couldn’t vote for me ‘because you’re an Indian,’ even though she agreed with me more than most other candidates. I disagree with her but respect she had the guts to speak her mind. It was a riveting hour.”
It was not, for the record, a riveting hour. I watched the whole thing and I remain entirely unriveted. Pretty creeped out, yes, but not riveted.
Ramaswamy should know by now that the kind of people who would think things like “I agree with you, but I’d never vote for you because you are Indian” almost always have the “guts” to speak their mind. In fact, I would have to imagine that he could find no shortage of Republicans who would be more than happy to tell him that directly to his face, and probably will, now that he’s made it clear that he is fine with that.
That should be real fun for him, I’d imagine. Personally, I don’t consider people who insult me to my face to be be “gutsy,” particularly if they follow that up with some real bad history. I would consider them stupid for not realizing that I will eviscerate them and send them home crying. Which is exactly what Ramaswamy would do if he had any guts beyond an ability to just sit there and look docile while taking all of Ann Coulter’s shit.
PREVIOUSLY:
"I disagree with her but respect she had the guts to speak her mind"
UGH...that crap reminds me of my racist aunt, who loved to say "well, isn't it better that I am honest about it?" Finally I got fed up and said "no, actually, being openly racist doesn't make it good to be racist."
She STFU after that.
Haven't been in touch with her in years. Don't miss her a bit...
/FFS
The Angols and the Saxons.
England is named for the Germanic tribe called the Angles. There they speak English and such speakers are called Anglophones.
Had the Saxons proved the better, they would have given us Sexland. There they would speak Sexish and the speakers would be rephered to as saxophones.