My Brush With Greatness

I almost had a heart attack today.

While re-reading a printout I had of an Ann Coulter column, I saw something I had evidently skipped over upon the first perusal.

This is how the column began:

"When I wrote a ferocious defense of Sen. Joe McCarthy in Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism , liberals chose not to argue with me. Instead they posted a scrolling series of reasons not to read my book, such as that I wear short skirts, date boys, and that "Treason" was not a scholarly tome."

What I didn't really absorb the first time is that she was talking about online reviewers panning the book with personal attacks rather than debating its claims. That part about the scholarly tome suddenly made me recall that, while on Amazon some time ago, I checked out some discussions about Ann, and that one of them was a ridiculous essay meant to prove that Ann's book was not scholarly. And, suddenly short of breath I recalled that I had posted a scathing response to the poster. The idea that Ann herself had read this discussion and maybe also my rebuttal was absolutely paralyzing.

Then I noticed the date of the column - November 7th. I had posted my response after Thanksgiving. Too bad. For a moment there, I had felt pretty incredible.

But I looked up the discussion a few minutes ago, to see if what I wrote was something I would be embarrassed to have The Ann read, or something I could have been proud of.

And I don't think it was too bad. So I think I'll repost the whole exchange here. First, the post by one calling himself Christopher K. Halbower:

"I'm of the opinion that they[Coulter's books] are not scholarly. I'll make my case below. However, I will preface this topic by saying that I am open minded. If a stronger case exists that proves Miss Coulter's books are scholarly, I'll certainly adopt that argument.

{Please note: Miss Coulter's political views are not really relevant as to whether her works are scholarly.}It is easy to dismiss Miss Coulter's literature on the basis of scholarly research.

For example, her book "Treason" is 368 pages long, has a relatively large font size and covers 60 years of history. She publishes a book almost every year.

Now, compare that with, say, Seymour Hersh's "Price of Power". This book is over 800 pages long, has a relatively small font size and covers 4 to 5 years of history. Hersh spent over 10 years researching this book.

Coulter's book is not cited in a single scholarly work. Hersh's book is cited in 92 other books.

"Treason" cannot be found in univserity libraries and therefore isn't being studied by tomorrow's historians. "Price of Power" is the definitive work on Kissinger's role as National Security Advisor; tomorrow's historians are almost certainly studying it.

And this is just one example. I could take any other scholarly work and compare it to Coulter's literature and arrive at the same conclusions: a)William Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich"; Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"; Josephus Flavius' "The Jewish Antiquities" and so on.

Coulter's works will not survive this generation because

1. they are not scholarly (see my above arguments)
2. the scholars of tomorrow are not studying them today
3. they are comtemporaneous without being scholarly and thus are not "timeless".

-Chris

Well, there's nothing more annoying than an earnest boob trying to prove his own scholarliness by name-dropping and liberal usage of words he doesn't really know his way around, so I felt compelled to research and respond.

Here's my post:

Does "scholarly" mean "full of crap?" Because if it does, your assertion that Seymour Hersh's works are scholarly while Ann's are not is certainly dead-on.

Here are some definitions of "scholarly" (Did you REALLY imagine you could post a credible discourse on the scholarliness or lack thereof of an author's works without beginning with an established, accurate definition of the word "scholarly"? REALLY? Wow.)

1. of, like, or befitting a scholar: scholarly habits.
2. having the qualities of a scholar: a scholarly person.
3. concerned with academic learning and research. -adverb
4. like a scholar.

"ˈscholarly - adjective: having or showing knowledge
Example: a scholarly person; a scholarly book"

Which certainly applies to Ann and her works - and how.

Doesn't say anything about said knowledge coming from unverifiably anonymous sources, or sources that are professional crooks, or sources that are reputable but misquoted, or slander, innuendo and outright lies, so I'm not sure whether that particular definition can be applied to Hersh's work or not.

Oh, wait, nope. This definition of the root word, scholar, precludes Mr. Hersh:

1. a learned or erudite person, esp. one who has profound knowledge of a particular subject.

Knowledge based on crap can hardly be called profound, now, can it?

There are some notable omissions in these definitions. I see no mention of the standards of number of pages or font size which are evidently essential factors in judging the scholarliness of a work.

I am surprised to discover that Shakespeare cannot be considered "scholarly." But apparently, it's true - he wrote 37 plays in a lifetime of 52 years, not even counting his poetry - and if Ann's writing 6 books in 10 years precludes her from scholarliness, than poor William has no chance.

He's certainly no Seymour Hersh.

"the most gullible investigative reporter I've ever encountered."

"..best understood as the Geraldo of print investigative reporters."

"there is hardly anything [in the book] that shouldn't be suspect."

"Hersh and his article lack integrity."

"Hersh used [supposedly authentic documents he discovered] to get NBC to sign a $2.5 million contract to make a Kennedy documentary, and when the network pulled out Hersh signed with ABC for the same amount. But when ABC had the documents tested, they turned out to be phony." (say, is Dan Rather scholarly?)

"a little fast and loose with the facts."

"Particularly arguable are the innuendoes in which he indulges and the conclusions to which he jumps on the basis of his raw material."

"If the standard for being fired was being wrong on a story, I would have been fired long ago."

If that's scholarly, the adjective is completely unworthy of being attached to Ann. Most of those quotes, all describing Hersh, came from liberals. The last was spoken by Hersh himself.

"almost every episode or statement on Kissinger ascribed to him by Hersh [was] a distortion, an exaggeration, a misinterpretation, or an expletive-deleted lie."

This quote is from a man cited by Hersh as a major source for his book.

I tremble to contemplate the stellar quality and unimpeachable credibity that must mark the 92 works that cited this guy.

And again, the scholarly thing to do would have been to open your thesis with a definition of the word scholarly. Just for next time.