Franken distorts the context of Coulter, Clarence Thomas and The New York Times

Franken’s first specific example of Ann Coulter supposedly using endnotes to “lie” involves the allegation of running together sentences to look as though one person has said something when a different person actually said it.

Franken not only used this example in his book but at BookExpo America in 2003, where he said:

I write a chapter about Ann Coulter… Let me quote from her book:

“After Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote an opinion contrary to the clearly expressed position of the New York Times editorial page, the Times responded with an editorial on Thomas titled ‘The Youngest, Cruelest Justice.’ That was actually the headline on a lead editorial in the Newspaper of Record. Thomas is not engaged on the substance of his judicial philosophy. He is called ‘a colored lawn jockey for conservative white interests,’ ‘race traitor,’ ‘black snake,’ ‘chicken-and-biscuit-eating Uncle Tom,’ ‘house Negro’ and ‘handkerchief head,’ ‘Benedict Arnold’ and ‘Judas Iscariot’. All this from the tireless opponents of intolerance.”

Now what percentage of her readers think, do you think, think that the New York Times, from this paragraph, called Clarence Thomas a ‘chicken-and-biscuit-eating Uncle Tom,’? I’ll betcha like ninety-nine percent.

Was Coulter trying to mislead her readers, hoping they would not bother checking the endnotes? Or is it more likely that her statement has been misinterpreted?

To begin with, let’s examine a three-word lie from Franken’s diatribe at the Expo: “from this paragraph.” How many of Franken’s fans think that his quote from Coulter was all one paragraph? I’d bet around ninety-nine percent.

In reality, the last line Franken quoted is not from that paragraph in Coulter’s book. It is the first line of her next paragraph—a paragraph in which she continued with her examples concerning Clarence Thomas. In his book, Franken likewise wrote it out as though it were one paragraph. As it turns out, the New York Times article was only the first of many examples and Coulter clearly did not intend it to appear any other way. Franken included the first line of the next paragraph because he needed it to sound as though Coulter was concluding her thoughts–triumphantly finishing a point exclusively about the New York Times piece rather than continuing, as she actually was, with a list of examples from a variety of sources.

If anything, when she cited the New York Times example, Coulter was just getting started.

Coulter’s readers knew she wasn’t referring to the New York Times because they had the full context in front of them and are accustomed to her style. She condenses sentences to say as much as possible in as few words as possible.

Consider the two paragraphs immediately preceding Franken’s “paragraph” from Slander:

Gore campaign manager Donna Brazile called Colin Powell an “Uncle Tom.” Seemingly unaware of her boss’s race, she vowed that she would not “let the white boys win in this election.” Brazile said Colin Powell and Republican Congressman J.C. Watts “have no love and no joy” and would “rather take pictures with black children than feed them.” Democratic strategist Peter Fenn defended brazile, saying she was trying “to be inclusive.” Colin Powell failed to appreciate the inclusiveness, saying he was “disappointed and offended” by Brazile’s comments. J.C. Watts called her inclusive statements “racist.” Gore–striving for inclusiveness–refused to apologize to Powell or Watts.

Meanwhile, when he was still co-host of the Today show on NBC, Bryant Gumbel casually asked J.C. Watts whether it bothered him to be associated with “conservative extremists who are historically insensitive to minority concerns.” This is in contrast to Democrats who are “inclusive.”

Can you see her jump from point to point? Who would have guessed Coulter was about to jump from J.C. Watts and Colin Powell to Clarence Thomas. Pay special attention to the parts in bold:

After Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote an opinion contrary to the clearly expressed position of the New York Times editorial page, the Times responded with an editorial on Thomas titled ‘The Youngest, Cruelest Justice.’ That was actually the headline on a lead editorial in the Newspaper of Record. Thomas is not engaged on the substance of his judicial philosophy. He is called ‘a colored lawn jockey for conservative white interests,’ ‘race traitor,’ ‘black snake,’ ‘chicken-and-biscuit-eating Uncle Tom,’ ‘house Negro’ and ‘handkerchief head,’ ‘Benedict Arnold’ and ‘Judas Iscariot’.

All this from the tireless opponents of intolerance. The “lawn jockey” name in particular was a huge hit with the inclusive crowd. Emerge, an African-American magazine, ran on its cover a caricature of Thomas as a grinning lawn jockey with the title “Uncle Thomas: Lawn Jockey of the Far Right.” An illustration accompanying the article portrayed a grinning Thomas shining Justice Antonin Scalia’s shoes. The late federal judge Leon Higginbotham said Thomas rendered “Uncle Tom Justice.” Syndicated columnist Julianne Malveaux said she hoped Thomas’s “wife feeds him lots of eggs and butter and he dies early, like many black men do, of heart disease.” And thus were exposed the logical flaws in Thomas’s judicial philosophy!

Notice how Coulter wrote, “Thomas is not engaged on the substance of his judicial philosophy” then gave many examples of Thomas not being engaged on substance, ending with, “And thus were exposed the logical flaws in Thomas’s judicial philosophy!”

To an objective reader, one of the sentences in bold was the start of her examples and the other was the conclusion.

Therefore, the examples she gave between those lines is what “exposed the logical flaws in Thomas’s judicial philosophy!” The Times headline was merely a lead-in.

It was not difficult for Franken to make it look as though Coulter was accusing the New York Times of calling Thomas a “lawn jockey”. His audience, oblivious to the larger context, didn’t have a chance.