This subthread about Coulter versus Olbermann keeps showing up, and it seems to me that the outgassing misses a fundamental point: The sensibilities and sense of humor of Conservatives and Liberals are very different, and the commentators and humorists popular with each side are fundamentally different. They can't simply be ranked on some scale as more or less of some one quality.

Fox "News" decided to take a nasty shot at "The Daily Show" (imagined by people unable to remember a time prior to 2000, when TDS had fun with Democrats, as a Liberal show) by producing "The Half Hour News Hour" in retaliation. It's going nowhere and I've only managed to catch it by accident a couple of times in a late Sunday night death spot, but it really shows the fundamental difference in the two brands of humor.

"The Daily Show"'s success is founded on its technique of letting politicians and officeholders make asses of themselves, in their own words. Their signature technique is to juxtapose statements, like Fleischer or Snowjob making liars of themselves; or to collect the utterances of several supposedly independent political spokesman to reveal that they're all reading from the same propaganda script. TDS ridicules powerful individuals and institutions, and it's clear that the audience is laughing along with Jon Stewart at the individual targets.

But Fox's show is very different. It relies on actors making insulting portrayals of ridiculous "Liberals" as imagined by Wingers. I have never once seen the show use an actual video clip of an actual Democrat. They make their shit up, and it's clear that the audience is laughing in appreciation of Fox's insults against an entire group of people, and not at the antics of any one politician. The show is a hate crime disguised as comedy.

And that's the truth about Winger humor: It's violent, vicious, lowbrow, bigoted, and filled with hate. I'm on a Winger emailing list, and every day I get to read examples of Winger hate-humor, such as the recurring lovingly-detailed fantasies about Hillary Clinton dying a brutal and painful death, or the vicious racist lies made up about Barack Obama. That's entertainment to Wingers!

In the modern style, political commentators and humorists tend to be one and the same people. They acquire their audiences by being able to deliver their point in an entertaining way..."a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down". Coulter and Olbermann are commentator/humorists, and their styles reflect their audience's taste. Olbermann is fairly erudite and his criticisms are directed at individuals; his outrage is pointedly directed at actions. Coulter's style of expression is brutish and her shotgun attacks are intended to hurt anyone who dares disagree with her extreme beliefs; her hatred is an indiscriminate toxic spew in all directions attacking beliefs, lifestyle, religion, and character.

I really think that Olbermann is one of the live-and-let-live types. He's clearly not intent on the genocide of all Conservatives, as Coulter has demanded the execution of Liberals. Olbermann isn't motivated by ideological bigotry, only incensed at the betrayal of trust by high officeholders. That makes Olbermann as American as apple pie, and Coulter and her ilk as un-American as Joseph McCarthy or George Lincoln Rockwell.

Keith Olbermann is one of the good guys. More power to him.

Ann Coulter is the daughter of Satan and a demon from the seventh circle of Hell in human form.

Any questions?