I  found myself looking at almost identical tag lines for two speeches by the same person but at different venues, “Ann Coulter just gave an OUTSTANDING Speech, gets standing ovation”. I just had to watch this paragon. The two speeches turned out to be very similar, but the video of one of them was a bit of a technical mess, so I chose the other which was less of a mess though the camera work was sloppy.

Ann Coulter has been described as the undisputed star of the rightwing American loudmouths, and while preparing this posting I watched her fillet Jeremy Paxman without breaking sweat.

The speech that I chose to cover here was at the Oxford Union, not normally regarded as a hotbed of right wing extremism, and I was fascinated to see how they took to her uncompromising approach to her opinions.

Coulter brings newness. President Trump is possibly the most polarising figure I can remember, and people’s attitude towards him has become tedious. I suffer from Trump fatigue to such an extent that when his name gets mentioned I want to be somewhere else. Trump haters will not hear a word on his behalf, not even over the promising developments in North Korea. Trump lovers will not hear a word against him. I’d given up waiting for an evaluation of his presidential progress that wasn’t buried under bigotry.

Here we have someone who, in her own words, is holding his feet to the fire. Very much a supporter she is nevertheless highly critical of him. I don’t have to agree with her to find that refreshing.

Her speaking style is likewise refreshing, being stripped of pretence. She just talks! Her focus is where it should be – on her message and her audience, she has plenty to say and she keeps it simple. I enjoy listening.

I also enjoy transatlantic echoes. In the early days of this blog I went out looking for speeches beyond British shores, many of them American, and got mildly involved in American politics. Despite the differing political systems the similarities with Britain are almost spooky. It was not mere chance that the Brexit vote and Trump’s election occurred within a few months of each other: both nations were facing similar fundamental issues. As an example, take a sentence that Coulter utters as part of her explanation for Trump’s electoral victory…

For twenty years both political parties have been lying to us…

From the evidence of this video Coulter didn’t get a standing ovation. The audience did laugh a couple of times, but in the main greeted the speech in respectful and thoughtful silence, applauding at the end. If they departed the hall disagreeing with every word she spoke, they didn’t do it from ignorance. They heard her out, probably learnt something, and that’s the value of free speech.