On Hannity & Colmes, Coulter again made Obama-Hitler comparison, said Clinton “would enjoy torturing” detainees

On Hannity & Colmes, Ann Coulter stated of Sen. Barack Obama: “He's a dime store Mein Kampf.” Co-host Alan Colmes then asked if Obama “is a two-bit Hitler,” to which Coulter responded, "[Y]es." Coulter also said of Sen. Hillary Clinton: “She's not obsessed with waterboarding and stopping waterboarding, and given the glint in her eye, I think she'd like torturing them.”

During the April 3 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, conservative pundit Ann Coulter stated of Sen. Barack Obama: “He's a dime store Mein Kampf.” Co-host Alan Colmes then asked if Obama “is a two-bit Hitler,” to which Coulter responded, "[Y]es." Colmes continued: “We should be as wary of Obama as they should have been of Hitler in Nazi Germany?” Coulter responded: “If only people had read Mein Kampf.” Earlier in the segment, citing her April 2 syndicated column, Coulter stated that Sen. John McCain “may end up being the luckiest man in the world, running against this absolute racist Obama, as noted in my column.”

As Media Matters for America noted, in her April 2 column Coulter wrote of Sen. Barack Obama's 1995 memoir, Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance: “Has anybody read this book? Inasmuch as the book reveals Obama to be a flabbergasting lunatic, I gather the answer is no. Obama is about to be our next president: You might want to take a peek. If only people had read 'Mein Kampf' ...” Mein Kampf, or “My Struggle” as translated from German, is the 1925 autobiography of Adolf Hitler and an exposition on National Socialist political theory, the ideological foundation of the Nazi Party.

Other conservative pundits have made Hitler references when talking about Obama. As Media Matters noted, on the February 11 broadcast of Fox News Radio's Tom Sullivan Show, host Tom Sullivan aired what he called a “side-by side comparison” of a Hitler speech and an Obama speech. On the February 22 edition of CNN Headline News' Glenn Beck, National Review Online editor-at-large Jonah Goldberg compared Obama and former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to Hitler.

Additionally, during Hannity & Colmes, Coulter asserted of Sen. Hillary Clinton: “She's not obsessed with waterboarding and stopping waterboarding, and given the glint in her eye, I think she'd like torturing them. Have you seen that woman give a speech? I think she would enjoy torturing them at Guantánamo.” Coulter previously claimed on the February 8 edition of NBC's Today that Clinton “has not hysterically denounced waterboarding.” In fact, Clinton said she opposed Alberto Gonzales' 2005 nomination as attorney general because "[m]emos prepared under his direction that same year recommended official authorization of cruel interrogation methods including: waterboarding, feigned suffocation, and sleep deprivation." Further, Clinton stated that she opposed Michael Mukasey's 2007 nomination to succeed Gonzales as attorney general because “Judge Mukasey's failure to clarify his answers and categorically oppose the unacceptable interrogation techniques employed by this Administration leaves me no choice but to oppose his nomination.”

From the April 3 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes:

SEAN HANNITY (co-host): But I will bet you any amount of money, any bet, any dinner, any place, anywhere, restaurant of your choice, with any bottle of wine you want --

COULTER: -- that I won't vote for her?

HANNITY: You won't vote for a Democrat. You will never pull the lever this election year for a Democrat.

COULTER: Well, I don't want to give either of them a mandate, so I will probably write in Ronald Reagan.

HANNITY: Oh, come on.

COULTER: But I'm not going to vote for a Democrat, so I won't vote for John McCain.

JOHN CARLSON (radio talk show host): I didn't think it was congenitally possible for Ann Coulter to pull the lever for a Democrat.

HANNITY: Right.

CARLSON: You're not really going to vote for Hillary.

HANNITY: No.

COULTER: If -- as I said, and I haven't --

HANNITY: She won't.

COULTER: -- changed my mind, if the election were close and it's between Hillary and McCain, I think Hillary would be better on national security.

HANNITY: She's not -- she doesn't mean it. I'm telling -- I know she would never do it. Never.

COLMES: She's lying?

[crosstalk]

CARLSON: Wait, wait, wait, hold on.

COLMES: Are you calling her a liar?

HANNITY: No, she's not lying; she's [unintelligible] --

COLMES: Let me defend you --

CARLSON: Why would Hillary -- why would Hillary protect America better than John McCain?

COULTER: Do you really want me to go through this again on Fox airwaves?

HANNITY: Answer this.

COULTER: 'Cause they're getting a little testy with me for making the case.

CARLSON: No, no. Who do you think the soldiers in Iraq would rather to see as their commander and chief?

COULTER: No, I understand we have spent 10 years building up a hatred for the Clintons. And frankly, when I endorsed her, I was secretly pleased that it seemed to kill her nomination.

However, she's not obsessed with being called a maverick by The New York Times, like -- oh, who could I think of? Yes, John McCain. She's not obsessed with waterboarding and stopping waterboarding, and given the glint in her eye, I think she'd like torturing them. Have you seen that woman give a speech? I think she would enjoy torturing them at Guantánamo.

CARLSON: They play those at Gitmo.

COULTER: She doesn't run around saying we've got to shut down Guantánamo. So I think I've just made the case. What do you have to say?

[...]

COULTER: I think the point is, the most important question right now is -- is who it is John McCain chooses as his vice president. Because he may end up being the luckiest man in the world, running against this absolute racist Obama, as noted in my column --

[crosstalk]

COLMES: Wait, wait a minute, wait a minute. Why are you calling him a racist? Why are you calling him a racist?

COULTER: -- or Hillary Clinton, who -- I mean, he could -- he could be the luckiest man in the world, liberal Republican --

COLMES: Why are you calling him a racist?

COULTER: Because we -- the topic we were supposed to be talking about in this segment, Sean -- my column this week. I'm the only person in America who has read Obama's autobiography --

COLMES: You know, as a matter of fact --

COULTER: -- and all he has a racial hair-trigger, he's a complete loon. All he talks about is constantly being offended. And Mr. Unity attacks Sean Hannity and me.

COLMES: All right, you said in your piece --

[crosstalk]

COULTER: -- and now we're offended.

HANNITY: Me and you in the same sentence --

COLMES: Hold on, we only have a second left. You said, if only -- you might want to take a peek at Obama and what he writes -- “if only people had read 'Mein Kampf' ... ”

COULTER: Yeah.

COLMES: So in other words, he would be as dangerous as Hitler?

COULTER: No. He's a dimestore Mein Kampf.

COLMES: Oh, he's a two-bit Hitler?

COULTER: But yes. It is absolute racialist. If you read Mein Kampf --

COLMES: I see.

COULTER: -- it's all about his Germanic heritage. And this is -- OK, go read it. If you don't believe me --

COLMES: All right, I see.

COULTER: -- you want to read the CliffsNotes version in my column.

COLMES: We should be as wary of Obama as they should have been of Hitler in Nazi Germany?

COULTER: If only people had read Mein Kampf.

COLMES: I just want to get you on the record. We will come right back.