First Cruise, now Coulter. Both media figures with outspoken views. Both went on the Today Show to discuss their respective projects with Matt Lauer. Both were challenged by Lauer and, arguably, came away from the show with public personas permanently damaged.

The cacaphonous reverberations now caused by a controversial appearance on the show are in no small part an effect of YouTube and the rise of Internet video, which can disseminate a Coulterism infinitely faster than a crashed book junket, leaked galley or even the 7:15 AM Today Show broadcast itself.

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