When I think of conservative pundit Ann Coulter, I can’t help but think about that scene from Scarface when Tony Montana, in a cocaine-induced rage, taunts a group of diners in a fancy restaurant: “You need people like me so you can … say, ‘That’s the bad guy.’ … You just know how to hide, how to lie. Me, I don’t have that problem. I always tell the truth—even when I lie.” Coulter might not be a liar, but her reality is far from the truth.
Coulter, a self-described “polemicist” who likes to “stir up the pot” and does not pretend to be “impartial or balanced”, has made a career out of controversy. Given her track record, I’m not shocked that she referred to John Edwards as a “faggot” earlier this month. At this point Coulter has to offend people just to get by. By not doing so, she would condemn herself to what every celebrity, A or B-list, fears most: obscurity.
Judith Warner framed Coulter’s idiocy: “‘Faggot’ and ‘total fag,’ like other political pearls of our time—such as ‘bring it on’ and ‘girlie men’—are just epoch-making in their stupidity.” Hardly surprising from Coulter, a person who has condemned Sept. 11 widows for exploiting their husbands’ deaths for personal gain and someone who recommended “sending liberals to Guantanamo.”
It’s no surprise that Democrats are outraged by Coulter’s career in nonsensical mudslinging. What might (or might not) be surprising is that all three major Republican presidential candidates condemned Coulter’s recent actions as well, sending the universal message that “Ann Coulter doesn’t speak for us.” The party Coulter supposedly supports refuses to return the favor, which brings up an interesting question: Who, exactly, does Ann Coulter speak for?
One answer lies in the thoughts of political commentator Frank Luntz: “To communicate with the people—the real people of ‘small town, middle America’—and to speak straight to their hearts, minds and entrails, you’ve got to put ‘yourself right into your listener’s shoes.’ In other words, think small.” While Luntz’s simplistic target of middle America is a stretch, he is correct in his assessment of Coulter’s exploitation of the politically ignorant by pandering to a more instinctual rather than intellectual side.
Extremism has always been marketable in this country. It has spawned a whole form of entertainment, inappropriately labeled “reality TV”, that depicts people eating worms and cheating on their spouses for prizes—Coulter advocates for extreme politics while “Fear Factor” promotes extreme reality. The truth is, none of it is real, only appetizing. Our nation is fascinated with ideologues, explaining why Savage has a nation and Colbert mocks O’Reilly. But Coulter, unlike the aforementioned pundits, has no media outlet to mobilize her masses. Thus she’s become a shameless self-promoter, a circus act that constantly needs to push boundaries to stay in the spotlight. Think of Coulter’s ideology as crack cocaine: a temporary pleasure quickly overshadowed by horribly retarding side-effects. It’s a cheap addiction a lot of people share, whether they admit it or not.
If this is so, shouldn’t we just ignore Ann Coulter, as we would a spoiled child? I initially thought so, and at first I considered not giving her my attention. But as USC law professor Susan Estrich warned: “What is wrong with being mean to get attention is that it plays to the worst in people, and in doing so it tears at our social fabric.” Unlike extremists Rush Limbaugh or Michael Moore, Coulter’s ideology is not a polarized politics, but rather a capitalization of bigotry. And while many might casually dismiss Coulter’s attack on godless liberals and homosexuals as trivial, ignoring her doesn’t change the fact that she promotes and legitimizes the hatred and contempt of those looking to exercise their prejudice.
Ann Coulter epitomizes the partisanship that has divided our nation over the past decade. But it seems that everyone, Republican and Democrat, stands united against Coulter, a reassuring indication of changing political times. And while Coulter declares war on godless liberals, she’s become the enemy of all America. Despite Tony Montana’s thinking, we don’t need Ann Coulter to know what’s good about our country. That’s because there’s nothing united about Coulter’s United States, and that’s not the liberal in me talking—it’s the American.
(This is my weekly column that appeared in the Daily Californian. You can also read it here)
