Responses to Coulter

By Richard Baehr

I have received a lot of email about my article on Ann Coulter. I have also watched the video of her interview with Donnie Deutsch a few more times. I am not a Deutsch fan by the way, regardless of what I think of Coulter. He appears to have learned his interview technique from Chris Matthews- namely sneer and talk over his guests. I feel better all the time for reading more and watching almost no cable TV news/interview programs.

Even if Coulter were the less obnoxious of the two on the short 5 minute video sequence, her comments are still problematic. Coulter applauds diversity within the Christian church, but thinks America would be better if there were no such diversity among the religions practiced in the country. There is a huge difference between believing one's religion is the right one and the best one (for you and for others) and even believing church doctrine that your religion has perfected earlier ones on the one hand, and believing the country would be better if all worshipped as Christians on the other.

Do people behave better and become better people once they become Christian? Regardless of individuals' path to salvation, we are not a better country (nor do we necessarily behave better) merely because more people become members of church X instead of synagogue Y or temple Z. To think otherwise about behavior in the temporal universe, is foolish, I think.

For my Jewish friends, I think there is little to fear from any Christian proselytizing effort, and Coulter's comments won't initiate any new crusade. Jews who leave the faith tend to leave it to become secular, not to accept another faith. And observant Jews are certainly not candidates for abandoning Judaism for Christianity.

Coulter is right about one thing -- Judaism is much tougher. It requires observance of the "law", which really means lots of laws. Coulter calls Christianity a "shortcut". In any case, my own experience is that Dennis Prager is correct in noting that there are often stronger ties and more commonality in behavior between religious Christians and religious Jews in this country, than between religious Christians and non-observant (nominal) Christians, or between religious Jews, and non-observant (very secular) Jews. The commonality that exists among religiously observant people, and also among secular people, often goes beyond attitudes about religion to political attitudes as well. Where Coulter is right, I think, is that many secular people, whether Jews or Christian, have joined the church of liberalism. I would prefer that she stick to trying to convert the members of that church.