Friday, January 06, 2012

Coulter's Anti-Catholic Screed Against Santorum Revisited ... "Don't Vote for Santorum Because He's 'Too Catholic' "

I am revisiting my post from yesterday titled "Ann Coulter ... Anti-Catholic Bigot" because I believe an important point needs to be re-emphasized.

Since publishing my piece yesterday, I have received mostly agreement from other quarters of the blogosphere, but there have been a few who have accused me of "misconstruing" Coulter's commentary. These accusations have been along the lines of "Coulter's late father was Catholic" (yeah, so was Henry VIII's) or "All she's saying is that Catholicism and conservatism aren't the same thing" (Really? Is that ALL she was saying?).

One commenter at my original post made essentially these arguments in multiple comments here, here, and here. Because I believe this commenter and others are the ones who are TRULY trying to misconstrue and obfuscate the real meaning behind Coulter's commentary, I believe a response is necessary.

These folks seem to be trying to make someone sound reasonable who isn't particularly known for her reasonableness. Coulter is a bomb thrower and an iconoclast. She's not trying to make a reasoned argument here for why Santorum is less preferable to Romney. It's not her style. Never has been. She's throwing bombs at Santorum using one of the best weapons available to do so - bigotry.

All the pro-Coulter spin can't cover that basic fact. The basic fact that, in its essence, Coulter's screed comes down to this: "Don't vote for Santorum because he's 'too Catholic'."

I wonder why Coulter invoked Ted Kennedy, who has almost nothing in common with Santorum other than the fact that they were baptized into the Catholic Church as infants? Could it be because to many evangelicals (and I know because I was a Southern Baptist for the first 36 years of my life), the Kennedys in general, and Ted Kennedy in particular, represents everything that is allegedly "wrong" with the Catholic faith? I cannot tell you how many times during my years as an evangelical that I heard the Kennedy name invoked as a warning about the dangers of Catholicism. It rather seems to me that what Coulter has done with her comparison to Kennedy is to try to tar Santorum with guilt by association in the minds of evangelical voters who might be tempted to support Santorum over Romney.

Honestly, is there REALLY any other way to interpret this piece by Coulter? If so, then she certainly left open the possibility of the reading I (and others, I might add) have given to it. But the one thing you can say about Coulter is that she has NEVER had a problem making herself perfectly clear. And she's perfectly clear in stating here that Santorum is unacceptable because he is "too Catholic".

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5 Comments:

At 1/06/2012 4:40 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Henry VIII died a loyal follower of all Catholic dogma except for the primacy of the Pope because he wanted a divorce. He viciously persecuted Evangelicals and Lutherans within his realm. His only beef with the Catholics was that they accept him as supreme head of the Church of England. It was not until the time of Elizabeth that the reformers found any measure of safety in England. But history aside, your one argument addressing something Coulter actually said rather than just your skewed perception of her as anti-Catholic is the Kennedy thing. In bringing up Kennedy, Coulter made a sound point about Santorum and the Catholic faith. Actually believing what Catholics are supposed to believe, unlike Kennedy, at whom her dig was aimed, automatically means you are Conservative on 60% of issues. That is a compliment to Roman Catholics, not a dig. The remaining 40%, however, is decided by the intelligence and wisdom of the individual. Santorum's choice of position on these issues, mostly of economics, demonstrates that Santorum is wrong on the most important issues to voters in this election and that makes him a terrible choice for the party's nominee. You know, if you go looking for something you can usually find it...

 
At 1/06/2012 6:42 PM, Blogger Paul Zummo said...

Actually believing what Catholics are supposed to believe, unlike Kennedy, at whom her dig was aimed, automatically means you are Conservative on 60% of issues.

Yeah, that's totally not what she said. Her implication was that 60% was a ceiling, not a floor.

Santorum's choice of position on these issues, mostly of economics, demonstrates that Santorum is wrong on the most important issues to voters in this election

Says you, but fortunately acting voting records and facts suggest otherwise.

 
At 1/06/2012 8:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

@PaulZummo. Her implication was that Santorum's single focus is on promoting Catholicism, and not Conservatism, which makes him a good fit for some Conservative positions, but not necessarily on others. And Santorum is bad on those other issues of his own accord. I happen to agree with Ann that the White House is a bad place for a man who sees no problem establishing through government his own particular religious ideals. As for his voting record, Redstate's Erick Erickson has a piece up today titled "What a Big Government Conservative Looks Like" with LINKS to all Santorum's worst votes. By my count, it includes approximately 110 offenses in the areas of judicial nominations, welfare reform, energy, education, spending and entitlements, waste, taxes, immigration, reform, guns, labor, defense, big government bureaucracies, social programs, and bankruptcy.

 
At 1/06/2012 10:31 PM, Blogger Militia Immaculata said...

I've heard Ann Coulter is an ex-Catholic, which, if true, is probably why she's anti-Catholic. Can anybody shed any further light on that?

 
At 1/10/2012 8:01 PM, Blogger Kurt said...

Ted Kennedy, who has almost nothing in common with Santorum other than the fact that they were baptized into the Catholic Church as infants

Well, let's take another example. Santorum and Kennedy opposed "Right-to-Work" laws. I don't if Santorum took that position because of prayerful reading of the Church's social teachings or because Pennsylvania has a lot of blue collar voters and politically he needed to as senator. But he and Teddy were on the same side and I am sure this outrages Coulter.

Having said that, Ann Coulter is a jerk and her bigotry probably does not stop at Catholics.

 

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