As I See Ann Coulter's "Treason" Part 1

In the fury of the last week’s ballyhoo over Ann Coulter’s “Godless” and its strongly worded attacks I decided that it would be a good thing if I read Ms. Coulter. Well, actually it was my office mate who thought it would be a good thing. So he, being the nice guy that he is, has lent me Treason. I shall peruse the volume over the next week or so and let you know what I think but for now one thing has already struck me as somewhat difficult to take.

On page nine Ms. Coulter writes, in response to Whittaker Chambers famous declaration that Communism was “the vision of man without God” that:

“Liberals chose Man. Conservatives choose God. The struggle between the two great faiths was the subtext of every great political conflict in America in the second half of the twentieth century. It was this conflict that fueled the Chambers-Hiss hearings, “McCarthyism,” Vietnam, Watergate, and the elites’ abiding hatred of Ronald Regan.”

This is heady stuff. And all this time I thought the struggle was between God and the devil! I sort of thing the devil might be a wee bit mad about be usurped. Oh well, win some, lose some, I guess.

It’s not that I don’t think the Liberals chose man, it’s just I don’t think the Conservatives actually choose God at all. I believe the ascendancy of the neo-conservatives was not at all the result of some deep felt conversion to the Almighty but was in fact a capitulation in style to the New Left.

“Let us return to the bygone days of yesteryear” as the saying goes. Back then, right after WWII it was quite fashionable to believe that we were on the cusp of making “the world [truly] safe for democracy.” We had just whipped the Nazi’s and booted the Japanese back to their little islands. We were the richest, most productive, most prosperous country on earth and we had full employment. The only cloud on our horizon were those evil Communists who didn’t believe in God at all. More importantly, they were, according to reliable sources I carry right here in my brief case, infiltrating who desks in our state department, our armies, our navies, and our nurseries! They were the new enemy and they had to be stopped. Senator Joe told us so and he had that durn briefcase of documents to prove it! But wait…if he had a whole briefcase of documents how come them Commies were still deeply planted in every branch of government? How come nobody did nothing bout it? Hmmm… could this be a left wing radical conspiracy to make America Communist? Stay tune next week for our exciting conclusion…

If all this sounds a bit odd to you, it should. Senator McCarthy and his style of evidence was well analyzed in an article by Richard Hofstader over thirty years ago. In the article, “The Paranoid Style in Public Address” In it he says, in part,

"American politics has often been an arena for angry minds. In recent years we have seen angry minds at work mainly among extreme right-wingers, who have now demonstrated in the Goldwater movement how much political leverage can be got out of the animosities and passions of a small minority. But behind this I believe there is a style of mind that is far from new and that is not necessarily right-wind. I call it the paranoid style simply because no other word adequately evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy that I have in mind. . . . [T]he idea of the paranoid style as a force in politics would have little contemporary relevance or historical value if it were applied only to men with profoundly disturbed minds. It is the use of paranoid modes of expression by more or less normal people that makes the phenomenon significant. Of course this term is pejorative, and it is meant to be; the paranoid style has a greater affinity for bad causes than good. But nothing really prevents a sound program or demand from being advocated in the paranoid style. Style has more to do with the way in which ideas are believed than with the truth or falsity of their content. I am interested here in getting at our political psychology through our political rhetoric. The paranoid style is an old and recurrent phenomenon in our public life which has been frequently linked with movements of suspicious discontent."

The anger, the paranoia, the blind forwardness of the bull in the China shop is what destroys political debate and persuasion. If the bull would just stand still we could lead him out and save the china too. But no, he is blind out of fear and frustration. And he is not a tame bull.

When Ms. Coulter writes that the Liberals have chosen man and the Conservatives God it strikes me as way too much an oversimplification. And then to claim that all the great conflicts of the last fifty years have had the “subtext” of God verses Man? A bit of a stretch.

But what intrigues me is not her conclusions, but her style. She blasts you with quote after quote, much as Senator McCarthy did in the early 1950’s and then draws the big conclusion. Never mind that the quotes don’t exactly match or even support the conclusion. She is a woman who knows and all of us should just bow to her intellect. I think the emperor has no cloths.

I would like to ask Ms. Coulter for her evidence of the “subtext” she sees in the the named events. How did the Conservatives’ belief in God inform their rhetoric. Did they quote chapter and verse in arguing for Vietnam? Did they sing religious songs at the edge of Communist rallies? Were, exactly, did they evoke the name of God as a justifier of America? And don’t give me banal claims that “In God We Trust” is on all our money so of course the Conservatives choose God over man. Liberals have wallets too.

So she blasts you with the quotes, draws unwarranted conclusions as if she has proved the case. Take, for instance the very next page. Here she says, in discussing what is commonly thought about “McCarthyism”

“While reacting with unblinking ennui to Soviet spies in high government office, Democrats engaged in drama queen theatrics over “McCarthyism.” The myth of McCarthyism is the greatest Orwellian fraud or our times. The portrayal of Senator Joe McCarthy as a wild-eyed demagogue destroying innocent lives is sheer liberal hobgoblinism.. Liberals weren’t cowering in fear during the McCarthy era. They were systematically undermining the nations ability to defend itself while waging a bellicose campaign of lies to blacken McCarthy’s name. Everything you think you know about McCarthy is a hegemonic lie. Liberals denounced McCarthy because they were afraid of getting caught, so they fought back like animals to hide their own collaboration with a regime as evil as the Nazis’. They scream about the dark night of fascism under McCarthy to prevent Americans from ever noticing that liberals sabotaged their own country. As Whittaker Chambers said: ‘Innocence seldom utters outraged shrieks. Guilt does.’”

First of all, while I would not dare to denigrate the scholarship of Ms. Coulter’s view, I would point out that she is simply repeating what Mr. McCarthy said in his own defense. He claimed the same things in 1952 and the country didn’t believe him. Of course to Ms. Coulter the “MSM” (Main Stream Media) is to blame for that. But that very media is not so dominant now so let’s examine the evidence for the defense. Oops… uh, I know, its in her briefcase. Just like McCarthy she carries a whole lot of flashy paper full of quotes but little beyond a great big game of “he says” and “she says.” If Ms. Coulter wants to make the claim fine, if she wants me to believe it she has to do a whole lot more work.

Of course maybe she doesn’t care if she persuades or not. All she appears to care about is rallying the troops by character assignation of her supposed enemies. If so, I can only say it is a cheap shot and succeeds only with those who are generally to ill informed and intellectually undisciplined to recognize an ad hominem attack from a real analysis of the issues and are already primed to believe any evil thing Ms. Coulter or her friends want to spit out. Too bad some of that spit lands on the truth.

But maybe I’m over-reacting. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time. Maybe, as I continue to wade through this book, I’ll reach enlightenment. Maybe I too will find the goddess of the book like so many of her followers. Maybe, but I doubt it.

And doubt is a good thing.