ANN COULTER: THE NEW FACE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY

Steven Jonas, MD, MPH

In this column we take a bit of a breather from giving advice to the Democratic Party.  (I think that we shall return to that theme next week.)  We turn instead to talking about the Republican Party, its public face, and what it truly stands for.  (Actually, there are some lessons for the Democrats to learn here, but they are indirect ones.)  For the relationship between the two is about to change.   Among people like most of the readers of TPJ, what it does truly stand for has been well known for quite some time: corporatism; the expansion of authoritarian government vs. Constitutionally guaranteed individual rights; an aggressive, militaristic foreign policy; the rapid expansion of globalization and the export of US capital seeking ever-higher profits; the shrinking to the maximum extent possible of those functions of government that support the broad national interest; and most recently using the national government to further the interests of the Christian Right by subsidy and the use of the criminal law.  However, until very recently to the extent possible the Republican Party has kept as much of their true agenda as possible in the shadows.   

Now comes the latest book from the Far Right icon, Ann Coulter: Godless: The Church of Liberalism.  In typical Coulter style, it is filled with rage.  In fact a discussion of Ann Coulter's rage became all the rage on the Left when the book came out a couple of months ago. Even Hillary Clinton (hardly on the Left of anything) went after her for the remarks she made about those 9/11 widows who have become strong critics of the Georgites on a variety of fronts. Prominent is a group colloquially called the " Jersey girls." Its original objective was to push the Bush White House to create a commission to investigate the government's failures before the 9/11 attacks. This was a commission the Georgites absolutely did not want (wonder why not?) They fought hard to prevent its creation. Since the issuance of the Commission’s Report that left so many questions unanswered, the Jersey Girls have continued on as Bush critics. In her latest effort, Coulter accuses the women of being "self-obsessed" and acting "as if the terrorist attacks happened only to them." "I've never seen people enjoying their husbands' deaths so much," she wrote (as if she had done some massive study of bereaved wives, looking at their relative levels of enjoyment on becoming widows)

Much of the focus on Coulter's latest outburst has been on her rage and unadulterated nastiness in regard of the 9/11 widows who have been and continue to be outspoken opponents of Georgite policies. Whether she really thinks these things or just says them so as to sell more books is beside the point. She prominently puts them out there and many people focus on them. However, to my mind both the remarks and the predictable outrage against them serve a purpose for Coulter well beyond selling books. They distract from the book's central message, which is of central importance to Coulter and her ilk within the Republican Party, people like Mary Matalin (you know, the wife of "Democratic" pundit and sometime political consultant James Carville) who defended Coulter without qualification on NBC's "Imus in the Morning" on June 10, 2006. It is that central message which is of the most import to her followers at the core of the Republican Party’s electoral base and to which we should be paying the most attention.    

Let us recall, as the media critic Eric Alterman noted in talking with Sam Seder sitting on for Al Franken on July 3, 2006, Karl Rove has openly said that what mobilizes his base is anger.  (Mobilizing fear he uses broadly, but it is anger that resonates with his base’s base issues.)  Nevertheless, until now the Republican Party has done a good job of keeping its anger mobilization off to the side, to the degree possible. Ann Coulter represents the coming public, open face of the Republican Party, folks. Make no mistake about it. The public Republican face will be contorted into anger, into rage, into fear, for all to plainly see.  No more Mr. Nice Guy or Ms. Nice Gal.  Mark my words. 

What a sea-change there has been in the Republican Party over the past 50 years.  On Nov. 8, 1954, Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower famously said: "Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are a few Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."  

Unfortunately that small number of (not-so) stupid people not only took over the Republican Party but they drove the whole political landscape in the United States well to the Right. Teddy Roosevelt was the greatest Republican President other than Lincoln (who was not a Republican even in the TR mold).  The Trust Buster railed against "the malefactors of great wealth;" made environmental conservation a major focus of his Presidency; was the first President to invite an African-American leader, Booker T. Washington, to meet with him in the White House;  put national health insurance onto his Bull Moose Party platform when he ran for President as an independent in 1912.  He would actually have a very hard time getting the Democratic nomination for President today; that is if the DLC had anything to say about it.  

Beginning with Goldwater, Eisenhower's "oil millionaires" moved in to the center of the party, and married right-wing politics to their cause, with great electoral success: Nixon and the racist "Southern Strategy" in 1968, Reagan and the bows to both racism and the Christian Right in 1980, this Bush's total embrace of the Christian Right in 2000. But still, outwardly the Republican Party has managed to look somehow "normal," in the American tradition, and certainly gentlemanly and ladylike for the most part, although George W. and Dick C. have been starting to wear the veneer off that one. But now comes Coulter.  

In a previous book, Coulter labeled all "liberals" and other non-supporters of Georgite policy as "traitors." The penalty for treason is death. Now liberals are "godless." For the "goddish" of the Coulter variety, as I previously said in this space, one deals with the “godless” by force. If Coulter has her way, the "traitorous" and "godless" "liberals" (as she defines them) would be going perhaps to the camps, going perhaps before the firing squads, perhaps becoming the targets of Death Squads (as advocated by the video game “Left Behind: Eternal Forces,” developed from Tim LaHaye’s best-selling “Left Behind” series, coming to a store near you this October just in time for Christmas), perhaps burning to death at the stake, which is what militant Christian Churches of a variety of stripes did to such persons who didn’t express their “goddishness” in quite the right way over a period of hundreds of years into the 17th century.  

In this context it is interesting to note that what drives her is a version of what she thinks "Christianity" is. (In the book’s cover photo, presumably indicating her connection with Christianity, Coulter wears a black halter top with a gold cross on her chest, the staff pointing directly at her cleavage.)  As she has said, "Although my Christianity is somewhat more explicit in this book, Christianity fuels everything I write." Whatever else it is or is not, Coulter's version of Christianity is surely militant. As for foreign policy, remember when about the Muslim world she said: "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity" (although given her version of Christianity one wonders why anyone would want to convert)?  As for domestic policy and how her version of "Christianity" informs it, just consider the following quote: "The ethic of conservation is the explicit abnegation of man's dominion over the Earth. The lower species are here for our use. God said so: Go forth, be fruitful, multiply, and rape the planet -- it's yours. That's our job: drilling, mining and stripping. Sweaters are the anti-Biblical view. Big gas-guzzling cars with phones and CD players and wet bars -- that's the Biblical view."  

The face of Ann Coulter: In no more than a few years, perhaps by 2008, all of the Republican veneer will be gone, with Coulterian rage, total intolerance of difference, rampant corporatism at center stage, and demonization of any opposition at the center of the message. The message will clearly be backed up by policy. And force, it is clear, is to be used against any and all opposition. At least the target will be clear and clearly out in the open.  It remains to be seen whether the leadership of the Democratic Party will be able to bring themselves to fire at it.

________________  

Dr. Steven Jonas is a contributing author for The Political Junkies (www.thepoliticaljunkies.net).  He is a Professor of Preventive Medicine at Stony Brook University (NY) and author/co-author of over twenty books. Dr. Jonas is one of America 's most perceptive Democratic political analysts.

In his book The New Americanism, Dr. Jonas presents his proposal for that “new vision and mission” for the Democratic Party that so many, for so many years, have been urging it to find.  A new vision and mission are obviously needed with increasing urgency as with increasing speed and determination the Georgites drive our nation towards frank theocratic fascism.  Dr. Jonas finds the needed vision and mission in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.  "The New Americanism: How the Democratic Party Can Win the Presidency  is available from Amazon.com (go to "Books;" enter the title) and BarnesandNoble.com (same). 

 He is also the author of The 15% Solution: A Political History of American Fascism, 2001-2022.  Under the pseudonym "Jonathan Westminster" this book was originally published in 1996.  It was republished with a New Introduction in 2004.  Under Georgite rule, the “fictional non-fiction” scenario of this work of “future history” is, most unfortunately, becoming all too real, now almost day-by-day.  The 2004 edition is available at www.barnesandnoble.com (search with the book title) and www.xlibris.com (click on “Bookstore,” then “Search” with the title).  Both versions are available at www.amazon.com (go to "Books;" search with the title).

 Dr. Jonas is also a Contributing Editor for the Weblog http://planetarymovement.org/blog/, produced by The Planetary Movement Ltd. UK (http://planetarymovement.org/blog/), TPJ's own Michael Carmichael,  President and Chief Executive Officer, a Contributing Columnist for the Project for the Old American Century, POAC (http://www.oldamericancentury.org/), on which his TPJ columns appear regularly, and a Columnist for the webmagazine BuzzFlash (http://www.buzzflash.com/) on which short(er) articles are published once a week or so. By invitation, Dr. J's TPJ columns are also posted periodically on the weblog Thomas Paine's Corner (http://civillibertarian.blogspot.com/).

2006
Jul 6,2006           "Ideas For Democrats, VII: Bipartisanship On Iraq"

Jun 29, 2006       "Ideas For Democrats, VI: Attack On Defense, II”
Jun 22, 2006       "Ideas For Democrats, V: Attack On Defense" 
Jun 15, 2006       "Ideas For Democrats, IV: The Ten Commitments, Re-visited”
Jun 8, 2006         "Ideas For Democrats, III: Dealing The DLC”
Jun 1, 2006         "Ideas For Democrats, II: Why Don't The Democrats?” 

May 25, 2006       "Ideas For Democrats, I: The Vision”
May 18, 2006       "On Conspiracy Theories"
May 11, 2006       "The Significance Of The Tony Snow Job”*
May 3, 2006         "Bush Is Not Hitler, II"

April 25, 2005       "Bush Is Not Hitler, I”
April 20, 2006       "Some Thoughts On The 'Immigration Problem'"
April 13, 2006       “The Georgite State Of The Union Address Revited"
April 6, 2006         "A Firebell In The Night:  The So-Called 'Gay Marriage' Amendment, II"
April 2, 2006         "A Fireball In The Night:                        
                            The So-Called ‘Gay Marriage’ Amendment, I

Feb 22, 2006         “The German Reichstag Fire of 1933 and 9/11: Some Comparisons. A Revisit,
                              Part II” 
Feb 16, 2006         “The German Reichstag Fire Of 1933 And 9/11: Some
                            Comparisons.  A Revisit, Part1" 
Feb 9, 2006           "A Comment On The Democratic Alchemy,’
                             Appearing In The American Prospect”         
Feb 2, 2006           "Vengeance Is Mine, Saith The LORD"

Jan 26, 2006          "George Bush And The Doctrine Of Original Intent"       
Jan 19, 2006          "Let's Hear It For Original Intent (Version 2)"
Jan 12, 2006          "A Quick Visit To Mexico"
Jan 5, 2006            "Why The Patriot Act, Redux: Fascism In The Here And Now, Cont." 

Dec 22, 2005          "Why The Patriot Act, Redux: Fascism In The Here And Now"
Dec 15, 2005          "An Iraq Exit Proposal"
Dec 10, 2005          “Exiting Iraq, The Georgite Way"
Dec 1, 2005            "The Future Of The Democratic Party, VIII:
                              A Politically Viable Progressive Position On The War" 

Nov 25, 2005            “The Future Of The Democratic Party, VII: ‘The Ten Commitments’”
Nov 17, 2005            "The Future Of The Democratic Party, VI: An Organizing Proposal For Progressives” 
Nov 10, 2005            “The Future Of The Democratic Party, V:
                               There Is No Middle Ground"
Nov 3, 2005              “On The (Possible) Indictments.”

Oct 27, 2005            “The Future of the Democratic Party, IV:
                                Bush, Bennett, Miers, and the DLC.” 
Oct 20, 2005            “The Future Of The Democratic Party, III:
                                First Thoughts On Dealing With The DLC.”
Oct 13, 2005            “The Future Of The Democratic Party, II: On The Republicans” 
Oct 6,  2005             “The Future Of The Democratic Party, I”

Sept 29, 2005          "The Bush Flood, And The Georgites: New Orleans, III"
Sept 22, 2005          "On The Great New Orleans Flood Of 2005, II"
Sept 15, 2005          "On The Great New Orleans Bush Flood Of 2005, I"
Sept 8, 2005            "Let's Hear It For Original Intent"
Sept 1, 2005            "An Iraq Solution"

Aug 25,2005             "Some Thoughts On The Atomic Bombing Of Japan"
Aug 18, 2005            "Why God Sent Us George W. Bush" 
Aug 12, 2005            "John Bolton And The Nuclear Option II"
Aug 5, 2005              "The Significance Of The Karl Rove Speech"

July 28, 2005             “Iran Nukes, Revisited"
                                 (Expanded Edition)
July 21, 2005             “Iran Nukes, Revisited"
July 14, 2005             "The Dick Durbin Disaster" A Follow Up
July 7, 2005               "The Dick Durban Disaster"

June 23, 2005            "Why All Of This Repression Abroad?"
June 16, 2005            “Not Very Intelligent Design"
June 8,2005              "Pat Buchanan's "What If, "III?"
June 2, 2005             "Pat Buchanan's 'What If,' II?"

May 26, 2005            "Pat Buchanan's 'What If?'"
May 18, 2005            "The Schiavo Case, V: The Attack On Science" 
May 12, 2005            “Possible Explanations For Bush-Behavior On And Around 9/11"
May 5, 2005              "Bill Frist's Declaration Of War"

April 28, 2005            "The Schiavo Case, IV: The Definitions Of Life And Death"
April 24, 2005            "The Schiavo Case, III: Further Legal Considerations And Their Political Implications"
April 14, 2005            “The Schiavo Case, II: William Bennett And The Beginning Of The End Of The Separation Of Powers"
April 7, 2005              "The Schiavo Case And The Locus Of The 'Police Power'"

March 31, 2005           “John Bolton And The Nuclear Option"
March 22, 2005            Of "Moolahs," Putin and Bush
March 17, 2005            Georgite "Freedom And Democracy"
March 10, 2005            "We Won't Have To Worry Any More"
March  3, 2005             "Iranian Nukes"

February 24, 2005        "Going Nuclear In Iran"
February 16, 2005        “The Georgite Social Security Scam: Bases For Suspicion”
February 10, 2005        “The Georgite Version of ‘Freedom and Democracy’ ”
                                   “The Coming 2nd Civil War (Unless),” No. 6
Feb 3, 2005                  “WMD Discovered --- In Washington”

Jan 27, 2005                 “Comparing George W. Bush And Adolf Hitler”
Jan 18, 2005                 “The Bush Second Inaugural: A Preview” “The Coming 2nd Civil War
                                    (Unless),” No. 5 
Jan 13, 2005                 “The Georgite Concept of Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law”
Jan 6, 2005                   “The ‘Unless’ Of The ‘Coming Second Civil War’ Series; Part II”  

Dec 30, 2004                 “The ‘Unless’ of the ‘Coming Second Civil War’ Series, Part I” 
Dec 23, 2004                 “The Real Meaning Of The ‘Faith-Based Presidency;’ Part II”
Dec 15, 2004                 “The Coming Second Civil War (Unless)” 
Dec 9, 2004                   “The Real Meaning Of The ‘Faith-Based Presidency’ ”      

Oct 28, 2004                 Why The Patriot Act?”
Oct. 21, 2004                “The Cheneys’ Daughter Flap”
Oct 14, 2004                 “George Bush’s America” 
Oct 7, 2004                   “The Debate” 

Sept 30, 2004                “Four 800 Lb. Gorillas In The Campaign Room” 
Sept 23, 2004               "Fixing The Kerry Campaign, 9/15/2004"
Sept 16, 2004               "Lessons From Japan.  Part II: Successful Occupations"
Sept 9, 2004                 "Thoughts On the Third Anniversary of the Tragedy of 9/11/2001"
Sept 2, 2004                 "Lessons From Japan, Part 1"

August 26,2004             “Dealing with the Republican National Convention and Related
                                     Issues”
August 18, 2004            "The Best Of Dr. Jonas"
August 12, 2004             “Some Thoughts For and About The Kerry Campaign, VI”
August 5,2004                “Some Thoughts For and About The Kerry Campaign, V”

July 29, 2004                “Some Thoughts For and About The Kerry Campaign, IV”
July 22, 2004                “Some Thoughts For and About The Kerry Campaign III”              
July 15, 2004                “Some Thoughts For And About The Kerry Campaign II”
July 7, 2004                  “Some Thoughts For And About The Kerry Campaign,I”
July 1, 2004                  “Counsel To The President”
June 24, 2004               “ ’You Know me Al:’ On the German Reichstag Fire of Feb. 27, 1933
                                     and the 9/11/01 Bombing of the World Trade Center, Part II”
June 17, 2004               “ ‘The Ralph Nader Problem’ --- A Re-run plus”
June 10, 2004               “Ronald Reagan’s Legacy”
June 3, 2004                 “’You Know Me Al:’ On The Reichstag Fire Of Feb. 27, 1933 And The
                                      9/11/01 Bombing Of The World Trade Center, Part I”

May 27, 2004                “On Fascism -- And The Georgites”
May 20, 2004                “On John Ashcroft -- And Jefferson Davis”
May 13, 2004                “Karl Rove’s Personal Political Notebook”
May 6, 2004                  “Possible Explanations For Bush Behavior And 9/11” 

April 29, 2004               “On George Bush and Religion, Part 2”
April 22, 2004               “What Condi Rice Might Have Said”
April 8, 2004                 “On George Bush And Religion”
April 1, 2004                 “Some Political Thoughts For Senator Kerry”  

March 25, 2004              “Brief Essays”
March 16, 2004             “You Know Me Al: The Iraq War --- So What Was It About, Anyway?
March 11, 2004             “A Word (Or Two) On Ralph Nader”
March 4, 2004               “A Firebell In The Night” 

February 27, 2004        “On Doctor Dean”

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