Now, Has She Gone Too Far?

Appearing at The Jaundiced Eye, the Independent Bloggers' Alliance, and My Left Wing. I think Ann Coulter goes too far every time she opens her mouth. I thought she went too far when she said, of Muslims, that, "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." I thought she went too far when she said that you can't be anorexic if you have a boyfriend. I thought she went too far when she said advocated revoking women's suffrage. I thought she went too far when... This is tedious. I'll be here all day. Here's a pretty good list. That Ann Coulter continues to have a career as a political pundit stands as a daily reminder of how much trouble we are in as a country. But this time she may really and truly have gone too far. Not because she advocated turning this country into a theocracy, which alarmingly few people seem concerned about. But, because now she's given the lie to they myth that the Christian right isn't, at heart, anti-Semitic. Sure the ex-girlfriend of Bob Guccioni, Jr., who once said that because she was unmarried there was nothing immoral about sleeping with a different man every night, is an unlikely spokesperson for the family values set, but she has set herself up as one repeatedly. Her horrific performance on CNBC's "The Big Idea," was such an instance, as she regaled her Jewish host, Donny Deutsch, with stories about the wholesomeness of all the "megachurches," where she frequently lectures. Her aggressive proselytizing of poor Deutsch, and admonition that Jews must be "perfected" by accepting Christ, has touched off a firestorm that may put even Coulter's natural allies on alert. Insulting Jews does nothing to advance a rightwing agenda. Consider the number of Jewish neoconsertives, or what a force AIPAC is to reckon with, for both parties. Let alone Republicans who want to bomb Iran... or, as they put it, "transform the Middle East." (Although, so far, David Horowitz is gaffing off any concern about her remarks.) Coulter's latest verbal tick underscores one of the dirty little secrets of the Christian Zionist movement; that they are using Jews to bring about the rapture, after which they fully expect them to go to hell. The issue is spelled out in segment three (above) of recent edition of "Bill Moyer's Journal," when Rabbi Lerner and evangelical Christian Dr. Timothy Weber address the concept of dispensationalism and how disadvantageous it is to Jews who wish to remain Jews, rather than converting to Christianity. BILL MOYERS: Before we go any further, give me a shorthand definition of dispensationalism. DR. TIMOTHY WEBER: Dispensationalism is a particular way of reading Bible prophecy which divides the Bible into two stories. There's a story about God's earthly people, Israel. And then a story about God's heavenly people, the Church. And the basic premise of dispensationalism is that all Bible prophecies concerning earthly events applies to the Jews. And all of those events will be fulfilled literally in the End Times. So, Israel must be returned to the land. They must stay in the land. Without Israel in the land, there can be none of the other events prophesied in the Bible. There can be no rise of Anti-Christ. There can be no rebuilding of the Temple. There can be no Battle of Armageddon. And there can be no second coming of Jesus Christ. So everything is riding on the Jews, getting them there and keeping them there in the Holy Land. RABBI MICHAEL LERNER: But I think-- but what you have to add in there is that when this is a step in the process that they see towards the end of end times in which the Jews will be cast down into eternal damnation and to the fires of hell. And only those Jews who convert to Christianity will be okay. And everyone -- all the rest of us so they're welcoming us now -- with open arms and saying, "Oh, we love the Jewish people" But they love the Jewish people literally to death because they they want see those of us who stay Jews burn in hell but not-- not right away. They don't imagine it will happen right away. So there's a staged process. And this is the first stage in the process that will eventually lead either to us converting totally to Christianity or burning in hell. So it's not a really great future for the Jews that those theological people have in mind.