I found this blog written by a conservative. Great rant.
Civility and the Coulterization of Conservatism
Conservatism is dead and Ann Coulter is its corpse.
That was my initial reaction to hearing Coulter�s latest semi-racists jibe: "I think our motto should be post-9-11, 'raghead talks tough, raghead faces consequences.'"
Admittedly, I�m being a bit hyperbolic. While suffering from decrepitude, conservatism isn�t exactly dead. And though she possesses the same pallor and stench, Coulter isn�t exactly a corpse. But the two appear to have formed a symbiotic relationship of decay.
Coulter has been serving up such excrement for years, yet far too many conservatives lap up such feculent bons mots as if they were bon bons. Here are a few choice selections (courtesy of Dignan):
* "liberals are always against America. They are either traitors or idiots..."
* "I think we ought to nuke North Korea right now just to give the rest of the world a warning."
* "Press passes can't be that hard to come by if the White House allows that old Arab Helen Thomas to sit within yards of the President."
* "We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too."
* "My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building."
* "Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the First Amendment."
* "We need somebody to put rat poisoning in Justice Stevens' creme brulee."
There was once a time when such remarks would have had Mr. Buckley scrambling for the smelling salts to revive Mrs. Schafly. But now hearing such comments made in a conservative forum elicits little more than an embarrassed shrug and a whatareryagonnado shake of the head that says, �That�s just Ann.�
Our political culture has truly become debased when even conservatives now accept what James Q. Wilson has described as the elevation of self-expression over self-control. (Perhaps it is to be expected, though, of a movement that has replaced the wisdom of Russell Kirk with the soundbites of Rush Limbaugh.) We have heartily embraced the leftist ideal that we have an inherent right to be as stupid and as banal as we want. As the legal scholar Stephen Carter says, �When offensiveness becomes a constitutional right, it is a right without any tradition behind it, and consequently we have no norms to govern its use.�
This �right� does have a tradition, though, for stupidity has a pedigree that reaches back to our first ancestor. �Stupidity is a form of behavior,� said the late media critic Neil Postman, �It is not something we have; it is something we do.� Conservatism used to recognize this fact and even played a role in society by helping citizens to avoid moral stupidity.
This is essentially what Russell Kirk was getting at when he outlined his six principles of conservatism. The principle of moral order (a belief in a transcendent moral order to which we ought to try to conform the ways of society), the principle of prescription (a reliance on the �wisdom of our ancestors�), and the principle of prudence (public measures should be judged by their long-term consequences) are all means of preventing moral stupidity.
Naturally, this role, while legitimate, has strict limits. Just as doctors don�t go around slapping Twinkies out of people�s hands, conservatives don�t attempt to prevent every act of stupidity in society. But there was a time when we at least attempted to prevent it within our own ranks.
Now we have embraced one of the most morally stupid behaviors ever conceived: the interminable use of the language of "rights." It is this appeal to �rights� that claims that freedom of speech rests on the slipperiest of slopes. Even people who reject slippery slope arguments when applied to abortion or same-sex marriage believe it is incontrovertible when applied free speech. Start chiding people for saying �raghead� , they contend, and the next thing you know we'll all be trading our pilates mats for sajjad and setting our Blackberry's to chime for salah.
Unfortunately, there are some conservatives who confuse a right with an obligation. They believe that since all speech must be protected it must also be defended. There is no disputing the fact that Coulter has the politically guaranteed freedom to spew her bile. There is also no question, at least in my mind, that we conservatives should exercise our own freedom of speech by telling her to shut her yap.
There really is no excuse for accepting her as one of our own. Perhaps if she possessed intelligence and a rapier wit, her cutting barbs might be endurable. But Coulter�s �humor� slices like a shard from a Mountain Dew bottle found on a meth lab floor. Her remarks leave jagged gashs that grow infected and fester with pus, infecting all of us in the process.
Conservatism deserves better, deserves more civility and less Coulter. The fact that she is tolerated�much less admired--by conservatives is evidence that we have lost our philosophical moorings. If the Big Tent of conservatism really has room for the likes of Coulter, then it might just be time to close this circus down.
http://www.evangelicaloutpost.com/archives/cat_conservatism_liberalism.html
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