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Ann Coulter recently appeared on Donny Deutsch’s CNBC show, “The Big Idea,” where she had an interesting (now controversial) conversation about Christianity and Jews (read the transcript here). Let me say first of all that I am not a fan of Ann Coulter. However, the discussion that Coulter had with Deutsch (who is a Jew) is very interesting, important and has unfortunately been misrepresented and misunderstood by a lot of people. Before I offer my thoughts on the incident, you should watch the clip:

Here are the facts to begin with: Ann Coulter is notoriously extreme; that’s how she makes a living. Deutsch is Jewish and obviously opposes Coulter to begin with, so there’s no doubt he’d look for any opportunity to negatively sensationalize Coulter’s remarks. That said, let’s think about what happened.

If you’ll notice on the page/transcript I linked to above, the article opens like this (my emphasis added):

Appearing on Donny Deutsch’s CNBC show, “The Big Idea,” on Monday night, columnist/author Ann Coulter suggested that the U.S. would be a better place if there weren’t any Jewish people and that they needed to “perfect” themselves into — Christians.

I think that is an intentionally equivocal summation of what was said. Anti-Semitism is one of the most controversial buzzwords out there and I think we need to be very careful about just throwing that concept around or applying it to people. I can not emphasize enough what is under discussion between Coulter and Deutsch. They are not talking about Israelis or people of Jewish descent per se. Deutsch tries his hardest to spin it that way, even going so far as comparing Coulter to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad! Rather, Coulter says - more than once - that she is simply echoing the message of the New Testament; i.e., that Jews are called to leave the “law of ordinances” and obey the new law, under Christ. Coulter isn’t talking about “wiping Israel off the map” by any stretch of the imagination. She is saying what the (Jewish) apostle Paul said throughout the book of Romans. Jews are called to a new law of liberty; they are called to become Christians.

This really shouldn’t be that shocking, and it wouldn’t be if the Catholic church’s “interfaith” mentality and political correctness had not gotten in the way of plain New Testament doctrine. Judaism is no longer a functional system and it was never a saving one. This says nothing about Jews as a nation or a people!

It’s frustrating to watch Deutsch try his best to spin what is being said, even as Coulter is clearly arguing against his claims.

COULTER: [Christians] believe the Old Testament. As you know from the Old Testament, God was constantly getting fed up with humans for not being able to, you know, live up to all the laws. What Christians believe — this is just a statement of what the New Testament is — is that that’s why Christ came and died for our sins. Christians believe the Old Testament. You don’t believe our testament.

DEUTSCH: You said — your exact words were, “Jews need to be perfected.” Those are the words out of your mouth.

COULTER: No, I’m saying that’s what a Christian is.

DEUTSCH: But that’s what you said — don’t you see how hateful, how anti-Semitic –

COULTER: No!

DEUTSCH: How do you not see? You’re an educated woman. How do you not see that?

COULTER: That isn’t hateful at all.

This whole thing has (unsurprisingly) been blown out of proportion and sensationalized on sites such as Digg which are notoriously anti-Christian. How could the statements above be construed as “hateful” or “anti-Semitic”? Perhaps Coulter could have been clearer by saying that Judaism has been perfected in the sense that it was replaced with a better, less burdensome law. As I said, I am not a fan of Coulter, but I feel the need to defend honesty and reason when they are obviously under attack. One has to really try hard (and dishonestly, for that matter) to construe her statements as hateful or racist. On the other hand, her comments about a “happy Republican America” remain odd and scary.

As a side note, I’d like to remind or inform my readers that I am a Libertarian. Republicans and Democrats are both guilty of legislatively attacking our constitutional freedoms, just from different angles. I discuss how this political viewpoint relates to Christianity in my article on Christianity & Government.

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