In an interview with Salon.com, Elizabeth Edwards was asked why she called in to Chris Matthews' "Hardball" show to confront the vile Ann Coulter who had refered to her husband, Democratic Presidential candidate John Edwards, as a "f****t" and had also found fault in Edwards' talking about the death of his teenaged son during the last presidential campaign."
"Ignoring the fact that she exists doesn't make her go away," Edwards said. "If it did, you wouldn't hear me utter her name. So I think maybe the better thing to do is simply confront people like her. Are you going to stop them? Under no circumstances will you stop them. But maybe you empower other people to stand up, and maybe that has an effect. When I travel, so many older people thank me for what I did. Because the vile kind of way Ann Coulter thinks and talks, that was not ever part of the public discourse until recently."

Mrs. Edwards also spoke about her commitment to equal rights for gays after making a second visit to San Francisco this summer at a gay rights event: "I remember hearing [former GOP Sen. Rick] Santorum ranting about how homosexual marriage threatens heterosexual marriage. I could be wrong, but I think heterosexual marriage is threatened more by heterosexuals. I don't know why gay marriage challenges my marriage in any way."