Jolie Lee

USA TODAY Network

Soccer is destroying the USA. So says conservative syndicated columnist Ann Coulter.

Coulter went on a rant about the sport, calling it un-American in a column Wednesday headlined, "America's Favorite National Pastime: Hating Soccer."

Readers called the column "contemptible," "uneducated" and "moronic" in comments posted on The Clarion Ledger's website. The Ledger is owned by Gannett, which also owns USA TODAY. Coulter's column is distributed by Universal Press.

"Hahaha this is the biggest lot of nonsense I have ever read," one commenter wrote.

Coulter argues the reason people are watching soccer now is because of Sen. Edward Kennedy's 1965 immigration law.

"I promise you: No American whose great-grandfather was born here is watching soccer," she wrote. "One can only hope that, in addition to learning English, these new Americans will drop their soccer fetish with time."

She also says soccer is not a "real sport." A real sport, she argues, requires individual achievement and "the prospect of either personal humiliation or major injury."

"Do they even have MVPs in soccer? Everyone just runs up and down the field and, every once in a while, a ball accidentally goes in," she wrote.

Tweeters also joined in on the chorus of criticism.

"Ann Coulter meets a new low. I have no words. Probably the worst column I've read. And I don't even like soccer," one person tweeted.

Some wondered if the writing was satire or "the most compelling piece of performance art you've ever seen?"

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