Letters to the Editor
-
Why oh why
Ah here we go again. The conservative tactic of changing the truth. Say it loud and long enough and it becomes truth. This is a ridiculous book by a charlatan and Salon can kiss my ass for spending the bandwidth on this idiot whose only claim to fame is his mother got him a job. Please
-
Libelous Fatshitism
Here's the shorter version of this 496 page travesty:
Librul gays and vegetarians sowed,
The fascist path Hitler and Duce strode.
They'd rather start world wars,
Than eat steaks and buy whores;
That's fatshits history from Doughy Pantload.
Actually, I'm not convinced that this book is about fascism at all.
When you look at the first two incarnations of subtitles; "The Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton", and "The Totalitarian Temptation from Hegel to Whole Foods", and then add this quote from the book; "The white male is the Jew of liberal fascism", you have much of what currently drives the Republican party; the reactive fear and vilification of anything that doesn't conform with the conditioning and traditions of their shrinking sphere of social dominance, and their subsequent claims of victimization.
So outwardly Doughy Pantload is pretending to have authored a book about fascism but what he's really done is throw a barely concealed hissy which goes like this:
We once controlled the dominant sphere,
With the power that others revere.
But since history's slipped past us,
We're the Jew to your fascist;
You librul vegetarian queer.
The only honest thing Goldberg said in this interview was; "[George] Orwell says fascism has come to mean anything not desirable as early as 1946,..." and of course he's either too dishonest or too lacking in basic self-awareness to realize that Orwell's quote completely expresses the driving force behind his entire idiotic effort.
Or I guess you could sum the whole thing up with this quote from 'Family Guy'; "Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a big fat white guy who is threatened by change."
That's what's going on here; the big fat white guy has taken everything he finds threatening and put it under the most unpleasant umbrella he could find and then cried victim.
It's not about fascism, it's about fatshitism.
-
I'm glad I read this interview.
I think this interview more clearly illustrates the Conservative mind (as well as how shoddy Goldberg's thesis is) than it does the Liberal mind. Conservatives have been on the losing end of history for so long they have an inherent inferiority complex. Even when they're winning Conservatives still aren't satisfied.
Think back to the beginnings of the Iraq War, before the insurgency and the attempt to rebuild the country. Remember how angry the Conservatives still were? How much they hated the anti-war left. They had gained everything they could possibly have wanted and they still weren't satisfied. I believe it's because they know that any Conservative gains have historically been temporary. The Liberal agenda marches on throughout history (not without setbacks, mind you) while the Conservatives always lose in the long run.
Conservatives are now so aware of this that they are attempting to spuriously redefine past Conservative thought to distance themselves. Goldberg merely redefines certain aspects of Fascism (which is already notoriously difficult to define) by ignoring the historical context and, apparently, the words of Fascist leaders as well. It's an easy trick. You could probably make Jesus look like a Fascist as well. Didn't Jesus allow gentiles and Jews into the same religion if they wanted. Well, it's an emphasis on "unity" just like Hitler and Barack Obama!
Other than that I thought the interviewer brought up some well researched exceptions, which Goldberg inelegantly stumbled over, without getting into some sort of shouting match. Goldberg's ideas are so ill-informed they easily fall on their own without much help.
-
Goldberg is Humpty Dumpty
To Goldberg, a word, "fascism" in this case, means what he wants it to mean and nothing else. Forget about the dictionary, forget about common usage, forget about de facto reality. Goldberg is plainly contemptuous of these and clearly in thrall to his own ego.
Herewith, some dictionary definitions of "fascism" that contradict Goldberg's fairy-tale view:
Merriam-Webster:
1 often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
2: a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English:
1. a political theory advocating an authoritarian hierarchical government; -- opposed to democracy and liberalism.
2. an authoritarian system of government under absolute control of a single dictator, allowing no political opposition, forcibly suppressing dissent, and rigidly controlling most industrial and economic activities. Such regimes usually try to achieve popularity by a strongly nationalistic appeal, often mixed with racism.
I won't bother boring everyone with further similar citations, but in view of these accepted definitions of fascism, it is perfectly clear that fascism is diametrically opposed to liberalism and thus patently qualifies as politically right-wing, and far right-wing at that.
Jonah Goldberg can blather on all he likes about whatever strikes his fancy, using words just as he wants to use them without regard to their standard accepted usage, but that does not change reality, much as he probably imagines it does.
And while fascism is not the very definition of evil, fascism is inherently evil because it usurps the rights of humans by dictatorial power. It is therefore anything but democratic and is richly deserving of every bit of the derision and scorn it receives.
-
Round and 'round
Already 45 years ago my political scinece professor said that rather than seeing the left-right continuum as a straight line it was better to see it as a circle where both the far-left and the far-right meet in their agreement on the need for totalitarian control to implement their visions.
The left wants control to implement their economic agenda, and the right wants it to control social/moral behaviour.
So the right doesn't mind that their system allows people to live in poverty as long as the poor can't get abortions, read porn, buy sex toys or have gays marry.
The left will let you have a govenment paid for abortion but only if you don't smoke in the waiting room.
-
Semantics
From now on, I'll call blue green and write a 500-page book about it to prove that the blue shirt you're now wearing actually is a green one.
That's what it all comes down to, his "new" personal definition of what fascism is? Send the man back to kindergarten and get him to learn the colors. Please.
-
Rebranding
This book is about ONE THING and ONE THING only: REBRANDING.
Communists! Marxists! Those epithets were the one thrown at the Left by the Right. Fascists! Nazis! were thrown back by the Left at the Right.
There things stood: Equally toxic either way.
But now the Communist/Marxist labels have lost something of their 'zing'. Not so the Fascist/Nazi ones. So now Jonah Goldberg has taken the point in a Right wing 'bright idea' to apply the (now) more toxic set of labels to the Left.
An entirely useful, historically valid and defenseable conceptualism has been thrown out the window. The really important point about that conceptualism hss been, starting either from the Left or the Right, one can arrive at totalitarianism. A fact Mr. Goldberg's 'cute' little ploy (scheme?)will obscure.
REBRANDING: NOTHING MORE, NOTHING LESS