This man has one of the most shallow and cliched understandings of fascism I've ever read (and not just because of the stupid cover). It's so amateur that I can't even bother to explain why.

You have one of the most intellectually dishonest pundits in the US in the crosshairs, and you don't fire? You treated Goldberg as though he actually might have a point, when his entire book is nothing but argumentum ad Hitlerum. I know you guys like to throw the right-wing a bone every now and again, just to keep them honest, but did you have to roll over for them here?

I also haven't read it, but I guess stuff like this this can engender interesting discussion/thought on the "social" assumptions that many of us take for granted, but I have to say that in this particular case itself sounds like a real "dog whistle" exercise - playing with labelling liberals.

For example, there seems to be plenty of "you seem to be saying this" followed by "no, no, I don't really mean it that way" going on in the interview.

is a very young person, and his ideas show it.

Who cares?

I'll ask the other posters on this thread to indulge me for a moment.

In another thread, RI, you told me:

I'd never attack someone based on their name, or their age. Then again, I wouldn't even have done that when I was younger. I was taught better.

And you are correct.

Sometimes there is a fine line between "snarky" and "mean" and in the course of my conversation with you earlier today I BLASTED past that line.

I am truly sorry for my behavior.

I was extremely unkind.

I can only ask your forgiveness.

Finding you to apologize will be the end of my posting anonymously as I obviously lack the boundaries to do so.

Thank you for listening and thanks to the others present for tolerating the interruption of this discussion (the original thread has now been closed).

Nothing but bullshit. Could I have some for my lawn. It could do with some fertilizer.

It just never stops. One can expect the MSM to engage in this behavior, but so-called liberal media as well?

It is hard enough keeping up with the BS coming out of the White House and Congress without wasting time arguing with a Putz.

OBTW , Hufffpost had both Tom Donohue ( fuerer of the US Chamber of Commerce ) and Henry Blodgett ( fired in disgrace Lying backstabber stock analyst ) on their business page ...

All the old ghosts keep getting recycled. I can't wait for Charlie Rose to have Kissinger on again. Just makes me crazy!

Has for decades now been to stridently accuse your opponet of being what you are.

Not even any point in reading it or the comments. Of course being an angry mob is arch, in context.

You do call it National Socialism, don't you?

why not just give Ann Coulter a long term contract. Or bring back David Horowitz. There are thoughtful conservatives out there, but for some reason Salon will only publish the completely crap ones. I'm a liberal, and I think liberalism can take on the best conservatism has to offer and come out on top on every issue. There is no need to to set up these fixed contests. Goldberg knows next to nothing about history, politics or economics. If you publish Goldberg, there is no reason not to publish any College Republican, and at least there is a chance it will be passable material.

I consider myself liberal, and I think that the way Goldberg puts together his argument is inflammatory and silly in a lot of ways, but a lot of the responses on here are making me feel ill. I'm not familiar with him in any other situations, so maybe the guy is always calling people names and being a complete and awful ass and deserves the name-calling he's getting here. But as annoying as he might be, 75% of the responses on here are just blisteringly stupid and childish.

I've been reading a lot lately, specifically Ezra Pound (both his more and his less fascist work) and Carolyn Dinshaw (who writes about Medieval literature and queer theory). One of the things I noticed was that a lot of the modes of thinking in the Pound were kind of similar to modes of thinking in Dinshaw's work. Hm. And then I thought, oh god, what am I doing? Am I saying that queer theory is fascist? Am I saying that Ezra Pound's fascism, or any fascism, is ok because it bears, in some ways, a passing resemblance to queer theory? No. I was noting and thinking about how two seemingly really different things, one very liberal and one very... fascist.. could be really similar, and it was leading to some useful stuff, like whether breaking down boundaries between queer and non-queer is useful, or if maybe instead it makes "queer" in all its vagueness less politically and/or personally meaningful.

Anyway, my point is that Goldberg has an strong agenda, and it's visible in how he shallowly and weakly defends his arguments. But any time you start name-calling, or even advocating for someone to be silenced, you're part of a problem. Can't you just think about his point, take what you can from it - maybe even glean something interesting that could point towards ways of solving problems? That's better than name calling, it's turning his arguments on him, making him look stupid instead of just calling him stupid. It's not cherry-picking, it's thinking and some of the commenters on here sound like they need to do more of it.

is that his 'rebuttal' strategy is already obvious: demean serious criticism of his book from the left, then claim that there's no serious criticism from the left. Solicit the usual plugging interviews, cash the checks.

Koppelman made Goldberg look a fool, and tore strips out of his silly book's silly thesis; Goldberg is either too stupid to realise it, or too craven to show that he's aware of it.

It demonstrates the pernicious way in which the right seeds the discourse: in this case, it's Michael Ledeen's academic work on fascism devoured, regurgitated, re-heated and served on a plate. It's a 450-page version of the perennial internet comment: 'but it's National Socialism'. It's a troll in print.