Monday, November 09, 2009

It Was Never Guaranteed To Be A Just Universe

What wakes liberal writers up at night -- I mean that eye-snap of soul-gnawing, nauseating dread -- is not social injustice, is not the fear of creeping fascism, is not rage against corporate greed ...

It is the haunting certainty that Jonah Goldberg will die happily in his sleep without ever comprehending that he's an idiot.

(Yeah, I tried reading Liberal Fascism. It's just that bad.)




EDIT: One of the commenters wrote:

Wow. Great way to insult half of Leverage's audience. You do realize that there are conservatives that watch and enjoy the show, don't you? This kind of commentary which spews vitriol towards a particular viewpoint only damages and taints the Leverage brand.

I'm sorry, that wasn't my intent at all. Let me clarify.

Goldberg isn't an idiot because he's a conservative. There are quite a few conservatives I both like and admire. We have many conservative fans of the show, because enjoying a good con show, or relishing watching protagonists taking down rich bad guys is neither conservative nor liberal. A fun show is a fun show.

Goldbeg's an idiot because he writes what he writes the way he writes it.

If I'm "spewing vitriol at one particular viewpoint", it's at shoddy research, childlike logic and a truly Cthulhu-level hubris. *

But if you equateGoldberg's massively awful thinking and writing with the conservative movement -- that is, if in your world-view you are OBLIGATED to admire or agree with Goldberg just because he's conservative royalty -- then that's the sort of lockstep, blind hero worship I don't respect in anyone of any ideological stripe.

If you consider an insult to Jonah Goldberg an insult to all conservatives, that's your problem. Not mine. And, frankly, an insult to thinking conservatives.









*(I also found Michael Moore's latest film an embaressment. But this post isn't about him.)

76 comments:

  1. It's not even so much that he doesn't realize that he's an idiot, it's the idea that he'll die thinking that his position in the media was gained by something other than simple nepotism that rankles.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Even worse; as an atheist, I'm certain that he won't get to find out even after he dies.

    I want an afterlife where I can yell "We told you so" at these idiots for eternity.

    ReplyDelete
  3. You didn't pay for the book, did you?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous8:29 PM

    Wow. Great way to insult half of Leverage's audience.

    You do realize that there are conservatives that watch and enjoy the show, don't you? This kind of commentary which spews vitriol towards a particular viewpoint only damages and taints the Leverage brand.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I tried reading Liberal Fascism.

    Jeeze, man, why would you put yourself through that?

    Hey, you can have revenge on Goldberg. You've got a TV series where blowhards and frauds get their cumuppance, yeah?

    'engratio': Harry Potter spell that makes the target feel indebted to the sender. 3 mana to cast, duration 10 minutes, Will roll to resist.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous8:43 PM

    "You do realize that there are conservatives that watch and enjoy the show, don't you? This kind of commentary which spews vitriol towards a particular viewpoint only damages and taints the Leverage brand."

    I have a feeling most of the conservatives who watch "Leverage" and read Rogers' blog, tend to be of the John Cole/Andrew Sullivan variety who consider Goldberg an gasbag. All the others (Save the odd concern troll.) tend to pass on by.

    ReplyDelete
  7. @anonymous

    I'm sorry, I may have been unclear. Goldberg isn't an idiot because he's a conservative. There are quite a few conservatives I both like and admire. We have many conservative fans of the show, because enjoying a good con show, or relishing a show taking down rich bad guys is neither conservative nor liberal.

    Goldbeg's an idiot because he writes what he writes the way he writes it.

    I also found Michael Moore's latest film an embarassment. But this post isn't about him.

    But if you EQUATE Goldberg's massively awful thinking and writing with the conservative movement -- that is, you are OBLIGATED to admire or agree with Goldberg just because hes conservative royalty -- then that's the sort of lockstep, blind hero worship I don't respect in anyone of any ideological stripe.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Yossarian9:03 PM

    "This kind of commentary which spews vitriol towards a particular viewpoint only damages and taints the Leverage brand."

    'Jonah Goldberg' is not a viewpoint, he's a person. And that person is an effing idiot.

    And I'm afraid that if you think "half of Leverage's audience" cares enough about the relative merit of Jonah Goldberg to actually be insulted by this post, then you've enormously overestimated the number of thin-skinned people out there who obsessively search for commie influences in their favorite TV shows.

    And though I find your comment to be misguided and just a little spiteful, I think you should take heart in the fact that, if Lucianne Goldberg were your mother, you would be more than qualified to edit National Review Online or write a best-selling book about how everyone you don't like is Hitler.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Throttle it back a little Yossarian. I thought the comment was short-sighted, but not spiteful, and I'd prefer if the Comments stay directed outside the Commenter box. I get to break that rule, but it's my blog.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous10:29 PM

    out of curiosity, in what way is his research shoddy? i haven't read the book, but am interested to know if he indeed is crap at researching or if you just disagree with his viewpoint by default and so therefore his research his crap.

    ReplyDelete
  11. It's really more a mix of bad research and truly atrocious reasoning.

    He can't tell the difference between populism and fascism, barely discusses (or indeed, by his own admission read for the research of the book) Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism - indeed, Mussolini is a socialist for his entire career, according to Goldberg, despite murdering every, you know, socialist he could find.

    Most importantly, he never really defines fascism in a book called LIBERAL FASCISM, basically taking a mulligan and saying it's undefinable (before, you know, writing a book about it). All this despite a broad historical consensus about the elements of fascism, including anti-intellectualism, nationalism, a longing to return to a "Golden age" of culture ...

    In short, as soon as -- I spotted while leafing ahead -- Goldberg teases the argument that vegetarianism is somehow fascist because the Nazis advocated vegetarianism (meaning, of course, the American moon landing program was fascist because of its link to Werner von Braun) I punched out. And by all accounts, that's not the dumbest thing in the book.

    Listen, I think there's a fine book to be written about the authoritarian impulse in both liberal and conservative culture, and there are times Goldberg in the book seems to be flirting with that (accidentally, because he either can't tell the difference or fudges it for his agenda), but this book ain't it.

    To be fair, what I read was enjoyable -- he's got a pretty light style. I never stopped reading because of the sort of turgid "behold my mighty intellect" compound phraseology you sometimes encounter in these kinds of books. He makes no sense and embarrassing arguments very, very cleanly and readably Even elegantly.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Anonymous11:56 PM

    Sorry, I can't really add to anything that's being said regarding this "media man" being "an idiot.. don't know, don't care at the moment anyway:) BUT I'd like to say I like Leverage as a really "fun show" - not to mention that Tim Hutton and CK are great to watch ;D
    I'm sure S3 is gonna be awesome!

    ReplyDelete
  13. >> Great way to insult half of Leverage's audience. <<

    Half? Let's be honest, it's more like 27%.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Hogan8:01 AM

    out of curiosity, in what way is his research shoddy?

    For example, Goldberg posted on the Corner a request for some expert on Herbert Spencer to get in touch with him, as he didn't know much of anything about Spencer and didn't want to take the (admittedly extensive) time to find out himself.

    A blogger named Scott Eric Kaufmann, who didn't think much of Goldberg but wanted to do some helpful outreach (and who wrote a dissertation on non-Darwinian theories of evolution in the nineteenth century), emailed him and offered to help. Goldberg sent him a draft passage, and Kaufmann told him he was grossly oversimplifying Spencer's thought; Spencer didn't really think that. Goldberg's response was "THEN WHY DO PEOPLE SAY HE DID?" Then he announced that Kaufmann wasn't helping and should stop emailing him.

    Whole story here.

    It appears to be bad research in the specific sense of cherrypicking: filtering out sources that disagree with your premise (unless they can be made to sound like they do). There may be other types too.

    ReplyDelete
  15. "Wow. Great way to insult half of Leverage's audience."

    Only two people watch Leverage? Then... who are all the people commenting on this site?

    ReplyDelete
  16. Can we just add that Chris Hitchens is a complete moron as well. The worst part of his moronitude (:P) is that he so obviously considers himself, and worse is widely considered by others, to be an "intellectual."

    ReplyDelete
  17. Notorious P.A.T.10:10 AM

    As a person who watches and enjoys "Leverage", and stops by this blog once in a while: what does this blog have to do with that show?

    ReplyDelete
  18. Goldberg is an idiot, and not only is Liberal Fascism a complete joke, it's so thoroughly penetrated by inexcusable laziness -- both of research and of argument -- that he must be laughing at all the nimrods who bought it.

    Fascism, for example, is both those who want to 'get beyond politics' and those who want to 'make politics into a religion'. Not making that up.

    It's just pathetic.

    ReplyDelete
  19. At the end of the book, Goldberg mentions the infamous argument between William F. Buckley and Gore Vidal, where Vidal kept calling Buckley a fascist, and Buckley got so annoyed that he called Vidal a faggot. Goldberg actually says something to the effect of, I wanted to do a more civil version of Buckley's retort. That explains the book as well as anything else.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Anonymous10:45 AM

    As a person who watches and enjoys "Leverage", and stops by this blog once in a while: what does this blog have to do with that show?
    One of the creators of Leverage has been known to stop by in the comments from time to time.

    ReplyDelete
  21. "Can we just add that Chris Hitchens is a complete moron as well."

    Seriously. He makes me ashamed to identify as an atheist at times. Then I realize that pretty much every group's got at least one idiot as a loud and proud member and I get over it.

    ReplyDelete
  22. "Wow. Great way to insult half of Leverage's audience."

    Oh come on - Jonah Goldberg isn't that fat.

    ReplyDelete
  23. If you're a conservative, and you watch Leverage, you're some kind of freaky masochist, who wishes that these wonderful people would come teach you the lesson you deserve, and tell you you deserve it.

    Or, like most conservatives, you're incapable of understanding what things actually mean.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Sorry:
    "... watching protagonists taking down rich bad guys is neither conservative nor liberal"
    Wrong:
    Protagonists taking down POOR guys is conservative; protagonists taking down rich bad guys is liberal.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Anonymous6:12 PM

    Also from that site that Hogan linked to that slays Goldberg, there's a post on "Leverage as liberal pornography" that's well worth the read.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Liberal Fascism, huh?
    You are referring, I hope, to this.

    Favorite passage:


    In Nazi Germany, you couldn’t pull yourself up by your own bootstraps by having your mom know
    someone who knew someone who sucked Clinton’s cock, parlay this into various no-work “jobs” funded by the inheritances of even more fortunate princelings, and eventually to a regular gig at a major metropolitan newspaper and a big book deal. (Note: this system is called “the free market”.)

    ReplyDelete
  27. Anonymous10:27 PM

    Wow.

    Calling a book shoddily researched and then go on to admit that you haven't read it is pretty weak.

    Being wrong about a thing, or having a different political view does not make one an idiot.

    Calling someone an idiot because you disagree with a book you didn't read doesn't do you any credit.

    I could understand and even respect a critique, if it went any deeper than "he is an idiot."

    One can encounter "leftists" routinely calling conservatives "fascist" without prompting any corrections from the left.

    Sure, Goldberg will have errors in his book. Most books have a few.
    But the overall claim of the book, that the "left" misuses the term "fascist" is well supported.

    Any honest examination of "fascism" will find left leaning economic principles and nationalist tendencies that the modern world would term "right-wing."

    Henry Rollins can call Ann Coulter a fascist in a video piece, and not get called an "idiot" for misusing the term. That makes the reason some wish to examine the meaning of the term more clear.

    Selective criticism of who gets to "own" the term is what I took the book to really be about.

    That conservatives get labeled "trolls" is explanation enough why none would bother to "stick around" your blog.

    The enforcement of a liberal orthodoxy in the comment section is decidedly illiberal.
    Possibly even fascist!
    Or vegetarian, at the least.

    ReplyDelete
  28. Actually, Jonah Goldberg is regarded as an idiot by people who have actually read what he has written.

    Face it; the man's an overinflated boob. And I don't mean that in a good way.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Hogan8:59 AM

    the overall claim of the book, that the "left" misuses the term "fascist"

    That is not the overall claim of the book. Have you read it?

    ReplyDelete
  30. Henry Rollins can call Ann Coulter a fascist in a video piece, and not get called an "idiot" for misusing the term.

    That's because it's Henry Rollins, who is not an idiot. He actually knows what the word means because he's bothered to read the books that talk about fascism as a historical and political force. also, he's criticising a woman who wrote a book defending McCarthyism. So, yeah. Maybe pick a better example next time.

    That Goldburg is a dumbass and his book utter crap is not liberal bias (other than the well known fact that reality has a liberal bias). His research methods are shoddy at best* and his ability to structure a rational argument approaches logic much like Haley's Comet approaches Earth: at a great distance and very rarely.

    * I say this as an academic librarian, who teaches people how to do proper research for a living. Goldburg's book is a textbook case of what not to do.

    ReplyDelete
  31. "Henry Rollins can call Ann Coulter a fascist in a video piece, and not get called an "idiot" for misusing the term."

    Two things.

    1. How can you criticize a video piece that you haven't even seen? (If it's a Henry Rollins video, it's a good bet that maybe one American in 100,000 has seen it, and if you're one of them, well, I pity you).

    2. If you think that Jonah Goldberg and Ann Coulter are exemplars of American conservatism, either American conservatism is barreling of an intellectual cliff, or you are. More likely, both.

    ReplyDelete
  32. "Jonah Goldberg and Ann Coulter are exemplars of American conservatism, either American conservatism is barreling of an intellectual cliff, or you are. More likely, both."
    Both? Please make a case for this, if you can. Conservatives publicly represent themselves, as you note, with Jonah Goldberg and Ann Coulter; also Palin, O'Reilly, Limbaugh, Malkin, Palin, Beck(!) and the Republican Party. Conservatives who go sane get labeled liberal. See John Cole archives at:
    http://www.balloon-juice.com/

    ReplyDelete
  33. Jonah Goldberg writes for conservative thought's premiere political journal, National Review, and Ann Coulter has twice been invited to be the keynote speaker of the most important conservative gathering of the year, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC, 2005, and 2006); she is a frequent guest on Fox News, and her books are always selections of the conservative book-of-the-month club. So, yeah, they pretty much *are* exemplars of today's American conservatism.

    I can see how this would make you, as a conservative, uncomfortable, but then I didn't make them exemplars. The movement did.

    ReplyDelete
  34. I wish you would separate out the Leverage posts from your musings. Which of course is just a comment from someone who looks at an entertaining show like Leverage as an escape from the Liberal/Conservative hate wars and does not want to stop by and kill my little mental vacation. Your blog, your views - no break for me.

    One more comment. It somehow taints the Leverage experience for me that someone thinks that conservatives somehow enjoy taking down the poor guy. Talk about limiting your education and dialogue. You all should read Jonathan Haidt who is a UVA professor who writes about morality and politics. It is a wonderful insight into ways that we might understand one another better.dis

    ReplyDelete
  35. In my view everyone ought to read it.

    ReplyDelete
  36. I think you giving great advice for playwrights staring out.Very nicely described your thoughts here.I like to read more about this.

    ReplyDelete
  37. Thanks so much for the post, really effective data.

    ReplyDelete
  38. Penderita Penyakit kondiloma atau Kutil Kelamin yang telah terinveksi disarankan untuk segera melakukan pengobatan secepat mungkin sebelum Virus HPV penyebab kutil kelamin makin banyak berkembang biak di dalam sel darah makin lama dibiarkan akan memperparah kondisi organ vital karena kutil kelamin akan terus membesar sehingga terlihat seperti jengger ayam untuk penderita yang baru tertular kurang dari satu bulan biasanya akan lebih cepat ditanggulangi obat kutil kelamin Paling ampuh dari De Nature dan terbaik ada hanya di http://obatkutildikemaluan.blogdetik.com/ untuk mendapatkan informasi yang lebih jelas mengenai pengobatan kutil pada kelamin silahkan kontak langsung di nomer 0852 808 77 999 atau 0859 7373 5656 Bagaimana mengobati Ambeien itu sendiri. pengobatan yang terbaik untuk Ambeien adalah dari luar dan dalam sehingga Ambeien benar benar tuntas dan tidak akan kambuh lagi. obat Ambeien terbaik "Ambeclear dari De Nature" AlamiAdalah obat Ambeien herbal yang memang terbaik untuk mengobati Ambeien, dan sudah terdaftar di badan obat dan makanan (BPOM) dengan nomer registrasi POM TR: 133 374 041. terbuat dari bahan alami antara lain terdiri Daung Ungu, Mahkota Dewa dan Kunyit Putih.

    ReplyDelete
  39. Penyakit kencing nanah bisa disebabkan oleh beberapa faktor seperti seks bebas, penularan, virus hpv, lingkungan, gaya hidup dan lainnya, Maka dari itu kita harus waspada dengan penyakit kencing nanah ini, karena penyakit kencing nanah sangatlah berbahaya, Namun untuk anda yang menderita penyakit kencing nanah, maka anda tidak perlu khawatir,

    ReplyDelete
  40. Bukan hanya pengobatan medis saja tapi ada juga pengobatan rumah alami yang dapat digunakan untuk menyingkirkan penyakit kutil kelamin ini. Intinya, karena kutil ini muncul di daerah yang sensitif, maka anda harus mencari pengobatan yang terbaik pada kulit Anda dan jika diperlukan juga dibantu dengan tenaga medis yang professional. Sebab dokter akan menjadi sumber informasi yang baik untuk mengobati penyakit ini.

    ReplyDelete
  41. Sekitar Vagina Tumbuh Daging, Berbahayakah? Kutil Pada Kepala Penis mirip bunga kol atau jengger ayam, Merupakan Penyakit Yang diakibatkan Oleh Virus.Kutil kelamin, atau disebut juga condyloma acuminata, adalah kutil atau daging berwarna kulit atau keabuan yang tumbuh di sekitar alat kelamin dan

    ReplyDelete
  42. penyakit yang ditularkan melalui hubungan seks : vaginal, oral dan anal. Juga dapat menular melalui persentuhan kulit dengan daerah yang terinfeksi.

    ReplyDelete
  43. Sebelum kita membahas tentang pengobatan ambeien, dalam kesempatan ini
    saya ingin menjelaskan sekilas tentang ambeien, agar kita semua bisa
    memahami benar apa itu penyakit ambeien

    ReplyDelete