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Title: Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning
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Manufacturer: Doubleday
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| Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday Truth | What is this book about?
Walmart got an unfair trade advantage by trading with Communist China, using their slave labor, and putting millions of small mom and pop American businsess out of business.
Walmart then supports the Republican party with their communist money.
Then some Commi Republican writes a stupid book. The Bush family has orchistrated our current free trade sysetem with China - the only country that systemiszes abortion yet they claim to be anti-abortion. Not! Plus they gave cCommi China the opportunity to poisen American children with toxic toys. Great job Republicans.
Read the end of animal farm and you will see the slave owning coomunists and their admiring capitalists working together.
Communism ended in Europe due to the greatest President Reagan and the fear he put into athiest pigs plus the union movement solidarty lead by Lech Walensa.
The Republicans today are funded by Communists and are Commi lovers. Read Animal Farm.
We need someone to fight for Democracy, not some screwed up vision of capitalism funded by trade with athiest communists, but plain Red, White and Blue Democracy. Vote Obama.
God, I wish Reagan were alive.
Our homes should also be more then just some capitalist driven Vegas-style pyramid scheme supported by a corrupt Republican engineered tax scheme.
I could write a book about the communist republican since the sad exit of Reagan.
| | Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday Not What You Think It's Going To Be | So many people, to include certain friends of mine, are all too willing to write this book off as just one more salvo from the Republican noise machine without ever bothering to read it. Goldberg's title is perhaps unfortunate in this regard, as it leaves one with the impression that it is another rightist screed targeting the usual suspects--"feminazis," militant environmentalists, and the like.
Goldberg had me right away, though, when he discussed the ways in which the word "fascism" (in contemporary discourse) has become pretty much emptied of all real meaning. It has become a sort of floating signifier onto which people project various meanings as they see fit. In the last forty years, "fascism" has been served as a sort of stand-in for "extreme conservative" or "Christian fundamentalist." One strain of this goes back to the protests of the sixties and continues in protest discourse today (a la Chris Hedges' book, for example). Yet, as Goldberg shows in his detailed historical analysis, "fascism" has never really been synonymous with conservatism in any significant way. Fascism is in fact a form of radicalism, as is Christian fundamentalism, whereas conservatism is a movement that is focused essentially on the preservation of tradition and the moderation of the impulse to institute reforms.
One of the great ironies of sixties-era radicals bandying about the word "fascist" to describe Richard Nixon and his ilk is that many of those radical groups who trafficked in such talk (Weathermen, the Black Panthers) employed many of the classic brownshirt tactics of fascist agitators.
This is a great book for anyone who has been perplexed by all the shifting alliances and labels of our times, and anyone who realizes how slippery and meaningless terms like "liberal" or "conservative" or "progressive" are when you try to pin them down. What it really leads the reader to do is rethink the way we think of the political spectrum, in terms of Right, Center, and Left. The radical Right and the radical Left, for example, have much more in common with each other than the radical Left does with traditional liberalism or the radical Right has with conservatism.
Goldberg's working definition of "fascism" is pretty much this: Total worship of the state, state control of all activities and expression, and state ownership of everything. Fascism is always more and more government. The classic example of Fascism, Mussolini's Italy, is exactly this when you examine the historical record. True conservatism, on the other hand, always seeks to lessen the influence of government.
Certainly, the Franco regime in Spain was heavily Catholic and at the same time in political sympathy with Germany and Italy (but ultimately neutral during WWII), but it is important not to confuse "theocracy" with true Fascism.
Goldberg's readings of Rousseau, Robespierre, Sorel, Mussolini, Hitler, Woodrow Wilson, Teddy Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, and many other figures are lively and very perceptive. Many of his revelations are shocking and surprising. Woodrow Wilson, for example, has gone down DRASTICALLY in my estimation after reading Goldberg's interpretation of some of his major writings.
If Hillary Clinton-style liberalism and fascism have anything at all in common, Goldberg says, it's the notion that the state is the supreme arbiter and caretaker for all and of all. | | Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday Most Helpful | | I have really enjoyed this book. Goldberg has shined a light on what it truly means to be Liberal today. While I had heard some of this in college a lot of the information, especially about Wilson was all news to me. At times it does seem that Goldberg reaches a little to make his point, but he does make it. I would, and have, recommend this book to Liberals I know so that they can lean a little about their history and where their beliefs come from | | Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday Progressive Totalitarians | Goldberg's book is excellent: well document, soundly reasoned, and sometimes painfully obvious for anyone who has studied the roots of progressivism, eugenics, the politically correct movement, the nanny state trends or the environmental movement.
Goldberg leaves no stone unturned. Wait until you see his sobering take on the origins of the minimum wage. It will surprise you. Much of the material in the book I had read or heard before. Goldberg, however, has done us a great service by pooling the ideas together in one comprehensive volume. So, what you might have gotten an inkling about by reading Robert Proctor's The Nazi War on Cancer, you get a fuller picture of in Goldberg's book. After all, who knew the Nazis were animal rights believers before Proctor? Not too many of us. Goldberg follows the line of thought from the progressives to modern day Democrats and leftists. The linking pin between those liberals a century ago and those today is fascism. This will come as a surprise to many people, but it is undeniable.
Goldberg's book is excellent. You won't be disappointed - unless you're a liberal and won't to desperately avoid the truth as liberals so often do. | | Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday DON'T ORGANIZE ME | Of all the books I've read since I've been writing reviews and reading others on Amazon, this book has had the most profound effect upon my thinking and my political affiliations.
THIS BOOK SHOULD BE REQUIRED READING FOR EVERY SINGLE HIGH SCHOOL'S (PUBLIC AND PRIVATE) AMERICAN HISTORY CLASS IN THE USA.
I mean every single word I say here.
I love writer's who make me think, love when I can tell they've done much soul searching and thinking themselves. Doesn't surprise me at all that he's a jew. I wouldn't have touched this book ten years ago knowing that he writes articles regularly for the National Review, a decidedly rightist publication. Very early on in this book, he made me think of two words very carefully: N A T I O N A L S O C I A L I S M.
"N A T I O N A L S O C I A L I S M"-What does it mean? Does it conjure anything resembling the republican ideals espoused by people like Alexander Hamilton??? Absolutely, absolutely not.
The symbol most associated with fascism is that of the bundle of sticks tied so closely that there is no space between them. An axe head is attached to the bundle, conjuring up utility, work, but also a threat. I have so many pages bookmarked in this book. I've been trying to find one I remember reading, but can't, where he talks of democratic ideals and if you wouldn't go along with the program, well-get out of the way. (You will never be fooled again after reading this book). Goldberg provides evidence that this last century began upon nationalistic, populist, fascist foundations most evident within democratic ranks as early as WOODROW WILSON! Yes, it is really shocking what you'll find here within. I have a more realistic appraisal of FDR now. You can tell when you've read a book that is well researched and carefully reasoned. It very definitely is thought provoking.
My book is a library book, overdue, and would love to have it on hand at all times. Would love a subscription to National Review. Needless to say, a deep and long lasting impression, this book has made upon me. It's time the American Heritage dictionary rewrote their definition of fascism. Goldberg effectively argues that the public's perception of fascism being a right wing phenomenon stems more from the extreme far left's, i.e. communism's, categorization of it. Fascism's association with the military and business and therefore the American Republican party is misguided. That the American left, most evident today in the far left Democratic party, has far more in common with Mussolini's not so racist brand of fascism will become abundantly clear upon reading this book.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK BE READ. GET A COPY SOMEHOW. | | Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning by Doubleday Product Description | “Fascists,” “Brownshirts,” “jackbooted stormtroopers”—such are the insults typically hurled at conservatives by their liberal opponents. Calling someone a fascist is the fastest way to shut them up, defining their views as beyond the political pale. But who are the real fascists in our midst?
Liberal Fascism offers a startling new perspective on the theories and practices that define fascist politics. Replacing conveniently manufactured myths with surprising and enlightening research, Jonah Goldberg reminds us that the original fascists were really on the left, and that liberals from Woodrow Wilson to FDR to Hillary Clinton have advocated policies and principles remarkably similar to those of Hitler's National Socialism and Mussolini's Fascism.
Contrary to what most people think, the Nazis were ardent socialists (hence the term “National socialism”). They believed in free health care and guaranteed jobs. They confiscated inherited wealth and spent vast sums on public education. They purged the church from public policy, promoted a new form of pagan spirituality, and inserted the authority of the state into every nook and cranny of daily life. The Nazis declared war on smoking, supported abortion, euthanasia, and gun control. They loathed the free market, provided generous pensions for the elderly, and maintained a strict racial quota system in their universities—where campus speech codes were all the rage. The Nazis led the world in organic farming and alternative medicine. Hitler was a strict vegetarian, and Himmler was an animal rights activist.
Do these striking parallels mean that today’s liberals are genocidal maniacs, intent on conquering the world and imposing a new racial order? Not at all. Yet it is hard to deny that modern progressivism and classical fascism shared the same intellectual roots. We often forget, for example, that Mussolini and Hitler had many admirers in the United States. W.E.B. Du Bois was inspired by Hitler's Germany, and Irving Berlin praised Mussolini in song. Many fascist tenets were espoused by American progressives like John Dewey and Woodrow Wilson, and FDR incorporated fascist policies in the New Deal.
Fascism was an international movement that appeared in different forms in different countries, depending on the vagaries of national culture and temperament. In Germany, fascism appeared as genocidal racist nationalism. In America, it took a “friendlier,” more liberal form. The modern heirs of this “friendly fascist” tradition include the New York Times, the Democratic Party, the Ivy League professoriate, and the liberals of Hollywood. The quintessential Liberal Fascist isn't an SS storm trooper; it is a female grade school teacher with an education degree from Brown or Swarthmore.
These assertions may sound strange to modern ears, but that is because we have forgotten what fascism is. In this angry, funny, smart, contentious book, Jonah Goldberg turns our preconceptions inside out and shows us the true meaning of Liberal Fascism. |
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