Look, NYT, a historian's review that actually uses, you know, history to analyze Jonah's piece of crap.
(Also, 1!!)
Sir Kraab:
The facts have no place in a modern debate.
How I wish Goldberg could just be ignored --- It's depressing to think that a guy with this little talent is actually important.
Will is right in 2, of course, but I'm hopelessly out of touch with the times, so must hasten to correct myself. Neiwert isn't a historian, but a writer who has actually read some history books. (Note that "actually read" and "history books" distinguish Neiwert's from Jonah's research methods.)
The sad thing is that this Information Age has really become a Information-Free Age.
Despite the ease in which someone can find actual facts, one can hide actual facts from the lazy or disinclined.
Overwhelm them with bad information. Repeat. Repeat. Get your friends to repeat that you have claimed it. Get their friends to repeat that their friends have reported it.
Bingo. It is now the truth to a lot of the population.
One might as well write about anti-Semitic neoconservatism
I dunno about this. Neoconservatism is only philo-semitic in a very narrow sense, where Israel's (and therefore Jewish) interests are assumed to coincide with maximum war. Jewish opinion in the U.S. is certainly anti-neocon, and I suspect (purely ex recto) the policy positions of U.S. neocons aren't overwhelmingly popular in Israel, either. So I bet someone could make a semi-plausible case that neoconservatism is anti-Jew.
Anyway, a much more plausible case than the one that liberals are fascists.
10: or at least it's "contentious." A "disputed issue" and so on. I'm not surprised that the system can be gamed but I'm sad that it's so easy.
10: And ta-da! Saddam was behind 9-11 and Obama is an undercover Muslim.
re: 10
Alex Yorkshire-Ranter refers to it as operationalized post-modernism.
Historically some Zionists hated ghetto Jews as bad as anyone did.
On the other hand, I've also toyed with the idea that Podhoretz is the Malcolm X of the weenie liberal Jew. The cleansing power of violence will come from the barrel of a gun and Jews will finally reclaim their birthright. Woodie Allen is their Uncle Tom.
Seriously. A lot of the neocons were leftists when Fanon and Malcolm X were everywhere. Podhoretz always has had violence fantasies, as have several other pop neocons (Krauthammer, Kristol).
"operationalized post-modernism"
Like many lawyers, I learned long ago that if I didnt have a compelling position or a powerful argument, I should hide it in a really, really long motion, brief or argument.
However, if I have a compelling position, I should state it simply and concisely.
Don't make it hard for people to find your position.
More funny than angry: RedStateUpdate on the NH results.
undercover Muslim
This screams out for a remake.
Perhaps the Huck! boys will have some free time after Super Tuesday.
11: politicalfootball--It's obviously true that most Jews aren't neo-conservatives, but I believe that most of the early, true neoconservatives were Jewish. I'm thinking of the people who considered themselves liberals and then turned conservative after 1968 or so. Most of them were peopel who championed Moynihan's work on the breakdown of the black nuclear family or were opposed to postmodernism. Wasn't Alan Bloom Jewish? I'm pretty sure that most of the folks at The New Criterion were. David Frum certainly is.
Neiwert isn't a historian, but a writer who has actually read some history books.
And written some history books.
The Jewishness of the early neocons is a cliche and a stereotype, but a pretty valid one. I knew some of them when they were still Left. My feeling is that, besides Leo Strauss, the combined effects of the LSD left, anti-Israel terrorism and the 1967 war, and the urban riots of the late sixties turned them around. I still regret how they turned out; they weren't bad guys to start off, and the craziness of 1967-1972 was enough to turn anyone conservative if they weren't themselves crazy too (which I, however, was).
I couldn't stand to speak to one of them now, though.
Undercover Muslim Brotherhood wasn't as funny as Undercover Brother. Oh well, not gonna hit a dinger every at-bat.
22 is right. I'd add that Jewish neoconservatism is a subset of Jewish U.S. conservatism, which is itself a minority Jewish position. You can't blame the Jews for neoconservatism, but you can blame certain Jews for a lot of it.
If I were writing, Goldberg-style, Anti-Semitic Neoconservatism I would point out that the neocons demonstrably lack interest in that stereotypical Jewish concern: "What's good for the Jews."
Also, Emerson, let me correct your mistake in 22: the LSD left Dirty Fucking Hippies.
Neiwert is perfectly correct to be angry. Do you know how many actual liberals and leftists died at the hands of the Nazis and other facists, killed for their liberalism? Goldberg's book is simply disgusting. So was the NYTimes review, I might add. I wish I'd written them about it.
Note that this review supports w-lfs-n's (iirc) argument that Goldberg attempted to discredit the "fascist" label.
one of the primary traits of Newspeak that all literary historians will agree on is its distinct anti-classicism.
