American Street: The GOP plan to break the backs of suffering Americans
the talking dog:: Really old school
Alternate Brain: Support the Troops? NIMBY!
Scott Horton: Power Shortage for the National Security State
Inside Higher Ed: Organized against labor
INSTAPUTZ: Althouse Putziness
That heavyweight intellectual, Jonah Goldberg, loves to tell his audiences that no one on the left took his masterpiece, Liberal Fascism, seriously -- they just made fun of it!
So this is how Goldberg responds to an actually serious critique.
Evidently, Goldberg thinks that ignoring a sound argument lets you declare victory over it.
Now, just to be clear: Goldberg has never responded to the core of my critique. He's tossed off side issues, but what I have said about Liberal Fascism from the get-go is that its central thesis -- that "properly understood, fascism is not a phenomenon of the right at all. Instead, it is, and always has been, a phenomenon of the left" -- simply does not have any grounding in, and is indeed refuted by, the actual historical facts about the "political space" which fascism historically occupied.
I laid it all out again not too long ago:
This is, in fact, the argument that Goldberg attempts to make in his book as well: That the fascists occupied the "political space" on the Left, and thus were simply out to compete against their fellow leftists. But this is where Goldberg most deeply portrays a lack of respect for the historical material available to him, because any careful study of the actual details of how the fascists came to power in both Italy and Germany makes abundantly clear that they were occupying the available political space on the right -- and had charged hard in that direction from early on in their drive to power.
I discussed this in some detail, citing particularly Robert O. Paxton's work in The Anatomy of Fascism. Paxton, for instance, debunks the fascists' ostensible "anticapitalism":
Alternate Brain: GOP Town Hall Handbook Revealed
Ta-Nehisi Coates: The Coverage We Deserve
Rising Hegemon: Remember that one time...
TBogg: Roll Over, John Phillip Sousa
The Impolitic: Doctor, doctor, gimme the news
OFF THE BEATEN PATH: Here and Now, Sandbox Report, Ramona's Voices, Morning Martini
Thom Hartmann: Dear President Obama
Booman Tribune: But did they get overtime pay?
The Washington Independent: How the CIA can fudge on torture effectiveness
They gave us a republic: Nightowl Newswrap
Zaius Nation: We must save Hitler's brain!
The Plum Line: New ad targets Palin's Facebook supporters, tells them she's a liar
D-Cap has done a series of ten (!) photoshops in honor of Tom Delay's "Dancing with the Stars" gig.
Some of them may require brain bleach afterwards.
I wrote to D-Cap to give me a rundown of the personalities here in "Seven Brides for Seven Birthers" and he replied (L to R)
Tom and Babs
Newt and Malkin
Eric and Ann
Dicky Armey and Bachmann
Glenn and the Moose
Dick and his lovely daughter Mary.
Thanks to Tengrain for hipping me to this post.
Open thread below....
"Mr. Pitiful" from Unfamiliar Faces
I freely admit the worst of intentions: I hope that by planting this little earworm here--having infected me via my kids singing this little ditty over and over this afternoon--that it will leave my brain and infect someone else's. Don't get me wrong, Matt Costa is great to listen to on a carefree Sunday afternoon, but I really need this song to get out of my head.
Anyone else suffering from earworm infection? Feel free to pass it on here.
David Broder in the Washington (Republican Propaganda) Post:
The saga of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and his Argentine romance has been such ripe fodder for the gossip mills that the essential governmental question has almost been forgotten.
Whether Sanford can resolve the mess he has made of his personal life is of little concern to anyone but the people involved.
But when he disappeared for five days, telling no one in his administration or even his security detail where he had gone, he did something totally irresponsible. Had any kind of emergency occurred, South Carolina would have been leaderless.
At the moment Sanford abandoned his duties in secret pursuit of private pleasure, he in effect tendered his resignation.
The Legislature should insist he follow through on it.
Now while I agree with the sentiment that Sanford abandoned his job to follow his little brain, er...heart to Argentina, I'm struck by the difference in Broder's tone from his coverage of Bill Clinton's infidelities:
One of the most revealing statements Broder -- or, perhaps, any political journalist -- has ever made came in 1998. In November 1998, after nearly a year of public opinion polls showing, basically, that people liked Bill Clinton and wanted the Lewinsky investigation to just go away, and of the Washington journalist/pundit crowd vehemently disagreeing, the Post published an article by Sally Quinn attempting to explain the disconnect (which lives on to this day).
Quinn famously quoted Broder explaining why the "Washington Establishment" -- which under anybody's definition includes both Broder and Quinn -- was so angry at Clinton: "He came in here and he trashed the place ... and it's not his place."
Broder's implication -- that Washington was his place, not the president's -- is arrogant enough. But Broder's other comment speaks volumes: "The judgment is harsher in Washington. We don't like being lied to."
What a difference ten years can make. Of course, it has nothing to do with Sanford being a Republican, does it, Dean Broder?
Poor Andy K!
Our webmaster Jamie sent the Crooks and Liars team a terrific link to a guy who re-configured his circa 1982 Commodore 64 computer so he could run Twitter from it. I said I could see running the youtube as an open thread -- dang, it's got five and a quarter inch discs in the video! -- if only I could mash it with Thomas Dolby's "She Blinded Me With Science."
Andy swore that song would stick in his brain for the rest of the day. Good heavens!
Why is it that wingers like Greta still need to ask if waterboarding is torture? Enhanced interrogations are code for torture, but we know that. I guess my brain is getting scrambled by having to watch FOX News constantly try and denounce waterboarding as not really being torture. It's enhanced, it just tastes a little better than before.
Greta: Is waterboarding torture or enhanced interrogation techniques, what words do we use on this?
McCain: It's torture. It's in violation of the Geneva Conventions of the international agreement on torture treaty...singed during the Reagan administration. It goes all the way back to the Spanish Inquisition. It's not a new technique and it is certainly torture.
Did Greta really believe she would get McCain to change his mind on this? Maybe she thought she could break him. Then they get into all the national security stories of the week. Greta wants all the documents released about Cheney and Pelosi and that's when McCain starts wanking along...
At least she brought up Graham rebuking the CIA. McCain is worried about the morale of the CIA? Are they really that weak-kneed? I doubt it, but it's a useful talking point against Pelosi because the media will never say, "hey, these guys are out their in covert world, why would they care what a politician said."
The Mahablog: More infantilism
Zaius Nation: Bristol Palin has miraculously transformed herself into the Abstinence Fairy
Alternate Brain: Always remember this...
Informed Comment: Karzai complains about US air strikes
HOLY CRAP: Teacher broke law by calling creationism "superstitious nonsense"...By their fruits ye shall know them...And maybe not want to hang with them...Hypocrites...Nigerian Witch-Finder going to court...Mormon Controversy...Texas seceeding from earth...This Week In God...Religion cures everything... Bible In a Minute...40 million Nonbelievers in America...This time, the Baptists are right...Always good for a laugh...
