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Liberal Fascism Explained
Campus Report ^ | January 16, 2008 | Amanda Busse

Posted on 01/16/2008 10:19:41 AM PST by bs9021

Liberal Fascism Explained

by: Amanda Busse, January 16, 2008

Conservative commentator Jonah Goldberg is tired of being called a fascist. In his latest book, Liberal Fascism, he fights back against the term that those on the right are often saddled with, reminding readers that the original fascists leaned more toward the left.

Goldberg, the editor-at-large for National Review Online, argues in his book that fascism under Benito Mussolini and Nazism under Adolf Hitler came from the same intellectual source as Progressivism, the birth-mother of American liberalism. The term “liberal fascism” comes from a speech made by author H. G. Wells when he told a group of Young Liberals at Oxford that Progressives must become “liberal fascists” and “enlightened Nazis.”

“I’m not saying today’s liberals are Hitler’s cousins,” Goldberg said at his first discussion of the book held at the Heritage Foundation. “They’re more like his grand-niece once removed.”

The author claims the point of the book is to give an accurate definition and history of fascism, a word which he asserts is commonly misused.

“Many modern liberals and leftists act as if they know exactly what fascism is. What’s more, they see it everywhere—except when they look in the mirror,” Goldberg’s book reads. “Indeed, the left wields the term like a cudgel to beat opponents from the square like seditious pamphleteers.”

The side of fascism he attributes to American liberalism is not that associated with the works of George Orwell or the racism and genocide of the Holocaust. It is much less brutal, “smiley-face fascism,” as he puts it. He asserts that liberals hold political principles which are similar to those found in many fascist regimes.....

(Excerpt) Read more at campusreportonline.net ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: bookreview; fascism; jonahgoldberg; liberalfascism; nazis; ussr
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To: bs9021
“I’m not saying today’s liberals are Hitler’s cousins,” Goldberg said at his first discussion of the book held at the Heritage Foundation. “They’re more like his grand-niece once removed.”

Sorry, the author is wrong.

They ARE Hitler's cousins. Unfortunately people have yet to realize this, and it will be to late once they start being people in the public square.

Liberals should be shut down in the polls and they should be shut down in their "freedom of speech". Why? Because they use NO RESPONSIBILITY in their speech. Once they learn to be responsible, fine... until then, their speech is seditious and they shouldn't be allowed to get up and preach Socialist values.
21 posted on 01/16/2008 10:49:02 AM PST by Rick.Donaldson (http://www.transasianaxis.com - Visit for lastest on DPRK/Russia/China/Etc --Fred Thompson for Prez.)
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To: Rick.Donaldson

They ARE Hitler’s cousins. Unfortunately people have yet to realize this, and it will be to late once they start being people in the public square.

should read:

They ARE Hitler’s cousins. Unfortunately people have yet to realize this, and it will be to late once they start ‘beating’ people in the public square.


22 posted on 01/16/2008 10:50:54 AM PST by Rick.Donaldson (http://www.transasianaxis.com - Visit for lastest on DPRK/Russia/China/Etc --Fred Thompson for Prez.)
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To: bs9021
I had fun with a twerp liberal once. He was whining about how we all need to work together and other such collectivist nonsense, so I played along with him. I said "so, you're saying that each one of us is individually weak like a stick by itself. But if we are all tied together like sticks in a bundle we will be much stronger." He agreed completely. I then went for the kill. I told him that described the Roman fasces, from which the term fascism is derived. The stunned liberal looked at me, blinked a few times and said that wasn't what he meant and found something better to do than talk to me any longer.

It was a beautiful moment.

23 posted on 01/16/2008 10:52:22 AM PST by KarlInOhio (Rattenschadenfreude: joy at a Democrat's pain, especially Hillary's pain caused by Obama.)
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To: KarlInOhio
Nicely played, KIO.

When I was in college, a common theme was that Communists were so far left and Fascists so far right that they eventually met.

When I questioned the professor that fascism was a phenomenon of the left, he became unglued. No greater insult to that Commie, for sure.

In denial to the end.

24 posted on 01/16/2008 10:58:34 AM PST by Zuben Elgenubi
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To: RightWhale
This is the one dozenth thread on this, something we already knew about before the book was published.

Oh, oh--a Freeper with really long whiskers.

25 posted on 01/16/2008 10:58:48 AM PST by Misterioso
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To: bs9021; wideawake
I understand that Goldberg dates "American fascism" to Woodrow Wilson (which is going to confuse a lot of "palaeocons" who think every conservative who doesn't hate Israel is a Wilson-worshiper), but I have a theory of my own: that had he lived long enough to see Mussolini, Theodore Roosevelt might very well have become an avowed fascist.

Think about it. TR advocated interventionism in both the economy and in foreign affairs. He glorified war. He was a "jingo." And while he supported radical policies domestically, he was a bitter opponent of radical organizations (much like Bismarck before him). Add to this our youngest president's preaching of "the strenuous life" sounds much like the vitalism and worship of "action" of early Italian fascism. Also, despite his progressivism, he had a belief in white supremacy not only endemic to his time but also influenced by Darwinian theory.

TR died just ten weeks before Mussolini organized the Fascisti in Milan. If he had lived to witness the new movement I believe it would have struck a chord with him.

26 posted on 01/16/2008 11:00:56 AM PST by Zionist Conspirator (Vayavo'u Venei-Yisra'el betokh hayam bayabbashah; vehamayim lahem chomah miymiynam umissemo'lam.)
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To: bs9021

Gun control advocates love to use the word facist to anyone who supports gun rights. I love to remind them that it was Hitler who gathered up all of the guns from the populace.


27 posted on 01/16/2008 11:10:35 AM PST by midwyf (Wyoming Native. Environmentalism is a religion too.)
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To: Zionist Conspirator
---having read many a biography of TR, I agree wholeheartedly. He used every office he ever held to expand the reach of government as much as possible.

Even as an ex-president (while he wasn't as loathsome as Carter) he couldn't keep his mouth shut, as his predecessors had--and was a major force in getting the US into WW 1, IMHO, the mistake of the century---

28 posted on 01/16/2008 11:11:28 AM PST by rellimpank (--don't believe anything the MSM tells you about firearms or explosives--NRA Benefactor)
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To: bs9021

I have been saying this for YEARS!


29 posted on 01/16/2008 11:14:47 AM PST by rightwingextremist1776
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To: KarlInOhio

Wow!
You are both vicious AND witty.
Any more heroic tales to tell about yourself?


30 posted on 01/16/2008 11:22:53 AM PST by BunkDetector
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To: Slapshot68
When liberals start calling a fascist or neocon, you can be reasonably assured that they have no clue what the definition is of either.

You do know the origin of neo-con is the Trotskyite, Irving Kristol, right?

31 posted on 01/16/2008 11:41:14 AM PST by Nephi ( $100m ante is a symptom of the old media... the Ron Paul Revolution is the new media's choice.)
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To: Greg F

I have Jonah’s book, over 400 pages.
A must read
information with historical facts, and several
pages of notes in back of book

He was also on C-SPAN last weekend and backs up


32 posted on 01/16/2008 11:59:38 AM PST by SoCalPol (Duncan Hunter '08 Tough on WOT & Illegals)
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To: Nephi

No, the origin of the term neoconservative is the socialist, Michael Harrington. He used the terms as a derogation of “splitters” such as Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz. Kristol and Podhoretz began to use the term as an ironic honorific, then later used the term in a more neutral sense.


33 posted on 01/16/2008 2:50:48 PM PST by oblomov
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To: oblomov

Interesting.
I didn’t realize that the label, “Neo-conservative” was a derisive term used by a student of the Trotskyite, Max Schactman to identify other former Trotskyites.


34 posted on 01/16/2008 5:22:27 PM PST by Nephi ( $100m ante is a symptom of the old media... the Ron Paul Revolution is the new media's choice.)
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To: Greg F

I got this book this weekend and I am very pleasantly surprised as to the size, character, good research etc.

Thread on my study soon.


35 posted on 01/21/2008 1:03:48 PM PST by KC Burke (Men of intemperate minds can never be free...their passions forge their fetters.)
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To: Zionist Conspirator
The "progresivism" of TR as well as Wilson is acknowledged in Goldberg's book. He characterizes the centralization as Wilson's alone where in TR it surrounded his personality. To be fair, George Will, in Restoration cited quite clearly a decade ago how these two consecutive Presidencies politicized the office and weakened Congress. He was making the point, but for other reasons (term limits to strengthen the legitamacy of Congress).
36 posted on 01/21/2008 1:22:16 PM PST by KC Burke (Men of intemperate minds can never be free...their passions forge their fetters.)
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To: KC Burke
The "progresivism" of TR as well as Wilson is acknowledged in Goldberg's book. He characterizes the centralization as Wilson's alone where in TR it surrounded his personality. To be fair, George Will, in Restoration cited quite clearly a decade ago how these two consecutive Presidencies politicized the office and weakened Congress. He was making the point, but for other reasons (term limits to strengthen the legitamacy of Congress).

This is all true, but my main point was that TR's peculiar youth, activism, social Darwinism, advocacy of "the strenuous life," of American jingoism, and statism (while simultaneously being strongly opposed to radical organizations) make him the closest thing to Mussolini in the America of that time period. Also check out TR's speaking style--the jutting jaw, the arm-waving, the moralism. And I am not saying that TR would have advocated a one party state (at least I don't think he would have), but if you boil fascism down to its essentials (vitalism, interventionism, militarism, and opposition to leftist organizations) TR is almost a fore-echo of Mussolini.

It would have been interesting if he had lived to see Mussolini's "experiment."

37 posted on 01/21/2008 5:40:19 PM PST by Zionist Conspirator ('Anokhi HaShem 'Eloqeykha 'asher hotze'tikha me'Eretz Mitzrayim, mibeit `avadim . . .)
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To: Zionist Conspirator
I will agree that the comparison is apt. The leadership attitudes that assembled into what became Fascism and later mutated to Nazism was originally fostered by the time and the reaction to the speed of economic change coupled with power shifts by democratization and the slow electorate.

This is the time when economic forces were powerful enough to be percieved as buying state legislatures to get Senators and then nimble enough to buy Senators, or their campaigns, with even greater efficiency after the change of the 17th amendment.

The proactive leaders used the traits you cite to try to get the advance on those forces the percieved as thwarting effective leadership and once it worked, bad actors saw the efficiency.

38 posted on 01/22/2008 6:56:18 AM PST by KC Burke (Men of intemperate minds can never be free...their passions forge their fetters.)
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To: bs9021
Jonah Goldberg will be on Glen Beck the whole hour tonight.


39 posted on 02/22/2008 8:39:32 AM PST by bigjoesaddle (Toby Keith doesn't want to be fed, Toby Keith wants to HUNT!)
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