Ezra Klein: Free Book Help

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March 22, 2007

Free Book Help

"Look," says Jonah Goldberg. "My book isn't like Dinesh's latest book. It isn't like any Ann Coulter book. It isn't what the Amazon description says or what the Economist claims it is. Or what Frank Rich imagines it is. It is a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care." Wow! That sounds like a really great book! Matt, though, is skeptical, and wonders if armed men held Goldberg down and forced him to use the unserious subtitle, The Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton.

I think we can fix this. I've never actually heard someone describe their own book as "a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care," but Jonah, after all, would know. So what about this title/subtitle combo: Liberal Fascism: a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care by Jonah Goldberg.

Yeah?

March 22, 2007 | Permalink

Comments

Wonderful title.

Posted by: Korha | Mar 22, 2007 12:32:03 PM

If he's even halfway serious, that putrid title has got to go - with a idiot name like that, it'll get lost in the mix, between Bushworld and one of Michael Savage's tomes. Most people do judge a book by its cover, Jonah.

I've been reading Goldberg's stuff since his salad days on NRO in 1998/1999, and he's always struck me more as a popularizer than a deep thinker. He has a decent, broad sense of humor, and he'd made the occasional cogent thought or two on conservative philosophy. But as the Bush years stretched on, Goldberg has increased his transformation to sheer hackery. Sad to see him sell out like most of his NR colleagues into shameless flackdom.

Someone please tell him to go back to jokes about his couch or his dog. We don't need another David Limbaugh filling the bookshelves with hysterical crap.

Posted by: The Mechanical Eye | Mar 22, 2007 12:42:07 PM

Jonah's ego rivals John Milton's, from Book I of Paradise Lost:

"Fast by the Oracle of God; I thence
Invoke thy aid to my adventrous Song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above th' Aonian Mount, while it pursues
Things unattempted yet in Prose or Rhime."

Posted by: lisongare | Mar 22, 2007 1:01:00 PM

Like Ramesh Ponnuru before him with his Party of Death book, Goldberg wants to have it both ways: have the inflammatory title and cover to increase sales among the rabid wingnuts, but disclaim all responsibility for the title and cover so that the book can be taken seriously and treated as a work of scholarship, getting attention in places that wouldn't touch the wingnut screeds.

Posted by: KCinDC | Mar 22, 2007 1:29:28 PM

'I've never actually heard someone describe their own book as "a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care," '

In his introduction to the Tractatus, Wittgenstein said:

"The truth of the thoughts communicated here seems to me unassailable and definitive. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the problems have in essentials been finally solved."

Jonah Goldberg, you are no Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Posted by: Jason | Mar 22, 2007 2:00:13 PM

It is a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care.

So, who's the ghost writer?

Posted by: Tiparillo | Mar 22, 2007 2:36:30 PM

I really think he ought to mention his mom in the title.

Posted by: sglover | Mar 22, 2007 2:55:01 PM

Jonah Goldberg, you are no Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Even Ludwig Wittgenstein was no Ludwig Wittgenstein, given that Ludwig went on to regret the Tractatus.

Posted by: nolo | Mar 22, 2007 3:08:40 PM

Even Ludwig Wittgenstein was no Ludwig Wittgenstein

Proper names... being used as definite descriptions! Saul Kripke is no Saul Kripke!

Posted by: Neil the Ethical Werewolf | Mar 22, 2007 3:15:21 PM

I kind of feel sorry for the lad... I've always felt this symbiotic connection to him, as if in some way he's having the career I could have were my Mother more sarcastic and my tendencies (even) more conservative (We have these weird parallels, which are probably only meaningful to me). I think it's going to turn ouut that he's a short form essayist and not really a book writer; I don't think he has the stick-to-it-iveness required, nor, ironically, the really blowhard self importance that he's the smartest guy in the room (Ponnuru, on the other hand, seems convinced the world hangs on his every word; ditto Stanley Kurtz... which is even sadder, really). I think Jonah's book is going to turn out to be too bookish for the screed readers, and to screedy for the serious reviewers, and so it will be a mixed reception poor seller. What do they say... don't quit your day job? Anyone else notice that he seems to be diving back into column writing and blogging with a vengeance?

Posted by: weboy | Mar 22, 2007 3:23:34 PM

"Liberal Fascism: a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made in such detail or with such care by Jonah Goldberg."

I think that's right: This book may represent the most serious and thoughtful argument that Jonah Goldberg has ever made before. Which basically means that he'll actually offer evidence for his assertions (however misrepresented that evidence may turn out to be.)

Posted by: M. Duss | Mar 22, 2007 4:07:03 PM

Jonah's title is horrible, but only somewhat worse than Gore's, which likewise appears to be a partisan screed, only without Bush in the subtitle. Gore's book has even more pretention, judging from the publisher's description.

Posted by: Sanpete | Mar 22, 2007 4:25:11 PM

It's hardly secret that Mussolini was a Marxist who converted from international socialism to national socialism because he found the cross-class solidarity in the trenches of WWI so much fun. Nor is it secret that the 1933-35 version of FDR's New Deal was largely lifted from Mussolini. Nor is it secret that much of the French intellectualizing that has dominated the high end of leftist thinking for the last 60 years has roots during the Nazi occupation of Paris. Jonah has a lot of material to work with, and I suspect he will do a pretty good job.

Posted by: Steve Sailer | Mar 22, 2007 4:39:15 PM

I think we've found our ghostwriter!

Posted by: weichi | Mar 22, 2007 5:15:10 PM

How about shortening the title a tad:

"Liberal Fascism: a very serious, thoughtful, argument has never been made by Jonah Goldberg."

Posted by: fuyura | Mar 22, 2007 5:18:07 PM

Actually, Steve, in the form you appear to understand them in those are secrets, at least from those who know what they're talking about.

Posted by: Sanpete | Mar 22, 2007 5:19:36 PM

Jonah has a lot of material to work with, and I suspect he will do a pretty good job.

Posted by: Steve Sailer

Well, I guess we can be rest assured that Goldberg's upcoming scholarly epic will demonstrate at least as much academic rigor as the thesis that Obama will bankrupt us because he's black. And because he, you know, felt alienated as a teen. That's some scholarly shit right there, man.

Posted by: Cyrus | Mar 22, 2007 5:31:57 PM

the thesis that Obama will bankrupt us because he's black

Can't find this thesis at your link. (Nor the hash that Matt makes of the excerpt.)

Posted by: Sanpete | Mar 22, 2007 5:55:29 PM

It's hardly secret that Mussolini was a Marxist who converted from international socialism to national socialism because he found the cross-class solidarity in the trenches of WWI so much fun.

Similarly, Strom Thurmond as governor of south carolina supported a crackdown on lynching and got rid of the poll tax, which just goes to show that forces of segregation and support of Jim Crowd have their origins in the pro-civil-rights left.

Posted by: Constantine | Mar 22, 2007 7:11:40 PM

though I suspect Hillary has some authoritarian issues, it's our problem. Not theirs. I wish wingers would just quit always worry about us and our politicians. Don't they have their hands full already with their politicians?

Posted by: vwcat | Mar 23, 2007 1:47:19 AM

funny

Posted by: gabe wildau | Mar 24, 2007 6:55:37 AM

I've been reading Goldberg's stuff since his salad days on NRO in 1998/1999,

Good grief! Why?

As far as Jonah patting himself on the back is concerned, I guess he is writing his own jacket quotes to save on having to suck up to the rest of the Corner crowd for a favorable quote

Posted by: rev.paperboy | Jun 28, 2007 5:15:16 AM

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