Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning

Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning
by Jonah Goldberg

Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning
List Price: $27.95
Our Price: $14.75
You Save: $13.20 (47%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $13.50 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions


(Click here)
Buy this book at online book store in your country
Canada | UK | Germany | France

Book Summary Information

Author: Jonah Goldberg
Edition: Hardcover
Published: 2008-01-08
ISBN: 0385511841
Number of pages: 496
Publisher: Doubleday

Book Reviews of Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning

Book Review: Intriguing, disturbing, and probably annoying
Summary: 5 Stars

Perhaps the most intriguing history of ideas which I've read in a long time. Mr Goldberg's thesis is that Italian fascism, German fascism (a much wider phenomenon than its anti-Semitism and the Holocaust), and American Progressivism all have common roots in the scientism, romanticism, and philosophy of the nineteenth century. His argument is that these roots, notably the American movement, are the source of what is now identified as liberalism in American politics and culture. He spends eight of his ten chapters making his case, and doing so largely in the words of Italian and German fascists and American progressives and modern liberals. The disturbing part of his book are the last two chapters and its afterword, which reveal, again in the words of political and cultural liberals, how the ideas which he has identified as fascism have so thoroughly permeated both our thinking that we are no longer aware of their presence or able to be self-critical regarding them. There are two things which I find annoying about the book. The first is that it requires me to re-think many of my own conclusions about the presuppositions of European and American culture these past several centuries, as a conflict between vacillating urges toward rationalsim and romanticism. The second is that Mr Goldberg ought really have spoken with someone in the field of classics before attempting to translate Greek words, and should have discovered the readily available information that the fasces were not a bundle of mutually reinforcing reeds but bundles of rods, sometimes with an ax bound into them, carried before certain Roman magistrates as a sign of their imperium (the power to command), which allowed them to punish (with the rods) and in specified circumstances to execute (with the ax) their fellow citizens. Regardless of the ad-hominem arguments flung at the author, all of which his thesis predicts, by the way, read the book. It cannot fail to make you think.

Summary of Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning

“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.

Politics Books

Book Subjects
Most talked about in 40 Most Popular Books of 2008
How Not to Look Old: Fast and Effortless Ways to Look 10 Years Younger, 10 Pounds Lighter, 10 Times Better ImageHow Not to Look Old: Fast and Effortless Ways to Look 10 Years Younger, 10 Pounds Lighter, 10 Times Better
by Charla Krupp
Springboard Press; Published: 2008-01-02; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.85
Price in other shops: $25.99
John Adams ImageJohn Adams
by David McCullough
Simon & Schuster; Published: 2008-01-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.99
Price in other shops: $20.00
How Come That Idiot's Rich and I'm Not? ImageHow Come That Idiot's Rich and I'm Not?
by Robert Shemin
Crown; Published: 2008-03-04; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.99
Price in other shops: $24.95
Into the Wild ImageInto the Wild
by Jon Krakauer
Anchor; Published: 2007-08-21; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.05
Price in other shops: $13.95
Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning ImageLiberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning
by Jonah Goldberg
Doubleday; Published: 2008-01-08; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.79
Price in other shops: $27.95
Sports Illustrated: Brett Favre: The Tribute (Sports Illustrated) ImageSports Illustrated: Brett Favre: The Tribute (Sports Illustrated)
Sports Illustrated; Published: 2008-03-31; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $16.76
Price in other shops: $27.95
The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich ImageThe 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
by Timothy Ferriss
Crown; Published: 2007-04-24; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.00
Price in other shops: $19.95
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't ImageGood to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't
by Jim Collins
Collins; Published: 2001-10; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.99
Price in other shops: $27.50
World Without End ImageWorld Without End
by Ken Follett
Macmillan Publishers Ltd; Published: 2007-10-31; Hardcover; Book
Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Meth Addiction ImageBeautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Meth Addiction
by David Sheff
Houghton Mifflin Co; Published: 2008-02-26; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.20
Price in other shops: $24.00
Similar Books and other products
If Democrats Had Any Brains, They'd Be Republicans ImageIf Democrats Had Any Brains, They'd Be Republicans
by Ann Coulter
Crown Forum; Published: 2007-10-02; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $9.46
Price in other shops: $24.95
Shadow Warriors: The Untold Story of Traitors, Saboteurs, and the Party of Surrender ImageShadow Warriors: The Untold Story of Traitors, Saboteurs, and the Party of Surrender
by Kenneth R. Timmerman
Crown Forum; Published: 2007-11-06; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $16.20
Price in other shops: $25.95
The 5000 Year Leap: The 28 Great Ideas That Changed the World ImageThe 5000 Year Leap: The 28 Great Ideas That Changed the World
by W. Cleon Skousen
Center for Constitutional Studies; Published: 2006-06-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $13.49
Price in other shops: $19.95
World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism ImageWorld War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism
by Norman Podhoretz
Doubleday; Published: 2007-09-11; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.47
Price in other shops: $24.95
Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations ImageSurrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations
by John Bolton
Threshold Editions; Published: 2007-11-06; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $6.99
Price in other shops: $27.00
Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America's Enemies ImageBlacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America's Enemies
by M. Stanton Evans
Crown Forum; Published: 2007-11-06; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $18.13
Price in other shops: $29.95
Real Change: From the World That Fails to the World That Works ImageReal Change: From the World That Fails to the World That Works
by Newt Gingrich
Regnery Publishing; Published: 2008-01-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $17.43
Price in other shops: $27.95
An Inconvenient Book: Real Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems ImageAn Inconvenient Book: Real Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems
by Glenn Beck
Threshold Editions; Published: 2007-11-20; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.75
Price in other shops: $26.00
The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression ImageThe Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression
by Amity Shlaes
HarperCollins; Published: 2007-06-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.98
Price in other shops: $26.95
Economic Facts and Fallacies ImageEconomic Facts and Fallacies
by Thomas Sowell
Basic Books; Published: 2007-12-31; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.95
Price in other shops: $26.00
Book store. Illustrated catalog of books on different categories