The bestselling author of Liberal Fascism dismantles the progressive myths that are passed-off as wisdom in our schools, media and politics.

According to Jonah Goldberg, if the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist, the greatest trick liberals ever pulled was convincing themselves that they’re not ideological.

Today, “objective” journalists, academics and “moderate” politicians peddle some of the most radical arguments by hiding them in homespun aphorisms.  Barack Obama casts himself as a disciple of reason and sticks to one refrain above all others: he’s a pragmatist, opposed to the ideology and dogma of the right, solely concerned with “what works.” And today’s liberals follow his lead, spouting countless clichés such as:

• One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter: Sure, if the other man is an idiot. Was Martin Luther King Jr. a terrorist? Was Bin Laden a freedom fighter?
• Violence never solves anything: Really? It solved our problems with the British empire and ended slavery.
• Better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man suffer: So you won’t mind if those ten guilty men move next door to you?
• Diversity is strength: Cool.The NBA should have a quota for midgets and one-legged point guards!
• We need complete separation of church and state: In other words all expressions of faith should be barred from politics …except when they support liberal programs.
  

With humor and passion, Goldberg dismantles these and many other Trojan Horses that liberals use to cheat in the war of ideas. He shows that the grand Progressive tradition of denying an ideological agenda while pursuing it vigorously under the false-flag of reasonableness is alive and well.  And he reveals how this dangerous game may lead us further down the path of self-destruction.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

About Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg’s first book, Liberal Fascism, was a number one New York Times bestseller. A visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, he is the founding editor of the National Review Online and has twice been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. He is also a Los Angeles Times columnist, a Fox News contributor, and a member of the board of contributors at USA Today. The Atlantic named him of America’s fifty most influential commentators. He lives with his family in Washington, DC.

Editorial Reviews

“What can one say to the self-proclaimed ‘independent’ who never has nor ever will vote other than Democratic; or to the wise soul suggesting, of any conflict at all, “the truth must lie somewhere in between”? Mr. Goldberg reminds us that one must stand up and demand of the muddled and supine either an absolute declaration of their principles and acknowledgment of the results of actions having flowed therefrom or a straightforward admission of their intransigence in refusing a concise reply.” -DAVID MAMET, bestselling author of The Secret Knowledge

“Straw man down! In the PC prison yard of accepted political thought, Jonah Goldberg has just shivved progressivism. Bold, brilliant, and bursting with humor, every page of The Tyranny of Clichés is right on the money. If you thoughtLiberal Fascism was good, wait till you read The Tyranny of Clichés --it is fantastic!” -BRAD THOR, bestselling author of Full Black

“Everyone says ‘think for yourself’ but very few people do. In The Tyranny of Clichés, Jonah Goldberg reveals how we’ve become trapped by ideas we think we understand but don’t. A must read.” -VINCE VAUGHN, actor and producer

Do Liberals Live Under A ‘Tyranny Of Cliches’?

NPR Book Review – May 2, 2012 (Excerpt)

Conservative critic Jonah Goldberg says he’s inspired to write when he gets annoyed. “Aggravation is a muse,” he says. And after speaking on a number of college campuses, he grew aggravated enough to write a book. It’s called The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas.

“One of the things that really drove me crazy was the way in which college kids in particular are educated to think that ideology is dangerous and bad. They’ll say, you know, ‘Mr. Goldberg, that sounds like an ideological statement,’ when I’m talking about tax cuts or something. … Of course it’s an ideological statement. You know I’m a conservative; I was asked to come here and be a conservative,” Goldberg says.

Goldberg, a columnist and editor-at-large for National Review Online, argues that ideology is not something to be shunned — in fact, it’s an inevitable part of political debate. “We are a species that must try to impose and find systems — systems of thought, ways of organizing and categorizing reality,” he says.

But in The Tyranny of Cliches, Goldberg argues that people he categorizes as “liberal” talk in ways that shut down any ideological debate. [Read the full article...]

Hating Liberals - ‘The Tyranny of Clichés,’ by Jonah Goldberg

The New York Times Book Review – May 18, 2012 (Excerpt)

Jonah Goldberg’s first book was called “Liberal Fascism.” It was a screed, of course, but a clever one. He argued that liberals who routinely denounce extreme conservatives as fascists should take a look in their own backyard, and he wasn’t fooling around: “It is my argument that American liberalism is a totalitarian political religion.” Goldberg has read around a bit, and he was able to lace his thesis with embarrassing quotations from progressives past who expressed admiration for Italian Fascism, eugenics and other assorted statist atrocities. But his essential point was a simple one: fascists believe in state control of almost every­thing, and so do liberals.

There was one small flaw in this argument, though. Liberals don’t believe that at all. They may favor government action to bail out the auto companies, but they don’t favor government auto companies. There are exceptions, and a liberal belief in ­government-managed health care may be one of them. But there are more than a few self-described conservatives who believe in that sort of socialism, too — about 70 percent of the American public, according to most polls, supports Medicare in its current form. One of the lovely things about American political life is its complexity. Another is its essential moderation, with, I’ll concede, a certain libertarian tinge. Goldberg isn’t much interested in complexity or moderation, though. In the end, “Liberal Fascism” was an exercise in sandbox casuistry: “I’m not a fascist. You are!” [Read the full article...]

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A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Noble, and any other good bookstore.

Conservatives Have Lower IQ

The more intelligent people are, the more they are willing to engage into something new. Conservatives and religious people, in turn, do have a lower intelligence quotient. Psychologists believe, the phenomena can be explained through an evolution-biological view.

It is a daily business in the political arena to categorize an opponent as naive, simple, and stupid. A new study conducted by psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa could strengthen the beliefs of lefties and liberals that they are indeed smarter than their conservative counterparts. According to Kanazawa, intelligent people tend more easily to accept social values as well as political and religious convictions new to the human evolution. The preservation of old values is, however, a matter of conservatives, who are supposedly less intelligent.

The scientist, in cooperation with his colleagues at the London School of Economics and Political Science, analyzed a survey of 14,000 US adolescents conducted between the year 2001 and 2002. One question addressed their level of religious beliefs. The options they were given ranged from “not at all religious”, “somewhat religious”, “moderately religious”, and “very religious.” The “not at all religious” group showed the highest IQ (103), while the “very religious” group came up with an average IQ of 97. This is, after all, only a minute but detectable difference. The average IQ of the entire population lies at 100.

The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health – used by the London scientists – also inquired the adolescents’ political convictions. As the scientists wrote in Social Psychology Quarterly, those who saw themselves as “very liberal” reached an IQ of 106, while those who characterized themselves as “very conservative” had only an average IQ of 95.

“Intelligence was advantageous for our ancestors when it came to solve new emerging problems for which they had no existing solutions,” says Kanazawa. For the same reason, intelligent people would detect and understand such scenarios sooner. The same is true when it comes to rethinking values and lifestyles. A higher IQ makes it possible to go new ways that are not compliant with values and convictions developed in the course of evolution.

The London scientist also claims, conservatives primarily take care of their family and friends, while lefties and liberals also have a heart for foreigners, people with whom they are in no direct genetical relationship. This may be a new development in evolution.

However, in case you are a lefty or liberal, don’t get too excited about the Kanazawa study. There are some slight side effects. People with higher IQs are often dissatisfied with their lives and make less money than conservatives.

Reference: http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/mensch/0,1518,680956,00.html

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The Bleeding Hills

A Novel by Wilfried F. Voss

I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith.
- 2 Timothy iv. 7

The Irish War is officially a part of history, but not for Finnean Whelan, an IRA veteran of almost 40 years. British Intelligence has produced evidence that he is the mastermind behind a conspiracy to assassinate the First Minister of Northern Ireland. For Whelan this is not only a mission of revenge, but marks the beginning of a journey into the past and the return to the one true love: Ireland. [More...]

The Bleeding Hills is available at Amazon.Com, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes & Nobel, and any other good bookstore.