I am loving it because the whole thing - book, posts, and comments - are giving me giggle fits and keeping me in a cheerful holiday mood as I watch the Republican candidates try to out-Jebus each other.

Comeon, Tbogg, Jonah just said that white Murikan males are the new Jews; so you got a new cultural identity out of the whole thing! Doesn’t that count for something?

I’m a bit confused though, by Doughbob’s dichotomous reckoning, this white male = Jew thing has me wondering what the hell my blonde, Jewish husband is now supposed to be called.

I spent the whole day yesterday alternating howls of laughter with stunned silence.

Yah, poor Jonah. In blog posts his intellectual pretensions usually just fly without attracting too much attention. Anyone can fling out a “Burkean” here or a “Kantian” there without attracting too much scrutiny. Flexing your brain power in book-length narrative for all to see… maybe not such a great idea. As bradrocket points out, this kind of thing is simply embarrassing:

“The nativist Ku Klux Klan - ironically, often called “American fascists” by liberals - tended to despise Mussolini and his American followers…”

“what the hell my blonde, Jewish husband is now supposed to be called.”

In Jonah’s world, Jew is the new black. So maybe call him Mandingo, or ‘Boo.’

Sumptin like dat.

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.

Not just any grade-school teacher, mind you, but a female.

You’d think that at least Mommy would have proofread this shit.

Stupidity accounts for more evil than malice.

What a minute: do I have this straight? I’m 53 years old, white, male, and midwestern. I’m the new Jew?!?!@?

Are there dues? Is a new wardrobe required? Is pork bar-b-q off the menu?

What I love about the nonsense about the Klan not being fascist ’cause they despised fascists is that, for some reason, this “rule” doesn’t apply to liberals because, if it did, there’d go Jonah’s “thesis.”

As I pointed out over on S,N!, this book really is the historical equivalent of Calvinball. And the great thing about the Pantload is that I think he’s mentally incapable of understanding that it is.

Wow. Four hundred pages of “I know you are but what am I?”

So with this white guys = new Jews stuff - What happens to the old Jews?

And as we know from the Florida 2000 debacle, Jews tend to vote democratic. So now white guys = Democrats?

Is this an example of Karl’s math?

“what the hell my blonde, Jewish husband is now supposed to be called.”

In Jonah’s world, Jew is the new black. So maybe call him Mandingo, or ‘Boo.’

Heh, heh, he’s going to LIKE that!

It’s the New Jew Revue, comin’ right at you!

I know the feeling. The other day I was inspired to send the following letter to the LA Times and National Review, though I doubt I will get a response.

I regret that I have had the great misfortune to read portions of Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism. Unfortunately, I lack the stomach to finish the entire putrid mess. The book is notable in its absolute lack of any intellectual merit. To call it abysmally sloppy scholarship would be a compliment. The book is not merely fact free, but overtly and aggressively counterfactual in many places. This would go a long way in explaining why a work with any intellectual pretensions is totally unsourced. Even such plebian partisan hacks as Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin at least make some pretense at footnotes, even though these are taken out of context, deliberately distorted, or wholly fraudulent. Goldberg further ignores, distorts, or denies widely accepted conventional usage (both popular and scholarly) of terms such as liberal, leftwing, conservative, and fascist in order to further his patently absurd thesis. This is well illustrated in his assertion that Adolph Hitler (who killed or imprisoned all communists, socialists, labor leaders, etc.) was a man of the left. It also shows in his statement that the American Revolution was somehow “conservative despite that fact that it represents the very definition of liberalism in the eighteenth century, when the term was coined, and whose leaders were largely, even by today’s standards, liberals on most issues. Overall, Goldberg sets new records for mental contortions and illogic that call to question whether the publisher has any objective standards at all for publication. The facts that this work ever saw the light of day and that Mr. Goldberg is still employed are irrefutable proof of the nonexistence of God. If there were indeed a God, he would be panhandling on skid row and dining in a soup kitchen. I call on all local public health officials to immediately quarantine the book should it make an appearance in their communities, lest it produce irreparable brain damage among the more vulnerable portions of the population.

I personally think that mama not only dropped little Jonah on his head as an infant, nut also stomped on it and kicked around the kitchen for a couple of hours. Would explain a great deal.

French conservatives collaborated with the Nazis. The leftists, mostly communists, went underground and resisted. Doesn’t he know that? I mean, you don’t have to study history, just rent a few movies, starting with The Sorrow and the Pity.

As someone at Crooked Timber pointed out, you can’t get an education degree at those schools: we knew he was lazy, but he keeps lowering expectations.

And seeing as though I am now officially a Jew, I guess it’s time for a second set of pots and pans.

Gavin at Sadly, No! came up with my favorite book review of the year so far:

Reading this book is like watching a flaming piano fall out of an airplane and land in a puppy farm.

Are there actually no footnotes or endnotes?

OMG!

Bradrocket over at Sadly No says it does, saying, and I paraphrase, “a whole nother barrel of retarded fish.”

French conservatives collaborated with the Nazis. The leftists, mostly communists, went underground and resisted. Doesn’t he know that? I mean, you don’t have to study history, just rent a few movies, starting with The Sorrow and the Pity.

Hell. Just watch a coupla episodes of Hogan’s Heroes. That Bob Crane!

Just returning from the emergency room after sustaining 3rd degree burns over 97% of my brain from all the stupid.

The trains should be coming for all us white males any day now.

First, the white males came for the white males and I said nothing, for I was so confused I didn’t know what to say…

You know Bob Crane was conservative, though, because of his sex scandal!

Dr. Dick, why did you hold back?

I read some of the screenshots of the book, and one thought kept running through my head: Jonah’s editor is going to be asking someone for demanding a damn big bonus this year, for being forced to wade through that dreck. If this is what it looks like now, can you imagine what it looked like before an editor tried to get it into shape?

Shit! I wonder if I can trade my Christmas tree for a menorah.

“Shit! I wonder if I can trade my Christmas tree for a menorah.”

Didn’t think of that. Who wants the Xmas gifts I purchased for the girlfriend?

New sets of bedding (lots of flannel), towels, stuff like that.

Obviously, you’re all just a bunch of fascists.

You’re all missing the point. He’s not an idiot at all. In fact he’s clearly an ironic genius! Isn’t it obvious that he’s the Ed Wood of the political commentary set, and that this is his “Plan Nine From Outer Space”?

Jonah just said that white Murikan males are the new Jews; so you got a new cultural identity out of the whole thing! Doesn’t that count for something?

The burning question is; how is this gonna effect the war on christmas? And, what’s poor ol’ BillO gonna do now that he’s no longer a white american male?

Does this mean Jonah should be circumscribed?

If Jonah (or his mother) had been more circumspect, he wouldn’t have half the Reality-Based Community laughing at him and the other half giving him the look they reserve for highway fatalities & other roadkill.

Oy gevalt! Is Jonah still one of the old Jews, or does he get to sing the New Jew Blues as a persecuted, oppressed minority?

thanks everyone for your lovely snark.

It means he should be castrated.