Monday, June 30, 2008

Responding to Stupidity   

A friend of mine just pointed out that this weekend's Washington Post had a silly swipe at Liberal Fascism. Some guy named Jonathan Karp writes:

Given those pressures, I understand why a conscientious publisher would choose the first option — to add titles fast and hope to catch some cultural wave. Think of Hannah Montana, Obama-mania, entrepreneurial self-promoters with a brand to build or political provocateurs such as Jonah Goldberg, whose pointless thought exercise "Liberal Fascism" is just the latest example of what the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan once termed "boob bait for the bubbas." Authors such as Goldberg serve up red meat for their constituencies while cable broadcasters fill airtime with their extreme, quasi-entertaining notions — in this case, the "parallels" between Nazi policies and those of such Democratic leaders as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Books of this ilk have always existed. But in the past, they've been balanced by substantive books, crafted by monomaniacal authors who devoted years to the work.”

Me: It should come as no surprise that I think this is ignorant twaddle. No one, save a few deeply partisan bloggers and leftwing water carriers, would describe my book thusly if they, you know, read it. I'd bet dollars to doughnuts Karp hasn't read it. And I see no reason to respond substantively to a substance-free insult. But this does raise an idea I've been meaning to float around here for a while. Readers often ask what they can do to help the book, get its information/argument out there and all that. Well, one thing those so inclined could do is simply send emails to authors or publications that try to get away with such idiocy. No need to be ad hominem in any way. Simply pointing out that even the New York Times reviewer (not to mention Ronald Radosh, Tom Wolfe, Thomas Sowell, Richard Bernstein, Daniel Pipes, Steven Hayward, R.J. Pestritto, John O'Sullivan, Paul Johnson and numerous others) does not consider Liberal Fascism to be anything like the book Karp describes. Asking hacks if they actually read the book is always a nice place to start, though.

Anyway, I think the book will have enduring legs on the merits. But, for those of you who want my hope to be a reality, a little help wouldn't hurt.

06/30 04:46 PMShare