Alex Pareene has a thorough and often very funny article about Jonah Goldberg, one of the reigning mediocrities of conservatism. Goldberg is a slightly less credible version of Thomas Friedman — the thing he says that aren’t patently absurd are incredibly obvious to the point of being platitudinous.
Goldberg is always careful never to actually stake out a controversial position on anything. He’ll never buck the movement, but he sees himself as above the right-wing populists. His position on any number of issues is impossible to discern. On gay marriage: “I have always felt that gay marriage was an inevitability, for good or ill (most likely both).” Jonah defended waterboarding while also claiming to find it a “tough question” and complaining that supporters of waterboarding were unfairly tarred as “pro-torture.” Everything he writes for publication is littered with “to be sure” ass-covering and declarations that he’s not actually seriously arguing what it seems very much like he’s arguing. (The Supreme Court’s Fred Phelps ruling was deplorable but also probably correct but maybe not. Julian Assange should be assassinated not that I’m saying for real that he should be assassinated.) He’s too cowardly and insecure to allow himself to be pinned down on most divisive political issues, much preferring to devote pixels and ink to making fun of mythical sandal-wearing Prius-driving (formerly Volvo-driving) liberals who supposedly think things he finds silly. Or Barbra Streisand, a recurring figure in his oeuvre.
Goldberg’s also a master at avoiding serious challenges to his half-formed opinions. In 2009, TBogg documented more than 40 instances of Goldberg evading arguments or declining to elaborate on points he’d made by invoking some rapidly approaching deadline. (Sample: “This has been discussed endlessly in the Corner and elsewhere. I’m on a deadline so I’m not going to wade too deeply into it.”) Other popular excuses in the Goldberg list of reasons he’s unable to respond to criticism have included working on his books, taking his children to and/or from school and/or the doctor, and being late for something…
In one of my favorite Goldberg passages of all time, he wrote: “I was trying to make a general point which everyone understands but also ended up communicating an even more general falsehood. Like saying violence never solves anything, people understand what I mean even when in reality what I’m saying isn’t true.” Not sure how anyone could argue with that.
And then there’s this line from Goldberg about the Park 51 mosque:
Here’s a thought: The 70% of Americans who oppose what amounts to an Islamic Niketown two blocks from ground zero are the real victims of a climate of hate, and anti-Muslim backlash is mostly a myth.
Well yes, there’s a thought. An incredibly shallow and stupid one, but it’s a thought — or what passes for one to Goldberg. Together with fellow quarterwit Rich Lowry — yes, the one who saw starbursts when Sarah Palin winked at him — are the wonder twins of the National Review, together forming one complete halfwit. They both suffer from delusions of adequacy.
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StevoR
May 15, 2012 at 1:45 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Reminds me of this :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7CnMQ4L9Pc&feature=related
assessment of Top Gears Richard Hammond’s essential ethical cowardice.
See especially the part at the eight minutes 39 second mark onwards.
mikeym
May 15, 2012 at 2:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
It’s like I’m reading H.L. Mencken again!
Area Man
May 15, 2012 at 2:57 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yeah, the anti-Muslim backlash is a myth, and I will prove this by highlighting the most blatant and obvious example of an anti-Muslim backlash I can find! Just to show you that no evidence of any sort will permeate my belief system.
Also, I’m clever enough to invent my own meaningless phrases, like “Niketown”.
jeevmon
May 15, 2012 at 3:33 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
But there is one thing Goldberg believes in. It’s in an American meritocracy, the kind where talent, hard work, and self-reliance lead to success. Or, failing that, where mental defectives who happen to be born to successful parents can be handed lucrative sinecures from which they cannot ever be removed.
scienceavenger
May 15, 2012 at 3:42 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
… the thing[s] he says that aren’t patently absurd are incredibly obvious to the point of being platitudinous
Sounds like he has a future as a motivational speaker.
bubba707
May 15, 2012 at 3:44 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Right-wing populist is a contradiction if ever there was one. Every right-winger I ever heard of or met is a hard core authoritarian not a populist.
Big Boppa
May 15, 2012 at 3:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Quarterwit….thanks Ed. I will be using that frequently.
It was the prominent positioning of doughy pantload’s columns in the Chicago Tribune that forced me to cancel my subscription after more than 30 years without a break. I’ve never regretted it.
slc1
May 15, 2012 at 4:05 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Hey, Tom Friedman, in his book, “From Beirut to Jerusalem,” came up with my favorite aphorism, [b]HAMA RULES[/b]!
slc1
May 15, 2012 at 4:06 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
RE #8
Apparently, the brackets don’t work on this blog. I meant to say HAMA RULES!
fastlane
May 15, 2012 at 4:13 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
So, is it two nits to a quarter? Or two halfs to a nit? I can never keep the conversion straight.
Damn US Imperial system…..
SC (Salty Current), OM
May 15, 2012 at 4:22 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Good name for an album, or whatever they’re called now.
Improbable Joe
May 15, 2012 at 5:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Doughy Pantload was on (anti-)American Family Radio last week, and the conversation almost literally went like this:
Doughy: “The Liberals keep calling us mentally defective and unable to see and deal with reality on reality’s terms. This is the same lie they’ve been telling about conservatives for 300 years, and it won’t work! People are starting to see the truth, that it is liberals who won’t accept reality!”
Host: “Yeah I know, right? Like with the lie of evolution! The liberals are desperate to discredit the Bible, but we all know that real legitimate science backs up the Biblical claim that the world was created in six 24-hour days a little over 6000 years ago! Those liberals are SO DELUSIONAL!”
Doughy: “Yes, exactly my point!”
slc1
May 15, 2012 at 6:14 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Improbable Joe @ #12
So lardass Goldberg is a YEC. I wonder what ole John Kwok will have to say about that?
tommykey
May 15, 2012 at 6:42 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Did you hear the latest from the Pantload? He tweeted that he didn’t consider the Time cover of the woman breastfeeding the child to be child porn because it “didn’t do anything” for him.
jnorris
May 15, 2012 at 9:01 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I remember when the national Review actually contributed to the intellectual debate of real issues in America. William Buckley’s family must be embarrassed that his name is associated with the NR.
Michael Heath
May 15, 2012 at 9:28 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
jnorris:
I never understood the appeal of WFB, Jr. I always found him to be a twit.
slc1
May 15, 2012 at 9:32 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re Michael Heath @ #16
Apparently, he was something of a charming fellow in person. Ken Miller, after their debate on creationism on Firing Line, had a little chat with him and found him to be very polite, quite intelligent, and totally ignorant of biology.
Phillip IV
May 16, 2012 at 6:07 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
That’s was his defense for having publicly taken two diametrically opposite positions on the same issue within a short span of time: He was just using cliches and his readers would be readily able to tell that he really meant the same thing in both cases, even if he said the opposite thing in one of them. To top it off, he didn’t clarify which of the two contradictory statements really reflected what he meant.
But that’ s the secret of his success: Convince the right-wingers you’re one of them by using the correct phrasing and dog-whistles, then be so vague and vacillating that the greatest possible number of them can project all of their ideas and convictions on you. Given today’s fractured and fratricidal conservative base, it’s the safest way.
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven
May 16, 2012 at 9:36 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Like if you say “Jonah Goldberg is a stupid sack of shit,” even though he isn’t really a bag and probably doesn’t contain more fecal matter than anyone else his size…
democommie
May 16, 2012 at 6:54 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“even though he isn’t really a bag and probably doesn’t contain more fecal matter than anyone else his size…”
I’m sorry, but that HAS to be wrong. Nobody can be that fucked up and still have a normal volumetric capacity for shit.