Like writing a book about the ocean without using the word "water"

[phamos]

This is a placeholder for the eventual post to come about how ridiculous it is to write a book that depends entirely on a convincing definition of "fascism" that ENTIRELY SKIPS OVER THE YEARS 1922-1943 IN ITALY UNDER MUSSOLINI. I mean, that's just STAGGERING. "Let's write a book about fascism but not mention what actually HAPPENED UNDER FASCIST RULE!" That's pretty much the most intellectually dishonest move I've ever seen in a piece of historical writing -- and I've read the whole neocon canon, so that's saying something!

I would like to rant about this further, but I must go to sleep. So I will try to post a longer rant tomorrow that will also discuss Jonah Goldberg's complete lack of irony and possibly a comparison of Sorel's "myth" with Plato's "noble lie" and Leo Strauss and Abram Shulsky and OSP/intelligence gathering/nous blah blah blah. Possibly. But probably not, because I haven't actually read any Sorel and that would make me as intellectually bankrupt and disingenuous as Mr. Goldberg -- probably I'll just post more rants about my cat's effect on my sinuses, or a deconstruction of the recent South Park parody of Heavy Metal, wherein I try to decipher how much of the boob-scenery was actually in the original movie. (I really should have watched more Bakshi while I was at Kim's.)

Also, Weeds is a good show. Romany Malco is hot -- but I think he might be kinda crazy in real life. That's the impression I got from the 40-Year-Old Virgin commentary track -- and obviously I should base all my judgments of human beings on how they come off when being peppered with vulgarisms by Seth Rogan.

Comments

[rationalpassion.livejournal.com]

Okay, that does it--I'm back to my "not gonna waste the time" perspective on the Goldberg book.