Jonah Goldberg: Trending quotes

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Jonah Goldberg: 178 quotes0 likes

“Great civilizations create great cathedrals, and the cathedrals of this generation should be in outer space. Cathedrals inspire rich and poor people alike to believe great things are possible. The Mars Polar Lander cost the average American the price of half a cheeseburger. A human lander would cost the average American more — perhaps even ten cheeseburgers! So be it. That is no great sacrifice.”

Jonah Goldberg

2000s, 2000, A Truly Great America (2000)

“Capitalism—at least as Sanders & Co. understand it—is not fulfilling. It doesn’t provide a sense of meaning and solidarity. It rewards—in their minds—the few and punishes the many. There must be a better, more humane way, in which we’re all in it together and sacrifice is shared. The word “social” comes from the Latin socii, meaning allies. People want to feel that they are allied with one another, fighting toward a common goal together for the good of the tribe, marching to the same drumbeats. This is innate in us. Our tribal brains crave social solidarity every bit as much as our palates crave foods that are sweet, fatty, or salty. We can train ourselves to resist the cravings or channel them toward productive ends. But very few of us can eliminate the craving itself.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Socialism is So Hot Right Now (2018)

“Making meaningful distinctions is not hypocrisy, it's called "thinking."”

Jonah Goldberg

2000s, 2006, Unbelievable (2006)

“[L]iberals are going to have to make peace with the possibility that their political enemies aren’t always the cartoon villains they so desperately want them to be.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Liberals' Irritable Mental Gestures (2018)

“One of the main reasons American liberals adore Europe is that Europe still worships its intellectuals. In America, intellectuals are mostly for entertainment. But across the pond, these folks get to do real damage. Why, just this spring a small Italian village had its barbershop cited by the local magistrate because its shaving brushes did not conform to the standard set by the European Union. I am not making this up.”

Jonah Goldberg

June 13, 2001 http://web.archive.org/web/20010105/www.nationalreview.com/goldberg/goldbergprint061301.html <br class="br">2000s, 2001

“The major difference between the left and the right when it comes to any movement dedicated to overthrowing the free-market order—corporatist, authoritarian, etc.—is which groups will be the winners and which groups will be the losers. A left-wing system might empower labor leaders, government bureaucrats, progressive intellectuals, universities, certain minority groups, and one set of industries. A right-wing system might reward a different set of industries as well as traditional religious groups and their leaders, an ethnic majority, aristocrats, or perhaps rural interests. But both systems would be reactionary in the sense that they rejected the legacy of the Lockean revolution…”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Socialism is So Hot Right Now (2018)

“The coalition instinct is the programming that helped us form strategic groups that advance our self-interest. We are a social species and cooperation is what helped us skyrocket to the top of the food chain.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, When Evil Becomes Inconvenient (2018)

“Obama violated not just democratic norms but also his constitutional oath by effectively granting amnesty to millions of immigrants in the country illegally despite having insisted that he did not have the power to do so.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Breaking democratic norms was rampant before the anonymous op-ed. Now it's a free-for-all (2018)

“Fascism is a religion of the state. It assumes the organic unity of the body politic and longs for a national leader attuned to the will of the people. It is totalitarian in that it views everything as political and holds that any action by the state is justified to achieve the common goal. It takes responsibility for all aspects of life, including our health and well-being, and seeks to impose uniformity of thought and action, whether by force or through regulation and social pressure. Everything, including economy and religion, must be aligned with its objectives. Any rival identity is part of the "problem" and therefore defined as the enemy. I will argue that contemporary American liberalism embodies all of these aspects of fascism… You can see why the Marxist left would resist the idea that Hitler was a revolutionary. Because if he was, then either Hitler was a force for good, or revolutions can be bad.”

Jonah Goldberg

Source: 2000s, 2008, Liberal Fascism (2008), p. 63

“The only society in which it is remotely possible for people to design their lives in the manner Marx fantasizes is one that is incredibly rich and incredibly free. We are nowhere near there yet, but it’s worth pointing out that if you plucked any laborer from another era and toured him or her around America today, they’d think that we were remarkably close.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, A Free People Must Be Virtuous (2018)

“Conservatism in America has always been deeply traditionalist, sometimes too much so. But at the core of the modern conservative movement has been the effort to protect, defend and conserve the traditions of a liberal revolution, grounded in the best arguments of the enlightenment (slavery notwithstanding). Bannon's potted blood and soil nationalism and racially tinged populism runs counter to that project and the best and highest ideals of conservatism and America itself. He turned Andrew's Breitbart. com into a "platform" (his word) for the alt-right seeking to inject European swill into the American body politic. Let him stay in Europe and hand out torches for the marchers. His un-American schtick has no place here. I'm sure Andrew would agree.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Andrew Breitbart would tell Steve Bannon to stay in Europe (2018)

“[S]ocialists are romantics in that they want to curate their lives entirely based on their own feelings.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, A Free People Must Be Virtuous (2018)

“I think Rummy should walk up to the table, take the oath, offer his prepared apologies and explanations and then, at the end of his remarks, he should take out a long Japanese knife. He should then cut off his pinky. If this Yakuza style contrition doesn't work he should look to the ranking Democrat on the committee and continue removing fingers until he gets a Shogun-like nod that his offering is acceptable. He should then wrap-up up his hand, curtly bow, and then say 'I am now pleased to take your questions.”

Jonah Goldberg

May 2004 http://web.archive.org/web/20001011/www.nationalreview.com/thecorner/04_05_02_corner-archive.asp <br class="br">2000s, 2004

“This is how we got here. It will get worse because there are no incentives to be better. It won’t end well either, but at least it will feel familiar.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, If You Think Our Politics Can’t Get Uglier Than the Kavanaugh Fight, Think Again (2018)

“[C]onservatism is not supposed to be against change or progress… It is supposed to be skeptical of grandiose or reckless schemes which throw out the good in pursuit of the perfect.”

Jonah Goldberg

2000s, 2000, Who the Hell Do You Think You Are? (2000)

“States have a habit of forming when the rules say “line starts here for free stuff.” Whoever manages the line becomes the “state” after a while.”

Jonah Goldberg

Twitter post https://twitter.com/JonahNRO/status/1049835451903815680 (9 October 2018) <br class="br">2010s, 2018

“I consider the Fourth a patriotic holday more than a nationalist one. We are celebrating the signing of a text, the establishment of a set of laws and principles on the Fourth of July. The Fourth is about political liberty and national independence. It is, for all its pomp and circumstance, a fairly secular and rational holiday. Meanwhile, Thanksgiving plays upon the mystic chords of memory and is prior to and independent of many of things we celebrate on the Fourth. Anyway, I agree its a fair criticism and probably just highlights different perspectives. And, yes, the food on the Fourth of July is really, really good. I am all about hotdogs, beer and barbecue.”

Jonah Goldberg

November 2004 http://web.archive.org/web/20040421/www.nationalreview.com/thecorner/04_11_24_corner-archive.asp <br class="br">2000s, 2004

“[B]ending the system to the idea that the government in Washington should see the country as a bunch of competing racial and ethnic groups with no particular or meaningful attachment to place and community, whose only relationship to government is unmediated through state and local government, is precisely the sort of thinking that Arthur Schlesinger lamented… If it makes you sad that California doesn’t have more clout in the Senate, fine. But playing statistical games based on race and ethnicity is a pernicious way of approaching that problem.”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Say No to a Parliament of Tribes (2018)

“One common tactic [socialists like to use] is to point to countries that liberals like and dub them real-world models of socialism. Thus Scandinavian countries with generous social safety nets become the real-world proof that socialism works. Others will just point to government-run programs or institutions—national parks, the VA, whatever—and say “socialism!””

Jonah Goldberg

What about Venezuela? “Shut up,” they explain.
2010s, 2018, Socialism is So Hot Right Now (2018)

“Everyone’s decrying tribalism, and yet the idea that we should rejigger the constitutional order to make sure that Asian Americans in California have the same “representation” in the Senate as Hispanics in, say, Texas or Rhode Island is profoundly tribal. Maybe Hispanics in Texas have different political interests than Hispanics in California? Maybe Hispanics — an incredibly diverse category of people — don’t vote based upon an abstract designation?”

Jonah Goldberg

2010s, 2018, Say No to a Parliament of Tribes (2018)