Jonah Goldberg quotes - page 3

[W]hat makes a libertarian in America a "right-winger” makes him a "liberal” in most of Europe. (Jonah Goldberg)
Progressives have won so many policy battles by relying on activist courts to do things they could not achieve at the ballot box, they've come to see an activist Supreme Court as a birthright. As a result, the Court has been politicized far more than it should be. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[T]here has never been a society in all of human history where the average person did not have to work. Sure, some crapulent prince could lay around all day and do nothing, but everyone else had to till the soil or pound the anvil or carry a spear. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[I]nstitutions and communities need to be able to exploit their comparative advantages. It's not just that the Marine Corps demands more from its members than the Peace Corps; it's that the Marines demand different things. For some people, being a Marine would be a kind of living Hell; for others it is a reason to live. That's what the individual pursuit of happiness means. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
Everywhere, unthinking mobs of "independent thinkers" wield tired clichés like cudgels, pummeling those who dare question "enlightened” dogma. If "violence never solved anything,” cops wouldn't have guns and slaves may never have been freed. If it's better that 10 guilty men go free to spare one innocent, why not free 100 or 1,000,000? Clichés begin arguments, they don't settle them. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[N]early every political evil can be found on display in China: slavery, discrimination, religious persecution, xenophobia, tyranny, mass-political indoctrination, colonialism, cultural genocide, and so on. And yet, the outcry against these things in America and the West is a tiny fraction of what it was with regard to South Africa in the 1980s or Israel today. Why? Some of the political answers are pretty obvious - and have much merit. A few that come to mind: China is non-Western, and many of these sins are supposed to be unique to white Europeans; China is a victim (or "victim”) of colonialism, and so we shouldn't judge it harshly; China is very powerful, and realpolitik dictates that we be diplomatic; and so on. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[S]ocialism has never been a particularly stable or coherent program, a point I made in these pages in 2010. It has always been best defined as whatever socialists want it to be at any given moment. That is because its chief utility is as a romantic indictment of the capitalist status quo. As many of the defenders of the new socialist craze admit, socialism is the off-the-shelf alternative to capitalism, which has been in bad odor since at least the financial crisis of 2008. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
We can debate how much socialism there was in Hitler's National Socialism. It is remarkable, however, that many of the people insisting that Norway or Sweden is obviously socialist even though they both are more free-market than Hitlerite Germany are aghast at the suggestion that the National Socialists were...socialists. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[C]apitalism is as much to blame for the consolidation and homogenization of nations as champions of progressive central planning are, if not more so. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
I wish to hearby announce that Wikipedia represents the highest, greatest, achievements of human life to date. I shall henceforth replace the phrase "the greatest thing since sliced bread" with the phrase "the greatest thing since Wikipedia." That is so long as what it posts about me is accurate or at least inaccurately extremely flattering. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
The modern doctrines of diversity and multiculturalism are a kind of homogenizing totalitarianism. Its acolytes want every institution to be filled with people who look different but think alike. What our society needs is not more "diversity” of this sort but more variety. Different communities and institutions need to be able live differently, because it is only with this kind of variety that a diverse people can find places where they all feel at home and where they can all find a kind of meaning that suits them as individuals. (Jonah Goldberg)
If Andrew were still around, I bet he'd tell Bannon to stay in Europe - and not just because his tendency to wear several shirts seems more consistent with European fashion. Bannon's understanding of conservatism is entirely European. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
Falsely accusing critics of "treason,” castigating law-enforcement agencies for prosecuting allies, and telling police they should rough up suspects is inconsistent with Trump's oath - and Pence's. But these days, oaths, like norms, are for everybody else. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
At the end of the day, happiness is derived from love - love for others and others' love for you. When I say "love” I do not mean simply romantic love, though that is obviously one of the greatest wellsprings of true happiness. I mean the love one feels from friends, and the love for places and things that brings people together for shared purpose. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
But, the people who criticized these people were ... what? I am so disgusted with people who think free speech is defined as being able to say what you think without being criticized. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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)
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
[S]ocialists are romantics in that they want to curate their lives entirely based on their own feelings. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg
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. View quote
Jonah Goldberg