Jonah Goldberg on All Topics
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“No doubt James Cameron could have made Avatar for $300 million less and still made a fortune. After all, audiences didn’t need the 3-D digital magic, explosions, giant aliens, or spectacular backdrops. All they wanted was an extended lecture about the evils of corporate America and the cruelty of the military, and some gassy pantheistic blather about the need to get back to nature. Why, Cameron could have simply recorded a poetry jam at Barbra Streisand’s house and still put out the highest-grossing film ever.”
“Our values, customs, traditions, and principles provide insulation against the corrosive acid of undiluted pragmatism. When you bundle these things together, it’s often called an ideology, and there’s no reason to apologize for having one.”
“For all the talk of how he needed to “pivot” to the center, the Obama we saw was the same Obama who ran for president and the same Obama we’ve seen over the last year. His White House is so deep in their own bunker they could sustain a Dresden-style carpet bombing without even hearing the dishware rattle.”
“Of course, if the Obama administration’s reluctance to treat terrorists like enemies is derived entirely from deep-seated ideological principle, then it should stick to its guns. But couldn’t some of the reluctance be a holdover from the politics of the George W. Bush years? The Democrats came into power believing that downplaying and downgrading the War on Terror was both right and politically smart. The former is debatable, the latter now is unsupportable.”
“Denial, arrogance, and self-pity are ingredients for a pretty toxic cocktail. And yet it seems that the occupants of the White House bunker, shell-shocked by Scott Brown, are coping by mixing all three with a little Kool-Aid.”
“Even if blame lies everywhere except among the victims themselves, it doesn’t change the fact that Haiti will never get out of grinding poverty until it abandons much of its culture.”
“The Democrats’ “bad climate” is a direct result of how they’ve governed. The populist backlash is fueled by a sense that Democrats are acting on their preferred agenda and by their own rules.”
“The real, sad lesson of this episode is that we have somehow come to define racism as disagreeing with the Democratic party or its African American base.”
“America is about second acts. We love contrition and redemption.”
“Americans are not ready for some full-tilt-boogie government activism.”
“Flying before 9/11 was already awful, and it has only become worse.”
“It’s the norm to speak glowingly of spirituality but derisively of traditional religion.”
“Obama’s rhetorical audacity breeds cynicism, because utopianism always comes up short. Obama has many victories ahead of him, but his cause is already lost.”
“Free-market nations are better at protecting their environments than statist regimes.”
“The Los Angeles Times reported the other day that the reality-show industry is suddenly having a crisis of conscience about its impact on the culture. That’s nice to hear, but it’s not nearly enough.”
