Jonah Goldberg
National Review senior editor Jonah Goldberg is a bestselling author and columnist and fellow of the National Review Institute. His nationally syndicated column appears regularly in scores of newspapers across the United States. He is also a weekly columnist for the Los Angeles Times, a member of the board of contributors to USA Today, and a contributor to Fox News. He was the founding editor of National Review Online. The Atlantic magazine identified Goldberg as one of the top 50 political commentators in America. In 2011 he was named the Robert J. Novak Journalist of the Year at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). He has written on politics, media, and culture for a wide variety of publications and has appeared on numerous television and radio programs. He is the author of two New York Times bestsellers, The Tyranny of Clichés (Sentinel HC, 2012) and Liberal Fascism (Doubleday, 2008).
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Jim Geraghty has a good piece today on how Team Clinton is already going after her rivals, specifically Jim Webb. Her minions were out prodding talk radio producers to focus on the sex scenes in Webb’s novels. Geraghty asks: ... -
Dear GOP: Show, Don’t Tell
Hey, Jeb, Ted, Rand, Marco, Bobby, Chris, and the dozen or more others I’m forgetting, here’s something to write on your bathroom mirror in 2015 and beyond: The “P” in POTUS stands for “President,” not “Pundit.” I understand that ... -
The Tribe of Liberty
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (including you feckless, sniveling crapweasels hiding under your desks at Sony), Freedom ... -
The Real Person of the Year
Jonathan Gruber should have been Time’s Person of the Year. The magazine gave it to the “Ebola Fighters” instead. Good for them; they’re doing God’s work. Still, Gruber would have been better. Time’s Person of the ... -
The Torture Taboo
For a long time I resisted the word “torture” when discussing the “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against high-value captives in the War on Terror. I don’t think I can do that anymore. The report put out by Dianne Feinstein ... -
Harry Reid Is a Sleazy Liar, Part 1,420,009
From our friend Byron York: Anyone who followed this year’s Senate race in Kansas — the one longtime GOP incumbent Pat Roberts appeared to be losing to Greg Orman, the businessman running as an independent — knows Orman and his supporters ... -
The Price of Everything and the Value of Nothing
A Harvard professor is accidentally overcharged $4 for Chinese food. Actually he wasn’t really overcharged, the professor, Ben Edelman, ordered off the website which had an outdated menu. He was in his rights to complain, I suppose. But this is ... -
Tomasky & Liberal Southern Hatred
Charlie, I just have one question for liberals so bigoted against the South as unalloyed bastions of racial hatred and economic backwardness. Why are blacks moving there in droves? -
Rolling Stone Crumbles
Forgive a moment of personal privilege here. I’ve spent the week being called a rape apologist and pro-rape for publicly calling Rolling Stone’s story false, so I’m going to admit to schadenfreude about this. I do feel ... -
Rand Paul Is Right about Eric Garner
Reasonable people can disagree on whether racism was involved in the tragic death of Eric Garner. My own suspicion is that this misfortune could have transpired just as easily with a white man resisting arrest and/or a black cop ... -
When Reason Takes Flight
I was reading Charlie’s excellent piece on the UVA story when I saw a reference to this tweet from Sally Kohn. She asked of me, “Wow, @JonahNRO, I’m curious when you last demanded that reporting on a burglary ... -
NYU Bound
I’ll be speaking at NYU tomorrow night. Details here. Always good to see friendly faces. -
Fables from Ferguson
On Tuesday, the day after it was announced that Officer Darren Wilson would not be charged in the slaying of Michael Brown, President Obama for a second time called for calm. His statement was measured, careful and responsible. He condemned ... -
My Race-Baiting Revealed
So last night I was watching Robert McCulloch’s press conference. I spent most of the time making fun of how long he was taking. For instance: “What’s really going to piss people off is when he restates the ... -
Bless His Heart
I often say some variation of “don’t be so open-minded your brain falls out.” Then there’s the Robert Frost line, “A liberal is a man too broadminded to take his own side in a quarrel” (which Frost may ... -
More White House Asininity
I’ve never been a fan of Chuck Hagel. I never thought he’d make a good secretary of defense. But this line from a “senior U.S. official” is just awful: “Make no mistake, Secretary Hagel was fired,” a ... -
Obama to Congress: It’s My Way or My Way
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (including those of you in the shadows), Like a cannibal in a ... -
The Presidency, the Policy & the Rhetoric
Below, Ramesh makes a very good point about how the “the policy and the rhetoric are at war with each other.” One could say the same about the presidency and the policy. I was struck by how Obama — like his ... -
No Words
Our friend, colleague and teacher Victor Davis Hanson couldn’t be on the cruise last week because he got the terrible news that his 27-year-old daughter, Susannah, had a medical emergency. He announced tonight that she passed away. I’m ... -
'Women Matter More Than Fetuses'
Rebecca Traister is pregnant. She just passed the 24-week mark. Congratulations are in order. And she is looking forward to having a second child. But Traister is also a bit wistful that the window has closed on her ability to ... -
Empty Integrity
The Oxford English Dictionary defines “integrity” in part as “soundness of moral principle; the character of uncorrupted virtue, esp. in relation to truth and fair dealing; uprightness, honesty, sincerity.” This is basically what most of us have in mind when ... -
The Biggest Loser: Obama
We know Barack Obama is good at least one thing: getting Barack Obama elected president of the United States. How good he is at being president of the United States is a subject of considerable debate. A less debatable proposition: ... -
Vote Early and Ignorant
It used to be that the first Tuesday in November was Election Day, but now it is the last day of Election Month. Election Month is bad, but it’s a symptom of a deeper problem that makes the underlying ... -
The Networks Notice the Elections
So the legacy networks — NBC, CBS, ABC — started covering the election tonight starting at 10:00 o’clock. The funny thing is that if someone only got their news from ABC, CBS, or NBC — or even all three — they might be stunned ... -
And a Single Standard Will Rule Them All
Out of morbid curiosity, I watched Morning Joe for a while this morning. It was pretty hilarious. The general consensus ranged from a GOP victory tonight would be a poisoned chalice for the Republicans because they will learn the wrong ... -
A Cat-Calling Addendum
Last Friday, I wrote a Corner post on cat-calling. I wrote, in part: Two things can be taken from this story, even if it’s not true that the phrase was born on 23rd Street. First, men have been pigs ... -
On Cat-Calling
As someone who had several summer jobs in New York — foot-messenger (I didn’t deliver feet, I walked), ice-cream vender etc — never mind someone who grew up in New York City and now lives in Washington, D.C., I find ... -
Whatever, Margaret
In her column on Joni Ernst, Margaret Carlson writes: ”At a National Rifle Association event that year, she said she would shoot first and ask questions later if the government violated her rights.” To back up her claim, Carlson provides ... -
Re: The Ever Blameless Left
Charles, this reminds me of debates I used to have over HBO’s series The Wire, easily one of the best TV shows ever made. The show’s creator, David Simon, was pretty much a member of the Naomi Klein/... -
The Enduring Power of Story
There is an enormous amount of whining these days about our ideological debates. This gets the problem wrong. Ideological debates are fought over ideas, but politics is more often about competing stories, or, as the eggheads call them, “narratives.” Much ... -
Feminism Sinks To A New Low
I know that sounds impossible, but I think it just may be true. I won’t embed the video, but you can find it here at Mediaite along with a fuller write-up. Someone thought it’d be really funny/bold/... -
Oil Rigs Support Biodiversity
Never let it be said that Mother Nature doesn’t appreciate irony. A new study led by researchers at Occidental College and the University of California at Santa Barbara has found that the oil platforms dotting the California coast are ... -
When All You Have Is the Race Card . . .
I just received a very earnest press release touting this piece over at Bill Moyers’s website (the e-mail subject line: “Will GOP Racial Appeals on Ebola Translate into Votes?”). The article is written by Ian Haney López. Here’... -
Putting the ‘O’ in EbOla
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (especially self-monitoring readers overjoyed that Ronald Klain has been named Supreme Allied ... -
Return of the Clinton Democrats (Not Really)
Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes is running for U.S. Senate in the great state of Kentucky. She is a woman of conviction, of substance, of principle. “I’m not an empty dress,” she insists, “I’m not a rubber stamp, ... -
When Anti-Islamophobia Is Pro-ISIS
I know, I know, with a name like National Union of Students, you’d expect nothing but sage and responsible decision making. Alas, not so much. The organization serves as the governing body/umbrella organization for the vast majority of ... -
Coming to Penn State
For those interested, I’ll be speaking tomorrow as part of the Penn State College Republican’s “Truth Week.” I’ll be speaking in Room 102, in the Thomas Building (Intersection of Shortlidge Road and Pollock Road) at 7:00. It’s open ... -
The Cartagena-Hooker Cover-Up
In news that must have left my friends at the New York Post — never mind the gang at The Daily Show – with a renewed confidence that ours is a just and beneficent God, the White House has been caught covering ... -
The Left Storms California’s Bedrooms
I have a slightly different take on California’s recent decision to regulate college sex. Don’t get me wrong: I think it’s beyond idiotic, unworkable, even borderline Orwellian. We’ll get to all that. But I also think ... -
Obama's Rhetorical Box-Checking
Rich — I think Hume makes a brilliant point, as he so often does. But this time his point is all the more salient because he agrees with me! I’ve been saying for over a month that Obama’s entire ... -
Liberal Democrat, Accent on the Latter
Barack Obama had a choice between liberalism and the Democratic party. He chose the latter, and it cost him dearly. Liberalism, as an ideology, insists that government can do good and great things for the people and the world if ... -
Omar Gonzalez vs. Alton Nolen
I must say, there’s something about the way accused White House intruder Omar Gonzalez is constantly described in the media that bothers me. I keep hearing him called “Army veteran Omar Gonzalez.” It’s true he’s an Army ... -
Re: More Jello Shots
Fred, since you mentioned both Jello Biafra and yours truly in your post last night, you might be amused to know I “toured” with Biafra. About 15 years ago, I was the token conservative on something called the “Spitfire Tour.” Former ... -
A Defense Department of Lawyers
Fox News host Bill O’Reilly wants a mercenary army to supply the ground forces in the latest installment of the War on Terror. And it seems the smart set can’t stop laughing. The Washington Post’s ... -
Obama at the U.N., for the U.N.
Obama’s speech today had something for everybody. To his credit, he is moving away from the ridiculous “ISIL is not Islamic” talk, speaking much more honestly about how the problem is Muslim extremism, even if he still won’t ... -
Do-It-Yourself Jihadism
On Thursday, Australian authorities claimed they thwarted a plot by supporters of the Islamic State to grab random people off the street and then behead the captured citizens on videotape. Australia’s attorney general said that the massive raid, the ... -
When Words Lose Their Meaning
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (Including the millions of poor souls staring at their TV like a ... -
Well, They're Both Painters
D.C. public schools are simultaneously among the worst and most expensive in the country. But sometimes that green-eye-shade critique fails to capture the scope of how bad they are. For instance: Some D.C. Public School seventh-graders were assigned ... -
National Honor Matters
‘I should have anticipated the optics,” President Obama said by way of acknowledging that golfing right after making a statement about the beheading of James Foley looked bad. “Part of this job is also the theater of it,” he said. “... -
Welcome to the Interregnum
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (and listeners even though you will never hear this “news”letter by ...
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A Year of Liberal Double Standards
Many conservatives finished the year angry about the same thing they were angry about at the beginning of the year: liberal double standards. As I write this, GOP House whip Steve Scalise is in hot water over reports that he ... -
A Demonization Double Standard
Going by objective standards of reason and fairness, Al Sharpton is not to blame for the assassination of two New York City cops over the weekend. Nor are New York mayor Bill de Blasio, U.S. attorney general Eric Holder, ... -
No Superheroes in The Interview Cave-In
The first issue of Captain America came out on December 20, 1940. It shows Cap slugging Adolf Hitler in the mouth. Good stuff, but note the date. America wouldn’t enter World War II for about another year. At the time, many ... -
Jonathan Gruber’s Pants Inferno
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (and other victims of the pitiless Cromnibus!), I learned from Twitter this ... -
We Need You
Look over there. That smoldering, smoking ruin was once The New Republic. The editors and writers dropping and rolling to put out their burning clothes once had jobs. The New Republic had everything going for it: a deep-pocketed owner (and, ... -
The Feminist Power Grab
Nine males were accused of being part of a heinous rape. The alleged injustice fomented a mob mentality. An enraged community wanted to skip any talk of a serious investigation, never mind a trial, and go straight to the punishment. ... -
The Buck Doesn't Stop Here
For the record, I am contemplating a new book. But, I should be clear, I am not the author of this book. Amazon seems to be saying I just wrote a book about Harry Truman. I found out about it ... -
The UVA Gang Rape that Wasn’t
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s (updated) weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader, When I wrote the “news”letter below, the news had not ... -
Chuck Schumer’s Uncompassionate Liberalism
At a time when Ferguson, Mo., has been under siege, the president unilaterally brought millions of illegal immigrants “out of the shadows,” the so-called Islamic State beheaded another American, an architect of Obamacare admitted that the law was conceived and ... -
Is This Video for You?
Obviously, it would be easy to make fun of this (and I probably will in tomorrow’s G-File). But on a more serious note, I am honestly curious: Who is this video for? I’m not a huge country music ... -
The BET ME Challenge
I really like Kevin’s piece today on asking pundits and other experts to put their money where their mouth is. But I have one big objection. He writes: If I were inclined to violate my own libertarian leanings, I’... -
A Story Too Useful to Verify?
Rolling Stone has published an incredible story about a rape at the University of Virginia, sending shock waves around the country. But when I say the story is incredible, I mean that in the literal, largely abandoned sense of the ... -
Barack Obama, Troll
Maybe President Obama is just trolling? For those who don’t know, in Internet parlance, trolling is an effort to elicit outrage from a specific group or the public generally. As the always useful — but not always G-rated, or spell-checked — ... -
Against Myself
My Corner post from last night has been given a new headline on the homepage: “The Prosecutor Was Right.” That wasn’t my doing and I’m not sure what I wrote easily lends itself to such a strident headline. ... -
Thoughts on Tonight
I believe the grand jury operated in good faith and from what I can tell Officer Wilson had the facts and evidence on his side. Given the eagerness of some parties to exploit Brown’s death, it’s tempting to ... -
The Thing about Candied Yams
Our friend and former Corner colleague John Podhoretz points me to this lovely memoir. John’s sister Rachel died last year. This is by her daughter. -
Gruber and Obama’s Big Lie
I understand we’ve turned the page to the next controversy — Obama’s unconstitutional immigration pander — but I’d like to dwell a little longer on the previous travesty. Obama administration health-care consultant Jonathan Gruber was discovered to have boasted ... -
‘Shirtgate’ and Common Decency
The European Space Agency’s Rosetta project accomplished one of the most impressive scientific feats in our lifetime. They essentially moved a clunky machine from one speeding bullet onto another, by remote control, from 310 million miles away. It’s hoped ... -
The New York Times Outdoes Itself
In an editorial, the New York Times comes out against a government program that helps Cuban doctors defect to the United States when they are working abroad. I find the whole thing to be lunatic, so I won’... -
Spinning for Hillary
In the old Soviet Union, Kremlinologists would read the state party newspaper Pravda not so much for the news it contained, but to glean what the commissars wanted readers to believe the commissars were thinking. The closest we ... -
Putting the O in Johnny Bravo
Dear Reader (particularly those of you who will buy me a drink on the Lido Deck next week), In Men in Dark Times Hannah Arendt says, “Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it . . . it brings about consent ... -
Politics in the Age of Big Data
‘To everyone who voted,” President Obama said in his press conference on Wednesday, “I hear you. To the two-thirds of voters who chose not to participate yesterday, I hear you, too.” Let me begin with a bit of a rant. ... -
Pat Roberts Rides a Wave
Fox News has called it for Pat Roberts. I can’t say I’m overjoyed about his victory, but I’m happy that the GOP will keep the seat and I’m delighted to see Orman lose. On those terms ... -
Murmur, Murmur, Gillespie, Murmur
I’ve been hearing for days, but especially today, from various sources that Ed Gillespie’s Senate bid from Virginia might be doing much better than reporting and, let’s face it, commonsense might suggest. That chatter is intensifying even ... -
U.S. Proxies Surrender in Syria
Michael Totten reports: Harakat Hazm and the Syrian Revolutionary Front just surrendered to Al Qaeda in Syria [1]. Most people have never heard of either organization, though they’ve been sort of quietly backed by the US since they oppose the ... -
It’s Not Obama, It’s You
Dear Reader (unless you’re the kind of chickens**t who calls people “chickens**t” anonymously), Obama fatigue is setting in. Indeed, I’ve gone from Obama fatigue through full-on Obama Epstein-Barr to end-stage Obama narcolepsy. I hear him talking, ... -
What Monsters Portend
‘You’re the butcher, or you’re the cattle.” That appears to be the theme of the fifth season of AMC’s The Walking Dead, the most successful TV series about zombies since C-SPAN covered the Reform-party convention in 2000. It’... -
Take the Hard Votes
‘What day is it?” “It’s today,” squeaked Piglet. “My favorite day,” said Pooh. As a proud member of the “don’t just do something, sit there” school of politics, I don’t fret much about partisanship and gridlock. Partisanship ... -
Polling for a Georgia (or Louisiana) Runoff
Andrew, maybe I’m missing something. Heck, I’m sure I’m missing something. Nonetheless, it seems to me that any polls conducted prior to Election Day pertaining to a runoff are beyond useless. The electorate for a runoff will ... -
Anti-Israel Bias in One Headline (or Three)
So earlier today the Associated Press ran a story with the headline “Israeli police shoot man in east Jerusalem.” Then they changed it to “Car slams into east Jerusalem train station.” Finally, after widespread outrage on social media, they changed ... -
NYT Editorial Board Shakes Fist at the Heavens
It’s rare I encourage NRO readers to check out a New York Times editorial, but this one is too delicious. The Times is furious at Democratic Senate candidates for their refusal to embrace Barack Obama. A few excerpts: The ... -
Truth in Advertising
From NGI’s Shale Daily: The elected Board of Supervisors in Kern County, CA, in the middle of the state’s oil patch in the lower San Joaquin Valley, was sued in California Superior Court last Thursday for allegedly ignoring ... -
The End of Ebola?
Oh I don’t mean as a disease. The plague rages on, alas. I mean as a driver of media hysteria, political finger-pointing, and perpetual White House panic, it may be that we’ve seen the worst of Ebola here ... -
Seriously!?
From ABC News A Dallas health care worker who handled clinical specimens from an Ebola-infected patient is on a cruise ship in the Caribbean – with the worker self-quarantined and being monitored for signs of infection, the State Department said in ... -
On the Travel Ban
Let me say upfront, I am less worried about an Ebola epidemic in the US than some folks. I can also sympathize with public health officials and the Obama administration in their obvious desire to avoid a national panic. What ... -
A Real-Life Contagion?
While disposing of a body in a mass grave, one man in a hazmat suit turns to another and asks, “When did we run out of body bags?” “Two days ago.” Fortunately, the scene is only from the movie ... -
Culture Wars All the Way Down
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (and the escort from Ipanema, who might feel ignored by this “news”... -
Re: Consenting in California
Ramesh — I’m with you on the substance of the law. But Conn Carroll’s argument reinforces the point I try to make in my column today. The feminist drive to regulate sex on campus is driven by a deep-seated ... -
The Ad of the Season
Apologies if you’ve seen this already. But it bears re-watching: -
Hillary Clinton: Dukakis in a Pantsuit?
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (including those of you under quarantine), Well, this “news”letter usually begins ... -
Days of Future Past
We’ve heard a great deal lately about the “wrong side of history.” It is one of the president’s favorite ways to describe whatever side he isn’t on, and it’s been a phrase on the lips of ... -
Obama’s Mixed Messages on War
It’s funny how President Obama is always talking about “I” and “me” whenever it makes him look good, but suddenly it’s “they” and “we” when mistakes are made. For instance, for years Obama boasted about how he ended ... -
The Revolution Will Be Internalized
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (including suspected terrorists like Steve Hayes), I probably shouldn’t be having ... -
Ginsburg: Abort the Poor
Let me offer three cheers for Kevin’s post on Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Let me also join the pile-on. First, Ginsburg’s view that we don’t want more poor babies is perfectly consistent with a century-old progressive tradition as ... -
What ‘War on Women’?
Last Friday, the White House announced its “It’s On Us” initiative aimed at combating sexual assaults on college campuses. I’m all in favor of combating sexual assault, but the first priority in combating a problem is understanding it. ... -
Obama’s Reluctant Rush to War
By all means, let’s destroy the Islamic State, but let’s talk about it first. We are in a very strange place right now. President Obama is rushing into a war he doesn’t want to fight. He can ... -
Is the Islamic State Really ‘Not Islamic’?
“Now let’s make two things clear: ISIL is not Islamic. No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL’s victims have been Muslim. And ISIL is certainly not a state.” — President Barack Obama in ... -
Good Luck, Mr. President
I thought that this was a fine speech, grading against the curve of my expectations. But my expectations were low. The problem for me, and I suspect for others, is that it’s very difficult to see him as anything ... -
Whatever Happened to Leaving War to the Generals?
For most of my life, it was a standard talking point for nearly all politicians — though especially Republicans — to say that politicians shouldn’t muck around with military decisions. Yes, the president is the commander-in-chief and he sets the mission, ... -
Welcome to the Interregnum
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is Jonah Goldberg’s weekly “news”letter, the G-File. Subscribe here to get the G-File delivered to your inbox on Fridays. Dear Reader (and listeners even though you will never hear this “news”letter by ...