Thing is Goldberg already is a nationally syndicated columnist.  He’s a made man.  All that is yet to be determined is if he becomes the next George Will or the next Cal Thomas.

He may be a made man (good gangster reference by the way) but he shouldn’t dare call himself a self-made man.  He’s an other-made man, a legacy admission, a poster boy for wingnut welfare, proof that there is little on the right that is too foolish to say or to pay for.

I remember seeing the kids doing City Year taking the trolleys home at night. It was so sad… they weren’t allowed to make eye contact with anyone, they bore the marks of repeated whippings, it was absolutely tragic. Thank the lord that Goldberg is raising awareness of this attrocity.

Is it just me, or is Jonah Goldberg getting stupider?

I really hope not.  I hope it’s me.  That’d mean I’m getting smarter!

So national service is bad and just like slavery, but stop-loss policies in the military are perfectly fine and not anything like slavery even though you’re forcing people to risk their lives to continue doing something after their term of service is up?

If not for Jonah’s mommy, he’d be asking, “Do you want fries with that?” right about now.

I think I’m being brainwashed by the Snorg T-shirts ads. At first it was just an annoyance, then it was a blind-spot, but today it’s more like “I want me some funyny T-shirts”. I’m worried.

No black man in history has ever been a slavedriver…

All that is yet to be determined is if he becomes the next George Will or the next Cal Thomas.

Not George Will.  Will, despite being wrong about everything, has an intellect.  Cal Thomas is a knee jerk ‘Get off my Lawn!!’ kind of conservative, so Goldberg could eventually turn into him.  But to be fair, Thomas doesn’t cross the Godwin line nearly as often as Goldberg.  I mean, he’s a cranky old coot, but not quite as stupid as Goldberg.  Very few people are.

“He just called a man, let alone a black man, a slavedriver.”

That’d mean I’m getting smarter!

True, but you’d only be getting smarter relative to Jonah Goldberg.

“He just called a man, let alone a black man, a slavedriver.”

Since you seem to be having trouble with English today, let’s parse the sentence, shall we?

It’s bad to call a man a slavedriver no matter what color he is.  Given the history of this country, it’s even worse to call a black man a slavedriver, because that’s not the history of slavery in this country. 

See?  Reading comprehension is fun!

Reading comprehension is biased against Republicans.

It never fails to amaze me every time I see one of those earnest navel-gazing pieces by ‘thoughtful serious Republicans’ about how their party just can’t seem to make any inroads amongst African American voters, despite AA voters being more conservative socially than most of the country.  How can they seriously not know?

Saying that “repeating what I said doesn’t prove that I said something different” is also biased against Republicans.

“Let alone a black man,” that’s English, right? You guys are the smart ones, so maybe you can explain how “Let alone a black man” doesn’t imply that black men should be exempt.

He just called a man, let alone a black man, a slavedriver.

That can only mean one thing:  Jonah Goldberg is Hitler.

Except that Jonah Goldberg really isn’t Hitler.

And military conscription is okay because it doesn’t violate the 13th amendment, even though it is heavily skewed toward the groveling classes.

<<No black man in history has ever been a slavedriver… >>

Well, actually there were black slave owners before the Civil War. Freed slaves who set up their own mini-plantations, who bought and drove some slaves to work.

Not many, but a wonderful novel came out several years ago, based on that subject, and written by a 21st century black author: the point being that a corrupt system would corrupt even a former slave.

So I agree that it’s not a good idea to argue from that point, but that Jonah Goldberg’s argument is not only offensive and untrue, but that he negates it himself at the end of the piece.

Barrack Obama is a slave driver, except he’s not.

But I still think Jonah Goldberg is a serial rapist.

“Let alone a black man,” that’s English, right? You guys are the smart ones, so maybe you can explain how “Let alone a black man” doesn’t imply that black men should be exempt.

Because “let alone a black man” doesn’t mean “you can call white guys slave drivers all you want.”  “Let alone a black man” means that it’s offensive to call anyone a slave driver, and it’s doubly offensive to call a black man a slave driver.

Your English teacher must have committed suicide after having you in her class.

Look, people, Jim’s point is simple: if any where, any time, there was a high-melanin person who owned slaves, then it is completely illegitimate and racist for Jessy to point out the bad taste of making light of our nation’s history of low-melanin people enslaving high-melanin people. Barack Obama is therefore a slavemaster.  QED.

“Let alone a black man” means that it’s offensive to call anyone a slave driver, and it’s doubly offensive to call a black man a slave driver.

Why? (Please don’t make your debate coach slit his wrists.)

Look, people, Jim’s point is simple: if any where, any time, there was a high-melanin person who owned slaves, then it is completely illegitimate and racist for Jessy to point out the bad taste of making light of our nation’s history of low-melanin people enslaving high-melanin people.

Speaking of English teachers killing themselves…

Hey, that rhymes! Well done.

Don’t worry, I didn’t expect you to give an actual answer. I just thought it was a funny thing you said.

Judy Brown, I can has novel name? That sounds like a good read, and I’m an Amazon-aholic.

And to further explain myself, because apparently we’ve lapsed into the era of Pandagon where every sentence needs a further paragraph to satisfy out conservative friends:

It’s true: I am out as a conservative. (Among other things! Tap tap tap, etc.)

given our nation’s history of slavery, it’s particularly offensive to insinuate that a black man in America is a 14th Amendment-ignoring slavedriver, particularly when you don’t mean it.

Okay, I can see that. I don’t agree with it, but I can see the sort of logic. It makes more sense than “Let alone a black man,” at least.

Weird sense of humor, Jim.

Granted!

Let’s stop feeding the grammar troll. His argument seems to sum up as “Your sentence structure is less than pure. Advantage: ME!”

Let’s stop feeding the grammar troll.

Hey, I’m not the one who brought up English teachers.

And if anything, I’m less a “grammar troll” than a “common wisdom troll.” Please respect my self-identification.

And if anything, I’m less a “grammar troll” than a “common wisdom troll.” Please respect my self-identification.

If we had to respect every conservative’s self-identification, we’d have a lot less internal consistency in the world. I’ll take reality over politeness.

Why? (Please don’t make your debate coach slit his wrists.)

Why is this a debate?  You don’t understand basic English—I explained it to you.  Trying to claim that it’s a debate because you don’t understand the language you’re reading or writing is like saying you can have a debate about whether a cow and a dog are the same animal.

Okay, I can see that. I don’t agree with it, but I can see the sort of logic. It makes more sense than “Let alone a black man,” at least.

Actually, it makes exactly as much sense for those with a sound knowledge of written modern English. That’s the point that was being made, Jim.

If we had to respect every conservative’s self-identification, we’d have a lot less internal consistency in the world.

Please try to be more courteous about our cultural differences.

Why is this a debate?  You don’t understand basic English—I explained it to you.  Trying to claim that it’s a debate because you don’t understand the language you’re reading or writing is like saying you can have a debate about whether a cow and a dog are the same animal.

Well, that clears it up! Good job, hon.

I’m amazed that someone can come to a blog and carry himself as if he’s won a “debate” just by acting like he has absolutely no reading comprehension skills.  Does anybody doubt that this guy actually understood Jesse’s point perfectly the first time around?  His entire argument seems to hinge on, “Some incredibly stupid people might not understand this grammatically-correct and logically-sound sentiment Jesse has expressed; therefore, Jesse deserves ridicule.”  That’s absolutely moronic.

I’m amazed that someone can come to a blog and carry himself as if he’s won a “debate” just by acting like he has absolutely no reading comprehension skills.

Oh, I assumed Mnemosyne was a woman. Sorry about that! (And it seems vulgar to pretend you know his motives. Tsk, tsk.)

Well, he’s succeeded in getting people smarter than him to talk to him. Negative attention is still attention, after all. He’s probably one of the guys who congratulates himself every time he can get a woman in a bar to actually turn around and tell him to fuck off.

Please try to be more courteous about our cultural differences.

That was really funny and clever. You tell those liberals, and use their own language to do it.

That was really funny and clever.

Aw, shucks.

You stopped reading my post after one sentence, then tried to turn things around to suggest that my comments about reading comprehension skills applied to someone else.

I’ll admit, at first I thought that was funny, in an ironic and self-deprecating way.  But, having visited your blog, I don’t think there’s any evidence that you’re capable of that type of cleverness.  Which is a shame.  You almost demonstrated some knowledge of how humor works.

Is this the same Jonah Goldberg who was caught sabotaging my cartoons and the cartoons of others at the Cartoonist and Writers Syndicate in 1998 and shown the door? The son of Nixon dirty trickster Lucianne Goldberg? Could that be the same guy? And he gets paid money to write books and stuff?

If that’s him, I definitely wasted my life as an honest man.

I’ll admit, at first I thought that was funny, in an ironic and self-deprecating way.

Much appreciated!

Okay, that was kinda funny.

Goldberg’s talent for equating (questionable) correlation and causality, and just throwing out non sequiturs is always entertaining.  At the very least it exercises my critical reading skills.  It seems he’s arguing that national service will teach students that volunteering is only to be done by government compulsion, and that (somehow) they will no longer ever be interested in volunteering without the financial aid carrot being dangled, even indirectly, in their face, resulting in a behavioral trend will last through adulthood.  He cites two examples to “prove” this:  1) European churches are government funded ergo no one goes to church on Sunday; and 2) nations with strong social assistance programs and compulsory service have much lower volunteering rates than the United States.

Even assuming his statistics are true, there’s no causality here. 

I wonder what Goldberg thinks about abstinence-only funding.  That’s a strings-attached program that if schools don’t participate in, they’re denied funding.  Or what about having military recruiters on college campuses that accept federal funding? 

At the end of the day, the idea that public service should only be executed with private behavior, and that service cannot be compelled or funded with public dollars defies the interpretation of Article I, section 8, that has lasted about 200 years.  A national service program is just an extension of existing federal powers.  I guess Goldberg is just defending the lazy or antisocial or something.

I always love the little trolls that come around to Pandagon and start tossing around “hon” and “sweetie”. Well, we’ve been put in our place now, I guess!

I guess Goldberg is just defending the lazy or antisocial

In other words, his base.

I always love the little trolls that come around to Pandagon and start tossing around “hon” and “sweetie”.

My bad, dollface!

Really, dude, stop storing them next to each other.

Wrong! The right answer, for Mr G, is to ensure all bottles contain drain cleaner of one flavour or another.

I tried to ascertain the truth in Goldberg’s column, which, as we all know, is a recipe for madness.

What bothered me was his extremely vague (what else?) assertion that Obama intends to compel service from students “by, among other things, attaching strings to federal education dollars.” A quick Google search, which is all I can do by taking time away from my job that I really can’t afford, turned up only coverage of a speech by Obama at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. The article, on the website of the local Fox affiliate, said he wanted to “encourage middle and high schools to develop service projects, with federal funding on the line.” That leaves it unclear whether the funding in question would be the regular federal funding the schools would expect, or additional funding if the schools met those goals.

I strongly suspect the latter is the case, especially since the article says that, regarding college students, he “proposes a tax credit of $4,000 for college students who complete 100 hours a year.” In other words, there’s nothing “involuntary” or “compulsory” about Obama’s proposal; he’s proposing incentives for young people to volunteer.

If this is slavery, then tax deductions for charitable contributions are extortion.

Oh, and Jim Treracher: Your website is even dumber than your comments here.

Aw, leave Jim alone. It’s not nice to make fun of the obviously mentally challenged. They can’t help it.

Calling an American black man a slavedriver is more stupid than offensive.  Jonah’s trademark.  He’s a stupid man.

Your website is even dumber than your comments here.

I wouldn’t have thought such a thing was even possible. Good eye!

You beat me to it, The One True Vegan!  Reading the comments in this thread made me think of the time this jackass in college kept on giving dollars to this mentally disabled guy to dance around like a chicken outside his frat house.  I laughed, but I felt really ashamed about it afterwards…

Reading the comments in this thread made me think of the time this jackass in college kept on giving dollars to this mentally disabled guy to dance around like a chicken outside his frat house.

I remember that nice man! The green paper had pretty pictures.

Jeff God of Biscuits—Actually, in a twist of irony, he’s just about finished with his degree in special ed…

Critiquing Jonah Goldberg is like shooting fish in a barrel. Not Sporting. Don’t give him any more attention - he’ll just act out more.

Everything the right does is predictable. Black people are the REAL racists, women are the REAL sexists, Jews are the REAL genocide supporters. (Well, Kristol is, but I think he’s the exception.)

It’s “I know you are but what am I” in syndicated column format.

The term “slavedriver” is a bit strong, but McBama certainly does want to keep blacks (and others) picking food stamp cotton on Uncle Sam’s welfare plantation.

It’s true that there were a handful of black slaveholders in the US, but the best black slavedrivers were the Dahomey in what today is known as Benin. Thye raided he interion of west Africa for slaves and traded the slaves for guns and gold. The Guns helped them get even more slaves to sell and make even more money. What did they do with all that money? They spent it on art. The Dahomey already had Bantu iron technology, and they combined this with European metalworking methods to make elegant and detailed bronze statues, and gold statues too.

They should have enlisted their artisans to manufacture guns at home and learned the secrets of gunpowder. Guns would have been a cinch given their metalworking skills. Maybe then they could have resisted their subsequent colonization.

*sigh* I can haz killfile for new pandagon, plz?

Reading this charming thread late, I think everyone was using the wrong definition of slave driver. I thought it was the guy who actually made the slaves work, rather than the guy who owned the slaves.

Take the Pledge, people!  Do Not Feed the Trolls!

Ab_Normal, if you’re running FireFox, the latest killfile script for Greasemonkey does work here.  My copy just got a new member.

I honestly don’t understand why you’re all talking to Treacherbot.

He can’t refute the post, so he tries to distract you and make the comments thread all about himself by playing dumb (or dumber). Just delete and ban.

Treacherbot… I like it.

He can’t refute the post, so he tries to distract you and make the comments thread all about himself by playing dumb (or dumber). Just delete and ban.

My goodness. Well, I hope the rest of your day gets a lot better!

Is anyone else as bored with Jim Treacher as I am?

Is anyone else as bored with Jim Treacher as I am?

Probably!

Treacherbot… I like it.

Yes, I realise that pretending to be delighted with insults is the only course open to you, but a slightly less robotic response would have been less embarrassing.

Probably!

I like it!

Yes, I realise that pretending to be delighted with insults is the only course open to you, but a slightly less robotic response would have been less embarrassing.

I wouldn’t say delighted. Amused, sure. That was a good one.

I like it!

Well, I’m glad we can agree on something. Have a good one!

(A good day, I mean. Not a good joke. Although you can have both, I’m not trying to tell you what to do.)

Right! Remember kids: black people owned slaves! So racism never existed! Ha ha!

Who said racism never existed? Oh, that was a joke. Okay, not bad, I guess.