From a reader in response to my magazine piece from the last issue:
Hi Jonah
Just got around to reading your article on Liberal Fascism and it’s critics. I read Tomasky’s review too and noted some of the same things, especially his religious claim that liberalism has something deep within it (a respect for individual liberty) that keeps it from EVER endorsing fascism. That was one of the most hilarious claims ever printed and the most indefensible.
But it was on the subject of leftist historiography that I had a question. You describe it as “team” based, but I would argue that it is more about ideology than you think. However, it is about which ideology has power. Read Foucalt, Derrida, Lacan, even Said- all center history around the question of who has power and what ideology they get to push. So you are right when you say that it is about allegiances and coalitions, but using the term “team” is misleading, because Leftists intellectuals are pretty honest in their understanding of power as the driving force, and their willingness to team up with whoever they need to in order to consolidate and maintain power. It is why they can team up with Islamofascists in Canada and sue Steyn. It’s why they team up with all kinds of seedy fascists or tacitly support fascists- all the while calling us fascists. The team mentality is simply the surface. The real issue is maintaining power for the team.