110+ Jonah Goldberg Quotes On Education, Democracy And Politics

Jonah Goldberg is an American conservative political commentator, author, and public speaker. He is a senior editor at the National Review and a frequent guest on various news programs. Goldberg is the author of several books, including the New York Times bestseller Liberal Fascism. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Jonah Goldberg on education, democracy, politics.

Top 10 Jonah Goldberg Quotes

1. The government cannot love you, and any politics that works on a different assumption is destined for no good.
2. If power made one evil, then God would be the Devil.
3. America's political system used to be about the pursuit of happiness. Now More and more of us want to stop chasing it and have it delivered.
4. I am just mystified by these people telling me I would think Obama was doing a great job if his skin contained less melanin.
5. Cultures grow on the vine of tradition.
6. Our fear of hypocrisy is forcing us to live in a world where gluttons are fine, so long as they champion gluttony.
7. I don't think twice about picking up my dog's poop, but if another dog's poop is next to it, I think, 'Eww, dog poop!
8. Facts are mere speed bumps on the road to lefty moral outrage.
9. John Kerry is a sphincter. Okay, that's a bit juvenile.
10. Today's unions are less Mobbed-up than those of yesteryear to be sure, but they're hardly above tactics that would be considered intimidating and coercive.

Jonah Goldberg Short Quotes

• And in the minds of progressives you are free to live anyway you want so long as it's progressive.
• If you write for the critics, only the critics will read you.
• Tom Friedman says China is so awesome they make kosher pigs.
• As we all know, the most effective lies are the ones sprinkled with the most actual truths.
• The GOP needs to figure out a way to become more appealing to new constituencies.
• Social distinctions tend to matter only at your own level and above.
• We’re all born idiots, and we only get over that condition as we get less young.
• I would also say Barack Obama has spent much, much, much, much more money than the Republicans.
• I think as - all in all, it's better to have a cool president than a not cool president.
• Liberals are Nazis, and Nazis are liberals. And if you don't agree with me, you're a Nazi too.

Jonah Goldberg Quotes About Politics

Hollywood's martyr-mythology leaves out the fact that the famed Hollywood Ten, for example, were in fact members of the Communist Party, which advocated the violent overthrow of the U.S. government in violation of the Smith Act and which took orders directly from Moscow. — Jonah Goldberg

...associational ad hominem attacks remain the left's favorite rhetorical strategy for undermining opponents. — Jonah Goldberg

Everyone understands that [democrat Senator Harry Reid] is deliberately lying. The man reads his lies from prepared texts. You can't read from a script and then claim you misspoke. — Jonah Goldberg

When I see hipsters wearing Mao hats or Lenin T-shirts, I'm grateful. It's like truth-in-labeling. For now I know you are: Woefully ignorant, morally stunted, purposively asinine, or all three. — Jonah Goldberg

Champions of Liberty get called Fascists by Champions of Statism — Jonah Goldberg

But this is the kind of ass-clownery that stems from the fact that all philosophy looks weird when you don't have one. — Jonah Goldberg

Fascism isn't a libertarian doctrine! It just isn't, never will be and it can't be cast as one. — Jonah Goldberg

[C]ontemporary liberalism stands on a foundation of assumptions and ideas integral to the larger fascist movement. — Jonah Goldberg

Are you a producer or a looter? If diversity were always and everywhere good we would be clamoring for more midgets in the NBA. — Jonah Goldberg

Republican politics have been off-kilter for several years now because a large segment of the conservative base does not look back fondly on the Bush presidency. — Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg Quotes About Government

If there is ever a fascist takeover in America, it will come not in the form of storm troopers kicking down doors but with lawyers and social workers saying. "I'm from the government and I'm here to help. — Jonah Goldberg

If you think shrinking government and getting it less involved in your life is a hallmark of tyranny it is only because you are either grotesquely ignorant or because you subscribe to a statist ideology that believes the expansion of the state is the expansion of liberty. — Jonah Goldberg

Keep Hope alive, particularly if Hope is the name of a very cute puppy and not some ill-defined abstraction that is in fact code for big government. — Jonah Goldberg

The problem with the United Nations is that while democracy within nations is the best available form of government, democracy among nations can be a moral disaster - especially if some nations are not democracies. — Jonah Goldberg

In crude Marxist terms, liberals have a theory of infallible government that is constantly at war with the reality of life. — Jonah Goldberg

Public unions are the country's foremost advocates for increased taxes at all levels of government. — Jonah Goldberg

And, of course, liberals see no problem with using the government to impose their cultural beliefs on others; they just won't admit that's what they're doing. — Jonah Goldberg

Government money only pays for the "liberties" the government thinks you should have, and therefore it can determine how you exercise them. That turns liberties into privileges dispensed at the whim of the state. — Jonah Goldberg

Governing involves choosing and making choices between competing goods. — Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg Quotes About Love

The progressive notion of the state as a loving, caring parent is becoming a bipartisan affair. — Jonah Goldberg

[A] country without a word to describe its love for what is best within it is a country ill-equipped to defend what is best within it. — Jonah Goldberg

Why is it fair game to question conservatives' love or loyalty to children or to their fellow man, but beyond the pale to question liberals' love of country? — Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg Quotes About Moral

Getting the support of Syria is the moral equivalent of winning the Klan's endorsement - it might be useful but it doesn't necessarily speak well of you. — Jonah Goldberg

As a broad generalization, big businesses have no moral objections to being whores. Getting into bed with Uncle Sam is all a question of price, not principle. — Jonah Goldberg

If we say that anyone who "moralizes" must be perfect morally then we are in effect saying no one can moralize. — Jonah Goldberg

Dissent is morally neutral. You can correctly call yourself a dissident because you like to kick puppies, but at the end of the day, you're just a jerk who likes to kick puppies. — Jonah Goldberg

The search for a moral equivalent of war continues to define American liberalism to this day. — Jonah Goldberg

Conservatives value economic liberty and moral security, while the liberal values economic security and moral liberty. — Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg Quotes About World

[In] the post-Enlightenment world, science [has] taken the place of magic, miracles, and superstition. — Jonah Goldberg

[Libertarianism] is about curbing state power to let people be and do what they want. Liberalism is about using state power to make people do and be what liberals want. And that makes all the difference in the world. — Jonah Goldberg

A week after his State of the Union address, political observers are still trying to figure out what President Obama's game is. That's because rhetorically and substantively, he seems to be in another world. — Jonah Goldberg

I suppose in John Kerry's world good diplomacy lets the boys in the bar finish raping the girl for fear of causing a fuss. Okay, that was unfair. — Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg Famous Quotes And Sayings

Look, I think liberals have reasonable gripes with Fox News. It does lean to the right, primarily in its opinion programming but also in its story selection (which is fine by me) and elsewhere. But it's worth remembering that Fox is less a bastion of ideological conservatism and more a populist, tabloidy network. — Jonah Goldberg

There was no intellectual movement in American history called social Darwinism. The people who were supposedly the leaders of the social Darwinist movement never embraced something called social Darwinism. It didn't exist. — Jonah Goldberg

The Founders understood that democracy was important, but if you didn't filter it through a republican system you'd be just as likely to end up with a tyranny of the majority as you would with a healthy society. Don't worry, I won't quote the Federalist Papers, but trust me, it's in there. — Jonah Goldberg

In Europe and America alike, voters increasingly recognize that the benefits of the green revolution aren't worth the costs, particularly when the revolutionaries don't have a clue what they're doing. — Jonah Goldberg

I've just returned from my daughter's Halloween parade at grade school. She was supergirl - and she was perfect. And, even better, she still considers boys to be made of kryptonite. — Jonah Goldberg

But if the choice is a cool president and 8 or 10 percent unemployment in a declining economy and a country that seems to be going in the wrong direction and structural unemployment for young people at 50 percent, I'd rather have a dorky president who fixed those problems. — Jonah Goldberg

Simply because the nanny-state wants to hug you doesn't mean it's not tyrannical if you don't want to be hugged. — Jonah Goldberg

Nothing drives your opponents more crazy than being utterly reasonable. And nothing makes demonizing or delegitimizing your opponents easier than letting them shriek unreasonable things for you. The Republicans need to get back to being the party that elicits unreasonable shrieking from their opponents. Not the other way around. — Jonah Goldberg

Progressivism, liberalism, or whatever you want to call it has become an ideology of power. So long as liberals hold it, principles don't matter. — Jonah Goldberg

I'd like to know why sociologists can't decide whether movie sex and violence has any effect on children, but there's a universal consensus that even a glimpse of a Camel will force children to become lifelong smokers. — Jonah Goldberg

Yes, I know liberals are more empirical because Jonathan Chait says they are, but my empirical studies of liberal empiricism keep spitting out contradictory findings. — Jonah Goldberg

Not reassuring when weathermen say 'Today will be terrible but don't worry it won't be as terrible as tomorrow or Friday. — Jonah Goldberg

If you're uncertain when life begins, why not give the unborn the benefit of the doubt and oppose abortion? — Jonah Goldberg

There is no - let me repeat - no example in the last quarter-century of a large, complex economy that has been successful with high taxes. — Jonah Goldberg

Free trade has been proven, time and again, as a reliable path to economic development. It pushes the public and private sectors alike toward greater accountability and transparency. It lifts people out of poverty, and while it can force unsettling changes on a society, those changes prove to be worthwhile in a very short time. — Jonah Goldberg

Pragmatism is the disguise progressive and other ideologues do when they want to demonize competing ideologies. — Jonah Goldberg

The more you socialize the costs of personal liberty, the more license you give others to regulate it. — Jonah Goldberg

The decision [to create a theme park called "EuroWorld"] was made by the EU countries in response to their collective realization that no one in Europe has had an innovative idea in well over a century. — Jonah Goldberg

The truth is France has been the chief Western advocate of normalizing relations with Iraq - one of its largest trading partners - for years, partly because France holds billions in IOUs from Iraq that wouldn't be redeemable by a new regime. — Jonah Goldberg

The white male is the Jew of liberal fascism. — Jonah Goldberg

(J)ust to clarify: If you go into every situation saying there's absolutely nothing worth fighting over, you will inevitably end up on a cot sleeping next to a guy named Tiny, bringing him breakfast in his cell every morning, and spending your afternoons ironing his boxers. Or, in the case of the French, you might spend your afternoon rounding up Jews to send to Germany, but you get the point. — Jonah Goldberg

And on Thursday, President Obama seized the opportunity of the National Prayer Breakfast to forthrightly criticize the 'terrible deeds' . . . committed 'in the name of Christ.'. — Jonah Goldberg

Those who say [Joseph] Padilla should get a civilian trial are essentially saying that if you reject the rules of civilized nations, like those inscribed in the Geneva Convention, you therefore deserve to be treated better, not worse, than those rules require. — Jonah Goldberg

You know those Navy SEALs, they weren't Democrats and Republicans. They were just doing what was best for America. Wouldn't that be a great country if all of you Americans were just like that? You followed orders, you marched in step and you followed my agenda. — Jonah Goldberg

But you're never taught in schools - we don't teach anyone in public schools that government is the problem. We don't teach anyone in college that government is the problem - except maybe a handful of sort of unique, conservative schools. But mainstream media never talks as if government is the problem. — Jonah Goldberg

A rising economic tide is bad for people who live off of the poverty of others. — Jonah Goldberg

Let's treat politicians like Twinkies. They have to disclose their ingredients - i.e., where their money is from - but beyond that, let the buyer beware. — Jonah Goldberg

If you spend any time in Washington you'll find nerds. What happens is most of them sublimate their fixations with comics, or baseball cards, or 1960s British comedies to policy minutiae and political arcana. But, like Christians in ancient Rome, you can still spot them if you know the signals. — Jonah Goldberg

Science is wonderful at explaining what science is wonderful at explaining, but beyond that it tends to look for its car keys where the light is good. — Jonah Goldberg

Three explanations dominate speculation about what Obama is up to. The first is that he's trying to lay the groundwork for his successor, presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton. The second is that he's trying to pad his legacy. The third is that he's trying to 'troll' or bait the GOP into debating his agenda rather than pursuing its own. All are plausible, and none necessarily contradicts the others. — Jonah Goldberg

There's nothing within science per se that says medical researchers must not experiment on human subjects; it is the imposition of ethical dogma that constrains the scientist. — Jonah Goldberg

I have a simple answer to any American patriot who claims that there is no conflict between his love of country and his desire to hitch our fate to the United Nations: “You're mistaken.” And, therefore, I'm thinking of adding this corollary to my General Rule of patriotism: The more intellectually consistent and pro-U.N. you are, the less patriotic you are likely to be. I haven't thought that all the way through, but it seems right to me. — Jonah Goldberg

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. — Jonah Goldberg

Bill Maher is anything but an impartial host. He sucks up to Hollywood liberals because A) he needs to get them back on the show, B) he usually agrees with them, and C) they tend to be wildly ignorant. — Jonah Goldberg

The mainstream perception that conservatives are close-minded and dogmatic while liberals are open-minded and free-thinking has it almost exactly backward. Liberal dogma is settled: The government should do good, where it can, whenever it can. That is President Obama's idea of pragmatism and bipartisanship: He's open to all ideas, from either side of the aisle, about how best to expand government and get the state more involved in our lives. — Jonah Goldberg

Progressivism was a sister movement of fascism, and today's liberalism is the daughter of Progressivism. — Jonah Goldberg

Of course, it's a mystery to me why any American who can't be bothered to pay attention to politics unless Pamela Anderson is discussing it should be welcome in that conversation. — Jonah Goldberg

A lot of the things that Trump needs to do to be a popular president requires annoying his biggest fans. — Jonah Goldberg

When activists say we need to move past the partisan divide, what they mean is: Shut up and get with my program. Have you ever heard anyone say, "We need to get past all of this partisan squabbling and name-calling. That's why I'm going to abandon all my objections and agree with you"? — Jonah Goldberg

Joe Biden says the Wall Street crisis is the result of George W. Bush's tax cuts, which makes as much sense as blaming the rising price of fairy dust. But as a wise man once asked, Who gives a rat's patoot what Joe Biden thinks? — Jonah Goldberg

We are all descended from cavemen who broke the skulls of their enemies with rocks for fun or profit. But that hardly mitigates the crimes of a man who does the same thing today. I see no problem judging the behavior of the Islamic State and its apologists from the vantage point of the West's high horse, because we've earned the right to sit in that saddle. — Jonah Goldberg

I have always seen the Clinton Foundation - yes, they do a lot of charitable good works. But by my lights, the charitable good works were a cost center like the electric bill. The reason why the foundation exists wasn't to do good work. It was to serve as sort of a place to park lugubrious sycophants like Sidney Blumenthal and other henchman, a place to serve as a super PAC, a place park her campaign while they were a government in exile — Jonah Goldberg

On Tuesday, the so-called Islamic State released a slickly produced video showing a Jordanian pilot being burned alive in a steel cage. On Wednesday, the United Nations issued a report detailing various 'mass executions of boys, as well as reports of beheadings, crucifixions of children, and burying children alive' at the hands of the Islamic State. — Jonah Goldberg

Keep in mind that Eric Alterman is media critic for The Nation-a hysterically left-wing magazine dedicated to the proposition that corporate America, U.S. foreign policy and the Republican Party are criminal, racist or both. The simple reality is that, for him, the Democratic Party is far too conservative. — Jonah Goldberg

In many respects fascism not only is here but has been here for nearly a century. For what we call liberalism--the refurbished edifice of American Progressivism--is in fact a descendant and manifestation of fascism. — Jonah Goldberg

I think there needs to be a meeting to set an agenda for more meetings about meetings. — Jonah Goldberg

I like vengeance as much as the next guy, if the next guy likes vengeance a whole lot. — Jonah Goldberg

Liberals and leftists have been dismissing inconvenient facts by attacking motives for generations. In the 1930s, '40s, and '50s, Soviet spies and abettors attacked the motives of their accusers because the fact of their guilt was undeniable. In the 1960s, over a thousand psychiatrists who'd never even met Barry Goldwater signed a petition saying the GOP candidate was too mentally unstable to be president. — Jonah Goldberg

I think what we're seeing on a lot of parts of the right is people bending their positions and their principles on account of the fact that Donald Trump won. — Jonah Goldberg

[Progressives] think the Constitution is like Felix the Cat's magic bag: Look in there long enough and hard enough, and you can find anything. — Jonah Goldberg

Despite what you may have been taught about Indians or Africans or ancient Celts, poor people are terrible stewards of their environment. For instance, if my kid were starving to death, I would happily feed her fresh panda. — Jonah Goldberg

[American] liberalism today sees no realm of human life that is beyond political significance, from what you eat to what you smoke to what you say. — Jonah Goldberg

You can see why the Marxist left would resist the idea that Hitler was a revolutionary. Because if he was, then either Hitler was a force for good, or revolutions can be bad. — Jonah Goldberg

Someone once noted that a 'gaffe' in Washington is when a politician accidentally tells the truth. — Jonah Goldberg

The problem is I think Howie is exactly right, is that Donald Trump would rather be at the center of a media controversy in a negative way than allow the limelight to move to Hillary Clinton and let her actually take heat in the public - in a public arena. And it just sucks up all of the oxygen. — Jonah Goldberg

Tip to all British tabloids: Do Not Hack Amy Winehouse's Phone. I repeat: Do Not Hack Amy Winehouse's Phone. — Jonah Goldberg

(T)he most important reason American leftists love France is that French elites say bad things about America. French intellectuals call us racist, stupid, imperialistic, simplistic, etc. ' and that alone is proof of their intellectualism. So long as you call America “racist,” you could add that an enema is as good as a toothbrush and some professor of “communications theory” would applaud. — Jonah Goldberg

When I started criticizing Donald Trump when he got more popular on the right, one of the most things that I discovered was how many people were mad at me for not living down to their expectations. There are a lot of pundits on the right who think their job is to be a cheerleader for their team. That is not my job. My job is to tell the truth as I see it, and that is gotten a lot of people angry. — Jonah Goldberg

Seriously, in 2008 we elected a community organizer, state senator, college instructor first term senator over a guy who spent five years in a Vietnamese prison. And now he's lecturing us about how America's gone "soft"? Really? — Jonah Goldberg

Capitalism is the greatest system ever created for alleviating general human misery, and yet it breeds ingratitude. — Jonah Goldberg

But there's a fourth interpretation: Obama can't leave his comfort zone. No president since Woodrow Wilson has been as enamored of abstract ideas or more sure that disagreement with him is proof of ignorance, bad faith or dogmatism. As a candidate, he insisted his real opponent was 'cynicism,' and in his address last week, he returned to this trite formulation, insisting again he was bravely battling the cynics. — Jonah Goldberg

[There] is something fundamentally unpatriotic in the yearning to fundamentally transform your country. — Jonah Goldberg

The logical upshot of liberalism's hatred of hypocrisy is that it is better for the liar to champion lying, the glutton to advocate gluttony, the adulterer to celebrate adultery, than for someone to preach the right thing if he himself occasionally does the wrong thing. Better to let your failings define you and be happy about it, than to let your ideals define you but then fall short of them, for that opens you up to the charge of hypocrisy. — Jonah Goldberg

We are a species that must try to impose and find systems - systems of thought, ways of organizing and categorizing reality. — Jonah Goldberg

Life Lessons by Jonah Goldberg

1. Jonah Goldberg is a great example of how hard work and dedication can lead to success. He has used his platform to speak out on important issues and advocate for his beliefs.
2. He has shown that it is possible to have a successful career while also staying true to your values and beliefs.
3. Jonah Goldberg has demonstrated that it is possible to be a successful celebrity while also maintaining a sense of humility and respect for others.