Jerry Kirkpatrick's Blog

Below is a repost from October 8, 2017, that discusses the origin and meaning of fascism as a form of socialism, which means it belongs on the left side of the left-right political and economic continuum. Following this repost, I have added a postscript on racism. For a detailed presentation of why the German form of fascism, Nazism, was totalitarian socialism, see George Reisman’s essay, “Why

Below is a repost from May 15, 2018, lightly edited. Two months later I posted “Is the Next Step for the Left to Liquidate Its Enemies?” July 11, 2018, in which I ask three times, “Are We There Yet?” A year earlier, October 8, 2017, I posted “The Fascist Left,” explaining the left-right continuum and arguing that fascism belongs on the left, as it is a form of socialism, “socialism of the German

Two prominent and accomplished conservative-leaning news analysts with decades of experience disagree in their assessments of today’s mainstream media. Bernard Goldberg says they are delusional, while Bill O’Reilly says they are lying. Take your pick of the issues. The media, whether print “reporter” or cable news talking head, frequently say things that are not true about our current

Theories of human nature underly theories of political and economic systems. Some people attempt to justify capitalism with the Calvinist theory that says, because of Original Sin, the inherent tendency to evil, we should do our duty by working hard to absolve those sins and ensure acceptance into Heaven. This is the gist of the Protestant Ethic.  Others attack capitalism by saying

Following is a repost from August 8, 2018. The issue today needs to be restated. Masculinity
and femininity are emotional styles that express our sexual
self-confidence as a male or female person in relation to the opposite
sex.*They are psychological achievements that derive from our
different anatomies and physiologies. Deficiencies in masculinity and
femininity, that is, diminished

Communists, socialists, and fascists, as well as the usual American political suspects, Democrats and Republicans, have all advocated, and today still advocate, democracy. The notion of a “soviet,” let me point out, was a locally elected communist council or committee, common in the USSR. Similar “elections” occurred in Maoist China. In World War II, the German people were “advised” to vote

The right to free speech does not mean you can say or write anything anytime, anywhere. Private property rights have primacy over speech rights. This means you may not say anything in my house if I dislike it. I may ask you to leave and if you don’t, I can have you arrested for trespass. If you make a vocal fuss, say, on my front lawn, I can press the additional charge of disturbing the

The philosophy of positivism—also called logical positivism and logical empiricism—has for decades been the bane of science, especially the human sciences. The concept “positivism” that I am using is broader than the logical positivism of the Vienna Circle in the1920s–1930s, which attempted, but failed, to find Immanuel Kant’s noumenal world through symbolic logic applied to sense data.

“Evil” is a strong word. The Oxford English Dictionary says it derives from Old English and, when applied to a person, is “the most comprehensive adjectival expression of disapproval, dislike, or disparagement.” It means the person is “bad, wicked, vicious” and causes harm. The concept is on the extreme end of the continuum of immorality. Ayn Rand says that evil people are a small

Writing is not automatic, and no one is born with the talent. When I was a sophomore in a public high school, I was a student in an honors English class and earned gentlemanly A’s and B’s. For the next two years, I attended a private school. In the first semester of my junior year, Miss K gave me a D- for not being able to write a coherent sentence. I was shocked and humiliated. Miss K