Christopher Hitchens

[Alejandro C]

I've just finished 'God is not Great' and thought that it was fantastic. From what I've read of his so far (god is not great, jefferson:author of america, and thomas paine: common sense) he's a great writer to read, very witty and he seems to have a piercing rationalism.

However, I've heard him say a few things in interviews that seemed dumb, dogmatic, and irrational; for example he said that while he was in Iraq he talked to his wife who said that she was afraid for him. He replied that he thought America was much more dangerous than Iraq.
-this struck me as a silly thing to say and was the first time I really thought there was cause to strongly disagree with him.

I'm wondering if anyone else can shed some more light and recommend which of his books I should read next.

Also- His debate with Al Sharpton recently is great, if you haven't seen it, make a point to.

[Random Precision]

He used to be a Trotskyist, but after Sept. 11th he showed his political opportunism and ended up an Iraq-war-supporting neo-conservative. I suggest you read this: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/seymour261105.html

[Alejandro C]

Wow, what a fantastic article, thank you Comrade RandomPrecision. It's very well written and seems well researched and all of that, but it just doesn't make sense. Why would a man with a history like he has had make such an about face? It has plenty of evidence, but I'm still left with that burning question of why?

It leaves me with only three possibilities:
His anti-muslim ideas have taken him to the too far extremes
He's gone completely bat-shit insane
He's on to something

Which of these three is true I'm not sure, but I'd love to see a rebuttal to this if there is one or anyone can point me to it.

[al8]

From a interview I listened to said he was basically just fed up with being "some cogwheel in a party" and decided to dump the problem by going the easy way out and sideing with the other side since it was stronger and had everything going for them.

[Alejandro C]

Could you point the rest of us to that interview?

[al8]

I can't seem to find it easily. It was with two guys that where interviewing him. A leftist talkshow. I'll have more time tomorrow. See if I can find it then.

[Zurdito]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GR8HrBsPVH8&NR=1

here he is being destroyed by George Galloway in a debate. Follow the responses to see the full 12 videos.

is it just me or is there something vaguely repulsive about Hitchens when you watch him talking? I can't necessarilly back that up, it's just a gut feeling that he is a creep.

[Alejandro C]

yeah, that was a pretty bad showing.
I think on the whole he is fantastic, for example his debate with rabbi schmuely boteach as can be seen here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnMYL8sF7bQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnMYL8sF7bQ

Or his bit on TVO's Big Ideas which can be found :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3fJTn7Ljwc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3A3rQyV3q0&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26Yct0XlAf8&feature=related

[Die Neue Zeit]

A Trotsky-con HACK is who Hitchens is. Apologies for offending real Trotskyists, but I'm really prone to using derogatory, Stalinist terms to describe neo-con TROTSKYITE-FASCIST WRECKERS. :(

[Led Zeppelin]

A Trotsky-con HACK is who Hitchens is. Apologies for offending real Trotskyists, but I'm really prone to using derogatory, Stalinist terms to describe neo-con TROTSKYITE-FASCIST WRECKERS. :(

That doesn't make sense, if they're neo-cons now then they aren't Trotskyist, so it is redundant to use that term to describe them.

Hitchens has some interesting things to say about religion but his solution to the problem (and many other problems) is idealist and pretty lame, if you look at it from a Marxist perspective.

By the way, did anyone know that after the Cuban revolution he moved to Cuba to work on a coffee plantation with some other Trotskyists to see if the revolution would end up as an alternative to the USSR?

[Alejandro C]

What's his solution?
As far as I can tell he says there is no solution. As long as we stay in our current state as a species and don't evolve we will continue to have the 'pre-frontal cortex too small, adrenaline gland too big' etc.

I also didn't understand his solution to the speech on TVO that I linked to. It's talking about whether or not there should be a decency censor in Canada and he ends it by saying that because the main source of hatred (religion) is also the main group calling for censorship, the idea of voting against a decency censor is a false antithesis.
-What??? I didn't understand that at all, but I got the rest of the speech and all of the points he makes in the beginning and middle are great.

I remember him talking about his trip to Cuba in a speech recently, but he used it to slam Cuba saying something like, 'before we were all obsessed with planting coffee, now you can't even buy a cup of coffee and no one even bother with the planting.' Do you know when he left and why?

[Die Neue Zeit]

That doesn't make sense, if they're neo-cons now then they aren't Trotskyist, so it is redundant to use that term to describe them.

I'm referring to the origins of neo-conned-ism in the "Shachtmanite-Burnhamite bloc" (to borrow from the purge trials describing the "bloc" of alleged Trots and "Zinovievites").

[Alejandro C]

I also heard he was a member of the Judean People's Front

[GPDP]

I was recently reading "Discovering America As It Is" by Valdas Anelauskas. It's outdated by about 9 years, but it presents a well-documented insight into the reality of life in the United States, as seen through the eyes of a former Soviet dissident from Lithuania who expected to see a land of freedom of opportunity in the US upon his exile from the USSR, but ends up sorely disappointed. He blasts both Soviet "communism" and American "capitalism" as being evil systems, and even goes on to say that the American system may actually be worse. Unfortunately, though he calls himself a staunch socialist in the book, I recently found out that he considers himself a "nationalist, white separatist, and racialist", which I cannot for the life of me reconcile with any concrete idea of socialism. I never would have guessed it from his book, either, as he shows tremendous sympathy for the poor and the oppressed minorities in this country. Still, he has gone on to deliver several lectures titled "Zionism and Russia", in which he demonizes the role of the Jews in the Russian Revolution. He has also made several ridiculous statements, such as stating that "there is a lot of truth in Mein Kampf". So, I don't know what to make of this guy. His book is great, and I'd recommend it to any leftist, but his personal politics are all kinds of screwed up. I have my Political Economy professor looking into him as we speak (since he assigned the book to us and all).