posted 02-13-2003 08:12 PM            

Extremism in defense of liberty

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Posted: February 13, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2003 WorldNetDaily.com

The first reviews of my new book, "Taking America Back," released earlier this week into bookstores across the country, are beginning to be published.

Publishers Weekly had this to say:

It's time for a revolution, declares Farah, co-author of "This Land is Our Land: How to End the War on Private Property" and founder of WorldNetDaily.com ("an independent newssite committed to ... reporting [on] government waste, fraud and abuse"). In this fiery volume, he calls on Americans to embrace God, get government out of their lives and clean up the moral wasteland he feels the country has become.

Beginning and ending with a firm belief in the Constitution and the power of religious faith, Farah stakes out a rigidly populist view of reform as he rails against conservatives and libertarians alike (while reserving special venom for liberals) for undermining the country's strength, its moral core and the "revolutionary creed of freedom and responsibility" on which it was founded. Indeed, Farah feels that the federal government is "intentionally encouraging and spreading immorality" and "turning us into slaves."

His proposal for change includes, but is not limited to: abolishing the income tax and the IRS, withdrawing from all international treaties and institutions, repealing all gun laws and ending federal funding for schools, the arts, conservation, housing and agriculture.

So far, so good.

I don't have a single major quarrel with anything written. It's a pretty accurate little capsule of the book. But the review continues:

What's left, you ask? Farah calls for churches and religious institutions to assume a broader role in molding the national character, including actively censoring the entertainment industry and having a direct role in education and family life. There's certainly a choir out there to whom Farah can preach, but most readers will find both his positions and his rhetoric uncomfortably extreme.

A couple of points about this …

"Censorship" has always been and will always be a tactic of government. If a Hollywood studio exec decides, after consulting with church leaders, that a script is offensive to Christians, is he "censoring" it by not spending millions on developing it into a motion picture? Or is he simply using his business judgment?
That's what happened in Hollywood from 1933 to 1966 – during the movie industry's Golden Age. That's what I'd like to see again – and I dare say most Americans would like to see it, too, given that much higher percentages of them attended those movies than buy tickets for today's crop of trash. Should churches and synagogues use their clout to uplift the culture? They are commanded to do so by God. Will they or should they ever be in a position to "censor" anyone in Hollywood? I think not. Nor did I ever suggest any such thing.

The reviewer suggests most readers of my book "will find both his positions and his rhetoric uncomfortably extreme." I'm sure that's a guess on the reviewer's part, based on his or her own reaction. Yet of the hundreds of letters I have received from people who have actually read the book, not one made any such comment nor expressed any such reaction. That's not to say some won't. But "most"? I don't think so.
I'll agree that my prescription for radical change in America will seem strange and extreme in the hallowed halls of the New York publishing industry. I will even agree that they will seem strange and extreme to most of my colleagues in the establishment press. They may even seem strange and extreme to the majority of Americans who rely principally on the content from these two worlds to form their own opinions.

So what? Glad to hear it.

It reminds me of an old quote from the 1964 Republican presidential candidate, Barry Goldwater: "I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."

I admit it. I am an extremist in defense of liberty. If you want to join me in that extremist defense of liberty, help me get "Taking America Back" in the hands of like-minded, freedom-loving people.