Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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42 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
For the open-minded, July 30, 2004
Left Illusions is one of the most important compilations of political and social commentary to have been published in recent years. David Horowitz provides the reader with a unique perspective of political life on both the left and the conservative right. For half of his life he was one of the most prominent American leftists. He helped establish the New Left - a movement that sought to dissociate the socialist dream from the gulags of Stalin - and committed himself in various ways to its cause: organizing the first anti-war rally at Berkeley, editing the left's most definitive periodicals, and aiding such organizations as the Black Panthers. Personal tragedy (the murder of a close friend at the hands of the Black Panther, and the subsequent cover-up by the entire left community) made him deeply question his ideological commtiments, and after a period of several years, he emerged again as a figure of the conservative right.
It is a sad fact about the state of political discourse (especially on college campuses) that people of the left automatically brand people of the right as racists, bigots, fascists and sexist pigs. Read this book - it will disabuse you of such preposterous notions (if you indeed believe in them). Though there are a few prominent right wing nuts (usually derided by other conservatives) you will quite clearly see the left's utter hypocrisy in levelling these accusations. With a clear, rational analysis - supported by facts - and made very readable by his lucid writing, Horowitz covers a broad range of issues in his debate with the left. He writes of their willingness to support the world's most oppressive regimes, and downplay or turn a blind eye to the deaths of millions (such as after the Vietnam War, the slaughter by the North Vietnamese government and also Pol Pot's regime - under these regimes, more Indochinese countrymen died in three years than they had in the thirteen prior years of war). He discusses the untenable nature of the socialist dream and how that dream has assumed various guises both before and after the fall of the Soviet Union; the Marxist doctrine is bound to be destructive when applied to the real world, as predicted even by certain prominent contemporaries of Marx and seen by every regime that has espoused those doctrines (though again, the left pointedly does not learn from history and the deaths of millions and the oppression of millions more). There are essays on the dominance of the left in our culture, particularly in academia, where college conservative groups receive contempt and scant funding from administrators and other student groups, and professors regularly teach only the left side of the argument and demand that students adhere to left opinions while writing assignments for class; I had known of the bias on campuses before reading this book, but reading the statistical figures and personal experiences shocked me - so many college students graduate without being encouraged in independent thought and inquiry and without ever hearing both sides of the debate. You will also be able to read Horowitz's debate on the reparations issue (one of the many debates in which his opponents unfairly smeared him); here you can see what he actually wrote and judge for yourself.
In any case, if you are open-minded and wish to read one of the most insightful political analysts around, pick up this book. The compilation of essays and excerpts, taken from an assortment of Horowitz's work, will not only show you his progression from radical leftist to member of the conservative right, it will force you to see certain issues in a new light and understand that conservatives - far from being the narrow-minded, hateful oppressors the left ironically brands them as - are for the most part a diverse body of people committed to a kind of classic liberalism: upholding private property, wishing for less government interference in private life, and championing individual rights and individual enterprise... among several other key principles.
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37 of 43 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Seeking truth through critical thinking!, January 5, 2004
What seems to bother the left so much about Horowitz is they have a difficult time using their typical propaganda to marginalize him. (Typical propaganda includes any way the left can tear a person's ideas down for an irrelevant reason -- for example: He's religious!; His ancestors owned slaves!: His family owned an "evil corporation!") One reviewer tries this tactic, but the only thing he can spew is that Horowitz was somehow disrespectful to his deceased parents in an earlier book. (Of course, Horowitz was not disrespectful, but this is how most of the left operates because they have little or no valid critique and certainly have no ideas.)Generally, conservatives come by their beliefs through honest, organic intellectual analysis. However, liberals can never acknowledge this because to do so would expose the truth that fair, intellectual quest is the almost exclusive province of the right, while the left relies on indoctrination, brainwashing, and intimidation to create lemmings and keep them in the "talking points" fold. This is why communist regimes execute and imprison educated persons with anti-communist points of view. This is the same reason the left wants to teach 1st-graders that homosexuality is a "natural" alternative, that America (and particulary Republicans) are going to destroy earth through global warming, etc. Horowitz's clean, clear thinking is too much for the liberal who wants to stay brainwashed.. More important, it is a challenge to the conservative to keep the mind sharp.
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60 of 72 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Radical Son, December 1, 2003
David Horowitz is amazing in his passion for political truths and his intellectual honesty. He spoke out when no one would against the left and their mixed-up visions of a socialist utopia on earth. He is brave, brilliant and an excellent writer!
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