Levin Talks About Thomas Paine and Edmund Burke

[leesagrrl]

Wow... Levin's crap here is a complete load of Plutocratic Hegemonic Fascist shit. Burke was a slimeball who wanted a Ruling Class of the Very Wealthy. He didn't believe in a Democracy in any shape. Thomas Payne was so incensed by Burke that he wrote the Rights Of Man.

Shame on you Levin for passing on this historically inaccurate rewrite... and if you actually believe this tripe... you're a fool.

[Slipinsizzers]

Jew Fuck Is The Shit !

[ozmafied]

Burke was a Whig supporter of the monarchy and state institutions, not natural rights in the Lockean sense. He did not treasure the individual and property as Levin leads us to believe but a strong conservative state, backed by hereditary passage of law and power. This separated him from the other social contract theorists who all lent themselves to the idea behind the French revolution, that is that man has rights in nature. Burke knew, as Arendt, that gov was needed to protect said rights.

[MrStupidfag]

that's not the reason burke disliked the french revolution

[blackamoor61]

This guy is a revisionist idiot. Pure nonsense.

[Dafariii]

Nothing really said in this 10 minute video. Why do you disagree with Paine?

And btw, Franklin was an atheist.

[slick222]

Edmund Burke was a genius. Russell Kirk was a gift. Read "The American Cause". Levin is right.

[MEpianist]

Don't get your history lessons from this idiot, lol.

[jwbrown1969]

@MEpianist - Can you qualify your justification for that remark? Mark Levin is a certifiable genius. Calling him an idiot is just inaccurate. You do not have to agree with him but present a counter argument rather than an ad homonym attack.

[leesagrrl]

@jwbrown1969

"Genius?" Me thinks thou dost drink too much of that dangerous Idiot Kool Aid.

[longfootbuddy]

"why do they have to read one or the other?" because thats the mentality of people...they dont look at details, theyr too lazy.. they dont want to make decisions...they want to get in a group, they want a team, a party...they want to be told what group to join, so they can be on the winning team...theyr followers, unable or unwilling to make theyr own decisions...and thats why we have government that is oppressive and treat us all like children incapable of living on our own...

[Krifko]

Paine did support the French revolution. However, he did not support the Great Terror that followed under the leadership of Robespierre. Paine was actually a critic of the regime and was captured to be beheaded. In the end he was able to escape the guillotine. Paine is one of the greatest Founding Fathers, not to mention endlessly more brave than this lying charlatan. Or he might not be a liar, just ignorant.

[NARDDB]

@Krifko Paine though had an anarchist ideal to him. read Thomas Paine.He attacks Burke because Burke wasnt an anarchist.

[Dafariii]

@NARDDB No, Paine attacked Burke because he was sucking up to the royalists. Paine was an anti royalist not an anarchist.

[NARDDB]

@Dafariii No actually Burke was on the side of "Our founding Fathers". Paine though was right for a blink but being obsessed (falsely ) that he could fix everything went wrong with a false belief went to France where he picked a side that at a glimpse but in reality was a wrong way , not "OUR FOUNDING FATHERS WAY" TO SOLVE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. Burke shows in his essays that Paine was totally crazy with Power(he falsely thought he had) to bend a totally Socially different cause. hence prison.

[leesagrrl]

@NARDDB

Oh bullcrap. Burke was a Plutocratic Calvinist Royalist.

[leesagrrl]

@Dafariii

I agree... But keep in mind that the original definition of "Anarchy" was true Democracy.

[makokun9]

I have read both, and I still consider that Payne was right on the two inssues, the American Revolution, and the French Revolution. You don´t have to be leftist to reject Burke, only human.

This guy is a disgrace as both, a radio host show, and a critic.

[NARDDB]

@makokun9 If you read both then how do you say Paine was right on both he was definitley an anarchist. Paine was a patriot on the America's plight but toward France he was a complete moron. How did you read both and not see the difference?Paine was a member during the "AMERICAN REVOLUTION" but during the french he really was just an asshole more or less a by stander who tells the jumper off the building to "JUMP.. JUMP ...JUMP".HE HAD A "I KNOW ALL FEELING" after the "american revolution" duh

[tuxguys]

I've become a big Mark Levin fan in the last year... I am gratified that, every time he appears on Don Imus' show, he is completely gracious (though completely unintimidated) and Imus is correspondingly courteous and, even, admiring.

Any syndicated talkshow host that can introduce Burke, Smith, and Paine to a national audience in an enticing way is, in my opinion, a genius. Has he ever taught in a classroom? He's a natural.

[BenderJJJ]

Nope. His "introduction" was awful.

[tuxguys]

I disagree. Any introduction of those thinkers to a mass radio audience would be anything but awful.

[BenderJJJ]

Calling him a genius was surely a bit much, no? It was also a very highly biased intro. In no way was that an introduction to the two thinkers. Mostly, it was a particular way to interpret why a hugely simplified version of Burke's thought ought to make him worthy of wider audiences.

[tuxguys]

1.) Notice my inclusion of the magic words, "in my opinion:" As I am the world's greatest authority on what I, myself, think, your quantification of my assessment is in fact, only yours, and you're welcome to it.

2.) Of course it's biased. All opinions are biased. His biases largely match up with mine, so I accept them.

3.) As I agree that Burke should be worthy of a wider audience, I consider Levin's use of his own show to introduce him to a wider audience to be an act of didactic genius.

[BenderJJJ]

@tuxguys The problem is that the real Burke goes missing in all this.

[tuxguys]

I think I may agree with you, somewhat, but don't lose sight of the big implication here: Some people that have never even heard of Burke before this may be motivated to look into him, his philosophy and writings, etc. ....

...I see no downside to this.

[BenderJJJ]

Agreed, it might cause someone to read more deeply on Burke.

I just don't like his bias.

[tuxguys]

At least you recognize that he has one, and he makes no secret of it, either. This is what public discourse should be.

[thatstrbl]

To the fools here stating that Burke did not support natural rights....in the sense you are thinking, he did not. Burke believed rights were the culmination of society's progress, a hallmark of civilization. He did NOT believe something as absurd as rights floating from the trees into men from some other stage of their development. And yes, Burke believed in order.....MORAL order, not feudal oppression. His ideas and reason are unbelievable to you people because you refuse to think!

[yohaneuano4]

Paine was an interventionist, who wanted greater economic equality and power of the people; a true figure of the left. Unlike Burke and most of the Founding Fathers, he was not an elitist. And no, Burke did not support natural rights, he supported injustices if they ensured 'order'. Smith was not a libertarian, that's an even greater myth, he was a sensible man. Burke also paid no attention to the rights of women, slaves, native Americans, or the excesses of the American Revolutionary War.

[eugdog106]

thomas jefferson was a deist

[kikaloka256]

Levin is an idiot. Burke was no advocate of natural rights; in his "Reflections," Burke referred to natural rights as "metaphysical sophistry!"

Yet another "conservative" who likes to throw around Burke's name to lend himself credibility, but knows nothing about Burke or conservatism.

[adammcg2]

Traditions above reason? No I think he saw that the reason tradition lasted is because it had been able to cope. He disliked the destruction of a functioning government that only needed reform for wild and unfounded abstract theories, which led to the rise of Napoleon and the September Massacres, the Terror, the executions of the King and Queen etc.

[WarVideo]

Burke was a primitivist who elavated "traditions" above reason.

He was an intellectual brute, no wonder conservatives like him.

[djsmurfie]

Edmund Burke was brilliant.

[adammcg2]

Good video. Only one point though, Burke did like the French monarchy but did admit that there were some problems with it.