# Posted 10:24 AM by Ariel David Adesnik  

BOOK REVIEWS: I just finished reading all the books Josh recommended on the basics of Western political thought. Yeah right. But I did read Stupid White Men, which Dan mentioned briefly.

To a degree, Moore's book is very "September 10th". However, the fact that his publishers tried to stop publication of the book after September 11th demonstrates that there were, in fact, some efforts to supress legitimate dissent as a result of the attacks. Legimitate dissent should not be confused with intelligent dissent, however. First of all, the book is filled with unforgiveable factual errors, as documented by Spinsanity in Salon. (Example: Bush has proposed a $1.6 trillion increase in the Pentagon budget.) Even worse is the fact that Moore provides footnotes to sources which don't even come close to saying what he does in the book. The fact that Stupid White Men made an impressive run at the top of the New York Times bestseller list is a disturbing indication of just how unelite America's intellectual eltie are.

Even if one forgives Moore's poetic license with the facts, the book fails on the grounds that its arguments are incoherent. While Dan is right that there are ad hominem attacks on Bush throughout, Moore does not present his book as an anti-Bush polemic, but rather one against the dominance of white males. This is race- and gender-baiting at its most crude. In his chapter on why white Americans are to blame for the nation's troubles, Moore does little more than argue that whites are too eager to hold blacks responsible for the vast majority of crimes. Perhaps. But since Moore blames white Americans for everything from pollution to pork-barrelling, he needs to do a lot more than show that black people are statistically less dangerous than some might think.

As for women, Moore observes that America denied them the right to vote until 1920. Afterwards, white men tricked them into voting for white men who would continue to hold them down. So basically, Moore's argument is that women are too stupid to recognize what's in their own interest. Not impressive for someone who claims to be against sexism. Moreover, Moore declares that all of the women in Bush's cabinet are honorary white males. In other words, all women and non-whites should have political opinions identical to Moore's. Again, not impressive for someone who claims to be against racial stereotypes.

To sum it up in one word, Stupid White Men is an embarrassment. (0) opinions -- Add your opinion