America’s main international enemy—Islamic radicalism—favors theocracy, curtails civil liberties, embraces torture, represses women, reviles homosexuality, subverts science and education, and reveres force over diplomacy. Markos Moulitsas shows how the American right shares those very same traits. He argues that our domestic jihadists are a greater threat to American democracy than any Islamic terrorist.

Markos Moulitsas is the founder and publisher of Daily Kos, America’s largest online political community. His publications include the critically acclaimed Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics (2006) and Taking on the System: Rules for Radical Change in a Digital Era (2008). Moulitsas is a frequent guest on cable news and shows like Meet the Press and Real Time with Bill Maher, a weekly columnist for The Hill, and a former Newsweek contributing columnist.

Praise for American Taliban

“I can’t remember a time in my life when anti-intellectualism and intolerance has been more pervasive. From America’s prejudice against evolutionary science to its reactionary condemnation of a scholarly African American president, the time has never been more ripe for a book such as this, which reminds us that fanaticism isn’t always an import.”
—Brett Gurewitz, Bad Religion

“It isn’t possible to understand American politics now without understanding the worldview and arguments of Markos Moulitsas. If you still believe the beltway caricature of the squishy, compromising, conciliatory American left, American Taliban should disabuse you of that notion.”
—Rachel Maddow, The Rachel Maddow Show

“Markos writes with a conscience and armed with facts to let you know: no, you’re not crazy. What you suspected all along was true—America’s right wing lives on a myth of self-constructed lies about the Other, with a juvenile disregard for reality, and Obama’s presidency has further radicalized an already radical conservative movement.”
—Janeane Garofalo, comic and actor

“Moulitsas alerts us to a clear and present danger in America: radical zealots who disregard our Constitution and our freedoms, and who disguise themselves as patriots.”
—Roger Ebert, film critic

“A thorough compendium of right-wing hypocrisy and selective memory that is either hilarious or tragic, depending on your mood. And it’s all lovingly couched in outrage and profanity.”
—David Cross, I Drink for a Reason

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

FOUNDER OF THE DAILY KOS COMPARES AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE MOVEMENT TO ISLAMIC RADICALS

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Sausalito, CA – “Our culture is superior. Our culture is superior because our religion is….” Sounds like an Islamic extremist, right? Wrong. These words were uttered by one of America’s most well known media figures, Pat Buchanan—just one of many proselytizers of conservative intolerance gaining a toehold in our culture.

This September, Markos Moulitsas, founder of Daily Kos, explores how the entire modern conservative movement has taken on the attitudes and tactics of the Islamic Taliban in his new book, American Taliban: How War, Sex, Sin, and Power Bind Jihadists and the Radical Right (PoliPointPress, September 2010).

Think about it. The freedom that jihadists hate—freedom of thought, inquiry, and lifestyle—are the very freedoms that the conservatives hate. On tactics and issues, there is little distinction between the Taliban and the radical right:  both embrace militaristic zeal, elevation of brute masculinity, disdain for women’s rights, outright hatred of gays, aversion to science and modernity, and staunch anti-intellectualism. Both movements are dedicated to the unbridled pursuit of power at all costs, have little tolerance for the trappings of democracy, and quickly resort to violence when challenged …  hardly the principles for which America stands.

Like their Islamic cousins, the American Taliban bases their ideology on “facts” that validate their worldview, but have little to do with reality—Obama is an illegitimate born in Kenya, ACORN stole the election. Lie after lie is repeated until each is firmly embedded as truth in the collective, delusional Taliban mind.

Moulitsas delivers a wry, searing broadside to the hypocritical—and dangerous—conservative movement, documenting the instances of the American Taliban at work in corporate boardrooms, on Capitol Hill, in the halls of the White House, or in FOX News studios. The book, divided into six chapters–Power, War, Sex, Woman, Culture and Truth–traces the simmering movement from its fringe origins to the American Taliban’s current front-and-center position in the Republican party.

Additionally, Moulitsas discusses:

• * Why the Supreme Court is a favorite target of the American Taliban
• * How and why a once-marginal movement went mainstream—and completely bananas—in January 2009
• * How the Teabaggers, fueled by Republican Party leadership, came to be the enforcers of the American Taliban

Ultimately, Moulitsas argues, the American Taliban is little different from their Islamic extremist counterparts  halfway around the world whom the conservatives claim to loathe. Make no mistake, he warns the American Taliban are not just ”plain batshit insane” —they are a clear and present danger to the nation and the values upon which it was founded.

Luckily, with American Taliban (the book), we have a first line of defense for rolling back the fanaticism masquerading as cultured and respected leaders that is the American Taliban.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Markos Moulitsas is the founder and publisher of Daily Kos, America’s largest online political community. His publications include the critically acclaimed Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics (2006) and Taking on the System: Rules for Radical Change in a Digital Era (2008). Moulitsas is a frequent guest on cable news and shows like Meet the Press and Real Time with Bill Maher, a weekly columnist for The Hill, and a former Newsweek contributing columnist.

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AMERICAN TALIBAN: How War, Sex, Sin, and Power Bind Jihadists and the Radical Right

By Markos Moulitsas

$15.95, PoliPointPress, September 1, 2010, Trade Paper

ISBN: 978-1-9362270-2-0, 256 pages, 5.5” x 8.5”

For more information, go to www.p3books.com/americantaliban/

For press inquiries, please contact Darcy Cohan: 415-339-4111 or darcycohan@p3books.com