The historian Jonathan Israel’s criticisms of Marx are not new. They have a long history in liberal Cold War anticommunism.

Jacobinism was not a betrayal of the Radical Enlightenment and the French Revolution. It was a historically necessary effort to defend both.

Marxism is the completion of the Radical Enlightenment project.

Hegel’s dialectical analysis of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution provides the groundwork for Marx’s theory of historical materialism.

The Radical Enlightenment starts with Baruch Spinoza’s materialist philosophy. There is a direct line from Spinoza to Marx and Engels via the French Revolution.

Jonathan Israel is one of the most important scholars of the radical legacy of the Enlightenment. But a look at Israel’s scholarship shows that his Radical Enlightenment is not radical enough.

Joker is not just a supervillain origin story. It is also an anticipation of fascism. (Note: This article contains spoilers).