Noam Chomsky funzone.

[LeftwingPitbull]

I will post some Chomsky letters, every now and again. He emailed me these:

On Social Security solvency:

"There's a very serious threat to Social Security. Though
the "crisis" is a scam, there is very little doubt that the
Bush-ites are very eager to get rid of it, even at huge
expense, for a number of reasons. One is simply greed:
privatizing it will be a huge bonanza for insurance
companies, etc., and cutting out employer contributions
will help the rich and powerful. Others are
psychological. Social Security is based on a principle
that the president's speech writers would call "evil," and
that has to be driven out of people's heads. The principle
is that you should care about others -- what Adam Smith
called the fundamental basis of a decent life. That is,
you should care whether the disabled widow across town
starves, or whether the kid across the street can go to
school. That's Evil, with a capital. You're supposed to
be a "rational wealth maximizer," concerned only with going
more deeply in debt to consume things you're taught to
"want" by huge propaganda campaigns. That way you keep out
of the hair of those who own and run the world by right.

There's plenty beyond Social Security that has to be
destroyed: e.g., health and safety standards in the work
place, the rights of workers to organize, the limited
health care system, progressive taxation (we're already
probably at about a flat tax, but it has to be made far
more regressive), and a lot more. Another 4-year mandate
for those who tell Bush what to say will reveal quite a lot
of this, I presume -- not that the political opposition is
radically different."

Noam Chomsky

[LeftwingPitbull]

1. On Cuba an it's education record.

"I presume you are referring to the literacy program in
Cuba, which was quite remarkable, and very successful.
Like Cuba's health programs, also remarkable. Nothing like
them in the world. Right now you read in the press ominous
warnings about "Cuban operatives" in Venezuela. Not
false. Cubans who gained a great deal of experience in
their own literacy programs are not in Venezuela helping to
run literacy campaigns, using pretty much the same
materials, very cheaply printed and accessible to poor
peasants. Same with health programs. Whatever one thinks
about Cuba, its international solidarity work puts the rest
of the world to shame.

What this has to do with "socialism" is another matter.
Depends what one means by the term. As for human nature
being hostile to "socialism," doesn't matter much what one
means by the term. We know next to nothing relevant about
human nature. Claims that are made are ideological
claptrap."

Noam Chomsky

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

2. And that is where Chomsky is entirely full of shit

Democrats not Republicans pushed for ADA, Family Leave, ergonmics safety, full funding of OSHA, and have been supportive of unions. For him to claim the opposition is not "radically different" is PURE hogwash...granted YMMV on the definition "radically" but given one party supports those things and the other party stands against them, I would say there is 180 degrees in between.

[LeftwingPitbull]

3. Hey surfer guy.

Mind if I send your diatribe to Chomsky?

[LeftwingPitbull]

4. One more..

"I didn't quite say what you remember. Rather, I criticized
the way the My Lai massacre was being used. It was quite
convenient to blame atrocities on poor, scarcely educated,
half-crazed GIs in the field, who didn't know who was going
to shoot at them next, but not on the nice cultivated folk
("just like us") sitting in air conditioned offices
planning these operations, targeting B-52 raids on
villages, etc., or even more significantly, on the civilian
leadership at home and the intellectual classes who provide
the means for them to initiate and implement huge
atrocities.

The anti-Arab attitude is fostered by forces far beyond
those you mention. Just to illustrate, about a year and a
half ago I was asked to give a talk by the anthropology
department on Harvard about anti-Semitism, which was then a
very hot issue on campus, having been stirred up by fanatic
supporters of Israeli atrocities and violence as a way to
deflect attention from the marginal protests against it.
After talking about the period, not that long ago, when
anti-Semitism really did exist at Harvard, I ended up by
saying that we no longer read publications by eminent and
respected Harvard professors saying .... -- then quoting
various utterly outrageous statements about Jews, which
suggest a revival of Nazism. There were gasps in the
audience, outrage that such statements could ever have been
made. I then said that I had been deceiving them. The
quotes were real, and were from eminent and highly
respected Harvard professors, some regarded as leading
humanists and civil libertarians, but they were current,
and were about Arabs, not Jews. There were sighs of
relief, and that ended the discussion. It never came up in
Q&A, which consisted mostly of hysterical ranting about
alleged anti-Semitism.

That's only one reflection of the extreme anti-Arab racism
that is deeply rooted in the intellectual culture. The
commanding officers are a small and derivative part of it.

Sure, the "other side" can say the same thing, and commonly
does."

Noam Chomsky

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

7. Sure send it to him. I love to hear why he thinks there is not

a great difference when I cited several of his own points.

[tkmorris]

8. Respectfully

I think perhaps you are being too harsh on Chomsky. My read is not that he believes there is no difference, or even that the difference isn't significant but rather that it is not enough.

[Az]

9. Agreed

In fact thats what I posted just there V down below this post. :)

[sangha]

13. Chomsky is getting off easy

"There's plenty beyond Social Security that has to be
destroyed: e.g., health and safety standards in the work
place, the rights of workers to organize, the limited
health care system, progressive taxation (we're already
probably at about a flat tax, but it has to be made far
more regressive), and a lot more. Another 4-year mandate
for those who tell Bush what to say will reveal quite a lot
of this, I presume -- not that the political opposition is
radically different."

On all of the issues that Chomsky thought important enough to list in the above quote, the Democrats are radically different than the Repukes.

[Az]

18. Radical par deux

Radical is realizing that the system is broke and finding the courage to tell the people. Radical is looking at corporate entities bleeding us dry and saying enough. Radical is realizing that a patch may not fix the problem.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

11. He used the word RADICAL

When the Clinton admin sued Microsoft (which would have been a test case for several monopolies) they were enjoying gradual success in the case. For all the bellowing about how the Democrats and the DLC laid down, one never hears about this case which was promptly abandoned by Bushco.

[sangha]

14. And then there's new source review

another issue where there's a radical difference

[Az]

17. The beginning of the end of the economic boom

Came the day the courts found MS guilty. This is what the Dems feared. 2 days after MS was found guilty Cisco systems and Compaq both took a massive dump on the stock market. After that consumer confidence in the .com industry dried up. It set in motion the eventual economic slide that we find ourselves in now.

MS scared the Dems. They have no idea how to proceed because of that event. They may realize that the system is out of control but they cannot see a path to change it that will not cost them all their political clout in the short term. The repukes meanwhile have thrown in fully with the corporate masters and will never strike down a company they can save (and thus expect favors).

This nation relies on a system. Systems left unattended go out of control. The repukes have knocked out the controls and the DNC/DLC was too paralyzed with the political cost of pointing out the failures of the glorious system called capitalism.

[Az]

6. Radically

No one in the DNC or DLC is standing up to corporate entities. That would be radical. This nation is like a train heading for a mighty crash. The Repukes want to speed it up so that their Corporate controlers can send out the cleanup crew and take away whatever is left for themself. The DLC simply wants to slow the train down. We are still going to crash, but as long as the DLC gets their win they feel like they have done something.

Its not about winning any longer. Its about standing up and realizing what is going on and doing something real about it. The first few to do so will of course lose. The first one to point at the naked emperor is the one they try to execute before others find their courage to speak the truth.

Yes the Dems are different from the repukes. But not radically. At not those in charge of the party. The radical left of the party is a pariah in the halls of power. And until that changes we are just delaying the inevitible crash. We need to lay down some new track. Not just slow this thing down.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

10. So did everyone forget that the Clinton admin sued Microsoft?

Was that LAYING DOWN to corporate entities?

[Az]

15. Yeah, I saw that

Laying down the law? Not really. Ending judgement. MS had to give a couple computers and some software to some schools. How was this not good for MS? Meanwhile they continue to devistate the industry and have even set their sites on more victims. The EU found the cahones to slap their wrist a bit. But in the US they continue to roll on.

Now it certainly may appear arguable that the lite slapping came from W's justice dept. But why was it allowed to get into their court?

How bout the wrist slap the music industry took for nearly 2 decades of collusion to keep CD prices artificially high. Now they are crying that the evil consumers are finding their own route to music and blame their failures on them.

The world is changing. Corporations are forming stronger holds on our societies. No one is standing up to them. Really standing up to them.

[President Jesus]

5. Noam Chomsky campaign contributions

based on this list, it's pretty significant that he's supporting Kerry, because he's only backed independents recently...

http://www.newsmeat.com/fec/bystate_detail.php?city=Lexington&st=MA&last=Chomsky

[WitchWay]

12. Noam Chomsky's endorsements

Here is more information about Chomsky's endorsement history:

http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_5943.shtml

[Room101]

16. Here is Chomsky's daily blog

http://blog.zmag.org/ttt/