Chomsky is one of the greatest intellectuals of our time. The man has nothing to lose and nothing to gain by voicing his thoughts. Too bad he is getting up there in age but hopefully we will enjoy his presence for many more years.
Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
11–20 of 98 posts
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#12Chomsky takes the anti-American, or anti-government side of any and all debates and writes whiny essays full of sarcastic jabs that preach to a choir of the faithful. He makes no attempt to consider the side of government(or whoever he as casting as the villain at the moment of his self righteous spiel). It's as much of a tragedy to take him seriously as it is to take radical right think tank garbage seriously.
I'm an American, and my e-mails, text messages, phone calls, and I guess even this post I am making right now is being eavesdropped on by the NSA. Snowden informed me of this.
The fourth Amendment to the Constitution is: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
When I was young, there was a president named Richard Nixon. It's probable he sent a bunch of burglars to the Democratic National Committee campaign headquarters at the Watergate hotel to do some espionage to try to fix the election his way. It's known he tried to illegally cover up this break-in - there's an audio tape of him doing this. He also was involved in a more extensive and illegal effort to fix the election and eavesdrop and conduct espionage on his political opponents. Later revelations showed the FBI was going beyond its mandate as well, sometimes to the ignorance of the Congress (such as an FBI-run political campaign against Martin Luther King Jr.) This happened in my lifetime, so fears of such things are not out of place. The tyrannical English king acted the same way in the 18th century, it's probably why fresh in the founding fathers midns they put such things in the Constitution.
Chomsky praises Snowden, and opposes bureaucratic attacks on the fourth amendment consitutional rights of Americans. For this you call him "un-American". Supporting the fourth amendment constitutional rights of innocent Americans to not have their fourth amendment rights violated is anti-American?
Here is what Chomsky says about the charge of "anti-American":
http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/20021209.htm
Chomsky: The concept "anti-American" is an interesting one. The counterpart is used only in totalitarian states or military dictatorships, something I wrote about many years ago (see my book Letters from Lexington). Thus, in the old Soviet Union, dissidents were condemned as "anti-Soviet." That's a natural usage among people with deeply rooted totalitarian instincts, which identify state policy with the society, the people, the culture. In contrast, people with even the slightest concept of democracy treat such notions with ridicule and contempt. Suppose someone in Italy who criticizes Italian state policy were condemned as "anti-Italian." It would be regarded as too ridiculous even to merit laughter. Maybe under Mussolini, but surely not otherwise.
Actually the concept has earlier origins. It was used in the Bible by King Ahab, the epitome of evil, to condemn those who sought justice as "anti-Israel" ("ocher Yisrael," in the original Hebrew, roughly "hater of Israel," or "disturber of Israel"). His specific target was Elijah.
It's interesting to see the tradition in which the people you refer to choose to place themselves. The idea of leaving America because one opposes state policy is another reflection of deep totalitarian commitments. Solzhenitsyn, for example, was forced to leave Russia, against his will, by people with beliefs very much like those you are quoting.
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#13Chomsky takes the anti-American, or anti-government side of any and all debates and writes whiny essays full of sarcastic jabs that preach to a choir of the faithful. He makes no attempt to consider the side of government(or whoever he as casting as the villain at the moment of his self righteous spiel). It's as much of a tragedy to take him seriously as it is to take radical right think tank garbage seriously.
Pointing out hypocrisy of the government isn't anti-American.
...it is American!
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#14Chomsky is one of the greatest intellectuals of our time. The man has nothing to lose and nothing to gain by voicing his thoughts. Too bad he is getting up there in age but hopefully we will enjoy his presence for many more years.
Agreed. He is so very adept at reducing a complicated system into simple relationships of cause and effect.
No government is to be trusted not to manipulate the population through fear. That should be taught in grade school.
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#15Chomsky takes the anti-American, or anti-government side of any and all debates and writes whiny essays full of sarcastic jabs that preach to a choir of the faithful. He makes no attempt to consider the side of government(or whoever he as casting as the villain at the moment of his self righteous spiel). It's as much of a tragedy to take him seriously as it is to take radical right think tank garbage seriously.
We disagree.
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#16Unsurprisingly, non-Americans take exception to American exceptionalism.
America is literally pulling a, "We're better than you so we can violate any of your laws - including our own - and then murder, torture & kidnap. We are sovereign over the entire world."
Few non-Americans think that's a swell idea, so it will only last as long as American power lasts.
If you agree with Chomsky or not or if you think American power will last or not, you at least have to be able to concede that everybody else in the world has a valid gripe about the benevolent bully who really likes his big stick. Chomsky is just an American who noticed that...
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#17Chomsky takes the anti-American, or anti-government side of any and all debates and writes whiny essays full of sarcastic jabs that preach to a choir of the faithful. He makes no attempt to consider the side of government(or whoever he as casting as the villain at the moment of his self righteous spiel). It's as much of a tragedy to take him seriously as it is to take radical right think tank garbage seriously.
Soup10 takes the anti Chomskian side and writes whiny comments full of ad-hominem attacks. He makes no attempt to consider Chomsky's side. But I still have hope and I am sure soup10 unlike Chomsky of course has a long list of documented bullet points that explain government's side.
I am a huge fan of Snowdens, of ending the Orwellian institutionalization of our democratic society, and even of Chomsky's statements in this instance but in Soup10's defence, Noam Chomsky IS an anti-American/anti-Government liberal socialist anarchist (in fact that is how he would describe HIMSELF) who uses linguistic gymnastics to de-construct cultural norms in a way the reflects his own ideology. As such he almost exclusively preaches to those already with a natural sympathy towards his world-view, in such language as is meant to incite.
Finally, while Chomsky is obviously a genius well beyond the trite use of that word; he undoubted can be described as both self righteous and egotistical regardless of their justification.
Honestly, Soup10's only real mistake was in suggested that Chomsky's ideas should not be taken seriously. Even if one doesn't agree with him, many will based solely on the position he holds in the pantheon of liberal intelligentsia. Meaning that his words are likely to effect the debase of this issue going forward and should not, therefore, be lightly cast aside.
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#18(This has nothing to do with Snowden but Chomsky's main point.)
One thing I found troubling about all this is you can't expect the victims in other countries to decouple the intentions of the American gov't from American citizens.
Except (even more troubling) is that citizens seem to support drone warfare (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/10/m...).
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#19I like the attention Chomsky brings to the NSA surveillance problem, but I think he does Snowden a disservice by using him in any kind of comparison to the true terrorists he lists. In attempting to point out the unevenness of America's extradition requests, he inadvertently puts him in the same "moral high ground" as the terrorists, which doesn't help.
Re: Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
#20(This has nothing to do with Snowden but Chomsky's main point.) One thing I found troubling about all this is you can't expect the victims in other countries to decouple the intentions of the American gov't from American citizens. Except (even more troubling) is that citizens seem to support drone warfare ( http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/10/m... ).
> you can't expect the victims in other countries to decouple the intentions of the American gov't from American citizens.
And that is why all these drone wars actually keep the "terrorist" recruiting machine running.
A handful of people in the US make huge $$$ on war (the military budgets are surreal, plus, billions are suddenly "lost", etc.).
$$$ are a clear incentive for war. This creates new terrorists. These need to be hunted and killed. That means we need to keep the "defense" budget high. And as a bonus, we get a totally transparent citizen.