FORA.tv

The Smart Network

FORA.tv SERIES: Commonwealth Club's Choicest Clips

Noam Chomsky: Philosophies of Language & Politics

Commonwealth Club
Rate It
82,382 Views
  • Info
  • Bio
  • Full Program
  • Highlights
  • Transcript
  • Download
  • More
Page 1 of 3 1 23
turbobrain Avatar
turbobrain
Posts: 9
Posted: 10.10.09, 03:54 AM
I think the idea that people are responding to extreme right wing media is off the mark. People are angry because the government is running right over them with no consideration for ethics or the constitution. People should not tolerate this and should fight back, this is what we are seeing. It is not organized by the right wing media. It is called the liberty movement! And it is all over the country.
Permalink
Lamont Cranston Avatar
Lamont Cranston
Posts: 3
Posted: 10.10.09, 05:26 AM
Thats an interesting take on some vague ideas about Universal Healthcare or some nebulous suggestions of progressive taxation turbobrain, some questions:
Where were these angry people during Dubyas taxcuts for the rich, PATRIOT ACT, the invasion & occupation of Afganistan and Iraq for just four examples?
If its nothing to do with any rightwing agenda, then why are the groups organising this funded by and the people organising and speaking in the media from the same rightwing think tanks/policy groups paid for by the healthcrare industry or rich folk who think they dont have to pay taxes?
Its hard to not see a connection.
Permalink
earthborg Avatar
earthborg
Posts: 4
Posted: 10.10.09, 02:13 PM
In Tyler Durden we trust.
Permalink
SNS Avatar
SNS
Posts: 64
Posted: 10.10.09, 02:50 PM
I think that Kennedy's historian and friend Arthur Schlessinger summed it up in saying of Chomsky that "it has long been impossible to take anything he says seriously" and adding "One can only conclude that Chomsky's idea of the responsibility of an intellectual is to forswear reasoned analysis, indulge in moralistic declamation, fabricate evidence when necessary and shout, always at the top of one's voice."

That pretty much nails it.
Permalink
burke Avatar
burke
Posts: 4
Posted: 10.10.09, 05:46 PM
So let me get this straight, Chomsky is indignated not that the public and audience are under the influence of an entity which according to him fuels their anger and gives them reasons for political activism, instigates them and they act like sheep (the Limbaugh & Savage segment); no he is indignated that these people are not representing the left and their activism which he confuses with ideology is not on his side.
I have seen many of his talks and have read his essays but I see something troubling here, judging from D. Rushkoff's recent blunders, and other confusions; that media theorists just cant keep up with the current progress in information. Chomsky is from a generation when things were more black and white, he should re-think everything. He sounds too much like a bizarro Limbaugh: the right-wingers, Reagan did it , Reagan did it. It's 2009 ffs.
Permalink
burke Avatar
burke
Posts: 4
Posted: 10.10.09, 05:48 PM
Disregard everything I've just said. It was Nixon, Nixon did it. It's why we can't have nice things anymore.
Permalink
Lamont Cranston Avatar
Lamont Cranston
Posts: 3
Posted: 10.11.09, 08:19 AM
SNS, Schlessinger is just mad Chomsky doesn't faun over the Camelot myth.
burke, watch it again. The "indignation" (what?) was that they had been abandoned by 'the left' - no one had gone and engaged them despite pretty common ground, leaving them ripe pickings for demagogues and corporate PR.

Their political activism, such as it is, is to unwittingly protect the very same institutions that are responsible for their terrible situation. So your argument is a little hollow.
Permalink
InVinoVeritas Avatar
InVinoVeritas
Posts: 12
Posted: 10.11.09, 09:57 AM
Lamont - that's not even the case, though it's a conveniently hopeful explanation for Chomskyites. Schlessinger was rightly bothered by Chomsky's chronic abuse of the facts and his weird polemic style. Noam Chomsky isn't take seriously by historians or political theorists in shouting distance of the credible center. He's looked at by some mainstream scholars as a sort of anthropological phenomenon worth studying - but his actual writing, outside of the field of linguistics, is so larded up with peeves and prejudice that it's almost unreadable.
Permalink
Karuna Avatar
Karuna
Posts: 10
Posted: 10.11.09, 11:46 AM
Speaking of Nazis:

The CIA hired some of the most heinous and wanted war criminals and then let them peacefully retire in South American countries. The "Buther of Lyon" Klaus Barbie sentenced thousands of children to death camps.

The Shah's SAVAK were taught Nazi torture techniques by the CIA and Israel's Mossad. They poured boiling water and inserted broken glass into people's rectums, tied weights to the testicles, extracted teeth and nails, beat, whipped, shocked, and preformed psychological torture on people as well.

As Martin Luther King, Jr. stated in his stance against the war in Vietnam, Diem's general Ky said his most admired person was Hitler.

***

If our President and other leaders around the world would just simply state that it would be best for the world for people to have no more than two kids and to adopt if they desire to have more children it would help control the human species. Why aren't we raining down condoms onto the third world and trying to educate people about the overpopulation crisis, since it's one of the most fundamental problems we face. The more people the harder it is to bring stability to the world.

Our US Space Command's insanely chilling Vision for 2020 states there'll be a growing number of "have and have-nots". Chomsky has stated before that this military template should be headline news. It's already over a decade old, and not too many people know about it.
Permalink
Lamont Cranston Avatar
Lamont Cranston
Posts: 3
Posted: 10.12.09, 08:12 AM
InVinoVeritas: you could have just saved the effort of writing all that and given your thesaurus a break by simply typing "ad hominem" a half dozen times.
Karuna: Klaus and the the rest didn't retire, they were still young men in the mid 1950s, rather having finished the counter insurgency against labour groups and the left and anti-fascists in Europe new work was to be had in all the charming dictatorships the USA was installing in South America.
Permalink
Page 1 of 3 1 23
Please log in or register to post a comment.
Advertisement

Related Programs

Filmmaker Michael Moore on Capitalism: A Love Story Filmmaker Michael Moore on Capitalism: A Love Story
01:04:13 min | 69,926 Views
Republican Gomorrah: Max Blumenthal Republican Gomorrah: Max Blumenthal
01:10:59 min | 54,846 Views
Berlin Wall: The Impact of the Fall 20 Years Later Berlin Wall: The Impact of the Fall 20 Years Later
01:02:55 min | 639 Views
Whistle-Blowers: A Conversation with Ellsberg and Dean Whistle-Blowers: A Conversation with Ellsberg and Dean
01:51:52 min | 14,231 Views
Human Rights and Their Limits Human Rights and Their Limits
00:00:00 min | 1,278 Views

Browse Programs by Tag

Arts Books Climate Change Computing Conflict Credit Crunch Defense Democratization Economic Policy Education Election 2008 Emerging Markets Energy Entertainment Entrepreneurship Environment Film Food Globalization Health & Wellness Healthcare History Internet Investing Law Medicine Music Muslim World Natural Sciences New Media Personal Technology Philanthropy Religion Social Issues Social Sciences Sustainability Terrorism The Bailout U.S. Foreign Policy White House 2009

Advertisement