Horizon

The case that he wants to make is that the US is uniquely awful.

Something you find a lot in, say, the likes of the ISO. And so easily disproved. It makes you wonder.

The case that he wants to make is that the US is uniquely awful.

Without a doubt, Chomsky does not attempt to make this case. Beaumont follow the usual script of Chomsky critics - he falsely attributes statements and ideas to Chomsky, and then attacks them.

Good Lord, we've attracted a Chomskyite!

Yes, Ben, if you'd read some of the comments you'd know that Chomsky is in the habit of calling the US the most free country in the world.

But then, NC apparently says that the protestations of world leaders as to their motivations should be ignored, and I see no reason why that shouldn't apply equally to himself.

I assume you've got your tongue firmly in your cheek, Alan, but for the sake of Thomas M, I'll respond as if that weren't the case.

I did read the comments -- a rather depressing assortment at the time.

The problem with Chomsky in general is that he's a mendacious twit who can't be trusted to make a single historical assertion without committing the wildest distortions through omission on the (usually correct) assumption that his audience will never check his sources. His politics appeal to our noble moral sense in a way that is both rare and commendable, so it's hard to realize that such a guy is fudging in the grossest manner most of the time. I've come to the conclusion that it's wisest to simply ignore the guy -- he's often right, sometimes wrong, but so often distorting the truth that you're better off without any input from him at all.

I should, perhaps, note that my conclusions are a result of my own analysis — matching his assertions about history against what I've read elsewhere and reading the originals of things like NSC-68. I'm not just parroting Oliver Kamm here.

I should, perhaps, note that my conclusions are a result of my own analysis — matching his assertions about history against what I've read elsewhere and reading the originals of things like NSC-68. I'm not just parroting Oliver Kamm here.

Chomsky amasses mountains of data and references and whether you like him or not it's inescapable that a large part of his popularity is due to the emblematic nature of having more than half of a book taken up by appendixes, as well as the fact that no one will ever thoroughly check such a comedically large mass of evidence.

So, on the one hand, you have a strong appeal to pretentious people who will never actually read any of the evidence but who are dazzled by academic showmanship (see that comment thread for many examples) -- that's the emblematic side. And on the other you have a marvelous defense mechanism, not unlike the practice of producing millions of documents in a court case when you know perfectly well exactly what your opponent is looking for.

This is one thing I particularly enjoyed about the original article. His anecdote about NC's conversational style (i.e., bludgeoning would-be opponents with an avalanche of data) seems perfectly in line with this strategy.

What I particularly like about Chomsky is his rigorous adherence to proveable facts and mainstream analysis. The results aren't pretty for the high priests of conventional wisdom, hence the angry (but vapid) responses.

You're kidding, right? Have you ever actually checked up on his "facts"? Certainly he writes and speaks in the style of someone who's quoting certainties, but the gaps and misrepresentations are shocking.

To take a simple example, Chomsky said 9/11 was the first time American soil had been attacked since the war of 1812. This statement is provable, and provably wrong: leaving aside his defining-away of Pearl Harbor, Chomsky just doesn't bother to mention Villa's raid on Columbus, NM which precipitated the Punitive Expedition. An obscure raid? Certainly, but not to someone as well-versed in the history of US involvement in Latin America as Chomsky.

Yeah, and notice particularly that Thomas and I have fallen into a similar kind of name calling which you always see when groupies debate Chomsky. I say: they can't handle facts, they are vapid and their intellects puny. And then he says: they can't handle the facts, they are vapid and their intellects puny (except that for the pro-Chomsky side throwing in Orwellian references to "high priests" and the like is a well-regarded flourish). Then you keep going around and around. Nothing could be more indicative of the emblematic, rather than substantive nature of Chomsky's mountains of data than this. It appeals to a kind of academic machismo. How many women commented in that thread, I wonder?