Chomsky: In swing states vote Obama

People should vote against McCain and for Obama - but without illusions

Chomsky says while it's true that the two parties are essentially like factions of one party - the party of business - the differences do matter to ordinary people. If you are living in a swing state, there is nothing wrong with picking the lesser of two evils.

The Real News Network:

Noam Chomsky: Current crisis demonstrates anti-democratic nature of financial system

In part two of their interview, Paul Jay asks Prof. Noam Chomsky to weigh-in on the dominant subject of the day, the economic crisis. While Prof. Chomsky agrees that the current crisis is a very serious one that will have broad implications for the broader society, he points out that the foreseeable Medicare-induced economic crisis will "dwarf" the current one in magnitude. Furthermore, Prof. Chomsky develops his contention that democracy is hindered by unrestrained free markets. While on the other hand, state-restricted markets are democratic by design in that they allow people take control--through their government--of financial institutions to force them to include externalities and risks to the broader population in their decision-making. These factors are such that profit-seeking enterprises will not accommodate them when left to their own volition, given that free markets do not put a price on these externalities.

Bio:

Noam Chomsky has written and lectured widely on linguistics, philosophy, intellectual history, contemporary issues, international affairs and U.S. foreign policy. His works include: Aspects of the Theory of Syntax; Cartesian Linguistics; Sound Pattern of English (with Morris Halle); Language and Mind; American Power and the New Mandarins; At War with Asia; For Reasons of State; Peace in the Middle East?; Reflections on Language; The Political Economy of Human Rights, Vol. I and II (with E.S. Herman); Rules and Representations; Lectures on Government and Binding; Towards a New Cold War; Radical Priorities; Fateful Triangle; Knowledge of Language; Turning the Tide; Pirates and Emperors; On Power and Ideology; Language and Problems of Knowledge; The Culture of Terrorism; Manufacturing Consent (with E.S. Herman); Necessary Illusions; Deterring Democracy; Year 501; Rethinking Camelot: JFK, the Vietnam War and US Political Culture; Letters from Lexington; World Orders, Old and New; The Minimalist Program; Powers and Prospects; The Common Good; Profit Over People; The New Military Humanism; New Horizons in the Study of Language and Mind; Rogue States; A New Generation Draws the Line; 9-11; and Understanding Power.

Technorati tags: 2008 Election, President, Barack Obama, Noam Chomsky, John McCain, Economy, economic crisis, endorsement, video, Real News Network

Noam Chomsky: Israel, Palestine and Apartheid

Chomsky says U.S. backing of continued Israeli occupation and annexation of Palestinian land is the biggest obstacle to peace.

This is from conference The Apartheid Paradigm in Palestine/Israel: Issues of Justice and Equality. The video was broadcasted by Democracy Now! on November 27, 2007.

Transcript

Technorati tags: Noam Chomsky, Palestine, Israel, Apartheid, Justice, Equality

MUST SEE: Noam Chomsky on Iran

Noam Chomsky on U.S. Policy Towards Iran: Are assumptions about Iran wrong?

"Suppose it was true that Iran is helping insurgents in Iraq. I mean, wasn't the United States helping insurgents when the Russians invaded Afghanistan? Did we think there was anything wrong with that? I mean, Iraq's a country that was invaded and is under military occupation. You can't have a serious discussion about whether someone else is interfering in it. The basic assumption underlying the discussion is that we own the world."

Noam Chomsky on Democratic presidential race and Iran: Do the Democrats have a different answer on Iran?

Original Source: The Real News

Technorati tags: Noam Chomsky, Democratic Party, 2008 Presidential Election, Iran

Noam Chomsky on "the Iran Effect"

TomDispatch - Tomgram:

On Tuesday, meeting with the press in the White House Rose Garden, the President responded to a question about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Syria this way: "[P]hoto opportunities and/or meetings with President Assad lead the Assad government to believe they're part of the mainstream of the international community, when, in fact, they're a state sponsor of terror." There should, he added to the assembled reporters, be no meetings with state sponsors of terror.

That night, Brian Ross of ABC News reported that, since 2005, the U.S. has "encouraged and advised" Jundullah, a Pakistani tribal "militant group," led by a former Taliban fighter and "drug smuggler," which has been launching guerrilla raids into Baluchi areas of Iran. These incursions involve kidnappings and terror bombings, as well as the murder (recorded on video) of Iranian prisoners. According to Ross, "U.S. officials say the U.S. relationship with Jundullah is arranged so that the U.S. provides no funding to the group, which would require an official presidential order or 'finding' as well as congressional oversight." Given past history, it would be surprising if the group doing the encouraging and advising wasn't the Central Intelligence Agency, which has a long, sordid record in the region. (New Yorker investigative journalist Seymour Hersh has been reporting since 2005 on a Bush administration campaign to destabilize the Iranian regime, heighten separatist sentiments in that country, and prepare for a possible full-scale air attack on Iranian nuclear and other facilities.)

The President also spoke of the Iranian capture of British sailors in disputed waters two weeks ago. He claimed that their "seizure… is indefensible by the Iranians." Oddly enough, perhaps as part of secret negotiations over the British sailors, who were dramatically freed by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Wednesday, an Iranian diplomat in Iraq was also mysteriously freed. Eight weeks ago, he had been kidnapped off the streets of Baghdad by uniformed men of unknown provenance. Reporting on his sudden release, Alissa J. Rubin of the New York Times offered this little explanation of the kidnapping: "Although [Iraqi foreign minister, Hoshyar] Zebari was uncertain who kidnapped the man, others familiar with the case said they believe those responsible work for the Iraqi Intelligence Service, which is affiliated with the Central Intelligence Agency." The CIA, of course, has a sordid history in Baghdad as well, including running car-bombing operations in the Iraqi capital back in Saddam Hussein's day.

And don't forget the botched Bush administration attempt to capture two high Iranian security officials and the actual kidnapping of five Iranian diplomats-cum-Revolutionary-Guards in Irbil in Iraqi Kurdistan over two months ago -- they disappeared into the black hole of an American prison system in Iraq that now holds perhaps 17,000 Iraqis (as well as those Iranians) and is still growing. As Juan Cole has pointed out, most such acts, and the rhetoric that goes with them, represent so many favors to "an unpopular and isolated Iranian government attempting to rally support and strengthen itself."

In addition, just this week, the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and other ships in its battle group left San Diego for the Persian Gulf. Two carrier battle groups are already there, promising an almost unprecedented show of strength. As the ship left port, U.S. military officials explained the mission of the carriers in the Gulf this way: They are intended to demonstrate U.S. "resolve to build regional security and bring long-term stability to the region."

And stability in the region, it seems, means promoting instability in Iran by any means possible. So, the President's Global War on Terror also turns out to be the Global War of Terror. No one has dealt with the way "state sponsorship of terror" works, when it comes to our own country, more strikingly than Noam Chomsky, who considers the larger Iranian crisis below. His latest book, Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, is just out in paperback and couldn't be more to the point at the present moment. Right now, if the U.S. isn't already a failing state, it's certainly a flailing one. Tom

Must Read:

What If Iran Had Invaded Mexico?
Putting the Iran Crisis in Context
By Noam Chomsky

Technorati tags: TomDispatch, Noam Chomsky, Iran, War, Mexico, news, commentary, op ed

Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media

Required Viewing for every citizen in the Free World.

How government and big media businesses cooperate to produce an effective propaganda machine in order to manipulate the opinions of the United States populous.

Click to watch: Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media

Technorati tags: Noam Chomsky, Media, Media control, Media Manipulation, Propaganda, United States, Government, Linguistics, news, commentary, film, video