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Worthy and Unworthy Victims
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Big_Bird

Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...

Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 8:36 pm Post subject: Worthy and Unworthy Victims

Why do some innocent civillians require our sympathy more than other innocent civillians?

Quote:

Economist and media critic Edward S. Herman and social and political critic Noam Chomsky note two kinds of victims in their classic 1988 book "Manufacturing Consent." So does journalist and documentary filmmaker John Pilger in his writings. "Unworthy" ones are the many unmentioned tens of thousands killed in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and all other places by US, Israeli and other rapacious imperial waring and occupying forces. "Worthy" ones, however, are those prominently mentioned who died or were hurt on September 11, 2001 in the US, on July 7, 2005 in a dubious London "terrorist" bombing, on March 11, 2004 in the Madrid train bombings, and the Israeli corporal practically the whole free world still knows about since he was taken captive in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) last summer and is still being held. More recent "worthy" victims are the 15 British Royal Navy seamen arrested by Iranian armed forces, now released, and BBC journalist Alan Johnston, also apparently abducted and held captive in the OPT since March 12 when his employer reported he was forcibly seized from his car by gunpoint driving home from work in Gaza City.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=21&ItemID=12732

Gopher

Joined: 04 Jun 2005

Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 9:01 pm Post subject:

I have a far more intriguing question, Big_Bird.

Quote:

Economist and media critic Edward S. Herman and social and political critic Noam Chomsky note...

Why do so many on the far left chronically recite Chomsky with the same accept-everything-at-face-value naivete that the Thermians apply to Galaxy Quest's "historical documents...?"

"Never give up! Never surrender!"

Quote:

[Trying to explain TV to the Thermians]
Gwen DeMarco: They're not ALL "historical documents." Surely, you don't think Gilligan's Island is a...
[All the Thermians moan in despair]
Mathesar: Those poor people.

Not all of us share your enthusiasm for Chomsky's "historical documents," Big_Bird...

gang ah jee

Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper

Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 9:15 pm Post subject:

Orwell put it very well in his essay 'Notes on Nationalism' (1945):

George Orwell wrote:

Indifference to Reality. All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts. A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of inconsistency. Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage � torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians � which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by �our� side. The Liberal News Chronicle published, as an example of shocking barbarity, photographs of Russians hanged by the Germans, and then a year or two later published with warm approval almost exactly similar photographs of Germans hanged by the Russians(5). It is the same with historical events. History is thought of largely in nationalist terms, and such things as the Inquisition, the tortures of the Star Chamber, the exploits of the English buccaneers (Sir Francis Drake, for instance, who was given to sinking Spanish prisoners alive), the Reign of Terror, the heroes of the Mutiny blowing hundreds of Indians from the guns, or Cromwell's soldiers slashing Irishwomen's faces with razors, become morally neutral or even meritorious when it is felt that they were done in the �right� cause. If one looks back over the past quarter of a century, one finds that there was hardly a single year when atrocity stories were not being reported from some part of the world; and yet in not one single case were these atrocities � in Spain, Russia, China, Hungary, Mexico, Amritsar, Smyrna � believed in and disapproved of by the English intelligentsia as a whole. Whether such deeds were reprehensible, or even whether they happened, was always decided according to political predilection.

The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. For quite six years the English admirers of Hitler contrived not to learn of the existence of Dachau and Buchenwald. And those who are loudest in denouncing the German concentration camps are often quite unaware, or only very dimly aware, that there are also concentration camps in Russia. Huge events like the Ukraine famine of 1933, involving the deaths of millions of people, have actually escaped the attention of the majority of English russophiles. Many English people have heard almost nothing about the extermination of German and Polish Jews during the present war. Their own antisemitism has caused this vast crime to bounce off their consciousness. In nationalist thought there are facts which are both true and untrue, known and unknown. A known fact may be so unbearable that it is habitually pushed aside and not allowed to enter into logical processes, or on the other hand it may enter into every calculation and yet never be admitted as a fact, even in one's own mind.

Of course, the most intriguing question is whether or not Gopher is capable of addressing anything Chomsky (or anyone else of his hated "New Left" for that matter) with anything other than ad hominems.

stevemcgarrett

Joined: 24 Mar 2006

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 12:38 am Post subject:

Chomsky is a clueless socialist. He has no credentials as a political science professor or the like. He is a linguist who happens to be arrogant enough (like most socialist leaders) to believe he has special insight. Sorry, Big Chick, you'll need to do better than that. Find someone whose biases doesn't include a self-serving agenda.

gang ah jee

Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:01 am Post subject:

stevemcgarrett wrote:

He has no credentials as a political science professor or the like.

Noam Chomsky wrote:

In my own professional work I have touched on a variety of different fields. I've done my work in mathematical linguistics, for example, without any professional credentials in mathematics; in this subject I am completely self-taught, and not very well taught. But I've often been invited by universities to speak on mathematical linguistics at mathematics seminars and colloquia. No one has ever asked me whether I have the appropriate credentials to speak on these subjects; the mathematicians couldn't care less. What they want to know is what I have to say. No one has ever objected to my right to speak, asking whether I have a doctor's degree in mathematics, or whether I have taken advanced courses in the subject. That would never have entered their minds. They want to know whether I am right or wrong, whether the subject is interesting or not, whether better approaches are possible - the discussion dealt with the subject, not with my right to discuss it.

But on the other hand, in discussion or debate concerning social issues or American foreign policy, Vietnam or the Middle East, for example, the issue is constantly raised, often with considerable venom. I've repeatedly been challenged on the grounds of credentials, or asked, what special training do you have that entitles you to speak of these matters. The assumption is that people like me, who are outsiders from a professional standpoint, are not entitled to speak on such things.

Compare mathematics and the political sciences -- it's quite striking. In mathematics, in physics, people are concerned with what you say, not with your certification. But in order to speak about social reality, you must have the proper credentials, particularly if you depart from the accepted framework of thinking. Generally speaking, it seems fair to say that the richer the intellectual substance of a field, the less there is a concern for credentials, and the greater is concern for content.

From: Language and Responsibility (1979), pp. 6-7

happeningthang

Joined: 26 Apr 2003

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:31 am Post subject:

Chomsky researches and cites very well, although his conclusions are up for debate like anyone else. The main point I took away from Manufacturing Consent, was that some facets of journalistic practice contributed to creating a certain perspective of the world in its readership. Not claiming to be an expert in any way, but in some journalism units I took as an undergrad - they told us that the principle of distance is one criteria for judging the 'newsworthiness' of a story. The closer to home, either by location, or by connection, the more prominent it will be. That's why you hear news stories like, "Yesterday, in Chad 300 people died in a plane crash, including one Australian tourist". This is news in Aust because of that one dead tourist, without him it's unlikely you'd ever hear of it. This guy is compatriot, like me, we're shown his face and name and he's humanised, while the remaining 299 people fall away from our thoughts. This has the unfortunate effect of creating an 'us vs them' dichotomy.

happeningthang

Joined: 26 Apr 2003

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:37 am Post subject:

stevemcgarrett wrote:

Chomsky is a clueless socialist. He has no credentials as a political science professor or the like. He is a linguist who happens to be arrogant enough (like most socialist leaders) to believe he has special insight.
Sorry, Big Chick, you'll need to do better than that. Find someone whose biases doesn't include a self-serving agenda.

...And you're an ESL teacher (I assume, maybe not) who seems to think exactly the same way. Fair?

Why do you get to have an opinion and not Chomsky, one of the worlds most influential intellectuals?

igotthisguitar

Joined: 08 Apr 2003
Location: South Korea (Permanent Vacation)

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:42 am Post subject:

I lost complete respect for Chomsky on his mind-boggling comments not so long ago re: 911

gang ah jee

Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:46 am Post subject:

igotthisguitar wrote:

I lost complete respect for Chomsky on his mind-boggling comments not so long ago re: 911 Idea

You mean where he pointed out that the US government wasn't behind the attacks and that conspiracy softheads damage progressive causes? I can see how you'd be upset by that.

igotthisguitar

Joined: 08 Apr 2003
Location: South Korea (Permanent Vacation)

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 1:49 am Post subject:

gang ah jee wrote:

igotthisguitar wrote:

I lost complete respect for Chomsky on his mind-boggling comments not so long ago re: 911 Idea

You mean where he pointed out that the US government wasn't behind the attacks and that conspiracy softheads damage progressive causes? I can see how you'd be upset by that.

FOR THE RECORD:

Would you like me to track down the video?

Here, don't bother (PART 1)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzGd0t8v-d4

Chomsky re: 9/11 inside job
UTTERLY MIND-BOGGLING

�Even if it�s true� that 9/11 was an inside job, ��who cares? I mean, it doesn�t have any significance. I mean it�s a little bit like the huge amount of energy that�s put out on trying to figure out who killed John F. Kennedy. I mean, who knows, and who cares � plenty of people get killed all the time. Why does it matter that one of them happens to be John F. Kennedy?� Shocked

Or three thousand predominantly middle and working class people in Washington DC and downtown Manhattan, presumably.

stevemcgarrett

Joined: 24 Mar 2006

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 2:56 am Post subject:

happeningthang asked:

Quote:

Why do you get to have an opinion and not Chomsky, one of the worlds most influential intellectuals?

He's influential only when he's speaking to his choir of leftists unless he speaks on linguistics. He's entitled to his opinion but if Stephen Hawkings gave me his opinion on Tony Blair it would carry no more weight than if Rosie O'Donnell said it. And we know how much weight Rosie carries.

happeningthang

Joined: 26 Apr 2003

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 3:30 am Post subject:

Fair enough. Still, with the amount of detailed research he's done, I'm going to suggest that Chomsky's is a very informed opinion. In any case the thread is about worthy:unworthy 'victims'. Why do you think the reporting of 'western' victims takes precedence over 'other's?

Gopher

Joined: 04 Jun 2005

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 10:20 am Post subject:

happeningthang wrote:

...one of the world's most influential intellectuals?

In leftist circles, you mean, right?

Every professional historian/area-specialist ("East-Asia," "Latin America and the Caribbean," etc.) I know rejects Chomsky's narratives that treat their area of expertise. He glosses over and simply gets wrong too much detail to make his works valuable as historical reconstructions and professional analyses. That is, he has never troubled himself to master the facts on the ground.

But he does not aim to produce historical reconstructions and professional analyses in any case. Everyone knows this but his followers -- who show no signs whatsoever of any self-awareness. They simply cite him as "the Truth," as a kind of gospel, as if God himself were speaking to them, and will zealously indeed viciously attack anyone who challenges this.

Chomsky, like everyone else evinces politics and a political agenda. Not like everyone else, Chomsky's work assumes an a priori hostile stance vis-a-vis America. This is because Chomsky emerged in the Vietnam-era New Left. Most of the New Left grew up and/or moved on to bigger and better things. Chomsky, Buzzanco, Cumings, and Zinn remain. Among them, Chomsky stands as the most influential by far.

The left has its right to its heroes, too, Happeningthang. But please do not assume that others outside of the left consider Chomsky an authority on anything but linguistics.

Here is where Chomsky lost me forever, by the way:

He attacked Immerman's book, The CIA in Guatemala. Here is what set Chomsky off...

Richard H. Immerman wrote:

...I began [this] study as a graduate student in 1973. At that time, imbued with the spirit of antiwar protests, I set out simply to expose the perfidy of the CIA. Over the years, however, as I pored over the literature, filed my Freedom-of-Information-Act requests, and spoke with the actors, I realized that to dwell on the CIA would be misleading. The intervention involved much more than a covert operation to defend the United Fruit Company.

Chomsky's review rejected all of this and suggested Immerman -- now SHAFR's president and highly respected among professional historians across the board -- get back to telling the American people what was really at the heart of this intervention...$$$ -- or simply translate today's simplistic "It's all about oil!" to yesterday's simplistic "It's all about bananas!"

But I am not aware, Happeningthang, that Chomsky has actually studied this intervention in any detail, or has even read the literature on it -- especially the Spanish-language literature and sources available. Rather, Chomsky has an overarching theory of how the American-dominated world works, and he shows impatience to all narratives that fail to conform to it -- evidence and data notwithstanding.

Note: none of the major works on this intervention, Cullather, Gleijeses, or Immerman, cite or reference in any way, Chomsky. This is because he has contributed nothing to the literature on this, Happeningthang.

On the other hand, Chomsky praised William Blum's Killing Hope -- Blum is a former Department of State employee who has joined the New Left -- as "Far and away the best book on the topic."

And Blum's Killing Hope, a diatribe that accuses America of perpetrating a Holocaust onto the world, villifies America, apologizes for everyone else -- including Soviet Russia and North Korea, the latter played no part in starting the war 1950-1953, etc.

I kid you not...

William Blum wrote:

In 1993, I came across a review of a book about people who deny that the Nazi Holocause actually occurred. I wrote to the author, a university professor, telling her that her book made me wonder whether she knew that an American holocaust had taken place and that the denial of it put the denial of the Nazi one to shame. So broad and deep is the denial of the American holocaust, I said, that the denyers are not even aware that the claimers or the claim exist...

(By the way, she ignored his letter. This dismayed him. And he therefore attacked her for a page or so in his introduction.)

Happeningthang wrote:

In any case the thread is about worthy:unworthy 'victims'. Why do you think the reporting of 'western' victims takes precedence over 'other's?

This thread is about Chomsky's antiAmerican, antiWestern framework.

If it were about "worthy and unworthy victims" in newsreporting, it might raise the issue "selective memory" presents, or it might indeed start with this for an OP...

Happeningthang wrote:

Not claiming to be an expert in any way, but in some journalism units I took as an undergrad - they told us that the principle of distance is one criteria for judging the 'newsworthiness' of a story. The closer to home, either by location, or by connection, the more prominent it will be.

That's why you hear news stories like, "Yesterday, in Chad 300 people died in a plane crash, including one Australian tourist". This is news in Aust because of that one dead tourist, without him it's unlikely you'd ever hear of it. This guy is compatriot, like me, we're shown his face and name and he's humanised, while the remaining 299 people fall away from our thoughts.

This has the unfortunate effect of creating an 'us vs them' dichotomy.

...and indeed it might also ask why other regions consider their own victims more important than Western victims as well: how about, for example, why Mexico chooses to remember Veracruz and Los Ni�os H�roes but not the Alamo or Goliad (or, for that matter, vice versa).

The thing is very simply this: we all -- that is, Homo sapiens -- tend to engage in myth-making regards ourselves, while dehumanizing those we perceive as our opponents in wartime. This is not exclusive to Western civilization or America. This is not even news, Happeningthan. -- you do not see this from where you stand in South Korea, you do not believe that the Iranians and others in the Middle East do this, especially with respect to Americans, British, and Israelis?

If one is interested in fixing the problem, that is the more honest place to start. But I do not believe this thread aims to do much more than castigate America and the rest of Western civilization for its alleged insensitivity vis-a-vis "the Other" while wielding Chomsky's framework as its primary weapon.

happeningthang

Joined: 26 Apr 2003

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 2:01 pm Post subject:

Um OK...

This is all looking very familiar. Didn't we already have this discussion Gopher? I was only trying to point out that Steve Mac had an opinion, and so does Chomsky. Difference being Chomsky is credited as being one smart mo-fo.

Gopher wrote:

happeningthang wrote:

...one of the world's most influential intellectuals?

In leftist circles, you mean, right?

No, I just meant he's recognised as an incredibly intelligent man, and that, perhaps, his opinion shouldn't be dismissed as readily as it was. I recognise your point that some will accept his word as truth writ large, and this is particular to the left, but this doesn't diminish the points he raises, or the discussion it provides. As I said, his interpretations are up for debate, like any commentary, and I'd like to think that's the point.

As a historian I'm sure you're well aware the degree interpretation and itellectual, and ideological framework plays in forming conclusions. So Chomsky has an ideology that is critical of some American foriegn policies. So do I. What's so wrong with that? Your comments here and elsewhere have demonstrated you're well aware that there exists a diversity of opinions and 'truths' - essentially that there is no such thing as a universal truth - so what is the basis of your complaint?

I did a quick google on Immerman and the Chomsky critique and I found an article by Streeter that says that the criticism of Immerman's work was that, 1) He didn't adequately explain what the motivations for CIA involvement were, 2) Immerman relied too much on US documents thus producing a perspective that was "the world according to Washington". Not exactly the Chomsky critique you presented. Do you have any sources for that?

To criticise Chomsky for not reading the literature, and assuming that he has a predetermined conclusion that doesn't depend on the data is a bit disingenuous. I feel sure that neither of these two suggestions are true. I may be wrong, but I do believe if you want to make those kinds of accusations, you'd better back it up.

Anyway I'm on dangerous ground here, since we could produce contradictory reviews and historians ad infintum. My point being that they will all be flawed in some way, or another, and criticism is all part of the process.

Gopher wrote:

Quote:

(By the way, she ignored his letter. This dismayed him. And he therefore attacked her for a page or so in his introduction.)

It might interest you to know I came across a link of this introduction, and your description isn't quite borne out.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/KHIntroNew_uned_WBlum.html

Well, dismayed yes. Attacked? No.

I�m beginning to see some pre-determined opinion here, characterised by slight misrepresentation and logical missteps.

Like your suggestion that Cullather, Gleijeses or Immerman didn't see fit to cite Chomsky, because he hasn�t written anything worthwhile. But, why would they? He's a social critic, and not a part of the history they're studying. I doubt any of the historical works on the topic cited Chomsky.

Blum's Killing Hope, is reviewed as a well researched one-sided book. So, yes perhaps you've got a point there. It's arguably NOT the best book on the topic. Gore Vidal said he enjoyed it in his dustjacket blurb. Does that mean we should disregard every opinion he's expressed or supported?

We've been over the evocative and counterproductive nature of mentioning all things Nazi related, so I understand your opposition to Blum's use of the term "American holocaust".

Gopher wrote:

The thing is very simply this: we all -- that is, Homo sapiens -- tend to engage in myth-making regards ourselves, while dehumanizing those we perceive as our opponents in wartime. This is not exclusive to Western civilization or America. This is not even news, Happeningthan. -- you do not see this from where you stand in South Korea, you do not believe that the Iranians and others in the Middle East do this, especially with respect to Americans, British, and Israelis?

Well, you quoted my post on this, so I'm going to assume you know the answer to that one. We're in agreement on this point, as is Gang Ah Jee.

Gopher wrote:

Happeningthang wrote:

In any case the thread is about worthy:unworthy 'victims'. Why do you think the reporting of 'western' victims takes precedence over 'other's?

This thread is about Chomsky's antiAmerican, antiWestern framework.

Well it is now.

I don't know Gopher. You say all the right things about wanting to make these topics a proper debate, but you do seem to have a tendency to make it a discussion between right and left, instead of right and wrong. You're right to point out obfuscating tendencies and tactics of leftists, but I think that's only helping to make this forum just another venue where left and right are cemented in opposition. I can see you were reacting to my suggestion that Chomsky's was an informed opinion, but even so you devoted the majority of your post to Chomsky and left crux of the matter as a footnote.

I'm more interested in talking about the issue, in an attempt to 'fix' problems, if you like, and if you track back the postings you'll see that that was where I started.

Gopher

Joined: 04 Jun 2005

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 4:17 pm Post subject:

Happeningthang wrote:

Recognized by some and not by others, Happeningthang.

Chomsky uncritically and wholly accepts that school of American foreign relations that reduces everything to banks, consortiums, and economic interests -- in a word, "economic imperialism."

In the Guatemalan case I cited, this is best represented by Kinzer and Schlesinger's Bitter Fruit, which Chomsky apparently accepts as "real," while we can see Chomsky's criticizing Immerman's CIA in Guatemala as failing to address American motivations as confirmation.

Immerman and others cite anticommunism and other factors. Immerman specificaly argues this...

Richard H. Immerman wrote:

The basis for the conflict between the two countries was, in sum, this: during the period of cold war tension, neither the United States government nor the public could understand Guatemalans.

In any case, I take your below-described point, Happeningthang -- and I recognize my own behavior when I see it described, moreover.

Happeningthang wrote:

...his opinion shouldn't be dismissed as readily as it was. I recognise your point that some will accept his word as truth writ large, and this is particular to the left, but this doesn't diminish the points he raises, or the discussion it provides. As I said, his interpretations are up for debate, like any commentary, and I'd like to think that's the point.

Happeningthang wrote:

As a historian I'm sure you're well aware the degree interpretation and itellectual, and ideological framework plays in forming conclusions. So Chomsky has an ideology that is critical of some American foriegn policies. So do I. What's so wrong with that?

He is critical of some American foreign policies? I think you are minimizing his position here. I see him defining himself through his opposition.

You have Thirdworldtraveller.com in front of you as well. Look at Blum's book. Look at Zepezaur's CIA's Greatest Hits while you are there. These are narratives Chomsky approves of.

Show me anything at all that they like about America -- except, of course, they would rather live, work, and publish there than anywhere else in the world.

Happeningthang wrote:

I did a quick google on Immerman and the Chomsky critique and I found an article by Streeter that says that the criticism of Immerman's work was that, 1) He didn't adequately explain what the motivations for CIA involvement were, 2) Immerman relied too much on US documents thus producing a perspective that was "the world according to Washington". Not exactly the Chomsky critique you presented. Do you have any sources for that?

I just checked the review index and there are twenty-something reviews on Immerman. I do not recall which one Chomsky wrote. But I do not believe that citing Streeter's summary of Chomsky's criticism secondhand is any more reliable than my summarizing Chomsky's criticism secondhand.

I also read Streeter's literature review on Guatemala. I believe you ref the one available at historycooperative.org. Nice review. Rejects the economic-imperialism interpretation, by the way. And I do not recall Streeter's saying that Chomsky cited Sally Marks's "world-according-to-Washington" thesis against Immerman. You might be mistaken. Marks published her article well after Chomsky criticized Immerman.

Again, Chomsky reduces American foreign policy to economic imperialism and behind that, to corporate and elite interests. He rejects the nation-state as a viable actor. This derives from Marxism-Leninism:

Karl Marx wrote:

Each step in the development of the bourgeoisie was accompanied by a corresponding political advance of that class. An oppressed class under the sway of the feudal nobility, an armed and self-governing association in the medieval commune: here independent urban republic (as in Italy and Germany); there taxable �third estate� of the monarchy (as in France); afterwards, in the period of manufacturing proper, serving either the semi-feudal or the absolute monarchy as a counterpoise against the nobility, and, in fact, cornerstone of the great monarchies in general, the bourgeoisie has at last, since the establishment of Modern Industry and of the world market, conquered for itself, in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway. The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie [emphasis added].

Also see Lenin's Imperialism: the Highest Stage of Capitalism for further devleopment of this: corporations, conglomerates, banks. (I merely remind you where this comes from, Happeningthang, I assume you have already read Marx and Lenin, or at least important excerpts.)

Happeningthang wrote:

To criticise Chomsky for not reading the literature, and assuming that he has a predetermined conclusion that doesn't depend on the data is a bit disingenuous. I feel sure that neither of these two suggestions are true. I may be wrong, but I do believe if you want to make those kinds of accusations, you'd better back it up.

Whenever he discusses Latin-American and Caribbean affairs he betrays this, Happeningthang.

For example, he refuses to acknowledge American national-security and anticommunist interests in the Caribbean Basin in favor of reducing the Guatemalan intervention to economic imperialism.

Anyone who does this either (a) remains trapped in their own political agenda and worldview or (b) has not even glanced at the evidence on American motives. -- or better yet: both.

Happeningthang wrote:

It might interest you to know I came across a link of this introduction, and your description isn't quite borne out...Well, dismayed yes. Attacked? No.

You ought to read Blum's book, Happeningthang. He believes that this professor and the American economic and elite interests she implicitly benefits from or apologizes for have "sabotaged" his discussion...

William Blum wrote:

It's as if the Wright brothers' first experiments with flying machines all failed because the automobile interests sabotaged each test flight...

In his mind, she refused to exchange books with him and then join him in denouncing the American holocaust.

I am not certain that she wanted as much to do with him as any other moderate American would like be seen endorsing Oliver Stone's JFK.

Happeningthang wrote:

I�m beginning to see some pre-determined opinion here, characterised by slight misrepresentation and logical missteps.

Unfortunate.

Happeningthang wrote:

Blum's Killing Hope, is reviewed as a well researched one-sided book.

Reviewed as well-researched by whom besides Chomsky and Vidal?

I have Helen Caldicott -- another "military-industrial complex" enthusiast -- telling us "Each chapter I read makes me more and more angry." -- as it should. That is what antiAmerican diatribes do, Happeningthang.

Here is some of what Blum says about himself in his autobiographical page at the end of his book, by the way...

William Blum wrote:

Blum left the State Department in 1967, abandoning his aspiration of becoming a Foreign Service Officer, because of his opposition to what the United States was doing in Vietnam...

In 1969, he wrote and published an expos� of the CIA in which was revealed the names and addresses of more than 200 employees of the Agency...

In the mid-1970's, he worked in London with former CIA officer Philip Agree and his associates on their project of exposing CIA personnel and their misdeeds.

The late 1980s found Mr. Blum living in Los Angeles pursuing a career as a screenwriter. Unfortunately, his screenplays all had two (if not three) strikes against them because they dealt with those things which make grown men run screaming in Hollywood: ideas and issues.

He is once again living in Washington, D.C., outstandingly inegligible to renew his lapsed security clearance; indeed, because of his questionable political views, doubtlessly unhirable by any government agency or right-thinking private company, and reduced, as can be seen, to writing rather eccentric books in a desperate attempt to make a living.

I cannot imagine, Happeningthang, why bureaucratic Washington would shy from awarding a nice guy like Blum a security clearance or offering him a position at State, the Pentagon, or CIA, can you...?

Happeningthang wrote:

I'm more interested in talking about the issue, in an attempt to 'fix' problems, if you like, and if you track back the postings you'll see that that was where I started.

Absolutely agree.

But we need to start with an entirely new framework. Chomsky's is not designed to talk about the issue or "fix problems" as much as indict the United States and give Hugo Chavez talking points. Neither is OP's one-sided reference. May I remind you -- and more to the point, may I remind Big_Bird -- of this language...?

OP's article wrote:

...rapacious imperial waring and occupying forces.

Not the same purpose at all, Happeningthang.

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