The First Thing You Ought To Do Is Verify What I Present. Just Because I Say It Doesn't Make It True. So Check It Out, See What Looks Correct, What Looks Wrong, Look At Other Material Which Wasn't Discussed, Figure Out What The Truth Really Is. That's What You've Got A Brain For.

-Noam Chomsky

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The First Thing You

Noam Chomsky

Topic

Brain

Looks

Firsts

More From Noam Chomsky

A Default Of The Us Government Would Not Only Be Very Harmful Here, It Would Probably Send The Country Back Into Deep Recession, But It Just Might Crash The International Financial System.

Country

Government

Might

I Think The Foreign Policy Is Really Not Donald Trump Administration Concern. Like The Syria Strike. I Mean, It Meant Almost Nothing. They Hit An Empty Air Base. Within A Day, It Was Functioning Again. Planes Were Flying Off It. It Was For A Domestic Show, You Know - Show What A Tough Guy I Am; I'm Not Barack Obama.

Mean

Thinking

Guy

When I Was Growing Up In The 1930s And '40s Anti-semitism Was Rampant. It Wasn't Like Nazi Germany But It Was Pretty Serious - It Was Part Of Life.

Growing Up

Germany

Serious

No One Is Concerned With Central America Anymore. If A Million People Are Facing Starvation In Northern Nicaragua And Honduras, It's None Of Our Business. Few People Even Recognize That This Situation Is In Part An Outgrowth Of Us Policies Going Back To The 1980's. Nobody Is Concerned Because Nicaragua Is Technically Stable.

America

People

Nicaragua

If You Sell Me A Car, We Have Perhaps Made A Good Bargain For Ourselves. But There Are Effects Of This Transaction On Others, Which We Do Not Take Into Account. There Is More Pollution, The Price Of Gas Goes Up, There Is More Congestion.

Car

Pollution

Made

It Seems Self-evident That We Should Want People To Be Free, To Be Able To Play An Active Part In Making Decisions About Matters Of Concern To Them, To The Largest Possible Extent.

Self

Play

People

The Bible Is One Of The Most Genocidal Books In History.

Bible

Atheist

Book

A Corporation Is A State Created Institution, State Supported Institution, Its Concentration Of Private Power, There Is No Reason Why It Should Have The Rights Of Persons.

Rights

Should Have

Corporations

Humans Have Certain Properties And Characteristics Which Are Intrinsic To Them, Just As Every Other Organism Does. That's Human Nature.

Doe

Human Nature

Characteristics

There Had Been A Free And Open Election In Haiti In The Early 1990s And President Jean-bertrand Aristide Won, A Populist Priest. A Few Months Later Came The Expected Military Coup - A Very Vicious Military Junta Took Over, Of Which The United States Was Passively Supportive. Not Openly, Of Course, But Haitians Started To Flee From The Terror And Were Sent Back And On Towards Guantanamo Bay. Of Course, That Is Against International Law. But The United States Pretended That They Were "economic Refugees."

Military

Law

President

You Keep Plugging Away--that's The Way Social Change Takes Place. That's The Way Every Social Change In History Has Taken Place: By A Lot Of People, Who Nobody Ever Heard Of, Doing Work.

Taken

People

Way

Where Are The Drug Cartels Getting Their Weapons? They Are Being Provided By The United States. Cut Off That Flow Of Arms.

Cutting

Drug Cartels

United States

The Educational System Is Pretty Much Geared To Passing The Next Exam. You're Educated To Pass Tests And Not To Understand.

Educational

Tests

Language Would Have Evolved First As An Internal Object, A Kind Of "language Of Thought" (lot), With Externalisation (hence Communication) An Ancillary Process. I Can't Review Here The Strong And Growing Evidence To Support This Conclusion, But I Have Elsewhere. There Are Ample Reasons Why Having A Lot Would Confer Selectional Advantage: The Person So Endowed Could Plan, Interpret, Reflect, Etc., In Ways Denied To Others.

Strong

Communication

Support

Western Intellectuals, And Also Third World Intellectuals, Were Attracted To The Bolshevik Counter-revolution Because Leninism Is, After All, A Doctrine Which Says That The Radical Intelligentsia Have A Right To Take State Power And To Run Their Countries By Force, And That Is An Idea Which Is Rather Appealing To Intellectuals.

Running

Country

Ideas

The Worst Terrorist Crimes Going On Right Now Are The Drone Campaigns.

Drones

Campaigns

Crime

Every Single One Cabinet Appointment: Education, Environment, Labor - Every Single One Is Selected To Undermine Any Aspect Of Government That's Of Any Help To People, And That Doesn't Benefit The Super-rich. And It's Absolutely Systematic. The Interesting Question Will Be How Long Donald Trump's Constituency Can Fall For The Con Game.

Fall

Long

People

In The Occupied Territories, What Israel Is Doing Is Much Worse Than Apartheid. The South African Nationalists Needed The Black Population. That Was Their Workforce. The Israeli Relationship To The Palestinians In The Occupied Territories Is Totally Different. They Just Don’t Want Them.

Israel

Black

Population

Thanh Hoa Itself Is A Rich Agricultural Province. Rice Fields, A Pattern Of Many Shades Of Green, Stretch Far Into The Distance Along The Road, Which Also Winds Through Foothills And The Fringes Of Heavy Jungle Where Tigers Are Said To Roam. The Vegetation, Wild Or Cultivated, Is Lush.

Distance

Wind

Patterns

During The 1990's, Colombia Was The Leading Recipient Of Us Military Aid And Training In The Hemisphere. Approximately Half Of All Us Aid In The Hemisphere Went To Colombia. Colombia Was Also Far And Away The Leading Human Rights Violator In The Hemisphere.

Military

Rights

Training

The American Revolution Was A Small Part Of A Major World War Going On Between France And England, So The French Intervened And That Was A Big Factor, But The Domestic Contribution Was Basically Guerrilla Warfare.

War

France And England

World

Nothing In These Abstract Economic Models Actually Works In The Real World. It Doesn't Matter How Many Footnotes They Put In, Or How Many Ways They Tinker Around The Edges. The Whole Enterprise Is Totally Rotten At The Core: It Has No Relation To Reality.

Real

Economic Models

Rotten

I Just Went Along With Political Activists And Interested In Other Intellectual Interests Which I Pursued Kind Of At Random. I Never Had A Real College Education. I Got A Degree, But It Was Just Patching Together Courses Here And There.

Real

College

Political

The People Who Are Unemployed Want To Do The Work, But The System Is Such A Catastrophic Failure That It Cannot Bring Together Idle Hands And Work. This Is All Hailed As A Great Success, And It Is A Great Success - For A Very Small Sector Of The Population.

Hands

People

Together

The Majority Of The Population Thinks That If The Government Runs Healthcare, They're Going To Take Away Your Freedom. At The Same Time, The Public Favors A National Healthcare Program.

Running

Thinking

Government

There Is Pakistan's Relationship With Afghanistan Which Will Also Be A Very Tricky Issue In The Coming Years. Then There Is A Large Part Of Pakistan Which Is Being Torn Apart From American Drone Attacks. The Country Is Being Invaded Constantly By A Terrorist Superpower. Again, This Is Not A Small Problem.

Country

Small Problems

Years

There Was A Free Election In Palestine, But It Came Out The Wrong Way. So Instantly, The United States And Israel With Europe Tagging Along, Moved To Punish The Palestinian People, And Punish Them Harshly, Because They Voted The Wrong Way In A Free Election. That's Accepted Here In The West As Perfectly Normal. That Illustrates The Deep Hatred And Contempt For Democracy Among Western Elites, So Deep-seated They Can't Even Perceive It When It's In Front Of Their Eyes. You Punish People Severely If They Vote The Wrong Way In A Free Election.

Eye

Israel

Europe

I Mean, What's The Elections? You Know, Two Guys, Same Background, Wealth, Political Influence, Went To The Same Elite University, Joined The Same Secret Society Where You're Trained To Be A Ruler - They Both Can Run Because They're Financed By The Same Corporate Institutions.

Running

Mean

Two

I Am Not Sure Just What Marx Had In Mind When He Wrote That "philosophers Have Hitherto Only Interpreted The World In Various Ways; The Point Is To Change It." Did He Mean That Philosophy Could Change The World, Or That Philosophers Should Turn To The Higher Priority Of Changing The World? If The Former, Then He Presumably Meant Philosophy In A Broad Sense Of The Term, Including Analysis Of The Social Order And Ideas About Why It Should Be Changed, And How. In That Broad Sense, Philosophy Can Play A Role, Indeed An Essential Role, In Changing The World.

Philosophy

Mean

Priorities

I Don't Really See What Can Be Said About The Role Of Faculty Members, Or Universities, Beyond The Truisms Voiced Earlier, And Their Elaboration In Various Domains, Ranging From Focused Intellectual Pursuits To The Concerns Of The Larger Society And Future Generations.

Faculty Members

Intellectual

Generations

The Senate Was Wealthy People And It Wasn't Elected, It Was Chosen Through Legislatures, Which Themselves Were Under Private Influence, Powerful Influence. They Were Remote From The Population And That's Where Power Was Suppose To Reside.

Powerful

People

Population

Free Speech Has Been Used By The Supreme Court To Give Immense Power To The Wealthiest Members Of Our Society.

Giving

Speech

Our Society

In Fact, When Drugs Are Legalized, Use Sometimes Goes Down, It's Been Claimed. Part Of The Reason Is That Teenage Kids Use Illicit Drugs Because They Are Illicit. They Are Thumbing Their Noses At Society. If They Were Legal, They Might Not.

Teenage

Kids

Drug

Silicon Valley Wouldn't Exist Without Massive Government Spending And In Fact Initiative.

Government

Facts

Valleys

The More There Is A Need To Talk About The Ideals Of Democracy, The Less Democratic The System Usually Is.

Democracy

Needs

Democratic

The Leading Student Of Business Propaganda, Australian Social Scientist Alex Carey, Argues Persuasively That “the 20th Century Has Been Characterized By Three Developments Of Great Political Importance: The Growth Of Democracy, The Growth Of Corporate Power, And The Growth Of Corporate Propaganda As A Means Of Protecting Corporate Power Against Democracy.

Mean

Democracies Have

Australia Day

It's Roughly The Case That If Systems Become Too Complex To Study In Sufficient Depth, Physics Hands Them Over To Chemistry, Then To Biology, Then Experimental Psychology, And Finally On To History. Roughly. These Are Tendencies, And They Tend To Distinguish Roughly Between Hard And Soft Sciences.

Hands

Psychology

Depth

In The United States, The Political System Is A Very Marginal Affair. There Are Two Parties, So-called, But They're Really Factions Of The Same Party, The Business Party.

Party

Two

Political

Adam Smith Is An Egalitarian, He Believed In Equality Of Outcome, Not Opportunity. He Is An Enlightenment Figure, Pre-capitalist. He Says, Suppose In England, One Landowner Got Most Of The Land And Other People Would Have Nothing To Live On. He Says It Wouldn't Matter Much, Because The Rich Land Owner, By Virtue Of His Sympathy For Other People Would Distribute Resources Among Them, So That By An Invisible Hand, We Would End Up With A Pretty Egalitarian Society. That Is His Conception Of Human Nature.

Opportunity

Invisible Hand

Hands

In Societies That Profess Some Respect For Law, Suspects Are Apprehended And Brought To Fair Trial. I Stress 'suspects.'

Stress

Law

Trials

There Is Always Room For Gramsci's "optimism Of The Will."

Optimism

Rooms

If Something Comes Along That You Don't Like, There Are A Few Sort Of Four-letter Words That You Can Use To Push It Out Of The Sphere Of Discussion. If You Were In A Bar Downtown, They Might Have Different Words, But If You're An Educated Person What You Use Are Complicated Words Like "conspiracy Theory" Or "marxist." It's A Way Of Pushing Unpleasant Questions Off The Agenda So That We Can Continue In Our Own Happy Ideology.

Downtown

Agendas

Four

We Had One Or Another Form Of State Capitalism During An Extremely Brief Period Of Human History, Which Tells Us Essentially Nothing About Human Nature. If You Look At Human Societies And Human Interactions, You Can Find Anything. You Find Selfishness, You Find Altruism, You Find Sympathy.

Selfishness

Looks

Human Nature

People Tend To Rally Around Power.

People

When People Denounced [former Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad For Rejecting And Criminalizing Homosexuality, It Should Be Remembered That Was True Of The United States Until Very Recently. Women's Rights Were Unheard Of. Civil Rights Proponents Were Horribly Treated, Not Just In The South. It Was Awful There, But Pretty Bad Here. Environmental Issues Did Not Exist. Opposition To Aggression Was Virtually Zero. In Fact, So Little, That To This Day, Even Scholarship Mentions The Vietnam War As Beginning In 1965.

Zero

War

Rights

One Of The Problems Of Organizing In The North, In The Rich Countries, Is That People Tend To Think - Even The Activists - That Instant Gratification Is Required. You Constantly Hear: 'look I Went To A Demonstration, And We Didn't Stop The War So What's The Use Of Doing It Again?'

Country

War

Thinking

People Have To Be Atomized And Segregated And Alone. They're Not Supposed To Organize, Because Then They Might Be Something Beyond Spectators Of Action. They Might Actually Be Participants If Many People With Limited Resources Could Get Together To Enter The Political Arena. That's Really Threatening.

Media

People

Political

What Has To Be Done Today Is (1) Large-scale Conversion (weatherizing , Etc.), (2) Sharp Change In Transportation To Greater Efficiency, Like High-speed Rail, (3) Serious Efforts To Move To Sustainable Energy, Probably Solar In The Somewhat Longer Term, (4) Other Adjustments That Are Feasible. If Done Effectively, That Might Be Enough To Stave Off Disaster. If Not, Then We Can Give Up The Ghost, Because There Are No Alternatives In This World, At Least None That I've Seen Suggested.

Giving Up

Moving

Effort

The Us Is A Country [in Which] Eighty Percent Of The Population Thinks The Bible Was Written By God. About Half Think Every Word Is Literally True. So It's Had To Appeal To That - And To The Nativist Population, The People That Are Frightened, Have Always Been... It's A Very Frightened Country And That's Increasing Now With The Recognition That The White Population Is Going To Be A Minority Pretty Soon, "they've Taken Our Country From Us."

Country

Taken

Thinking

Government May Not Redistribute Private Wealth Or Grant Special Privileges To Any Individual Or Group.

Government

Special

Groups

Like Most Technology, The Internet Has Mixed Effects. It's A Neutral Instrument.

Technology

Internet

Instruments

The World Was Warned Of Extremely Severe Dangers Unless Urgent Steps Are Taken To Deal With Global Warming.

Taken

World

Steps

I Really Suggest Listening To Talk Radio. I Mean, If You Just Listen To What The Talk Hosts Are Saying, They Sound Like They Are Lunatics.

Mean

Listening

Sound

The Imf Economists Were Doubtless Shaken By The Extreme Failures Of Their Prescriptions Over Many Years, And By The Collapse Of The Intellectual Edifice Of Economic Theory On Which They Were Relying.

Years

Intellectual

Imf

You Can See It In The Worship Of [ronald] Reagan, Which Portrays Him As Somebody Who Saved Us From Government. Actually He Was An Apostle Of Big Government.

Government

Worship

Bigs

The Most Powerful Country In World History, Which Is Sure To Set Its Stamp On What Follows, Placed The Entire Government (executive, Legislative, Judicial Branches) In The Hands Of An Organization - The Republican Party - Dedicated To Escalating The Race To Disaster.

Country

Powerful

Party

Unfortunately, You Can’t Vote The Rascals Out, Because You Never Voted Them In, In The First Place

Firsts

Vote

Rascals

I Think That We Have Basically Nothing In The Field Of Human Behavior. Maybe That Is Just A Condition Of Temporary Ignorance. But It May Be That We Are Simply Not Intellectually Equipped To Develop Such A Theory.

Ignorance

Thinking

May

As We [with Edward Herman] Discuss There [in Manufacturing Consent] And Elsewhere, Recognition Of The Importance Of "manufacturing Consent" Has Become An Ever More Central Theme In The More Free Societies.

Recognition

Theme

Importance

If You Want To End Terrorism Stop Participating In It.

Want

Terrorism

Ends

It's A Class War, And A War On Young People Too... That's Why Tuition Is Rising So Rapidly. There's No Real Economic Reason For That. It's A Technique Of Control And Indoctrination. And This Is Really The First Organized, Significant Reaction To It, Which Is Important.

Real

War

Class

There Are All The Activist Groups On Every Imaginable Topic - Solidarity Groups, Environmental And Feminist Groups - Sectors Of These Movements Do Very Valuable Work.

Feminist

Environmental

Groups

Around 2008 And Again In 2013 Nato Officially Offered The Ukraine The Opportunity To Join Nato. That's Something No Russian Government Is Ever Going To Accept. It's Right At The Geopolitical Heartland Of Russia.

Opportunity

Russia

Government

In The Literal Sense, There Has Been No Relevant Evolution Since The Trek From Africa. But There Has Been Substantial Progress Towards Higher Standards Of Rights, Justice And Freedom - Along With All Too Many Illustrations Of How Remote Is The Goal Of A Decent Society.

Rights

Illustration

Justice

Greece, Alone, Is In A Very Vulnerable Position. If The Greeks Had Had Support From Progressive Left And Popular Forces Elsewhere In Europe They Might Have Been Able To Resist The Demands Of The Troika, But They Had Almost No Support. Not Even From Portugal, Spain, Or Other Left Forces. They Were Left Alone.

Europe

Support

Greek

Those Are Possibilities For Technology, Which Don't Tend To Be Used, Because Of The Way Power Is Concentrated. There Are All Kinds Of Possibilities, Including For Coercion. In China, Technology Is Used To Control And Coerce. Here Too, To An Extent, But Not To That Extent.

Technology

Coercion

Way

Honduras Has Become A Murder Capital Of The World; There's Horrible Atrocities, Infanticide, Murder Of Women Is Way Up, And People Are Fleeing In Desperation. They Come To The Border, And We Put Them In Trucks And Send Them Back To Mexico To Die. And Here People Are Scared Of Illegal Immigrants - That's What We're Doing. It's Pretty Shocking.

People

Atrocities

Fleeing

A Very Large Majority Of The U.s. Population Is In Favor Of Establishing Diplomatic Relations With Cuba And Has Been For A Long Time With Some Fluctuations. And Even Part Of The Business World Is In Favor Of It, Too. But The Government Won't Allow It.

Government

Long

World

Labor #‎ Unions Are The Leading Force For #‎ Democratization And #‎ Progress .

Progress

Unions

Force

Jingoism, Racism, Fear, Religious Fundamentalism: These Are The Ways Of Appealing To People If You're Trying To Organize A Mass Base Of Support For Policies That Are Really Intended To Crush Them.

Crush

Religious

Racism

If You Ask The Ceo Of Some Major Corporation What He Does, He Will Say, In All Honesty, That He Is Slaving 20 Hours A Day To Provide His Customers With The Best Goods Or Services He Can And Creating The Best Possible Working Conditions For His Employees.

Honesty

Creating

Corporations

[antonio] Gramsci's Words And Actions Explain Their Assessment, Though I Think We Should Refrain From Using The Term "model Intellectual" For Him Or Others.

Thinking

Assessment

Intellectual

Every Predecessor Has Used Mercenaries, Often Drawn From The Country That They're Attacking Like England Ran India With Indian Mercenaries. You Take Them From One Place And Send Them To Kill People In The Other Place. That's The Standard Way To Run Imperial Wars.

Running

Country

War

There Are In Fact Many Ways To Combat The Trump Project Of Creating A Tiny America, Isolated From The World, Cowering In Fear Behind Walls While Pursuing The Paul Ryan-style Domestic Policies That Represent The Most Savage Wing Of The Republican Establishment.

Wall

World

Republican

The Evangelicals. . . . If All They Want Is Gold Cadillacs And Sex And So On, No Big Problem.

Sex

Gold

Cadillacs

[mikhail Bakunin] Expectations Were Generally Confirmed, Including His Prediction That Some Would Seek To Gain State Power On The Backs Of Popular Revolution, Then Constructing A "red Bureaucracy" That Would Be One Of The Worst Tyrannies In History, While Others Would Recognize That Power Lies Elsewhere And Would Serve As Its Apologists, Becoming Mystifies, "disablers," And Managers While Demanding The Right To Function In "technocratic Isolation," In World Bank Lingo.

Lying

Expectations

World

There's Something Deeply Rooted In American Culture. You Can Pretty Much Identify What It Was. You Take A Look At The History. It Was Internal Conquest. You Had To Defend Yourself Against What The Declaration Of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, An Enlightened Figure, Called The Attacks Of The "merciless Indian Savages," Whose Known Way Of Warfare Was Torture And Destruction. Also You Had A Slave Population, You Had To Protect Yourself Against Them. You Needed Guns.

Gun

Independence

Population

[isaiah] Berlin's Observation Is Accurate Enough, And Applies At Home As Well, And Even More Harshly For The Reasons Already Mentioned: The Apparatchiks And Commissars Could At Least Plead Fear In Extenuation.

Home

Berlin

Enough

The Fact Of The Matter Is That The U.s. Is Run By An Unusually Class-conscious, Dedicated Business Class That Has A Very Violent Labor History, Much Worse Than In Europe.

Running

Europe

Class

The Us Is Also Unusual In The Enormous Scale Of Religious Fundamentalism. The Impact On Understanding Of The World Is Extraordinary. In National Polls Almost Half Of Those Surveyed Have Reported That They Believe That God Created Humans In Their Present Form 10,000 Years Ago (or Less) And That Man Shares No Common Ancestor With The Ape. There Are Similar Beliefs About The Second Coming.

Religious

Believe

Men

Arab Public Opinion Does Not Regard Iran As A Hostile Entity. In Fact It's So Supportive Of Iran That A Majority Would Think The Place Would Be Better Off If Iran Had Nuclear Weapons. The Main Enemies Are The United States And Isreal, In The 80, 90 Percent Range.

Thinking

Iran

Enemy

You Have 30% Of The World Unemployed, A Huge Amount Of Work, That Needs To Be Done Just Rebuilding The Society Alone.

Needs

Done

World

If You Read People Like Say Bruce Blair One Of The Leading, Most Sober, Knowledgeable Specialists, He Says, Look, [donald Trump] Statements Are All Over The Map, But His Personality Is Frightening, He's A Complete Megalomaniac.

People

Personality

Maps

It's As If We're Higher Apes Who Had A Language Faculty Inserted.

Apes

Language

Faculty

Universities Are Less Constrained By Authority And Rigid Doctrine In The United States Than In Most Other Societies, To My Knowledge.

United States

Doctrine

Authority

There Was Also A National Policy, Which As A Child I Didn't Know Anything About. In 1924 The First Major Immigration Law Was Passed. Before That, There Was An Oriental Exclusion Act, But Other Than That, European Immigrants Like My Parents Were Generally Admitted In The Early Years Of The Twentieth Century. But That Ended In 1924 With An Immigration Law That Was Largely Directed Against Jews And Italians.

Children

Years

Law

I Still Think, Despite Everything, That The Us Is Very Unlikely To Attack Iran. It Could Be A Huge Catastrophe; Nobody Knows What The Consequences Would Be. I Imagine That Only An Administration That's Really Desperate Would Resort To That.

Thinking

Iran

Would Be

What Is Important To Us Is To Reverse The Shameful Course Being Pursued By America. It Won't Be Easy, But It Must And Can Be Done.

America

Important

Done

The Kind Of Work That Should Be The Main Part Of Life Is The Kind Of Work You Would Want To Do If You Weren't Being Paid For It. It’s Work That Comes Out Of Your Own Internal Needs, Interests And Concerns.

Needs

Want

Kind

There's An Internal Coherence And Logic To What They Get From [rush] Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, And The Rest Of These Guys. And They Sound Very Convincing, They're Very Self-confident, And They Have An Answer To Everything - A Crazy Answer, But It's An Answer. And It's Our Fault If That Goes On. So One Thing To Be Done Is Don't Ridicule These People, Join Them, And Talk About Their Real Grievances And Give Them A Sensible Answer, Like, "take Over Your Factories."

Crazy

Real

Self

The 'free-floating Intellectual' May Occupy Himself With Problems Because Of Their Inherent Interest And Importance, Perhaps To Little Effect.

Intellectual

Floating

May

I Had Two Spinster Aunts Who Were Seamstresses, And Of Course Unemployed In The 1930s, But The Union Gave Them A Life. They Had A Couple Of Weeks In The Country For A Union Installation And They Had Educational Programs And All Sorts Of Things. There Was A Life, You Know, A Real Community.

Country

Couple

Real

It Hardly Takes More Than A Day In Gaza To Begin To Appreciate What It Must Be Like To Try To Survive In The World’s Largest Open-air Prison.

Air

Appreciate

Trying

Those Who Actually Do Have A Valid Claim To Such Special Competence Have A Particular Obligation To Make Very Clear To The General Public The Limits Of What Is Understood At Any Serious Level; These Limits Are Typically Very Narrow In Matters Of Significance In Human Affairs.

Special

Levels

Matter

The Dynamics Of The Taliban Now Appear To Be Very Different And Complex, In Both Afghanistan And Pakistan, As They Attack Governments And Mainstream Parties.

Party

Government

Different

It's Kind Of Interesting And Sick That The Intellectual Culture Called The 1960s, "time Of Troubles," A Dangerous Period In Which A Lot Of Harm Was Done To The Society. And The Reason Is Because We Were Civilized And That's Dangerous. That Increased The Commitment To Democracy, To Rights And So On, And This Left People Much Less Obedient.

Commitment

Rights

People

There Are Massive Efforts On The Part Of The Internet's Corporate Owners To Try To Direct It To Become A Technique Of Marginalisation And Control.

Effort

Trying

Technique

The Military Has A Huge Role In The Economy [of Pakistan] With Big Stakes And, As You Say, It Has Constantly Intervened To Make Sure That It Keeps Its Hold On Policy Making. Well, I Hope, And There Seem To Be Some Signs, That The Military Is Taking A Backseat, Not Really In The Economy, But In Some Of The Policy Issues. If That Can Continue, Which Perhaps It Will, This Will Be A Positive Development.

Military

Policy Making

Issues

In Fact, Clinton-era Publications Of The Us Space Command Describe Control Over Space As A Parallel To Control Over The Oceans A Century Ago. Then, Countries Built Navies To Protect And Enhance Their Power In Commercial And Strategic Interests. Today, The Militarization Of Space Is Intended To Protect Us Investments And Commercial Interest And Us Hegemony Around The World.

Country

Ocean

Space

Concision Is A Technique Of Propaganda. It Ensures You Cannot Do Anything Except Repeat Clichés, The Standard Doctrine, Or Sound Like A Lunatic.

Technique

Sound

Doctrine

Ever Since I've Had Any Political Awareness, I've Felt Either Alone Or Part Of A Tiny Minority.

Political

Minorities

Tiny

For Those Of Us Who Got Into Good Colleges Or The Professions, Did We Stand Up To That High School History Teacher Who Told Us Some Ridiculous Lie About American History And Say, "that's A Ridiculous Lie. You're An Idiot"? No. We Said, "all Right, I'll Keep Quiet, And I'll Write It In The Exam And I'll Think, Yes, He's An Idiot." And It's Easy To Say And Believe Things That Improve Your Self-image And Your Career And That Are In Other Ways Beneficial To Yourselves.

Teacher

Lying

Believe

The Sanders Campaign Showed That A Candidate With Mildly Progressive Programs Could Win The Nomination, Maybe The Election, Even Without The Backing Of The Major Funders Or Any Media Support. There's Good Reason To Suppose That Sanders Would Have Won The Nomination Had It Not Been For Shenanigans Of The Obama-clinton Party Managers. He Is Now The Most Popular Political Figure In The Country By A Large Margin.

Country

Party

Winning

There Is Still Much Debate About Whether Torture Has Been Effective In Eliciting Information - The Assumption Being, Apparently, That If It Is Effective, Then It May Be Justified.

Information

May

Assumption

Nafta And Gatt Are Quite Similar. They Both Have Highly Protectionist Elements. They're Kind Of A Mixture Of Liberalization And Protection Designed To Expand The Power Of Transnational Corporations. They're Very Basically Investor's Rights Agreements. One Crucial Part In Both Is The "intellectual Property Right," Which Is A Funny Way Of Saying That Corporations, Like Pharmaceutical Companies, Will Have Near-monopolistic Rule Over Future Technology. This Now Includes Product As Well As Process Rights.

Technology

Rights

Agreement

Democracy Doesn't Mean Much If People Have To Confront Concentrated Systems Of Economic Power As Isolated Individuals. Democracy Means Something If People Can Organize To Gain Information, To Have Thoughts For That Matter, To Make Plans, To Enter Into The Political System In Some Active Way, To Put Forth Programs And So On. If Organizations Of That Kind Exist, Then Democracy Can Exist Too. Otherwise It's A Matter Of Pushing A Lever Every Couple Of Years; It's Like Having The Choice Between Coca-cola And Pepsi-cola.

Couple

Hero

Mean

A Functioning Eco-system Is A Human Need.

Needs

Eco

Humans

Bradley Manning Should Be Regarded As A Hero. He Is Doing What An Honest, Decent Citizen Should Be Doing: Letting Your Population Know What The Government, The People Who Rule You Are Doing. They Want To Keep It Secret Of Course.

Hero

Government

People

In Studying Language We Can Discover Many Basic Properties Of This Cognitive Structure, Its Organization, And Also The Genetic Predispositions That Provide The Foundation For Its Development. So In This Respect, Linguistics, First Of All, Tries To Characterize A Major Feature Of Human Cognitive Organization. And Second, I Think It May Provide A Suggestive Model For The Study Of Other Cognitive Systems. And The Collection Of These Systems Is One Aspect Of Human Nature.

Thinking

Organization

Trying

In The 1960s, There Was A Point, 1968, '69, When There Was A Very Strong Antiwar Movement Against The War In Vietnam. But It's Worth Remembering That The War In Vietnam Started - An Outright War Started In 1962.

Strong

War

Vietnam

No Sane Human Being Devotes 100% Of His Or Her Life To Political Activism.

Political

Activism

Sane

If You Look At Say, England And Germany A Century Ago, Which Had The Most Advanced Navies Then, They Were Dealing With Extremely Tricky Technological Problems. Putting A Huge Gun On A Moving Platform And Ensuring That It Could Hit Another Moving Target Was One Of The Hardest Technical Problems Of The Early Twentieth Century.

Moving

Gun

Navy

Our Whole Educational And Cultural System Is Not Designed To Provide Those Intellectual Tools, So People Are Often Lost And The Internet Often Becomes Kind Of A Cult Generator.

Educational

People

Intellectual

We Have To Recognize That There Is A Range Of Interests, Like There Isn't A Single Corporate Interest And A Single State Interest, So There's A Range. In Addition To That, There Is The Fact Of Professional Integrity.

Integrity

Facts

States

The People Who Were Really Important Are The Ones Whose Names Are Forgotten. And That's True Of Every Movement That Ever Existed.

Names

People

Important

There Is Kind Of A Fundamental Conformity, Which Is A Virtual Requirement To Enter Into The Media.

Media

Fundamentals

Requirements

As A Research Tool, The Internet Is Invaluable.

Tools

Research

Internet

If North Korea Doesn't Have A Deterrent, They Will Be Wiped Out.

Korea

North Korea

Deterrent

I Think The Christian Coalition Could Be Extremely Dangerous. We Should Always Be Concerned When Any Group Wants To Impose Their Doctrinal Concerns On All. To An Extent That's What They Are Trying To Do.

Christian

Thinking

Trying

Well, They Really Didn't Have To Worry, Because The Way Power Politics Works, The World Court Can't Do Anything. Look, There's One Country In The World At The Moment Which Has Refused To Accept World Court Decision-that's The United States. Is Anybody Going To Do Anything About It?

Country

Worry

Decision

There Isn't Much Doubt That Like Other Animal Societies, Those Of Homo Sapiens Involved Plenty Of Cooperation, Which Might Have Been Considerably Enhanced, One Would Suppose, By The Emergence Of The Remarkable Instrument Of Language.

Animal

Doubt

Might

As International Support For Obama's Decision To Attack Syria Has Collapsed, Along With The Credibility Of Government Claims, The Administration Has Fallen Back On A Standard Pretext For War Crimes When All Else Fails: The Credibility Of The Threats Of The Self-designated Policeman Of The World.

War

Government

Self

It Is Not A War. It Is Murder.

War

Murder

It Was Right After Woodrow Wilson's First Serious Post-world War I Repression, Which Deported Thousands Of People, Effectively Destroyed Unions And Independent Press, And So On. Right After That, The Anti-immigration Law Was Passed That Remained In Place Until The 1960s.

War

Independent

Law

Some Of The Younger People Afford Hope For The Future. I Am Not Opposed To Reform Initiatives. For Example, If You Can Build Up Enough Popular Support In The United States To Put Through A Reasonable Health Care Program Or To Support The Rights Of The Working People Against The Version Of Nafta Which Was Rammed Through, These Can Be Good Things.

Rights

People

Support

I Admire Ralph Nader And Denis Kucinich Very Much, And Insofar As They Bring Up Issues And Carry Out An Educational And Organisational Function - That's Important, And Fine, And I Support It.

Educational

Issues

Support

When Nazi Emissaries Came To The United States, They Were Welcomed At Harvard.

United States

Nazi

Harvard

I Think There Are All Kinds Of Intrusions Into Private Rights That Make Use Of Contemporary Technology.

Technology

Thinking

Rights

Us Wars Are Going To Be Against Much Weaker Enemies. And They Have To Be Won Quickly And Decisively Before A Popular Reaction Develops.

War

Enemy

Reactions

It's Not A Matter Of Public Relations And Rhetorical Style But Of Actions. It's The Actions And Policies Under George W.bush Administration That Have Left The Us Government Remarkably Isolated, Feared And Often Hated To An Extent With No Historical Precedent.

Historical

Style

Action

The Smart Way To Keep People Passive And Obedient Is To Strictly Limit The Spectrum Of Acceptable Opinion, But Allow Very Lively Debate Within That Spectrum - Even Encourage The More Critical And Dissident Views. That Gives People The Sense That There's Free Thinking Going On, While All The Time The Presuppositions Of The System Are Being Reinforced By The Limits Put On The Range Of The Debate.

Smart

Thinking

Views

It's True That Language Is In A Sense Linear But That Is As Obvious As Perceptual Space Is Three-dimensional.

Space

Three

Language

How It Is We Have So Much Information, But Know So Little?

Littles

Information

Knows

In Egypt The Neoliberal Programs Have Meant Statistical Growth, Like Right Before The Arab Spring, Egypt Was A Kind Of Poster Child For The World Bank And The Imf [international Monetary Fund:] The Marvelous Economic Management And Great Reform. The Only Problem Was For Most Of The Population It Was A Kind Of Like A Blow In The Solar Plexus: Wages Going Down, Benefits Being Eliminated, Subsidized Food Gone And Meanwhile, High Concentration Of Wealth And A Huge Amount Of Corruption.

Children

Spring

Blow

Julian Assange Shouldn't Be The Subject Of A Grand Jury Hearing, He Should Be Given A Medal. He's Contributing To Democracy.

Democracy

Hearing

Should

Power Has To Be Protected From Scrutiny. That's The Principle Of Every Dictatorship, Of Every Autocracy. You Hear It From High Priests At Harvard And Every Government Department, That Power Has To Be Kept Secret Otherwise It Will Fade And It Won't Work. But Bradley Manning Is Violating That Principle.

Government

Secret

Principles

Very Commonly I Get Queries. Somebody Saw Something Of Mine On Youtube And Of Course If There Is A Talk On Youtube, There Aren't Any Footnotes - And They Want To Know Why Did You Say This. Well If They Bothered To Look Up Something In Print, They Would've Seen Why I Said That. If They Ask For Evidence, I Just Say Well Take A Look And Mention Something They Can Read And That Usually Ends The Conversation.

Looks

Want

Saws

Technology Provides Means For Expression And Interchange And So On, So Yes It Should Be Free And Open, But There Are A Lot Of Constraints On How Its Used.

Mean

Technology

Expression

The Federal Reserve, Has An Official Commitment To Two Different Policies. One Is To Prevent Inflation From Getting Too High. The Second Is To Maintain High Employment... The European Central Bank Has Only The First. It Has No Commitment To Keep Employment Up.

Commitment

Two

Different

The First Commitment Is Raise Your Salary. One Of The Ways To Raise Your Salary Sometimes Is To Have Short-term Profits But There Are Many Other Ways.

Commitment

Salary

Way

I Think A Decent Society Should Protect Rights To Private Property Within Limits, But Not Concentrations Of Private Power That Infringe On The Freedom And Rights Of Others, Including Exploitation Of Labor, And That Convert Any Democratic Forms Into What Have Been Called Sometimes "hierarchical Democracies," Like Ours, In Which Some Have Vastly Greater Influence Over Public Policy Than Others. Spelling All Of This Out Is A Complex Matter That Raises Many Issue And Problems That Are Impossible To Address Here.

Thinking

Democracy

Impossible

Language Is A Process Of Free Creation; Its Laws And Principles Are Fixed, But The Manner In Which The Principles Of Generation Are Used Is Free And Infinitely Varied. Even The Interpretation And Use Of Words Involves A Process Of Free Creation.

Language Words

Law

Generations

Iraq Has The Second Largest Oil Reserves In The World, It Is Right In The Midst Of The Major Energy Reserves In The World. Its Been A Primary Goal Of Us Policy Since World War Ii To Control What The State Department Called "a Stupendous Source Of Strategic Power" And One Of The Greatest Material Prizes In History.

War

Goal

Energy

The Development Of Space Technology, Including Space Warfare Today, Is Similar In Its Technological-industrial Significance To The Development Of Navies A Hundred Years Ago.

Technology

Space

Years

It's Very Hard To Look In The Mirror. We All Know This. It's Much Easier To Have Illusions About Yourself. And In Particular, When You Think, Well, I'm Going To Believe What I Like, But I'll Say What The Powerful Want, You Do That Over Time, And You Believe What You Say.

Powerful

Believe

Thinking

There's Just No Question That The United States Was Trying Desperately To Prevent The Independence Of South Vietnam And To Prevent A Political Settlement Inside South Vietnam. And In Fact It Went To War Precisely To Prevent That. It Finally Bombed The North In 1965 With The Purpose Of Trying To Get The North To Use Its Influence To Call Off The Insurgency In The South.

War

Political

Independence

Us Government Policies Are Continuing To Do Exactly The Same Thing [produce Terrorism]. Two Days After The Boston Marathon Bombings, There Was A Drone Strike In Yemen Attacking A Peaceful Village, Which Killed A Target Who Could Very Easily Have Been Apprehended. But Of Course It Is Just Easier To Terrorise People.

Government

Boston

Two

In The Late 1990s, Some Of The Worst Terrorist Atrocities In The World Were What The Turkish Government Itself Called State Terror, Namely Massive Atrocities, 80 Percent Of The Arms Coming From The United States, Millions Of Refugees, Tens Of Thousands Of People Killed, Hideous Repression, That's International Terror, And We Can Go On And On.

Government

People

Atrocities

Maybe [the Republicans] 'll Find Ways Around It, But The Financial System Of The World Depends Very Heavily On The Credibility Of The Us Treasury Department. Us Treasury Securities Are What's Called "good As Gold"; They're The Basis Of International Finance, And If The Government Can't Uphold Them, If They Become Valueless, The Effect On The International Financial System Could Be Quite Severe. But In Order To Destroy A Limited Health-care Law, The Right-wing Republicans, The Reactionary Republicans, Are Willing To Do That.

Government

Order

Law

The British Had An Even Stronger [then America] Business Interest In Nazi Germany. And Benito Mussolini Was Greatly Admired.

America

Stronger

Germany

Enormous And Growing Parts Of The Population Are Basically Superfluous For Profit-making Purposes. Along With This, The Jail Population Is Increasing Very Rapidly; It's The Highest In The Industrial World By Far. New And Onerous Crime Bills Are Being Passed To Deal With This Superfluous Population.

Jail

Population

Purpose

George Washington Hated The Guerrillas. He Wanted To Imitate The British Red Coat Armies, Fighting As Gentlemen Are Supposed To Fight.

Fighting

Army

Gentleman

The Us Cannot Be Brought To The World Court For Major Crimes, For Example The Supreme International Crime, Invasion, Or Violation Of The Un Charter, Or Violation Of The Genocide Convention, These Are Things The Us Is Exempt From, Because They Exempted Themselves From Being Subjected To International Treaties In World Court Proceedings.

Example

World

Invasion

The Media Are Corporations So... It's The Concentrations Of Private Power Which Have An Enormous, Not Total Control, But Enormous Influence Over Congress And The White House And That's Increasing Sharply With Sharp Concentration Of Private Power And Escalating Cost Of Elections And So On.

Media

White

House

It May Be Beyond The Limits Of Human Intelligence To Understand How Human Intelligence Works.

May

Limits

Humans

The Change Between Horse And Buggy To Automobile Is A Big Change And There Hasn't Been A Major Change Since.

Horse

Bigs

Automobile

Even In A Largely Depoliticized Society Such As The United States, With No Political Parties Or Opposition Press Beyond The Narrow Spectrum Of The Business-dominated Consensus, It Is Possible For Populate Action To Have A Significant Impact On Policy, Though Indirectly. That Was An Important Lesson For The Indochina Wars.

War

Party

Impact

It Is Important To Bear In Mind That Political Campaigns Are Designed By The Same People Who Sell Toothpaste And Cars.

People

Car

Political

The Printing Press Had A Very Liberatory Effect That Meant Individuals - Small Groups Could Produce Radical Pamphlets - Could Use It For Organizing.

Groups

Use

Individual

For Those Who Stubbornly Seek Freedom, There Can Be No More Urgent Task Than To Come To Understand The Mechanisms And Practices Of Indoctrination. These Are Easy To Perceive In The Totalitarian Societies, Much Less So In The System Of 'brainwashing Under Freedom' To Which We Are Subjected And Which All Too Often We Serve As Willing Or Unwitting Instruments.

Freedom

Practice

Tasks

Technologies Can Be Liberating, But It Can Also Be A Tool Of Coercion And Control.

Technology

Tools

Coercion

Markets Also Have A Very Bad Psychological Effect. They Drive People To A Conception Of Themselves And Society In Which You're Only After Your Own Good, Not The Good Of Others And That's Extremely Harmful.

People

Psychological

Effects

The Republican Party Has Pretty Much Abandoned Any Pretense Of Being A Traditional Political Party. It's In Lockstep Obedience To The Very Rich, The Super Rich And The Corporate Sector. They Can't Get Votes That Way So They Have To Mobilize A Different Constituency. It's Always Been There, But It's Rarely Been Mobilized Politically. They Call It The Religious Right, But Basically It's The Extreme Religious Population.

Religious

Party

Political

The Us Is To An Unusual Extent A Business-run Society, Where Short-term Concerns Of Profit And Market Share Displace Rational Planning.

Running

Planning

Unusual

The Beauty Of Our System Is That It Isolates Everybody. Each Person Is Sitting Alone In Front Of The Tube, You Know. It's Very Hard To Have Ideas Or Thoughts Under Those Circumstances. You Can't Fight The World Alone.

Fighting

Ideas

Sitting

The Idea That Hezbollah Is Acting As An Agent Of Iran Is Very Dubious. It's Not Accepted By Specialists On Iran Or Specialists On Hezbollah. But It's The Party Line. Or Sometimes You Can Put In Syria, I.e. "syrian-supported Hezbollah," But Since Syria Is Of Less Interest Now You Have To Emphasize Iranian Support.

Party

Iran

Ideas

A More Appropriate Expansion Is The Statement "it Is The Responsibility Of Intellectuals To Speak The Truth And Expose Lies" A Transcript Of A Talk To A Writers Conference In Australia In 1996, Where I Had Been Asked To Talk On "writers And Intellectual Responsibility" - A Question That I Said I Found "puzzling," Because I Knew Of Nothing To Say About It Beyond Truisms, Though These Were Perhaps Worth Affirming Because They Are "so Commonly Denied, If Not In Words, Then In Consistent Practice."

Lying

Responsibility

Practice

Internal Security Means Something. It Means War Against Your Own Population.

War

Mean

Population

It's Not In Doubt That Tobacco Is Far More Lethal Than Hard Drugs.

Drug

Doubt

Tobacco

To Say That The United States Has Pursued Diplomacy With North Korea Is A Little Bit Misleading. It Did Under The Clinton Administration, Though Neither Side Completely Lived Up To Their Obligations. Clinton Didn't Do What Was Promised, Nor Did North Korea, But They Were Making Progress. So When Bush Came Into The Presidency, North Korea Had Enough Uranium Or Plutonium For Maybe One Or Two Bombs, But Then Very Limited Missile Capacity. During The Bush Years It's Exploded. The Reason Is, He Immediately Canceled The Diplomacy And He's Pretty Much Blocked It Ever Since.

Korea

Years

Two

In Fact, The Outer Space Treaty Of 1967 Bans Militarization. Potential Adversaries Of The Us, And Even Its Allies, Are So Far Behind That These Countries Are Very Interested In Maintaining The Treaty. Europe And The Rest Of The World Want A Strong Reaffirmation Of The Treaty And The Us Is Unilaterally Trying To Derail It. Termination Of The Treaty Would Mean That The Us Could Develop Satellite Weapons, Put Offensive Weapons In Space. It Would Probably Mean Using Nuclear Power In Space. All Of This Leads To Some Very Dangerous Scenarios, Including Destruction Of The Species.

Country

Strong

Mean

There Is Either A Crisis Or A Return To The Norm Of Stagnation. One View Is The Norm Is Stagnation And Occasionally You Get Out Of It. The Other Is That The Norm Is Growth And Occasionally You Can Get Into Stagnation. You Can Debate That But It's A Period Of Close To Global Stagnation.

Views

Growth

Return

Jesus Himself, And Most Of The Message Of The Gospels, Is A Message Of Service To The Poor, A Critique Of The Rich And The Powerful, And A Pacifist Doctrine. And It Remained That Way, That's What Christianity Was Up... Until Constantine. :constantine Shifted It So The Cross, Which Was The Symbol Of Persecution Of Somebody Working For The Poor, Was Put On The Shield Of The Roman Empire. It Became The Symbol For Violence And Oppression, And That's Pretty Much What The Church Has Been Until The Present.

Jesus

Powerful

Church

There's One White Powder Which Is By Far The Most Lethal Known, It's Called Sugar. . . . The Caribbean Back In The 18th Century Was A Soft Drug Producer: Sugar, Rum, Tobacco, Chocolate. And In Order To Do It, They Had To Enslave Africans.

Order

White

Chocolate

Luckily For [barack] Obama, The Russians Came Along And Rescued Him With This Proposal [to Confiscate Assad's Chemical Weapons] Which He Quickly Accepted - It Was A Way Out Of The Embarrassment Of Facing Likely Defeat. They Still Have The Option Of Bombing If They Want To. And Incidentally, To Add One Comment About This, You'll Notice That This Would Be A Very Good Moment To Institute A Call For Imposing The Chemical Weapons Convention On The Middle East.

Want

Weapons

Way

I Agree With Bill Clinton That Us Forces Should Not Be Sent To Haiti, But Not For His Reasons.

Haiti

Bills

Reason

Clinton, Kennedy, They All Carried Out Mass Murder, But They Didn't Think That That Was What They Were Doing - Nor Does Bush. You Know, They Were Defending Justice And Democracy From Greater Evils.

Thinking

Evil

Justice

Edward Said Is A Very Honorable Representative Of The "intellectual" In The Sense Of The Term That He Defines.

Intellectual

Said

Honorable

Technology Can Be Used That Way And It Can Also Be Used In Other Ways.

Technology

Way

Used

In A Democracy The Day When You Pay Your Taxes, April 15, Would Be A Day Of Celebration, Because You're Getting Together To Provide Resources For The Programs You Decided On.

Democracy

Together

Would Be

The Media Is Uncritical, And Their So-called The Concept Of Objectivity Translates Into Keeping Everything Within The Beltway. However, Iraq Was Quite Different. Here, There Were Flat-out Lies, And They Sort Of Knew It. They Were Desperately Trying To Make Connections Between Saddam Hussein And 9/11.

Lying

Iraq

Objectivity

The Missile Defense Component Is A Minor Feature That Nobody Takes Very Seriously. Nobody Really Believes That The Us Is Trying To Protect Itself From North Korea. That's Not Serious. But The Militarization Of Space Is Quite Serious.

I Don't See Much Use In General Slogans. Sometimes It Is Worth Resisting Evil With Lesser Evil, Very Commonly In Fact.

Evil

Use

Facts

Now, You Ban Not The Whole Muslim World. You Ban Seven States, Seven States That Have Not Been Responsible For A Single Terrorist Act. Those Are The Seven [donald Trump] Banned. But, You Leave The Ones That Really Are Responsible, Like Saudi Arabia, Which Is The Center For Propaganda And Funding And So On For Radical Islamic Jihadism, Well You Can't Touch Them Because Of Business Interests, Also They Have Oil And So On And So Forth.

Islamic

Oil

Arabia

It Is The Worst Atrocity Underway [in Rwanda]. But It's Barely In The Media, And People Just Don't Know About It. And That's Quite Generally True.

Media

People

Atrocities

If A Person Chooses Not To Be A Writer, Or Speaker, Then (by Definition) The Person Is Choosing Not To Be Engaged In An Effort,"to Bring The Truth About Matters Of Human Significance To An Audience That Can Do Something About Them," Apart, Perhaps, From Some Circle Of Immediate Associates.

Circles

Effort

Definitions

Take Germany And Japan, Both Defeated In The Second World War. Germany Has Acknowledged Its Monstrous Crimes To A Certain Extent, Has Paid Reparations And So On. Japan, In Contrast, Apologizes For Nothing And Has Paid No Reparations, With One Exception: It Pays Reparations To The United States, But Not To Asia.

War

Japan

Asia

In The Major State Capitalists Economies, Europe And The Us, It's Low Growth And Stagnation And A Very Sharp Income Differentiation A Shift - A Striking Shift - From Production To Financialization.

Europe

Growth

Income

I Can Understand The Idea That There Is A Conspiracy. In Fact, In Much Of The World There Is A Sense Of An Ultra-powerful Cia Manipulating Everything That Happens, Such As Running The Arab Spring, Running The Pakistani Taliban, Etc. That Is Just Nonsense. They [cia] Created A Monster And Now They Are Appalled By It.

Running

Powerful

Spring

We Recriminalized Black Life. Incarceration Rates Since The 1908s Have Gone Through The Roof, Overwhelmingly Black Males, Women And Hispanics To Some Extent. Essentially Re-doing What Happened Under Reconstruction. That's The History Of African Americans - So How Can Any One Say There's No Problem. Sure, Racism Is Serious, But It's Worse Than That.

Racism

African American

Black

... The Media Serve The Interests Of State And Corporate Power, Which Are Closely Interlinked, Framing Their Reporting And Analysis In A Manner Supportive Of Established Privilege And Limiting Debate And Discussion Accordingly.

Media

Supportive

Analysis

The Idea That People Should Be Allowed To Decide Something About Their Own Fate Is Just Anathema To European Elites.

Fate

Ideas

People

A Lot Of The People Involved In The Media Are Very Serious, Honest People, And They Will Tell You, And I Think They Are Right, That They Are Not Being Forced To Write Anything... What They Don't Tell You, And Are Maybe Unaware Of, Is That They Are Allowed To Write Freely Because Their Beliefs Conform To The... Standard Doctrinal System, And Then, Yes, They Are Allowed To Write Freely And Are Not Coerced.

Writing

Thinking

Media

It's Only Terrorism If They Do It To Us. When We Do Much Worse To Them, It's Not Terrorism.

Terrorism

Ifs

We [ With Edward Herman] Believe That The Empirical Evidence We Review There - And Elsewhere, In A Great Deal Of Joint And Separate Work - Lends Substantial Support To The Conclusions; Whether That Is True Is For Others To Judge.

Believe

Judging

Support

In The Case Of [antonio] Gramsci, The Fascist Government Agreed That He Was A "model Intellectual" In [edward] Said's Sense, And For That Reason Determined, In Their Words, That "we Must Stop This Brain From Functioning For Twenty Years."

Government

Years

Intellectual

No One Seriously Doubts That If Piraha Children Are Brought Up In Boston They'll Be Speaking Boston English, That Is, That The Capacities Are Present, Unlike Other Animals, As Far As Is Known. There's No Challenge To The Theory - Not Mine, But Everyone's - That The Human Language Faculty Provides The Means For Generation Of An Infinite Array Of Structured Expressions.

Children

Mean

Animal

In Fact, It's Doing It All Over The World. Obama, First Of All, Is Running The Biggest Terrorist Operation That Exists, Maybe In History. The Drone Assassination Campaigns, Which Are Just Part Of It. All Of These Operations, They Are Terror Operations.

Running

Drones

Campaigns

If You Are Working 50 Hours A Week In A Factory, You Don't Have Time To Read 10 Newspapers A Day And Go Back To Declassified Government Archives. But Such People May Have Far-reaching Insights Into The Way The World Works.

Government

People

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.

2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.

2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.

2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.

3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.

3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.

3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.

4. Proper Usage of Quotes

4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.

4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.

4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).

5. Common Mistakes to Avoid

5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.

5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.

5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.

6. Quotes in Different Contexts

6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.

6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.

6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.

7. Punctuation and Formatting

Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:

Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.

Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.

Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.

8. Ethical Considerations

Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes

Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.

Conclusion

Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.

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