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To Pay Attention To The Actual Core Of The Movement - That Would Be Pretty Hard. Can You Concentrate For Example On Either The Policy Issues Or The Creation Of Functioning Democratic Communities Of Mutual Support And Say, Well, That's What's Lacking In Our Country That's Why We Don't Have A Functioning Democracy - A Community Of Real Participation. That's Really Important. And That Always Gets Smashed.
-Noam Chomsky
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To Pay Attention To

Noam Chomsky
To Pay Attention To The Actual Core Of The Movement - That Would Be Pretty Hard. Can You Concentrate For Example On Either The Policy Issues Or The Creation Of Functioning Democratic Communities Of Mutual Support And Say, Well, That's What's Lacking In Our Country That's Why We Don't Have A Functioning Democracy - A Community Of Real Participation. That's Really Important. And That Always Gets Smashed.
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Topic
Country
Real
Mutual Support
More From Noam Chomsky
In Fact, Anyone Who Merits Attention And Who Promotes Any Cause At All Is Doing So On The Basis Of A Belief That It Is Somehow Good For Humans, Because Of Their Inherent Nature.
Attention
Causes
Facts
If You Go To One Demonstration And Then Go Home, That's Something, But The People In Power Can Live With That. What They Can't Live With Is Sustained Pressure That Keeps Building, Organisations That Keep Doing Things, People That Keep Learning Lessons From The Last Time And Doing It Better The Next Time.
Religious
Home
People
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 Current Period Of Regression Is Registering Some Success In "producing People" Who Are Subordinated To External Power, Diverted To Such "superficial Things" As "fashionable Consumption" And Other Pursuits More Fitting For The "bewildered Herd" Than Participation In Determining The Course Of Individual And Social Life.
Superficial Things
People
Regression
It’s Ridiculous To Talk About Freedom In A Society Dominated By Huge Corporations. What Kind Of Freedom Is There Inside A Corporation? They’re Totalitarian Institutions - You Take Orders From Above And Maybe Give Them To People Below You. There’s About As Much Freedom As Under Stalinism.
Freedom
Power
Government
Terror Became A Big Issue When The Reagan Administration Came In. They Immediately Announced [their Plans] And Kind Of Disparaged Carter's Alleged Human Rights Programs. The Main Issue Is State-directed International Terrorism. Right At That Time That Big Industry Developed. That's When You Start Getting The Academic Departments On Terrorism.
Issues
Rights
Administration
States Are Violent To The Extent That They Have The Power To Act In The Interests Of Those With Domestic Power
Violent
States
Interest
I've Already Supported Bernie Sanders In The Primaries.
Primaries
The Iranian Government Is Undoubtedly A Severe Danger To Its Own Population, But Not Beyond That.
Government
Population
Danger
The United States Invaded Iraq To Gain Control Of One Of The Major Sources Of The World's Energy.
Iraq
World
Gains
There Have Been Repeated Cases When Nuclear War Came Ominously Close, Often A Result Of Malfunctioning Of Early-warning Systems And Other Accidents, Sometimes [as A Result Of] Highly Adventurist Acts Of Political Leaders.
War
Leader
Political
The Media Want To Maintain Their Intimate Relation To State Power. They Want To Get Leaks, They Want To Get Invited To The Press Conferences. They Want To Rub Shoulders With The Secretary Of State, All That Kind Of Business. To Do That, You've Got To Play The Game, And Playing The Game Means Telling Their Lies, Serving As Their Disinformation Apparatus.
Lying
Mean
Media
If You Want To Find Weapons Of Destruction, You Can Find Them All Over The Place. Take, Say, Israel. There Is A Very Great Concern Right Now About Proliferation Of Nuclear Weapons, As There Should Be. Israel Has A Couple Of Hundred Nuclear Weapons And Also Chemical And Biological Weapons. This Stockpile Is Not Only A Threat In Itself But Encourages Others To Proliferate In Reaction And In Self-defense. Is Anybody Saying Anything About This?
Couple
Israel
Self
[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
Now, The Libertarian Party, Is A *capitalist* Party. It's In Favor Of What *i* Would Regard A *particular Form* Of Authoritarian Control. Namely, The Kind That Comes Through Private Ownership And Control, Which Is An *extremely* Rigid System Of Domination - People Have To... People Can Survive, By Renting Themselves To It, And Basically In No Other Way... I Do Disagree With Them *very* Sharply, And I Think That They Are Not..understanding The *fundamental* Doctrine, That You Should Be Free From Domination And Control, Including The Control Of The Manager And The Owner.
Party
Thinking
People
The Term "intellectual" Is Used Conventionally To Refer To People Who Happen To Have Unusual Opportunities In This Regard, And As Always, Opportunity Confers Moral Responsibility.
Responsibility
Opportunity
People
By Most Accounts, Aristide Is The Most Popular Figure In Haiti.
Haiti
Figures
Accounts
Why Should Workers Agree To Be Slaves In A Basically Authoritarian Structure? They Should Have Control Over It Themselves. Why Shouldn't Communities Have A Dominant Voice In Running The Institutions That Affect Their Lives?
Running
Voice
Should Have
You Can't Mention Hezbollah In The U.s. Media Without Putting In The Context Of "iranian-supported Hezbollah." That's Its Name. Its Name Is Iranian-supported Hezbollah. It Gets Iranian Support. But You Can Mention Israel Without Saying Us-supported Israel. So This Is More Tacit Propaganda.
Israel
Media
Names
The Leading, The Most Respected Vietnam Historian, Military Historian Bernard Fall -he Was A Hawk Incidentally, But He Cared For The Vietnamese - He Said It Wasn't Clear To Him Whether Vietnam Could Survive As A Historical And Cultural Entity Under The Most Massive Attack That Any Region That Size Had Ever Suffered. He Was Talking About South Vietnam, Incidentally.
Military
Fall
Talking
For Those Who Stubbornly Seek Freedom, There Can Be No More Urgent Task Than To Come To Understand The Mechanisms And Practices Of Indoctrination.
Practice
Tasks
Indoctrination
It's As If We're Higher Apes Who Had A Language Faculty Inserted.
Apes
Language
Faculty
The Real Invasion Of South Vietnam Which Was Directed Largely Against The Rural Society Began Directly In 1962 After Many Years Of Working Through Mercenaries And Client Groups. And That Fact Simply Does Not Exist In Official American History. There Is No Such Event In American History As The Attack On South Vietnam. That's Gone. Of Course, It Is A Part Of Real History. But It's Not A Part Of Official History.
Real
Years
Groups
The Internet Could Be A Very Positive Step Towards Education, Organisation And Participation In A Meaningful Society.
Positive
Meaningful
Steps
I Don't Suggest That The Observations Are Surprising Or Profound. Rather, They Seem To Me The Merest Truisms. I Was Not Aware That [ Michel] Foucault Had Used The Phrase "speaking Truth To Power." I Had Thought It Was An Old Quaker Phrase.
Profound
Phrases
Quaker
The Process Of Shaping Opinion, Attitudes, And Perceptions Was Termed The 'engineering Of Consent' By One Of The Founders Of The Modern Public Relations Industry, Edward Bernays.
Attitude
Engineering
Perception
The Local Grocery Store Was A Gathering, A Community Place. You Knew The Owner, If You Didn't Have Any Money They'd Let You Go For A Couple Days. You Talked. It Was A Friendly Place. Supermarkets Are Totally Impersonal. I Mean, You May Say Hello To The Checkout Girl Or Something, But The Personal Connections Are All Gone.
Girl
Couple
Mean
Half The Population Hold That The Government Is Run By A Few Big Interests Looking Out For Themselves, As Polls Regularly Show.
Running
Government
Population
There's An Interesting Book About That Called The Third Reich And The Ivory Tower, Written By Stephen H. Norwood. It Has A Long Discussion About Harvard, And Indeed The School's President, James Conant, Did Block Jewish Faculty. He Was The One Who Prevented European Jews From Being Admitted To The Chemistry Department - His Field - And Also Had Pretty Good Relations With The Nazis.
Block
Book
School
I Don't Even Know If I Ever Knew - Some Sweatshop In Baltimore. I Knew With My Other Relatives - Some Of The Women Were In The International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union And Men Were Shop Boys And Things Like That. I Happened To Be In Philadelphia, But The Family Was In New York. I Could See What The Union Was Doing For Them.it Really Saved Their Lives.
New York
Boys
Men
As Long As Individuals Are Compelled To Rent Themselves On The Market To Those Who Are Willing To Hire Them, As Long As Their Role In Production Is Simply That Of Ancillary Tools, Then There Are Striking Elements Of Coercion And Oppression That Make Talk Of Democracy Very Limited, If Even Meaningful.
Meaningful
Long
Democracy
Given Their Unusual Privilege, Western Intellectuals Can Realistically Accomplish A Great Deal. The Limits Are Imposed By Will More Than Objective Circumstances. And About Human Will Predictions Are Without Value.
Limits
Privilege
Unusual
I Think Such An Inquiry Will Reveal A Rather Different Picture: Namely, It Will Reveal A Very Strong Tendency For The Intellectuals Who Are Respected And Privileged To Be Those Who Subordinate Themselves To Power.
Strong
Thinking
Different
U.s. International And Security Policy . . . Has As Its Primary Goal The Preservation Of What We Might Call "the Fifth Freedom," Understood Crudely But With A Fair Degree Of Accuracy As The Freedom To Rob, To Exploit And To Dominate, To Undertake Any Course Of Action To Ensure That Existing Privilege Is Protected And Advanced.
Goal
Degrees
Might
If The United States Loses The Economic Weapons Of Control, It Is Very Much Weakened.
United States
Weapons
Economic
Unlimited Economic Growth Has The Marvelous Quality Of Stilling Discontent While Maintaining Privilege, A Fact That Has Not Gone Unnoticed Among Liberal Economists.
Growth
Quality
Gone
In General, The Attitude Towards Nazi Germany Was Not That Hostile, Especially If You Look At The U.s. State Department Reports. In 1937 The State Department Was Describing Adolf Hitler As A "moderate" Who Was Holding Off The Forces Of The Right And The Left.
Attitude
Germany
Looks
The Threat And Use Of Violence Is Stimulating Nuclear Proliferation Along With Jihadi Terrorism.
Use
Nuclear Proliferation
Violence
Michael Flynn, National Security Adviser, [his Reaction] To The Iranian Missile Test The Other Day Was Very Frightening. Now The Missile Test Is Ill-advised, They Shouldn't Have Done It. But It's Not In Violation Of International Law Or International Agreements. They Shouldn't Have Done It. His Reaction Suggested Maybe We're Going To Go To War In Retaliation.
War
Agreement
Law
My Feeling Is That If Any Republican Was Elected It Would Be Almost A Death Knell For The Species Literally, Just Because Of Their Attitude On Climate Change.
Attitude
Feelings
Climate
Let's Take Southeast Asia. The Last 20, 30 Years Has Been What's Called The "asian Miracle" - Fast Economic Growth, Industrial Society. It's Happening All Over, With One Exception, Which One? The Philippines Is The One That Can't Grow, Which The Us Has Been Running For 100 Years. Is There A Correlation? Have You Read About It? It Comes To Mind, At Least.
Running
Years
Miracle
Through Much Of Its History, The Us Did Not Have High Inequality As Compared With Europe. Less So, In Fact. That Began To Change In The Industrial Age, Reaching A Peak In 1928, After The Forceful Destruction Of The Labor Movement And Crushing Of Independent Thought. Largely As A Result Of Labor Mobilization, Inequality Declined During The Great Depression, A Tendency Continuing Through The Great Growth Period Of Regulated Capitalism In The Early Postwar Decades.
Crush
Independent
Growth
Armed Attack Has A Definition In International Law. It Means Sudden, Overwhelming, Instantaneous Ongoing Attack.
Mean
Law
Ongoing
While Trump Keeps The Spotlight On Himself, The "respectable" Republican Establishment Chips Away At Government Programs That Benefit The General Population.
Republican
Program
Respectable
Allowing An Independent And Sovereign Iraq Could Be A Nightmare For The United States. It Would Mean That It Would Be Shi'ite-dominated, At Least If It's Minimally Democratic. It Would Continue To Improve Relations With Iran, Just What The United States Doesn't Want To See. And Beyond That, Right Across The Border In Saudi Arabia Where Most Of Saudi Oil Is, There Happens To Be A Large Shi'ite Population, Probably A Majority.
Mean
Independent
Iran
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
What Happened In The Following Years? Well, I Think That Among The Educated Classes It Stayed The Same. You Talk About Humanitarian Intervention, It's Like Vietnam Was A Humanitarian Intervention. Among The Public, It's Quite Different.
Thinking
Years
Class
If [respulicans] Can't Get Rid Of [obamacare], They're Going To Have To Tell Their Base, We've Been Lying To You For The Last Five Years. So They're Willing To Go To Almost Any Extent To Do That. That's Unusual, In Fact I Think It's Unique In The History Of Modern Parliamentary Systems. And It's Very Dangerous For The Country And For The World.
Country
Lying
Unique
The People Who Live On The Land - Israelis And Palestinians - Have A Right To Live In Security And Peace.
Land
People
Palestinian
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 Capacity To Transfer Production Elsewhere Is A Weapon Against The Western Workers.
Weapons
Capacity
Workers
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
Markets Have Built In Inefficiencies, Serious Inefficiencies Which Are Well Known.
Serious
Well Known
Wells
Desktop Publishing Was A Big Innovation That Meant Small Groups Or Even Poor Societies Could Do Their Own Publication Without The Capital Investment In A Major Printing Press. That's A Big Difference. Same Is True Of More Advanced Technologies - It Can Offer Plenty Of Liberatory Possibilities - Can - But Whether It Does Or Not Or Whether It Serves For Coercion Depends On Socioeconomic Decisions.
Technology
Differences
Decision
The U.s. Is Different From Europe And Other Industrial Countries.
Country
Europe
Different
The Threat Of China Is Not Military. The Threat Of China Is They Can't Be Intimidated. Europe You Can Intimidate. When The Us Tries To Get People To Stop Investing In Iran, European Companies Pull Out, China Disregards It. You Look At History And Understand Why - They've Been Around For 4,000 Years, They Have Contempt For The Barbarians, They Just Don't Give A Damn.
Military
Iran
Years
From Now On I Will Consider A Language To Be A Set (finite Or Infinite) Of Sentences, Each Finite In Length And Constructed Out Ofa Finite Set Of Elements. All Natural Languages In Their Spoken Or Written Form Are Languages In This Sense.
Elements
Language
Infinite
Silicon Valley, After All, Feeds Off The Existence Of Computers, The Internet, The It Systems, Satellites, The Whole Of Micro Electronics And So On, But A Lot Of That Comes Straight Out Of The State Sector Of The Economy. Silicon Valley Developed, But They Expanded And Turned It Into Commercial Products And So On, But The Innovation Is On The Basis Of Fundamental Technological Development That Took Places In Places Like This [mit] On Government Funding, And That Continues.
Government
Technological Development
Innovation
The Communists Basically Acted As The Police Force Of The Security System Of The [spain] Republic And Were Very Much Opposed To The Anarchists, Partially Because [joseph] Stalin Still Hoped At That Time To Have Some Kind Of Pact With Western Countries Against [adolf] Hitler. That, Of Course, Failed And Stalin Withdrew The Support To The Republic. They Even Withdrew The Spanish Gold Reserves.
Country
Security Systems
Support
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
Cuba Has Become A Symbol Of Courageous Resistance To Attack. Since 1959, Cuba Has Been Under Attack From The Hemispheric Superpower.
Cuba
Resistance
Courageous
If You Don't Like What Someone Has To Say, Argue With Them.
Arguing
Ifs
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
It Is A Privilege To Join The Campaign To Support Bradley Manning For His Courage And Integrity In Serving His Country By Helping Make The Government Accountable To Its Citizens, And To Inform The World Of What Its People Should Know.
Country
Integrity
Government
The Pashtuns In Particular Are Kind Of Trapped. They've Never Accepted The Durand Line Nor Has Any Afghan Government Historically Accepted It.
Government
Lines
Kind
The Major Organizing Centers, Like The Labor Movement, Have Been Severely Weakened In The United States By Policy.
United States
Movement
Policy
What's Called Obamacare Is An Effort To Mildly Change This [health-care System], Not Change It As Far As It Should Go Or As Much As The Population Wants It To Go, But To Make It A Little Better And A Little More Affordable.
Obamacare
Effort
Population
To Achieve Respectability, To Be Admitted To The Debate, They Must Accept Without Question Or Inquiry The Fundamental Doctrine That The State Is Benevolent, Governed By The Loftiest Intentions, Adopting A Defensive Stance, Not An Actor In World Affairs But Only Reacting To The Crimes Of Others...if Even The Harshest Of Critics Tacitly Adopt These Premises, Then The Ordinary Person May Ask, Who Am I To Disagree?
Ordinary
Doctrine
Inquiry
Nobody Can Successfully Defy The Master Of The Hemisphere [america], In Fact Of The World, Hence The Savagery.
America
Hemisphere
World
The Very Idea That There Should Be A Certain Class Of People Who Give Orders By Virtue Of Their Ownership Of Wealth And Another Huge Class Who Take On Orders And Follow Them Because Of Their Lack Of Access To Wealth And Power, That's Unacceptable. So, Sure It Should Be Abolished.
Order
Class
Ideas
It Has Been Known For Some Time That A Major Nuclear War Might Lead To Nuclear Winter That Would Destroy The Attacker As Well As The Target. And Threats Are Now Mounting, Particularly At The Russian Border, Confirming The Prediction Of George Kennan And Other Prominent Figures That Nato Expansion, Particularly The Way It Was Undertaken, Would Prove To Be A "tragic Mistake," A "policy Error Of Historic Proportions."
War
Mistake
Winter
The Iraq War Was The First Conflict In Western History In Which An Imperialist War Was Massively Protested Against Before It Had Even Been Launched.
War
Iraq
Firsts
Propaganda Is To A Democracy What The Bludgeon Is To A Totalitarian State...
Media
Political
Democracy
To Understand How People Organize Social Systems, We Have To Discover The Principles That We Create To Make Some Societies Intelligible.
People
Principles
Social
There Are Very Interesting Books About These Events, For Instance One By A Very Well-known American Historian Named William R. Polk Called Violent Politics. It's A Record Of What Are Basically Guerrilla Wars From The American Revolution Right Up Through The Wars In Afghanistan And Iraq.
War
Book
Iraq
Those Who Had Demanded No More Than An End To The Bombing Of North Vietnam And A Commitment To Negotiations Saw Their Demands Being Realized, And Lapsed Into Silence.
Commitment
Silence
Being Real
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
It's Perfectly Obvious That There Is Some Genetic Factor That Distinguishes Humans From Other Animals And That It Is Language-specific. The Theory Of That Genetic Component, Whatever It Turns Out To Be, Is What Is Called Universal Grammar.
Animal
Language
Theory
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
The Educational System In The Us Was A Highly Predictable Victim Of The Neoliberal Reaction, Guided By The Maxim Of "private Affluence And Public Squalor." Funding For Public Education Has Sharply Declined. As Higher Education Is Driven To A Business Model In Accord With Neoliberal Doctrine, Administrative Bureaucracy Has Sharply Increased At The Expense Of Faculty And Students. Cost-cutting Leads To Hyper-exploitation Of The More Vulnerable, Creating A New Precariat Of Graduate Students And Adjuncts Surviving On A Bare Pittance, Replacing Tenured Faculty.
Educational
Students
Graduates
Why Does Everyone Take For Granted That We Don't Learn To Grow Arms, But Rather, Are Designed To Grow Arms? Similarly, We Should Conclude That In The Case Of The Development Of Moral Systems; There's A Biological Endowment Which In Effect Requires Us To Develop A System Of Moral Judgment And A Theory Of Justice, If You Like, That In Fact Has Detailed Applicability Over An Enormous Range.
Justice
Facts
Doe
Palestinians Have No Wealth Or Power.
Wealth
Palestinian
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 Remember At The Age Of Five Travelling On A Trolley Car With My Mother Past A Group Of Women On A Picket Line At A Textile Plant, Seeing Them Being Viciously Beaten By Security People. So That Kind Of Thing Stayed With Me.
Birthday
Mother
Past
Bear In Mind That Capitalism Is A Tiny Period Of Human Society. You Never Really Had Capitalism, You Always Had One Or Another Variant Of State Capitalism.
Mind
Tiny
Bears
You Know, You Can Go To The Fiftieth Thing On A Google List And That's The One You Want, But The Ones You Are Going To Be Directed To Are The Funders.
Google
Lists
Want
Before The 1970s, Banks Were Banks. They Did What Banks Were Supposed To Do In A State Capitalist Economy: They Took Unused Funds From Your Bank Account, For Example, And Transferred Them To Some Potentially Useful Purpose Like Helping A Family Buy A Home Or Send A Kid To College.
Home
Kids
College
Intellectuals Of The Categories Happen To Enjoy Unusual Privilege, Unique In History, I Suppose. It's Easy Enough To Find Ugly Illustrations Of Repression, Malice, Dishonesty, Marginalization And Exclusion In The Academic World.
Unique
Illustration
World
September 11 Shocked Many Americans Into An Awareness That They Had Better Pay Much Closer Attention To What The Us Government Does In The World And How It Is Perceived. Many Issues Have Been Opened For Discussion That Were Not On The Agenda Before. That's All To The Good.
Government
Issues
September 11
If You're Worried About The Deficit, Pay Attention To The Fact That It's Almost All Attributable To Military Spending And The Totally Dysfunctional Health Program.
Military
Attention
Pay
Mr. Mijanovi And Those Associated With Him Are The Hope And The Conscience Of The Yugoslav Revolution.
Revolution
Conscience
In 1961, The United States Began Chemical Warfare In Vietnam, South Vietnam, Chemical Warfare To Destroy Crops And Livestock. That Went On For Seven Years. The Level Of Poison - They Used The Most Extreme Carcinogen Known: Dioxin. And This Went On For Years.
Years
United States
Warfare
The Only Way We Can Put A Permanent End To Terrorism Is To Stop Participating In It.
Way
Terrorism
Ends
Our Health Care Is Rationed By Wealth.
Care
Wealth
Health Care
If The Naacp Were To Impose A Control Of Something Towards All, Then I Would Staunchly Oppose It.
Naacp
Ifs
There Are No Conservatives In The United States. The United States Does Not Have A Conservative Tradition. The People Who Call Themselves Conservatives, Like The Heritage Foundation Or Gingrich, Are Believers In -- Are Radical Statists. They Believe In A Powerful State, But A Welfare State For The Rich.
Powerful
Believe
People
The "end Of History" Has Been Proclaimed Many Times, Always Falsely.
Ends
Has Beens
One Of The Most Interesting Reactions To Come Out Of 1968 Was In The First Publication Of The Trilateral Commission, Which Believed There Was A 'crisis Of Democracy' From Too Much Participation Of The Masses.
Interesting
Democracy
Too Much
The Death Penalty Can Be Tolerated Only By Extreme Statist Reactionaries Who Demand A State That Is So Powerful That It Has The Right To Kill.
Powerful
Demand
Death Penalty
I'm Sorry To Say It Has Some Historical Analogs. It's Kind Of Reminiscent Of What Happened In Germany In The Late Weimar Years.
Sorry
Years
Historical
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
Right After 9-11, As Far As I Know, One Newspaper In The United States Had The Integrity To Investigate Opinion In The Muslim World: The 'wall Street Journal.'
Wall
Integrity
United States
The Most Interesting - In Fact, Inspiring - People I Met There [porto Alegre] Are Those Who Remain Nameless: Representatives Of The International Campesino Movement, The East Timorese Delegation,... - The Usual Heroes, Who Disappear, Unknown, Apart From The Consequences Of Their Work.
Hero
People
Interesting
When I Was Ten Years Old I Wanted To Be A Taxidermist For Some Reason, Don't Ask Me Why.
Years
Reason
Ask Me
There’s No More Morality In World Affairs, Fundamentally, Than There Was At The Time Of Genghis Khan.
World
Morality
Affair
It’s A Shameful Moment For U.s. Media When It Insists On Being Subservient To The Grotesque Propaganda Agencies Of A Violent, Aggressive State.
Agency
Media
Moments
My Own Feeling Is That A Corporation Has No Right To Have A Political Or Social Influence.
Political
Feelings
Corporations
Africa's A Wreck And It's Not Because It Was Hit By An Asteroid. It's A Wreck Largely Because It Was Hit By Europe.
Europe
Wrecks
Asteroids
Fed And Electoral College Could Use Some Tinkering, But They Are Not The Source Of The Problems.
College
Tinkering
Use
Human Language Is Nothing Like The Signalling Systems Of Other Animals.
Animal
Language
Humans
England Shouldn't Have The Real Freedom Of Vote And We Shouldn't Either. Because As [james Madison] Put It, One Of The Primary Goals Of Government Was To Protect The Minority Of The Opulent Against The Majority, To Make Sure The Opulent Maintain Their Rights. The Constitutional System Was Structured To Ensure That Outcome.
Real
Rights
Government
Efforts Can Succeed Over Time, And Not Trying Ensures That The Worst Will Happen.
Effort
Trying
Succeed
The Big Change, The Really Radical Change In Communication, Was In The Late 19th Century. The Shift From Sailing Ships To Telegraph Is Astronomical. Everything Since Then Has Been Small Increments, Including The Internet.
Communication
Sailing
Ships
If The Mutation Is Partially Transmitted To Offspring, They Too Would Have The Advantage. And Over Time It Might Have Come To Dominate A Small Breeding Group.
Groups
Mutation
Might
The Corporations Plainly Want Academic Scholarship To Create A Web Of Mystification That Will Avoid Any Public Awareness Of The Way In Which Power Actually Functions In The Society, And The Faculty Has Caught The Message And They Do It Magnificently.
Power
Society
Want
Pakistan Is Not A Unified Country. In Large Parts Of The Country, The State Is Regarded As A Punjabi State, Not Their (the People's) State.
Country
People
Pakistan
When People Know We Are Ready To Use Nuclear Weapons, They're Going To Back Off If We Do Something Aggressive. So Basically, Nuclear Weapons Are Always Being Used.
People
Nuclear
Use
We Can, For Example, Be Fairly Confident That Either There Will Be A World Without War Or There Won't Be A World - At Least, A World Inhabited By Creatures Other Than Bacteria And Beetles, With Some Scattering Of Others.
War
Example
World
When [bill] Clinton Came Along, It Sort Of Moderated A Little Bit, But Clinton Had A Different Device For Breaking Unions Called Nafta [north America Free Trade Agreement]. Because The Government Was Entirely Lawless, Employers Could Exploit Nafta To Threaten Union Organizers With Transfer. It's Illegal, But When You've Got A Lawless Government, It Doesn't Matter If It's Illegal. I Think The Number Of Union Drives Blocked Increased By About 50 Percent.
Thinking
Government
Agreement
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
The Principle That Human Nature, In Its Psychological Aspects, Is Nothing More Than A Product Of History And Given Social Relations Removes All Barriers To Coercion And Manipulation By The Powerful.
Nature
Powerful
Principles
Peace Is Preferable To War. But It’s Not An Absolute Value, And So We Always Ask, “what Kind Of Peace?
Peace
War
Kind
After World War Ii There Were Many Jews Who Remained In Refugee Camps...president Harry F. Truman Called For The Harrison Commission To Investigate The Situation In The Camps And It Was A Pretty Gloomy Report. There Were Very Few Jews Admitted Into The United States.
War
President
United States
State Formation Has Been A Brutal Project, With Many Hideous Consequences. But The Results Exist, And Their Pernicious Aspects Should Be Overcome.
Overcoming
States
Projects
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
Moral Cowardice And Intellectual Corruption Are The Natural Concomitants Of Unchallenged Privilege.
Intellectual
Privilege
Moral
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
I Do Not Feel That We Should Set Up People As "models"; Rather Actions, Thoughts, Principles.
People
Principles
Action
The Most Important Issues To Address Are The Truly Existential Threats We Face: Climate Change And Nuclear War. On The Former, The Republican Leadership, In Splendid Isolation From The World, Is Almost Unanimously Dedicated To Destroying The Chances For Decent Survival; Strong Words, But No Exaggeration. There Is A Great Deal That Can Be Done At The Local And State Level To Counter Their Malign Project.
Strong
War
Survival
Farming Out Atrocities To Paramilitaries Is Standard Operating Procedure.
Atrocities
Farming
Procedures
I Wouldn't Say That The Efforts Of Academics To Critique The Media's Messages Are "half-hearted." As Far As I Am Aware, The Efforts Scarcely Exist: Very Few Even Pay Attention To The Question.
Media
Effort
Attention
Boards Of Directors Are Allowed To Work Together, So Are Banks And Investors And Corporations In Alliances With One Another And With Powerful States. That’s Just Fine. It’s Just The Poor Who Aren’t Supposed To Cooperate.
Powerful
Working Together
Directors
There Is No Evolutionary Pressure To Create Minds Capable Of Forming Sciences; It Just Happened. Evolutionary Pressure Has Not Led To Higher Rates Of Reproduction For People Capable Of Solving Scientific Problems Or Creating New Scientific Ideas. So If, In Fact, The Science-forming Capacities Evolved For Other Reasons, It Would Not Be Too Surprising If Those Particular Structures That Have Developed Proved To Be Rather Special In Their Nature, Reflecting The Contingencies Of Their Evolution Or The Working Of Physical Law.
Law
Ideas
Creating
As Soon As One Identifies, Challenges And Overcomes Illegitimate Power, He Or She Is An Anarchist. Most People Are Anarchists. What They Call Themselves Doesn’t Matter To Me. The World Is Full Of Suffering, Distress, Violence And Catastrophes. Students Must Decide: Does Something Concern You Or Not? I Say: Look Around, Analyze The Problems, Ask Yourself What You Can Do And Set Out On The Work!
People
Challenges
Suffering
The United States Is A Very Insular Society. Most People Know Very Little About The Outside World And Don't Care That Much. They're Concerned With Their Own Affairs.
People
Care
Littles
We Shouldn't Be Looking For Heroes, We Should Be Looking For Good Ideas.
Hero
Ideas
Should
We Need Not Stride Resolutely Towards Catastrophe, Merely Because Those Are The Marching Orders.
Order
Needs
Stride
Somebodys Paying The Corporations That Destroyed Iraq And The Corporations That Are Rebuilding It. Theyre Getting Paid By The American Taxpayer In Both Cases. So We Pay Them To Destroy The Country, And Then We Pay Them To Rebuild It. Those Are Gifts From U.s. Taxpayer To U.s. Corporations.
Country
Iraq
Pay
In A Society That Has Very High Concentration Of Capital In A Narrow Sector Of The Population, That's Going To Influence Everything In Different Ways.
Way
Population
Different
The Internet Is An élite Organization; Most Of The Population Of The World Has Never Even Made A Phone Call.
Phones
Organization
Population
Industrial Production Of Meat Makes A Huge Contribution To Global Warming.
Meat
Global Warming
Contribution
In Turkey Also, For A Long Time, The Military Was The Decisive Force But In The Past 10 Years They Have Backed Off Somewhat And The Civilian Government Has Gained More Independence And Autonomy Even To Shake Up The Military Command. In Fact, It Even Arrested Several High-ranking Officers [for Interfering In Governmental Affairs]. Maybe Pakistan Can Move In A Similar Direction.
Military
Moving
Past
Corporations Are Totalitarian Institutions. Board Of Directors At The Top Of Managers Give Orders, Everyone Follows Orders..... At The Very Bottom Of Command, If You Are Lucky You Can Rent Yourself To It And Get A Job , And If You Are Sufficiently Propagandized You May Even Buy Some Of The Junk They Produce And So On.
Jobs
Order
Giving
Presented With The Claims Of Nineteenth-century Racist Anthropology, A Rational Person Will Ask Two Sorts Of Questions: 'what Is The Scientific Status Of The Claims?' 'what Social Or Ideological Needs Do They Serve?'
Two
Needs
Racist
The Truth Of The Matter Is That About 99 Percent Of Teaching Is Making The Students Feel Interestedin The Material. Then The Other 1 Percent Has To Do With Your Methods. And That's Not Just True Of Languages. It's True Of Every Subject.
Education
Teaching
Reading
To Summarize, Draft Resistance Can Make Use Of The Inegalitarian Nature Of American Society As A Technique For Increasing The Cost Of American Aggression, And It Threatens Values That Are Important To Those In A Decision-making Position.
Decision
Important
Technique
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
Major Efforts Have To Be Undertaken To Bring The General Public To Understand The Real Reasons For Their Plight, And The Possibilities For Radical Social And Political Change To Construct Meaningful Popular Control Of All Institutions - In Communities, In The Workplace, In The Larger Society, And On To The International Order.
Meaningful
Real
Order
Sooner Or Later, Jihadist-style Terror And Wmd Are Going To Come Together And The Consequences Could Be Horrendous.
Wmd
Style
Together
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
We Have A Record For Nawaz Sharif But Not The Others. And Judging By The Record, It's Pretty Hard To Be Optimistic. His [sharif's] Previous Governments Were Very Corrupt And Regressive In The Policies Pursued.
Optimistic
Government
Judging
If Something Is Right (or Wrong) For Us, It’s Right (or Wrong) For Others. It Follows That If It’s Wrong For Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti, And A Long List Of Others To Bomb Washington And New York, Then It’s Wrong For Rumsfeld To Bomb Afghanistan (on Much Flimsier Pretexts), And He Should Be Brought Before War Crimes Trials.
New York
War
Long
The Rise Of What's Called Islamic Fundamentalism Is To A Significant Extent A Result Of The Collapse Of Secular Nationalist Alternatives Which Were Either Discredited Internally Or Destroyed, Leaving Few Other Options. Something Like That May Be True Of American Society.
Islamic
Leaving
Alternatives
Predatory Capitalism Created A Complex Industrial System And An Advanced Technology; It Permitted A Considerable Extension Of Democratic Practice And Fostered Certain Liberal Values, But Within Limits That Are Now Being Pressed And Must Be Overcome. It Is Not A Fit System For The Mid-twentieth Century.
Technology
Practice
Political
In England, Enclosure Programs Kind Of Destroyed The Commons. In The United States, It Happened Later. But, Ah, Now It's Happening In The World. The Last Remnant Of The Commons Is The Environment, Which The Indigenous People Are Still Trying To Preserve And We Sophisticated Rich People Are Trying To Destroy.
People
Trying
World
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
There Is A Phrase In Trade Theory; It's Called "kicking Away The Ladder." First You Violate The Rules - The Market Rules - And Then By The Time You Succeed In Developing, You Kick Away The Ladders So Others Can't Do It Too, And You Preach About "free Trade."
Kicking
Phrases
Ladders
The Labor Movement Can Be Rebuilt, As Has Happened Before After Sharp Declines.
Movement
Decline
Labor
The Main Selling Appeal Of Nafta To Us Corporations Is That It Gives Them An Advantage In The North American Market Over Their European And Japanese Competitors.
Giving
Corporations
Selling
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
Some [people] May Be "servants Of The Power Structure," But That Has To Be Shown. I Think It Often Can Be Shown, But The Burden Of Proof Is On The Critic Who Puts Forth That Thesis In Particular Cases.
Thinking
Burden Of Proof
Often Can
You Never Know How [donald Trump] Is Going To React. When He Learned For Example That He'd Lost The Election By About Three Million Votes, His Instant Reaction Was Insanity; You Know, Three To Five Million Illegal Immigrants Somehow Were Organized In Some Incredible Fashion To Vote.
Fashion
Insanity
Example
I Don't Use The Social Media But I Can See The Effects In My Own Correspondence. I Get A Ton Of Correspondence. It Used To Be Hard Copy And Now It's A Very Limited Amount Of Actual Letters People Write. So It's Mostly Email.
Writing
Media
People
Modern Science And Technology Can Relieve Men Of The Necessity For Specialized, Imbecile Labor. They May, In Principle, Provide The Basis For A Rational Social Order Based On Free Association And Democratic Control, If We Have The Will To Create It.
Technology
Men
Order
The Dangers Of Unexamined And Unregulated Monopoly Power, Particularly In The State Executive, Are Hardly News. The Right Reaction Is Not Passive Acquiescence.
Power
Acquiescence
News
The Prescription For Endless War Poses A Far Greater Danger To Americans Than Perceived Enemies Do, For Reasons The Terrorist Organisations Understand Very Well.
War
Enemy
Reason
The Person Who Wins The Nobel Prize Is Not The Person Who Read The Most Journal Articles And Took The Most Notes On Them. It's The Person Who Knew What To Look For. And Cultivating That Capacity To Seek What's Significant, Always Willing To Question Whether You're On The Right Track - That's What Education Is Going To Be About, Whether It's Using Computers And The Internet, Or Pencil And Paper, Or Books.
Book
Winning
Track
The Republican Establishment, The Mainstream Corporate Financial Wealth, Is Getting To A Point Where It Can't Control The Base It's Mobilized.
Financial
Republican
Wealth
Markets Are Lethal, If Only Because Of Ignoring Externalities, The Impacts Of Their Transactions On The Environment.
Impact
Environment
Transactions
An Effective Regulatory System Today Would Be One Guided By A Few Basic Premises That Can Be Applied Flexibly But Also Universally.
Today
Venezuela Is Independent. It's Diversifying Its Exports To A Limited Extent, Instead Of Just Being Dependent On Exports To The United States. And It's Initiating Moves Toward Latin American Integration And Independence. It's What They Call A Bolivarian Alternative And The United States Doesn't Like Any Of That.
Latin
Moving
Independent
We're Supposed To Worship Adam Smith But You're Not Supposed To Read Him. That's Too Dangerous.
Worship
Adam
Dangerous
A Language Is Not Just Words. It's A Culture, A Tradition, A Unification Of A Community, A Whole History That Creates What A Community Is. It's All Embodied In A Language.
Communication
Community
Culture
I Don't Really Think There Have Been Transitional Periods To Socialism. There Have Been Efforts, But They Have Usually Been Destroyed By A Combination Of External Force And Internal Corruption.
Thinking
Effort
Socialism
A Democracy Barely Functions Under The Neoliberal System.
Democracy
Function
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
In America, The Professor Talks To The Mechanic. They Are In The Same Category.
4th Of July
America
Mechanic
A Fundamental Element Of Human Nature Is The Need For Creative Work, For Creative Inquiry, For Free Creation Without The Arbitrary Limiting Effects Of Coercive Institutions. A Decent Society Should Maximize The Possibilities For This Fundamental Human Characteristic To Be Realized.
Creative
Needs
Arbitrary
In Europe There's An Dangerous Growth Of Ultra Xenophobia Which Is Pretty Threatening To Any One Who Remembers The History Of Europe... And An Attack On The Remnants Of The Welfare State. It's Hard To Interpret The Austerity-in-the-midst-of-recession Policy As Anything Other Than Attack On The Social Contract.
Xenophobia
Europe
Growth
There Could Be An Independent Labor-based Party, Which Might Over Time Become An Important Force The Way The Labor Party Did In England. To All Of These Things There Are Plenty Of Barriers, In The Culture And In The Social And Political Institutions, The Concentration Of Economic Power. But These Are Not Insuperable Barriers, I Think. They Can Be Overcome. And It Is Urgent That This Be Done, Because There Are Really Incredible Problems That Are Simply Not Being Addressed.
Party
Independent
Thinking
Stability Means You Do What We Say, And What We Say Is That Colombia And The Resources Of The Andean Region Shall Be Freely Available To The Rich And Powerful Of The World, Particularly Us-based Multinational Corporations.
Powerful
Mean
World
Every Book That Comes Out, Every Article That Comes Out, Talks About How - While It May Have Been A "mistake" Or An "unwise Effort" - The United States Was Defending South Vietnam From North Vietnamese Aggression. And They Portray Those Who Opposed The War As Apologists For North Vietnam. That's Standard To Say. The Purpose Is Obvious: To Obscure The Fact That The United States Did Attack South Vietnam And The Major War Was Fought Against South Vietnam.
War
Mistake
Book
...if You Ask Me Whether Or Not I'm An Atheist, I Wouldn't Even Answer. I Would First Want An Explanation Of What It Is That I'm Supposed Not To Believe In, And I've Never Seen An Explanation.
Atheist
Believe
Answers
The Washington Leadership Has Put Aside Non-proliferation Programmes And Devoted Its Energies And Resources To Driving The Country To War By Extraordinary Deceit, Then Trying To Manage The Catastrophe It Created In Iraq.
Country
War
Iraq
Whenever There Is Injustice, Oppression, Aggression, Violence, It's Standard For It To Be Supported By Those We Now Call "intellectuals," But Typically Not By All; There Is Typically A Fringe Of Dissidents. With Very Rare Exceptions - In Fact, It's Hard To Think Of Any - They Suffer In One Or Another Way; How Depends On The Nature Of The Society.
Thinking
Suffering
Way
After All, The Internet Originated Around 1960 And Wasn't Privatized Until 1995. That's Thirty Five Years In The Public Domain During The Hard, Creative Development Period.
Years
Creative
Development
A Big Producer Can Survive Price Fluctuations On The World Market. A Small Farmer Can't.
World
Bigs
Fluctuation
The People Of The Third World Need Our Sympathetic Understanding And, Much More Than That, They Need Our Help. We Can Provide Them With A Margin Of Survival By Internal Disruption In The United States. Whether They Can Succeed Against The Kind Of Brutality We Impose On Them Depends In Large Part On What Happens Here.
College
People
Understanding
Who Wrote The Bible? Current Scholarship, To My Knowledge, Assumes That The Material That Constitutes The Old Testament Was Put Together From Various Oral And Folk Traditions (many Of Them Going Far Back) In The Hellenistic Period. That Was One Of Several Currents, Of Which The Collection That Formed The New Testament Was Another.
Together
Assuming
Tradition
In Western Europe, Turkey Is Regarded As Uncivilized, So They Can't Come In Into The European Union Until They're Civilized. I Think It's The Other Way Around. If You Could Achieve The Level Of Civilization Of, Say, Turkish Intelectuals, It Would Be Quite An Achievement.
Thinking
Europe
Turkeys
For 500 Years, Since European Explorers Came, Latin American Countries Had Been Separated From One Another. They Had Very Limited Relations. Integration Is A Prerequisite For Independence.
Country
Latin
Years
During The Terrorist Regime In Haiti In The 1990s, The Cia, Under The Administration Of Bill Clinton, Was Reporting To Congress That Oil Shipments Had Been Blocked From Entering Haiti. That Was Just A Lie. I Was There. You Could See The Oil Terminals Being Built And The Ships Coming In.
Lying
Oil
Entering
Nixon At One Point Informs Kissinger . . . That He Wanted Bombing Of Cambodia. And Kissinger Loyally Transmits The Order To The Pentagon To Carry Out A Massive Bombing Campaign In Cambodia. Anything That Flies On Anything That Moves . . . Genocide.
Moving
Order
Campaigns
Some Of [donald Trump] Comments Can Be Interpreted As Potentially Reducing The Threat Of Nuclear War. The Major Threat Right Now Is Right On The Russian Border. Notice, Not The Mexican Border, The Russian Border. And It's Serious. He Has Made Various Statements Moving Towards Reducing The Tensions, Accommodating Russian Concerns And So On.
War
Moving
Mexican Border
Borders Are Semiporous. Capital Flows More Freely Than People Across Them. On C Span.
People
Borders
Flow
While I Think In Principle People Should Not Have Irrational Beliefs, I Should Say That As A Matter Of Fact, It Is People Who Hold What I Regard As Completely Irrational Beliefs Who Are Among The Most Effective Moral Actors In The World, In Many Respects. They're Among The Worst, But Also Among The Best, Even Though The Moral Beliefs Are Ostensibly The Same.
Thinking
People
Principles
These Are Fashionable People Who Call Themselves Philosophers.
People
Philosopher
Fashionable
I Have Trouble Reading Modern Hebrew. In The 1950s, I Could Read Anything. I Don't Know How Much Experience You've Had With Contemporary Hebrew. It's Quite Difficult.
Reading
Hebrew
Trouble
Suppose Vietnam Could Separate Itself From The American Dominated Global System And Carry Out A Successful Social And Economic Development. Then That Is Very Dangerous Because Then It Could Be A Model To Other Movements And Groups In Neighboring Countries. And Gradually There Could Be An Erosion From Within By Indigenous Forces Of American Domination Of The Region.
Country
Successful
Erosion
The Two Countries [pakistan And India] Have Already Come Close To Nuclear Confrontation Twice And This Could Get Worse. So Dealing With The Relationship With India Is Extremely Important.
Country
Two
Important
Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

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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