La moustache

Du temps où il était le correspondant du New York Times à Jérusalem, Thomas Friedman était mon idole journalistique, un raconteur hors pair capable de nous faire voir, sentir, entendre et comprendre la vie et la politique en Israël et dans les territoires palestiniens.

Rencontre avec Thomas Friedman, Richard Hétu, 27 mars 2010

QUESTION: Is there a reason why American reporting has improved? Does it reflect a change in attitudes either among the American public or elite?

CHOMSKY: I think it's a mixture. For one thing there are a couple of good reporters there. I was very pleased to see that The New York Times withdrew Thomas Friedman. That made it possible for some good reporting. They sent John Kifner, who is a very good professional journalist. When they send John Kifner somewhere it's because they want the story to come out, not because they want it to be covered up. Friedman's job is to cover it up. Similarly in the [Washington] Post there was good reporting. The Boston Globe had, perhaps, the best reporting of all.

On Trip to Middle East: Noam Chomsky interviewed by Burton Levine,
Shmate: A Journal of Progressive Jewish Thought, 20, Été 1988

Ce n'est pas une conspiration

When…the ITN report was hailed as a great image, should the team have stood up and publicly said, “Hey, hang on a minute. It wasn’t quite like that.” In an ideal world, yes…. But given the commercial pressures of modern TV and the fact that to have spoken out would hardly endear the ITN crew to their employers and might even have endangered their jobs, it is understandable but not forgivable that no one chose to do so.

Phillip Knightley, submissions for the LM defense, 28 décembre 1998. —Reproduit dans Alexander Cockburn, "Storm Over Brockes' Fakery," CounterPunch, Novembre 2005

Vulliamy's Smears, Edward Herman et David Peterson, 23 novembre 2009

Clarté

Williams writes that the United States was "certainly wrong" in failing to intervene to prevent the horrendous Indonesian crimes. That has been the standard line of apologists: We "looked away" instead of intervening to stop the crimes. But as Williams and others who resort to this evasion know very well, the United States and United Kingdom most definitely did not fail to intervene during the quarter-century of Indonesian aggression and atrocities. Rather, they did intervene, and massively: By providing decisive support for these crimes, continuing to do so as the crimes accelerated again in 1999, even after the destruction of Dili in September, which elicited from Clinton's National Security Adviser Sandy Berger the statement that "I don't think anybody ever articulated a doctrine which said that we ought to intervene wherever there's a humanitarian problem" — so therefore the United States and United Kingdom continued their crucial participation.

Even more remarkably, Williams writes that "Chomsky points out that it was Clinton's intervention that persuaded the Indonesian generals that the game was up in East Timor. Yes it was long overdue, but it was an American intervention, which deserves some grudging credit."

The intervention Williams praises was Clinton's termination of U.S. participation in the aggression and atrocities. By Williams' logic, he should praise Russia for intervening in Afghanistan by withdrawing its troops in 1989. It would be instructive to see if even the most extreme Communist Party loyalist stooped to that.

The nature of his apologetics becomes even clearer when we consider the statement of mine to which he is responding:

To end the atrocities in [East Timor] would not have required bombing, or sanctions, or indeed any act beyond withdrawal of participation. That was demonstrated shortly after Berger's reaffirmation of Western policy, when, under strong domestic and international pressure, Clinton formally ended US participation. The invaders immediately withdrew, and a UN peacekeeping force was able to enter facing no army. That could have been done any time in the preceding quarter-century. Astonishingly, this horrendous story was soon reinterpreted as vindication of R2P, a reaction so shameful that words fail.

Williams' reiteration of this shameful stance leaves one truly speechless.

Response to Williams, Noam Chomsky, 1er septembre 2009

Création d'un monde nouveau

U.S. author, dissident intellectual, and Professor of Linguistics at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology Noam Chomsky met for the first time with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in Caracas and analyzed hemispheric politics during a nationally televised forum on Monday.

Chomsky is well known in Venezuela for his critiques of U.S. imperialism and support for the progressive political changes underway in Venezuela and other Latin American countries in recent years. President Chavez regularly references Chomsky in speeches and makes widely publicized recommendations of Chomsky's 2003 book, Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance.

"Hegemony or survival; we opt for survival," said Chavez in a press conference to welcome Chomsky. He compared Chomsky's thesis to that of German socialist Rosa Luxemburg in the early 1900s, "Socialism or Barbarism," and referred to Chomsky as "one of the greatest defenders of peace, one of the greatest pioneers of a better world."

Through an interpreter, Chomsky responded, "I write about peace and criticize the barriers to peace; that's easy. What's harder is to create a better world... and what's so exciting about at last visiting Venezuela is that I can see how a better world is being created."

During Monday's forum, which was broadcast on the state television station VTV, Chomsky pointed out that the ongoing coup in Honduras, which began on June 28th, is the third coup the United States has supported in Latin America so far this century, following the coup against Chavez in 2002 and Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004.

The nearly finalized deal to allow the U.S. to increase its military presence on Colombian bases "is only part of a much broader effort to restore Washington's capacity for intervention," said Chomsky.

According to Chomsky, the region has the capacity to unite and form a "peace zone" in which foreign militaries are forbidden to operate. "Venezuela can help to advance this proposal, but it cannot do it alone," he said.

"The transformations that Venezuela is making toward the creation of another socio-economic model could have a global impact if these projects are successfully carried out," said the renowned author.

Aporrea.org, a popular Venezuelan news and pro-revolution analysis website, described Chomsky as oriented toward "libertarian socialism" and "vehemently anti-Stalinist" in an introduction to a recent interview in which Chomsky said U.S. President Barack Obama's foreign policy will be similar to that of the second administration of former U.S. President George W. Bush.

Chomsky addressed this issue during Monday's conference as well, commenting that Obama "could have much to offer Latin America if he wanted to, but hasn't given any signals that he does." He cited the U.S.'s indecisive posture toward the coup in Honduras as evidence.

Chomsky also addressed the media and freedom of expression in the U.S. "In the United States the socio-economic system is designed so that the control over the media is in the hands of a minority who own large corporations... and the result is that the financial interests of those groups are always behind the so-called freedom of expression," he said.

Chomsky said the growing disappointment with the Obama administration in the U.S. was predictable because the corporate media marketed Obama's presidential candidacy on the slogan of "Change We Can Believe In" but omitted concrete proposals for effective changes, and the Obama administration has since shown an incapacity to institute such changes.

Chomsky was accompanied in Caracas by the co-founder of South End Press and ZMagazine and system operator of ZCom, Michael Albert, and the co-founder and editor of Venezuelanalysis.com, sociologist Gregory Wilpert.

Noam Chomsky Meets with Chavez in VenezuelaJames Suggett, 28 août 2009

Infériorisation totale

[...] but you’ve said in a recent analysis that this has been Israeli policy almost from the founding of the state, the attack on civilian populations. Could you explain?

NOAM CHOMSKY: They say so. I was just quoting the chief of staff—this is thirty years ago, virtually no Palestinian terrorism in Israel, virtually. He said, “Our policy has been to attack civilians.” And the reason was explained—you know, villages, towns, so on. And it was explained by Abba Eban, the distinguished statesman, who said, “Yes, that’s what we’ve done, and we did it for a good reason. There was a rational prospect that if we attack the civilian population and cause it enough pain, they will press for a, what he called, “a cessation of hostilities.” That’s a euphemism meaning cessation of resistance against Israel’s takeover of the—moves which were going on at the time to take over the Occupied Territories. So, sure, if they—“We’ll kill enough of them, so that they’ll press for quiet to permit us to continue what we’re doing.”

Actually, you know, Obama today didn’t put it in those words, but the meaning is approximately the same. That’s the meaning of his silence over the core issue of settling and takeover of the Occupied Territories and eliminating the possibility for any Palestinian meaningful independence, omission of this. But Eban [inaudible], who I was quoting, chief of staff, would have also said, you know, “And my heart bleeds for the civilians who are suffering. But what can we do? We have to pursue the rational prospect that if we cause them enough pain, they’ll call off any opposition to our takeover of their lands and resources.”

Noam Chomsky à Democracy Now, 23 janvier 2009



On Saturday December 27, the latest US-Israeli attack on helpless Palestinians was launched. The attack had been meticulously planned, for over 6 months according to the Israeli press. The planning had two components: military and propaganda. It was based on the lessons of Israel's 2006 invasion of Lebanon, which was considered to be poorly planned and badly advertised. We may, therefore, be fairly confident that most of what has been done and said was pre-planned and intended.

That surely includes the timing of the assault: shortly before noon, when children were returning from school and crowds were milling in the streets of densely populated Gaza City. It took only a few minutes to kill over 225 people and wound 700, an auspicious opening to the mass slaughter of defenseless civilians trapped in a tiny cage with nowhere to flee.

"Exterminate all the Brutes": Gaza 2009, Noam Chomksy, transcription de Chomsky on Gaza Public Forum, MIT, 13 janvier 2009

The best and the brightest

So let's go back to the evidence that we have, rhetoric and actions. Rhetoric we know, but what are the actions? So far the major actions are selections, in fact the only action, of personnel to implement Brand Obama. The first choice was the Vice President, Joe Biden, one of the strongest supporters of the war in Iraq in the Senate, a long time Washington insider rarely deviates from the party vote. In cases where he does deviate they're not very uplifting. He did break from the party and voting for a Senate resolution that prevented people from getting rid of their debts by, individuals, that is, from getting rid of their debts by going into bankruptcy. It's a blow against poor people who've caught in this immense debt that's a large part of the basis for the economy these days. But usually, he's a, kind of, straight party-liner with the democrats on the sort of ultra naturalist side. The choice of Biden was a, must have been a conscious attempt to show contempt for the base of people who were voting for Obama, or organizing for him as an anti-war candidate.

Well, the first post-election appointment was for Chief of Staff, which is a crucial appointment; determines a large part of the president's agenda. That was Rahm Emanuel, one of the strongest supporters of the war in Iraq in the House. In fact, he was the only member of the Illinois delegation who voted for Bush's effective declaration of war. And, again, a longtime Washington insider. Also, one of the leading recipients in congress of funding from the financial institutions hedge funds and so on. He himself was an investment banker. That's his background. So, that's the Chief of Staff.

The next group of appointments were the main problem, the primary issue that the governments' going to have to face is what to do about the financial crisis. Obama's choices to more or less run this were Robert Rubin and Larry Summers from the Clinton -- Secretaries of Treasury under Clinton. They are among the people who are substantially responsible for the crisis. One leading economist, one of the few economists who has been right all along in predicting what's happening, Dean Baker, pointed out that selecting them is like selecting Osama Bin Laden to run the war on terror.

Is There Truth in Obama's Advertising?, Noam Chomsky, 28 novembre 2008


Le titre du billet est de Donald Cuccioletta lors de la revue de l'actualité à Bazzo.tv, semaine du 27 novembre. L'invité était RDD, qui n'a pas mentionné Esther Delisle une seule fois, il était même intéressant à écouter.

Chomky sur la crise

Of course, all this is increased still further by the fanaticism of the market fundamentalists who dismantled the regulatory apparatus and permitted the creation of exotic and opaque financial instruments.

The Financial Crisis of 2008, entrevue par Simone Bruno, 13 octobre 2008

Notez: increased.

Humour Chomskyien

There were, to be sure, some who shared Mark Twain’s despair. One distinguished example is Chris Patten, former EU commissioner for external relations, chairman of the British Conservative Party, chancellor of Oxford University and a member of the House of Lords. He wrote that the Western reaction “is enough to make even the cynical shake their heads in disbelief” – referring to Europe’s failure to respond vigorously to the effrontery of Russian leaders, who, “like 19th-century tsars, want a sphere of influence around their borders.”

Patten rightly distinguishes Russia from the global superpower, which long ago passed the point where it demanded a sphere of influence around its borders, and demands a sphere of influence over the entire world.

[...] standard principles formulated by high-level planners during World War II, which offered the prospect of global dominance. In the postwar world, they determined, the US should aim “to hold unquestioned power” while ensuring the “limitation of any exercise of sovereignty” by states that might interfere with its global designs. To secure these ends, “the foremost requirement [is] the rapid fulfillment of a program of complete rearmament,” a core element of “an integrated policy to achieve military and economic supremacy for the United States.” The plans laid during the war were implemented in various ways in the years that followed.

The goals are deeply rooted in stable institutional structures. Hence they persist through changes in occupancy of the White House, and are untroubled by the opportunity for “peace dividends”, the disappearance of the major rival from the world scene, or other marginal irrelevancies. Devising new challenges is never beyond the reach of doctrinal managers, as when Ronald Reagan strapped on his cowboy boots and declared a national emergency because the Nicaraguan army was only two days from Harlingen Texas, and might lead the hordes who are about to “sweep over the United States and take what we have,” as Lyndon Johnson lamented when he called for holding the line in Vietnam. Most ominously, those holding the reins may actually believe their own words.

Ossetia-Russia-Georgia, Noam Chomsky, septembre 2008

À Paris 2

via-1 Denis Robert debout, Philippe Val couché, Jean-François Diana, 3 juillet 2008


Sur le même sujet, lire aussi Philippe Val Fait Sa Vilenie Mercredique, Vive le feu, 25 juin 2008

Le blogue de Denis Robert: la domination du monde

À Paris

Chine v.s. Israël

Take the recent US-backed Israeli violence in the OT and Chinese violence in Tibet. The former is far greater, and the justifications far weaker. Just imagine how the US and Israel would react if Palestinians in illegally annexed East Jerusalem were to burn down a bank and Jewish stores, attack Jews, etc., as in Tibet We can then compare the actual reactions. In the case of US-backed Israeli violence and illegal actions in the OT, overwhelming support for embattled Israel. In the case of Chinese violence in Tibet, much grandstanding, as when Nancy Pelosi -- an enthusiastic supporter of Israeli violence -- declares passionately that if we don’t stand up for Tibet we will lose our "moral authority" (she didn’t explain on what that authority rests).

One can proceed -- that is, if one is interested in truth and justice and immune to shrieks of horror and a deluge of brickbats.

Chomsky replies on Zcom sustainers forum regarding Palestine and Tibet, 26 mars 2008

The Most Wanted List, Noam Chomsky, 26 février 2008

"Good News," Iraq and Beyond, Noam Chomsky, 16 février 2008

Variations autour d'un même thème

Tient, de Manufacturing Consent: Chomsky And The Media:




Avec un peu de chance, voici ce qui nous attend au Québec:

Ça ne vient pas de François Brousseau

Before saying a word, I’d like to express some severe personal discomfort, because anything I say will be abstract and dry and restrained. The crimes against Palestinians in the Occupied Territories and elsewhere, particularly Lebanon, are so shocking that the only emotionally valid reaction is rage and a call for extreme actions. But that does not help the victims. And, in fact, it’s likely to harm them. We have to face the reality that our actions have consequences, and they have to be adapted to real-world circumstances, difficult as it may be to stay calm in the face of shameful crimes in which we are directly and crucially implicated.

[...] Bostonians could read in the Boston Globe a few days ago that at the Taba Conference in January 2001—now quoting—“Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak accepted ideas floated by President Bill Clinton that would have produced a Palestinian state in 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of Gaza,” but these forthcoming gestures failed. The evil Palestinians refused Israel’s generous offers, keeping to their time-honored insistence on seizing defeat from the jaws of victory and proving they’re not partners for negotiation.

Well, there’s one fragment of truth in this conventional fabrication: there was a conference in Taba. And, in fact, it did come close to a possible settlement, but the rest is pure invention. In particular, the conference was terminated abruptly by Prime Minister Barak. The truth is completely unacceptable, so the facts are either suppressed, as they generally are, or, as in this case, just inverted. And we can expect a good deal more of that. Actually, the truth about the Taba Conference merits attention. That week, in one week in January 2001, that was the one moment in thirty years when the United States and Israel abandoned the rejectionist stance that they have maintained in virtual isolation until the present.

Not Through Annapolis: Noam Chomsky Says Path to Mideast Peace Lies in Popular Organizing Against U.S.-Israeli “Rejectionism”, Democracy Now, 27 novembre 2007

Vidéo [flux Real Video]

Chomsky sur l'Iran

Noam Chomsky on U.S. policy towards Iran: [partie 1] Are assumptions about Iran wrong?, The Real News Network, 19 novembre 2007

À Paris

I've received many requests to comment, and have heard some crazed reactions, but almost all from Europe, in fact mostly Paris. Here as far as I know there hasn't been much interest, apart from extremist right-wing and ultranationalist Zionist circles, who will leap on anything to defame someone who doesn't worship their holy states with sufficient ardor.

Chomsky from Znet sustainers forum on being mentioned by Bin Laden, 21 septembre 2007

Contexte: Philippe Val, directeur de Charlie Hebdo, qui fait son intellectuel parisien, lire Philippe Val sur France Inter : un récital de mensonges et de calomnies contre Chomsky, Henri Maler, 17 septembre 2007. Merci urukvideomachine

De l'auteur de Glengarry Glen Ross

David Mamet (b. 1947): Not an imbecile, at least according to Noam Chomsky.

The apostate Jew is a “fraud.” “The world hates the Jews,” and so “his delusion of freedom to choose sentences him to a life of disappointment.” He “muddles toward community and calls it yoga, self-help, agnosticism, Buddhism.” Or he tries “sports,” and “college tutoring,” and will pay outrageous sums for “an inert white cream that has been suggested to reverse the aging process.” He is “deluded” to think he can integrate into “society at large.” He thinks the Holocaust “was not tragic.”

Mamet Embraces Ritual, Spews Venom at Lapsed Jews, Philip Weiss, 8 octobre 2006


via-1 David Peterson.

Ça vaut tellement la peine de se coller le nez sur ce site-là

Arab Peace Initiative
By Noam Chomsky

The Arab League Peace Plan of 2002 is what was called here the "Saudi Plan." It has just been renewed. In 2002, the US and Israel simply dismissed it, and I don't recall media commentary. It is pretty much a version of the international consensus that was articulated clearly for the first time in January 1976 at the Security Council, in a resolution brought by the major Arab states, vetoed by the US (again in 1980). With the Security Council eliminated by the veto, the same principles came up almost annually in the General Assembly, under pressure from the third world and the non-aligned movement, but with Europe also going along. The votes were usually something like 150-3 (US, Israel, sometimes a client state like El Salvador). Standard for General Assembly votes on a wide range of issues. The basic principle is a two-state settlement on the international (pre-June 1967) borders, with minor and mutual border adjustments, incorporating the wording of UN 242 (all states in the region have the right to exist in peace and security within recognized borders, etc.). In 1988 the Palestinian National Council formally accepted this proposal, having tacitly backed it since the mid-1970s. The reaction of the Israeli coalition government (Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Shamir) was to declare that there can be no "additional" Palestinian state between Jordan and Israel (Jordan, by implication, being a Palestinian state), and that the fate of the territories would be settled in accord with the guidelines of the Israeli government. That proposal was adopted without qualification by the Bush I administration (the Baker plan of December 1989). That is the most extreme rejectionist stand taken by any US administration. All of this is doctrinally unacceptable in the US, in fact the West generally, so suppressed. But the facts are uncontroversial.

The Arab League plan goes beyond earlier versions of the international consensus by calling for full normalization of relations with Israel.

By now, the US and Israel can't simply ignore it, because US relations with Saudi Arabia are too tenuous, and because of the catastrophic effects of the Iraq invasion (and the great regional concern that the US will go on to attack Iran, very strongly opposed in the region, apart from Israel). So therefore the US and Israel are departing slightly from their extreme unilateral rejectionism, at least in rhetoric, though not in substance.

The plan has overwhelming international support, of course from the Third World (the "South"), which, as mentioned, has been in the lead in pressing the basic proposal for 30 years, but also again Europe. It's supported by the Arab states and by Iran. Hezbollah has been quite clear that though it does not like it, it will not disrupt any agreement that the Palestinians reach. Hamas has indicated that it will support it. That includes its most militant faction, headed by Khaled Maashal in Damascus, who said that Hamas would accept an Arab consensus -- namely, the Arab League plan, now renewed. A large majority of Americans supported the Saudi plan when it was announced, and presumably still do, though I don't know of current polls. That leaves the US-Israel in their usual stance of splendid isolation, opposing a diplomatic settlement -- not just in words, but in deeds: the massive settlement/infrastructure projects in the West Bank, and all the rest.

In fairness, it should be pointed out that there was one week in which the US-Israel departed from their unilateral rejectionism: in January 2001, in Taba Egypt. Israeli and Palestinian negotiators came close to a settlement on all outstanding issues, and in their last press conference, stated jointly that with a little more time, they could finalize an agreement. Israeli Prime Minister Barak called off the negotiations early, presumably to prevent that outcome. The Clinton administration didn't object. We don't know more about the internal discussions. Shortly after came Bush-Sharon, and formal negotiations stopped, but informal (Track II) negotiations continued, leading to the Geneva accord between high-level Israeli and Palestinian figures, but unofficial. It received strong world support as usual. Israel rejected it. The US ignored it. It was dismissed with little-disguised ridicule in the mainstream US press, where it was noticed at all. It was quite detailed, more or less in line with the Taba negotiations and the international consensus. There certainly is a basis for settlement, and it's been well-known for a long time what the basic contours are, but it cannot progress as long as it is blocked by the US.

The pretense here is that the US has been an honest broker, but didn't pay enough attention to diplomacy under Bush, matters now being remedied by Rice. The posture cannot survive inspection of the extensive public record, which is therefore suppressed, in the familiar fashion.

ZNet Commentary, 9 avril 2007

Juste pour le plaisir de le bloguer avant qu'il ne soit publié pour le vrai

Beware of State Power, Noam Chomsky interviewé par George McLeod, 3 avril 2007

Ça va en prendre des bons juifs dans un Israël indépendant

She will be remembered not only as a resolute and honorable defender of the rights of Palestinians, but also as one of those who have struggled to defend the moral integrity of her own Israeli society, and its hope for decent survival.

In Memory Of Tanya Reinhart, Noam Chomsky, 23 mars 2007

J'y suis allé pour la stricte référence, mais, évidemment, remplacez dans par pour dans le titre pour que ça ait vraiment du sens.

Barrie Zwicker is a jew

Ça débute ici: [entrevue, google video]. Barrie Zwicker interview Chomsky dans le cadre d’une émission religieuse, 360 Vision. C'est une bonne entrevue. Puis voilà le monsieur conspirationniste du 11 septembre [strategy session, google video]. Et pan à 22:50: Noam Chomsky est un garde-barrière de la gauche (left gatekeeper), parce qu'il ne croit pas à la thèse conspirationniste, et ce tout de suite après que Zwicker eut palabré sur l'importance de ne pas crier de noms, puis d'inclure tous les points de vue, donnant l'exemple de webfairy... C'est un thème récurrent chez les conspirationnistes de tout acabit, chercher les traîtres, les infiltrateurs et les agents ennemis. Alex Jones a lui aussi Chomsky dans sa mire.

Il est clair que le mouvement conspirationniste est infiltré et larvé: le départ forcé du Pr. Steven Jones de Scholars for 9/11 Truth en fait foi; mais lancer des fatwa ne prouve pas sa droiture, peut-être est-ce même l'inverse.

Je suis en désaccord avec Chomsky au sujet du zionisme (pas sur le lobby juif, sa logique est parfaitement correcte), et je suis moi-même fort attentif aux argumentaires conspirationnistes du 11 septembre, d'autant plus que les dissidents états-uniens y ont opposé une résistance pathétique, ce dernier texte ayant aussi été publié sur ZMag, mais ça ne le rend pas moins essentiel pour autant. Scepticisme est un mot bien faible pour décrire le sentiment que j'éprouve face à ces gens qui voudrait que l'on se prive d'un tel intellect pour ... pourquoi au juste ? Pouvez pas simplement le citer et le réfuter ? Et Barrie Zwicker est un juif. Noam aussi, en passant: [FrenchConnection_5, wmv video].

Joyeux Chomsky

Petits problèmes de connection internet...

Ahhhh que ça fait du bien. L'Irak:

There are, then, very powerful reasons why the US-UK are likely to try in every possible way to maintain effective control over Iraq. The US is not constructing a palatial Embassy, by far the largest in the world and virtually a separate city within Baghdad, and pouring money into military bases, with the intention of leaving Iraq to Iraqis. All of this is quite separate from the expectations that matters can be arranged so that US corporations profit from the vast riches of Iraq.

These topics, though surely high on the agenda of planners, are not within the realm of discussion, as can easily be determined. That is only to be expected. These considerations violate the fundamental doctrine that state power has noble objectives, and while it may make terrible blunders, it can have no crass motives and is not influenced by domestic concentrations of private power. Any questioning of these Higher Truths is either ignored or bitterly denounced, also for good reasons: allowing them to be discussed could undermine power and privilege. I don't, incidentally, suggest that commentators have much awareness of this. In our society, intellectual elites are deeply indoctrinated, a point that Orwell noted in his (unpublished) introduction to Animal Farm on how self-censorship works in free societies. A large part of the reason, he plausibly concluded, is a good education, which instills the understanding that there are certain things "it wouldn't do to say" -- or more accurately, even to think.

Iraq: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, Noam Chomsky & Michael Albert

Si vous n'en lisez qu'un, cet autre must: l'industrie du Cambodge. Tout citoyen devrait réfléchir avec attention à ces questions:

The preceding illustrates one of the crucial functions of the various industries, in Finkelstein's sense. Their advocates surely understand very well that mendacity and deceit require merely a phrase, when one is lining up with power. But correction takes time and effort. One service of the industries, doubtless intended, is to immobilize critics of the crimes of concentrated power.

The Cambodia Industry, Noam Chomsky, 21 décembre 2006

Et pour rester informé sur l'Amérique Latine:

There was a meeting on the weekend of December 9-10 in Cochabamba in Bolivia of major South American leaders. It was a very important meeting. One index of its importance is that it was unreported, virtually unreported apart from the wire services. So every editor knew about it.

Historical Perspectives on Latin American and East Asian Regional Development, Noam Chomsky, 24 décembre 2006