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Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Chomsky and his Ilk

This is actually pretty funny. It's about Noam Chomsky's recent sejour with Hezbollah. I don't know how one can take seriously a grown man who uses phrases like "imperialistic forces." Once you're past high school, you shouldn't be talking that way. Cross-posted at Wonkitties.

Posted by wonkitties on May 23, 2006 in International Affairs | Permalink

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Comments

Gnome Chompsky is not a grown man at all ... he is a commie retard with a post graduate degree ... so you know what to expect from that!

Posted by: Duke McGoo | 2006-05-23 11:45:21 AM


Please clarify. Chomsky was there ...why?

Posted by: lwestin | 2006-05-23 11:58:04 AM


... to support the terrorists. Why do you ask?

Posted by: Warwick | 2006-05-23 12:03:53 PM


Wrong thread I know but I need to comment about
Hitchens.

As far as I'm concerned, He could have stayed home.

He pretends to be more intelligent and grown up than other people.

Another one before him did that, saying the bible would cease to exist. Voltaire was the one. Now his house has become a place to print bibles. One day he will die and have to face his Creator.

Posted by: Rémi Houle | 2006-05-23 12:17:04 PM


"I don't know how one can take seriously a grown man who uses phrases like "imperialistic forces.""

This from a hack who has this to say about eggs:

"Sometimes I cannot get beyond the fact that I am eating fetuses, sometimes I crave them to no end"

Posted by: Justin... | 2006-05-23 1:02:57 PM


Justin:

Other than that appendage at the top of your head, what's your point?

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-23 1:11:20 PM


He also called the Iranian regime "a democratic one resisting the will of imperialists"

This guy is pathetically stupid and clueless, if u will

Posted by: Winston | 2006-05-23 1:38:53 PM


Winston:

A brilliant double-slam.

Got both Chomsky and Justin at once.

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-23 1:42:31 PM


I wonder why anyone would pay any attention to this nut. Like all leftists, he does not walk the talk. They are an interesting bunch in that they seek, knowingly or not, the destruction of Western civilization, the very one which grants them the freedom of their soapbox.

Posted by: verdad | 2006-05-23 3:42:37 PM


Treason is no longer a crime .. apparently

Posted by: John | 2006-05-23 3:44:02 PM


Treason might be too strong a word, since the US is not at war with Palestine.

If he ran in an election, how many votes do you suppose he'd get?

Yet in a democracy, he and his ilk (I love that word) would always have a soapbox, as do all those who can convince others they are a victim of some type.

At best, Chomsky is articulate, yet delusional ... like many of his ilk (yeehaw) of university-educated automatons.

Ilk, Ilk, Ilk, Ilk, Ilk ... everybody say ilk.

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-23 4:18:09 PM



like many of his ilk (yeehaw) of university-educated automatons.

Yes indeed and these fools think that after all they had to go through to get that education and with the cost etc ... they are OWED!!

Perhaps that's where the entitlement mentality started. Makes sense.

Personally I avoided all the so-called education and am able to pass those savings along to my customers.

Posted by: John | 2006-05-23 6:05:49 PM


What do the terrorists get out of it? Also, how did Chomsky get INTO Lebanon? Isn't the gov't there 50/50 Muslim and Christian?

I don't know how revered he may be in the LEFT, but he's a deconstructionist - right? How can he help anyone, other than a cheap publicity stunt here and there. Doesn't that kind of activity take away from his 'intellectual cache?

Posted by: lwestin | 2006-05-23 6:27:07 PM


Maybe, just maybe, Noam Chomsky's bloated ego has been somewhat diminished by the fact that his audience has been reduced to "alternative press" kooks and he craves the spotlight.

Posted by: Howard Roark | 2006-05-23 7:48:43 PM


Maybe he was auditioning for a bit role in a jihadist Hack off Their Heads flick.

Now, that would get him the noteriety he so desperately seeks.

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-23 8:03:04 PM


Obviously Chomsky is entitled to his (misguided) views, but he ought to realize that visiting Lebanese prisions and praising terrorists only makes him look like a pathetic idiot.

I guess its good that the left has people like him spouting out their ideas - he clearly articulates how wrong they are.

Posted by: Andrew Smith | 2006-05-23 8:28:28 PM


I wonder why commies such as Chimpsky LIVE in a capitalist state

Pack your stuff and go to Cuba or North Korea and enjoy all the comforts of Communism there

Posted by: Winston | 2006-05-23 8:28:34 PM


Go, Oilers go!

Piss off, Noam, piss off!

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-23 10:43:09 PM


All kinds of ilk ... having a good time and, didja hear, the bars in Edmonton are running out of beer on hockey nights.

The Ilk of the Oil march on to the Cup final!

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-24 11:10:36 AM


Sadly Noam Chomsky is actually taken quite seriously by "intellectuals" in our "universities".

SYF: Seriously though, doesn't it seem hollow to watch the NHL playoffs knowing that the Jets could be there...imagine that, Jets vs. Oilers western confrence final.

Posted by: WinnipegLibertarian | 2006-05-24 11:46:34 AM


Chomsky is just another rich guy who has found a way to sell crap to those who 'want to believe'. Idiots.

Posted by: infidel | 2006-05-24 12:27:45 PM


My first introduction to the self-loathing Chomsky was unforgettable. In my first year of college, while completely apolitical, I befriended a Che-clad pseudo revolutionary kid who would preach from his bible of Manufacturing Consent. At the time didn't care one way or the other for politics, but I must say I did find Chomsky's verbal bile quite amusing. (One time my friend, knowing I was a huge sport's fan, tried to explain "Noam's theory" that professional sports were just the state's way of distracting the people (yawn). I told him he should read more on Greek and Roman history if he really thought that's was Chomsky intellectual contribution in the year 1997.

Anyway one day this friend tell me e that 'ol Noam is speaking at UofT and asked if I wanted to come? I figured, why not, at least for shits and giggles. Then he tells me it's $150 a plate.
For the oppressed masses, I suppose? I hear is speaking fee these days is up to $50,000. And we can all be sure he's responsibly redistributing that wealth can't we. I wouldn't be surprised if you could draw a straight line from Hezbollah to a New England bank account.

Posted by: Stopthetrain | 2006-05-24 12:30:29 PM


Chomsky is being misrepresented here. First, his policital writings and rantings do not have high respect in the intellectual community, at least among political theory and political science types. This is not Chomsky's academic field. Linguistics is. Now there Chomsky is seen as a force to be reckoned with, and he is. Chomsky was wrong on some major points and has retreated somewhat, but he is still respect. Further, Chomsky can in no sense be called deconstructionist. Indeed, he appears to react strongly against that trend in language; Chomsky has historically ascribed to innate universal grammar, which is diametrically opposed to deconstructionism. Chomsky has relented concerning the innateness, and now seems to concede that computational constraints limit the possible viable grammatical rule structures, rather than innate universal grammar, but he is still a long was from deconstructionism.

Regarding Chomsky's political theory, there is an element of truth to what he says, in the sense of it forms a coherent perspective. Anything complex has hundreds, thousands of simultaneous causes and the value of critical analysis is to both unveil ones invisible to predominant ideology, but also to weigh the materiality of the numerous influences. Chomsky (to my mind) seriously misjudges as to how much weight he gives his pet considerations.

Posted by: murray | 2006-05-24 1:15:17 PM


Thanks for that thorough, indepth and scholarly debunking of Chomsky`s life work. You convinced me.

Posted by: Clap Clap. | 2006-05-24 1:38:06 PM


"Sometimes I cannot get beyond the fact that I am eating fetuses, sometimes I crave them to no end"

Posted by: Justin... | 2006-05-24 2:39:41 PM


?

Posted by: lwestin | 2006-05-24 3:02:32 PM


Justin, is this a quote from Dr. Morgentaler's upcoming memoirs?

Posted by: Howard Roark | 2006-05-24 8:33:28 PM


Wpg:

Busy day.

Go, Jets, go.

New arena, nobody willing to buck up.

Anybody put a bid on Pittsburgh? Would be nice to see Kid Sid more than once every couple of years ... and if we can somehow convince Ovechkin to come out west ... woo, hoo.

Chomsky still sucks.

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-24 8:47:35 PM


Take time to read Manufacturing Consent -- it might open your eyes.

Posted by: Mike Jones | 2006-05-25 3:21:27 AM


I've seen Conspiracy Theory. It's not a very good movie. Why would I read the book?

Chimpsky is an ass that has used his command of language to spin up some of the lamest sophistry/propaganda ever.

Posted by: Warwick | 2006-05-25 7:39:36 AM


Warwick:

There are many examples of how schmucks like Chomsky create a sphere of influence through their command of language.

Start with any Middle East jackass dictator ... they're long on bluster and short on substance.

How bout Mr. Hilter? He managed to get the populace good and riled up.

My eldest son, sadly a Chomsky fan (I don't know where I went wrong) was telling me yesterday that somebody recently kicked his ass in a televised debate. Said Chump the Chimp did not have enough time to expound his position.

So, I asked, Chomsky wins by talking and talking and talking until his audience's eyes glaze over. Then, they cry for mercy, saying enough, already. You're right. Just shut up.

I also told No. 1 son if he persists in his position, the $1.49 he would have received as an inheritance is definitely in jeapordy. But then, I was just kidding. He was actually in line to get five bucks.

Posted by: Set you free | 2006-05-25 7:50:56 AM


Noam Chomsky shot his wad decades ago.
His work on the influence of prejudicial bias in the media was GREAT.....even if he thought that the problem was a Conservative Establishment Bias.
Well at least he was half right!

His willingness to submit to the socialist world view really did ruin an otherwise promising intelect.
Proof of LeftWing Idiology = Shit for brains.

Posted by: PGP | 2006-05-25 11:11:25 AM


I don't think Chomsky's work on media was either great or insightful. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. put it best, the media are like the children dancing in front of the parade--it only appears like they are leading it. This is my point about the difference between using critical inquiry to identify causal influences (shareholder influence on editorial policy, for example) and judiciously weighing the materiality of the influences. Ironically, MArxists are critical of postmodernism (in the Foucault vein) for treating minor power influences (bias in language, concept formation, etc.) as though they were the most material. Chomsky's analysis falls into this type of misjudgment.

Put another way, there is generally an element of truth in the rantings of a paranoid person. The problem is generally one of misjudgment as to materiality and probability, such that the perspective becomes distorted in relation to reality.

Posted by: murray | 2006-05-25 11:41:29 AM


Karol,

Are you saying ravings of lunatics drive change instead of accurate analysis, or that change must begin with acknowledgement of existing reality (which presumably lunatics lack and accurate analysis provides)?

Posted by: murray | 2006-05-25 2:23:56 PM


Manufacturing Consent is just a paranoid rip-off of Walter Lippmann's Public Opinion.

Posted by: Roark | 2006-05-25 6:22:57 PM


As Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. wrote, you can't legislate bliss.

Or as Nietzsche wrote (of Plato), he wants the flower without the roots and stem, and so he wants it in vain.

It's the ifference between creating an orderly market from which prices and supply are an effect, versus top-down price legislation. When will they ever learn?

Posted by: murray | 2006-05-26 7:55:40 AM



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