Chomsky and Hero Worship

Michael Cohen mike at cns.bu.edu
Thu Oct 8 11:03:26 PDT 1998


Chomsky more than any one I know has documented the attrocities and evil acts of the American Elite. Not terribly surprisingly on some details especially evils committed by so called leftists he is weak. Unfortunately, unlike Marx or Keynes his

work doesn't have a serious class analysis nor has he seriously sketched

any alternatives to the current mess at least to my knowelge. Because of his scholarship, which may be biased or mistaken or even immoral on occasion we know more about the intentions and the brutal acts committed by the American brand of imperialism than we otherwise would have known.

It seems to me either attempting to lionize him or demonize him, or even to label his political position is almost entirely beside the point and mostly a waste of time. This is true also of most of the other notables discussed on this list. Its sort of like asking whether Kepler's law of planetary motion should be dropped or relabled as midieval, scholastic, theistic. because he believed this was an instantiation of the structure of heaven as revealed by God. Its hard enough to understand whats going on, to construct strategies to improve the situation, and hopefully to participate is serious social change than to waste ones time labeling, lionizing and demonizing and labeling individuals.

--mike -- Michael Cohen mike at cns.bu.edu Work: 677 Beacon, Street, Rm313 Boston, Mass 02115 Home: 25 Stearns Rd, #3 Brookline, Mass 02146 Tel-Work: 617-353-9484 Tel-Home:617-734-8828 Tel-FAX:617-353-7755



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