Chomsky and Hero Worship

Michael Cohen mike at cns.bu.edu
Fri Oct 9 11:59:20 PDT 1998


Rakesh Bhandari wrote:


> It's been several years since I have read Chomsky. Mike Cohen noted
>
> > especially evils committed by
> > so called leftists he is weak.
>
> Oh, cmon, Mike: Chomsky has always been an anti-bolshevik, characterized
> the Soviet Union as a police state, written favorably of anarchist
> criticisms of Marx (e.g., intro to Guerin book).

I could be wrong here. Chomsky is so prolific that its hard to know what to focus on.He writes about what he knows best. I don't regard this as a criticism. Its a balance. I don't know who I would trust to get a balanced account of the number of Atrocites committeed in Indochina by US enemies for example. It seems to me that factually Chomsky was incorrect about the effect of the Marshall Plan, it probably didn't balance inflows from Europe and may have benefitted the entire Population. However, I am sure he was correct about the motivation of the US Elites in sponsoring the Marshall plan, there was substantial fear of socialism after the war. As Chomsky often himself says is wrong to swallow anybodies ideas hook line and sinker


>
>
> Or do you think that just because Chomsky criticizes Israel he pussy
> foots on the question of Mubarek or Saddam or the Taliban? The venality
> of Saddat and Arab leadership is a big theme of the Fateful Triangle.
>

This is where Chomsky is most useful. Personally I am no Zionist


> Moreover, Chomsky is scathingly critical of the liberal left in this
> country: the so called doves, the Democratic Party, union leadership.

Also quite useful. I agree with this.


>
>
> What specific criticisms of the left or third world tyrannies do you wish
> he had made and would have been appropriate to make in his critical
> studies, along with Edward Herman, of US foreign policy?\

Mentioned above. In an ideal world I would like him to have done the same analysis of theRussian nomenclatura that he has done for the American intelligencia but we are dealing with one man. That he can do as much as he has is amazing.


>
>
> > Unfortunately, unlike Marx or Keynes his
> > work doesn't have a serious class analysis
>
> Along with Herman, and drawing from Lars Shoultz, Chomsky emphasises that
> the US has historically contributed the greatest military and political
> aid to those regimes which repress labor for the benefit of US corporate
> interests, though the argument is made much more clearly by Edward Herman
> in The Real Terror Network.
>
> After having read Chomsky, I was not surprised to learn of the torture
> tools Michael Huffingon (Arianne's husband) bought for the Indonesian
> military. For some reason, I always have this on mind when I see Arianna's
> smiling face (though the tv has been disconnected for several months now,
> allowing me to spend all my time with you folks).
>
> Chomsky ends Year 501 with a study of class struggle in the US; before
> that he outlines new intellectual property regimes. The latter seems to me
> to be a study of class power, no?

Again its been a while and I am not familiar with Year 501. Its possible that this is much better than the material I have known. Also Chomsky seems to have no economic theory at all which limits his analysis.


>
>
> > 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.
>
> In what kind of cynical or imperialist world, could this be dismissed as a
> small contribution?

I think this is a major achievement. I wish I had his intellect to do as much.


>
>
> Just the detailed reports he has provided to Z on Haiti make him an
> exceptional academic. I always appreciating learning about how the post
> Aristide US trained military killed and terrorized thousands of
> people, how in the 1994 US invasion for democracy the US military
> confiscated reams of documents on the relationship between the CIA and the
> Haitian military, how the CIA has come to the defense of their trained
> assasins. Now I don't remember if I read this in Chomsky or not. The point
> is that I probably first read it there, and Chomsky is meticulous and
> thorough in his reportage of purgatory in which the wretched of the earth
> are trapped. There is no doubt in mind that
> Chomsky has made some of the mightiest blows for humanity with his pen
> in contemporary intellectual life.

I would say as far as very high class sophisticated knowledgeable Journalism its the best we canget. The man has an absolute photographic memory and is immensely prolific.As a social historian I prefer Barrington Moore Jr and his class analyses, much more historically knowledgable, much deeper and much less well known. He's retired now but I've read every one of his books I could get my hands on and I sorely miss his analysis. A wealth bourgeoise by background but a the probably the best contemporary class Historian I ever read.


>
>
>
> > 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.
>
> On one of the old marxism lines, I presented critical comments (e.g., he
> tends to view capitalism as a static system of power and provides no
> theoretical elaboration of the tendencies or laws of motion, as Marx put
> it, of the system; yes, he has no crisis theory, so we are left with a
> litany of how the rich exploit, how the big eat the small, how the
> powerful are hypocritical--Chomsky is very depressing and not very
> dialectical!). I think I would find Alex's criticisms most interesting as
> well.

Which is what I was saying in other words. Especially because his work is largely about corrupt elites and their practises his work is very depressing. I took a course from him years ago entitled Intellectuals and Social Change, which me and my Friends labeled "The Americans are the Agressors" . After we discovered this we wondered then what, and where did the misdeeds of the rest of the worlds population fit in. We also wondered how might change be accomplished.At that time he had little to offer.


>
>
> > social change than to
> > waste ones time labeling, lionizing and demonizing and labeling
> > individuals.
>
> Who has done any such thing with Chomsky on this list?

I would prefer to reply to this in private if necessary. I don't feel attacking directlypeople in public is conducive to discussion on this list.


> I think the people who made that movie about Chomsky have some serious
> problems and perhaps Chomsky is a fool or naive or conceited to have
> allowed such a movie to have been made about him--you know the facile
> presentation of his ideas, the big stadium size pictures of him, the
> absence of true critical engagement with his ideas (while getting all high
> minded about how someone like Silber the BC president wouldn't really
> engage him)

I'd like to see the movie. Nobody I have ever seen has the intellectual ability to debate Chomsky at least when I was watching him, because there is nobody I know in more command of the factual material. The man has a total photographic memory, at least he did when he was younger. I saw him personally debate McGeorge Bundy at M.I.T., Chomsky made Bundy who is not a total idiotliterally look retarded because his command of the source material was a couple of orders of magnitude less than Chomsky. Chomsky was the Ameteur and Bundy was the Professional! I remember an incident where Bundy with a prepared debating point on VietNam cited a publication by Lucien Pye saying that it was reported that the Viet Cong killed people in a certain village. Chomsky unphased with text said that "if you look two pages further into the book you'll see that the people making the report were government paid agents"....

Needless to say I admire Noam Chomsky immensely. But like the rest of us mortals he has limitations.

--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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