Farewell to Oskar

William S. Lear rael at zopyra.com
Thu Mar 18 15:48:35 PST 1999


On Wednesday, March 17, 1999 at 11:40:15 (-0800) Brad De Long writes:
>> "A farewell to Oskar"
>> By Noam Chomsky
>>
>> On March 11, Oskar Lafontaine resigned his position as German Finance
>> Minister and chair of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). His
>>resignation
>> elicited "euphoria" in "jubilant" financial markets, editorial offices,
>> and news rooms.[1]
>
>As best as I can see, the "newsrooms" and "editorial offices" part of this
>sentence is false. ...

And of course you have counter-evidence to offer? How many editorials in the NYT and WSJ, Washington Post, LA Times expressed despondence when Lafontaine resigned? Is the number greater than zero?


>>And as is well understood, the
>> threat to relocate is also a powerful weapon against democracy and
>>human
>> rights -- specifically, against the socioeconomic rights guaranteed by
>>the
>> Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but derided as a "letter to
>>Santa
>> Claus" and "preposterous" by the leaders of the relativist challenge to
>> the UD, in Washington.[5]
>
>The implication is that these "leaders of the relativist challenge to the
>UD" are powerful holders of government office in Washington today. But the
>quotes are from Jeanne Kirkpatrick and Morris Abram--who are not.

More vitriolic mush: Brad, you can read whatever you want into this. Chomsky, however, makes no such claim.

Chomsky's main points, as usual, stand your irrelevant sniping: the plutocrats and their policy advisors do run our world and don't give a damn about most folks. You may adhere to your fantasies of do-gooders heroically urging policies to help all of us, but that is all they are.

Bill



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