Posted by David Wearing
on November 4, 2009, 5:48 pm, in reply to "Chomsky beats Sackur by narrow margin"
I agree. Sackur clearly came with a lot of preconceived ideas, and showed little interest in finding out the thoughts of the interviewee (surely the point of an interview). This combatitive style is supposed to be challenging, but it just sabotages serious debate. I agree with the commenter above on this thread that Francine Stock's BBC interview with Chomsky a few years back was far better. She challenged him from a mainstream liberal perspective - which is useful because it gives him the opportunity to challenge that perspective in front of a mainstream audience - but she did it respectfully, thoughtfully and productively.
--Previous Message--
: I've just done a (rough) calculation on how
: long Sackur spoke on Hardtalk as opposed to
: Chomsky. Up to the 19-minute mark of a
: 30-minute interview, Sackur spoke for just
: under 8 minutes and Chomsky for just over 11
: minutes. These calculations were done with
: an ordinary wristwatch, so there's margin
: for error, though the proportions are as
: accurate as I could make them.
:
: But what does it tell you about an
: interviewer's interest in his interviewee
: and in finding out his opinions when the
: questions and interjections take up almost
: as much time as the answers? If Sackur was
: really a responsible journalist doing an
: honest job of discovering what Chomsky
: thought, he would have allowed him the time
: (severely limited anyway) to express
: himself. But Sackur clearly had a fixed
: agenda and was determined to implant it, in
: what would have been perceived as a
: belligerent manner had it been a regular
: politician of either left or right, or a
: business leader on the receiving end of it.
: Speaks volumes that Sackur felt no qualms
: about employing this attitude against
: Chomsky but wouldn't have dreamt of it with
: an establishment figure.
:
: Textbook example of embedded corporate bias
: ~ carried out quite unselfconsciously of
: course, without the slightest
: self-awareness. In fact I'd lay good money
: that Sackur would regard this interview as
: impartial and objective.
:
:
: --Previous Message--
: Pity then that when confronted with Sackur's
: "fact" about Taliban-sheltered
: Jihadists from Afghanistan being responsible
: for 9/11, Chomsky only meekly responds that
: that is his belief too, with only the
: proviso that it's "only a belief".
:
: Chomsky could also have metioned that even
: five years after the event, the FBI still
: have no evidence linking Bin Laden to the
: crime of 9/11.
:
:
:
: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/27/AR2006082700687.html
:
: There can be no serious opposition to the
: Afghan war without first addressing its
: mythical cassus belli. With his cagey answer
: here, it seems Chomsky may have finally
: begun to understand this.
:
:
:
:
David Wearing
http://www.democratsdiary.co.uk
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