OK I'll follow your tangent: Archived Message
Posted by Thomas Newfield on January 10, 2020, 10:38 pm, in reply to "Re: I love Gideon Levy, mostly, and Amira Haas. They are full of heart, insightful, experienced. What "
[Chomsky] has spent a career exposing the lies and propaganda of the New York Times and gives reasons why he finds it still worth reading Yes we know, but we should also know these reasons are nonsense: that the NYT is still the foremost "paper of record" I believe is his basic contention. Yet on the economic precipice on which the US is perched, the dire situation of millions in that country citizens and illegals, that paper is almost silent. On Syria, Lebanon, Iran; Honduras, Haiti, Venezuela - for example - it's the usual empire serving, frank deceit. All well-catalogued as the old Noam would say. Also, the business press essentially trust their audience. They don’t have to impose propagandistic illusions to keep the rabble under control. A glance at the actual thing that's pink and read in the morning will show this too is counterfactual. The FT largely peddles the same neo-liberal hocus pocus economics; the same tendentious nonsense about China, Russia and the near East (some of which NC sadly supports these days) as the rest of the MSM. Yes there are snippets of sanity in the right wing media occasionally in the econmic and foreign policy fields such as Ambrose Evans Pritchard here in the UK, or Peter Oborne. So there may be something in the argument. Perhaps. But not at the FT. But forgive my poor reasoning, do you have no burden of evidence yourself? Sorry about the conflation of "free" and "democratic", you've set me to rights there. Nevertheless that the USA is "the freest" country is also a highly dubious proposition. I suppose if you base your notion of freedom on 19th / enlightenment liberalism, primacy of the individual, and so on, as I believe Chommers does then that makes some sense. If on the other hand you find the truest expression of freedom in human nature expressed in a healthy and natural social milieau, a community grounded in common values where everyone is accounted for more or less - not a liberal conception - then the statement is more debatable to say the least. His contrast with Iran, which has hotly contested elections (Ahmedinajad; Mousevi) between quite different development paths, and the moribund US-2-cheeks-of-the-same-arse variety is also weak. Even the narrow definition I think Chomsky is using is becoming a bit shaky what with SWAT teams and rising state violence at home, not to mention, at random: millions of homeless from mortgage foreclosures; the absence of parental rights in divorce cases; highest prison population anywhere ever; the ruining of romantic life of those with the taste by state / legal intrusion; the availability of nutritious food... I will go back to looking for the Chomsky interview where he discusses his personal distaste for emotive language, citing MLK's old Washington speech as an example. Did you and Turtleman say you would run down the street naked eating a hat when I post it or was that my imagination?
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Message Thread:
- To consciously ignore Israeli media at a time like this is patently ridiculous.. - Der January 9, 2020, 6:55 pm
- He's the only guy on here I've daded! I can't abide nincompoops. - Der January 9, 2020, 7:03 pm
- I love Gideon Levy, mostly, and Amira Haas. They are full of heart, insightful, experienced. What - Thomas Newfield January 9, 2020, 7:14 pm
- Re: To consciously ignore Israeli media at a time like this is patently ridiculous.. - Si January 9, 2020, 7:27 pm
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