Re: Chomsky for Kerry

I especially like this email exchange because it points out the=20
following:

Whether you prefer economic expansion or military superiority, the=20
choice is clear: vote for the Democrats.

(only half tongue-in-cheek)
Nick

On Oct 8, 2004, at 8:56 PM, Aaron S. Hawley wrote:

>
> 1. Exchange between John Enyang and Noam Chomsky
> 2. Further griping by (our friend) Gilles d'Aymery
> 3. Comment by Louis Proyect
> 4. Conclusions from John Enyang
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: John Enyang
> To: Noam Chomsky
> Cc: Marxism list
> Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 22:18:08 +0900 (JST)
> Subject: [Marxism] Re: Anybody but Kerry
>
> Dear Professor Chomsky,
>
> Spare us the cant about the moral superiority of the Democrats (and=20
> their
> liberal constituency in the US) relative to the heinous and =
reactionary
> Republicans.
>
> The liberal wing of the US ruling class gave us Harry Truman who used
> nuclear weapons on the Japanese people to show the world (that is the
> re--emergent nations in Asia and Africa, and the Soviet block) who=20
> rules
> the roost.
>
> Kennedy (another democrat) threatened humanity with nuclear=20
> annihilation
> to prove the point that the Carribean and socialist Cuba is a US
> backyard.
>
> Kennedy, Johnson and McNamara, a trio of democrats, also gave us the =
30
> year war in South East Asia, a war you admirably opposed and whose
> consequences you documented. Versus Lyndon Johnson who campaigned as=20=

> the
> "peace candidate," your "peace candidate" Kerry at least has the=20
> honesty
> to tell us beforehand that he supports the war against Iraq, only
> promising to execute it better than Bush.
>
> The benign and smiling liberal Carter began the arms buildup which was
> subsuquently credited to malignant Reagan. Carter and Brzezinski also,
> through the CIA and alliances with the most reactionary social groups=20=

> in
> Afghanistan, to used that unfortunate country to  entrap the Soviet=20
> Union
> in a futile war whose consequences have been almost as disastrous for=20=

> the
> rest of the world as they were to the Afghan people themselves.
>
> Obviously this well known history of the Democratic Party as the more
> successful war party in the US has no more bearing today than does the
> fact that its present candidate (Kerry) sought in 2004 to secure
> republican senator and arch-militarist John "I hate gooks" McCain as=20=

> his
> vice-presidential running mate.
>
> Echoing Ms Thatcher's TINA mantra "There Is No Alternative" you =
mispose
> the question facing humanity as a choice between two war parties of=20
> Bush
> and Kerry or Rumsfeld and Brzezinski, all of whom unanimously agree=20
> that
> US hegemony must be preserved at whatever cost (to humanity that is).
> Pretending as you do that there is a real division between different
> factions in the US ruling class around these issues excludes the only
> viable alternative facing humanity at this juncture -- that is a=20
> popular
> movement against hegemony. Such a movement cannot and will not emerge=20=

> from
> the rotten mileu that is the Democratic Party (or the European Social
> Democratic parties either for that matter).
>
> John Enyang
>
>
> On Sun, 3 Oct 2004, Noam Chomsky wrote:
>
>> There is a simple matter of logic.  Either Bush or Kerry will win. =20=

>> There
>> is only one way to stop Bush from winning: to vote for Kerry in swing
>> states.  Someone who objects to that is in favor of electing Bush, =
and
>> therefore is supporting the policies of Rumsfeld-Cheney-Wolfowitz....
>>
>> Some things can be debated.  Simple logic cannot be.  Those who want=20=

>> to
>> extricate from the choices of the real world are permitted to do so,=20=

>> of
>> course, but not to pretend to themselves or others that they are=20
>> taking a
>> moral stand.
>>
>> At 01:12 PM 10/3/2004 +0900, you wrote:
>>
>>> Dear Professor Chomsky,
>>>
>>> Yes, were I in favour of electing Bush then it would be correct to
>>> conclude that I supported his policies. However, no evidence=20
>>> whatsoever
>>> exist to say that I am "in favour of electing" either Kerry or Bush.
>>>
>>> You on the other hand do in fact support and are willing to elect=20
>>> Kerry.
>>> Which means that you support or are willing to see his policies=20
>>> enacted,
>>> including muscular internationalism, militarisation of space,=20
>>> increases
>>> in military spending -- around which there is a ruling class=20
>>> consensus.
>>> You cannot at the same time support Kerry and oppose the ruling =
class
>>> bi-partisan consensus around the key issues of the day. =46rom your =
own
>>> logic, it follows from your support for Kerry, and your willingness=20=

>>> to see
>>> him elected, that you support his policies -- not least the =
continued
>>> occupation of Iraq, increases in the size of the US military, and=20
>>> the DP
>>> doctrines of muscular internationalism.
>>>
>>> John Enyang
>>>
>>> On Sat, 2 Oct 2004, Noam Chomsky wrote:
>>>
>>>> If you are in favor of electing Bush, then it follows that you
>>>> are willing to see his policies enacted, including those I
>>>> indicated.  There is no red-baiting in pointing that out.  It is
>>>> just simple logic.  If you are not in favor of electing Bush,
>>>> then you will adopt the "safe states" strategy.  I'm afraid it
>>>> is as simple as that.
>>>>
>>>> The rest I'm afraid is just fantasy.  It has nothing to do with
>>>> anything I have written or said, or believe.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> At 05:13 PM 10/2/2004 +0900, you wrote:
>>>>> Dear Professor Chomsky,
>>>>>
>>>>> I refer to your email attached below. Your charge that I
>>>>> support the "destruction of the US social security system" and
>>>>> "the militarisation of space" etc, bizarre in the extreme. Your
>>>>> assertion is not only unfounded; it is eerily reminiscent of
>>>>> spurious charges made by many an establishment figure,
>>>>> red-baiting liberals among them, who sought to discredit you
>>>>> personally, slanderously asserting, for instance, that your
>>>>> efforts to place events in Cambodia in an historical and
>>>>> political context tarred you as a supporter or at least an
>>>>> apologist for "genocide in Cambodia" etc.
>>>>>
>>>>> Now on the contrary, it is self--proclaimed liberal figures
>>>>> such as yourself who, in falling in line behind the war
>>>>> candidate offered by one wing of the Washington establishment,
>>>>> eviscerate domestic and international opposition to the ruling
>>>>> class consensus by giving credence to such meaningless
>>>>> differences as exist between "muscular internationalism" vs
>>>>> "preemptive war".
>>>>>
>>>>> I note also that in keeping with your dishonest support for the
>>>>> muscular international wing of the U.S. ruling class (a
>>>>> grouping that surely does support and implement the policies
>>>>> you so dishonestly charged me, and by extension a large part of
>>>>> the anti-imperialist left with supporting), you saw more merit
>>>>> in biliously slandering me than in addressing the comments made
>>>>> by fellow muscular internationalist Barack Obama to the Chicago
>>>>> Tribune, threatening war against Iran, Pakistan should his
>>>>> party gain power -- as appended in my original email to you
>>>>> below.
>>>>>
>>>>> What a decline for someone of your stature and integrity.
>>>>>
>>>>> With disgust,
>>>>> John Enyang
>>>>>
>>>>> On Mon, 27 Sep 2004, Noam Chomsky wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Interested to hear that you favor destroying Social
>>>>>> Security, OSHA, the limited medical care system, the last
>>>>>> vestiges of progressive taxation, etc., and that you are in
>>>>>> favor of radical escalation of militarization of space and
>>>>>> eliciting the predicted responses from Russia, China, etc.,
>>>>>> which are driving the world towards likely nuclear war, etc.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I'm not.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> At 11:06 AM 9/27/2004 -0400, you wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dear Professor Chomsky,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I write to register my disgust and disappointment with your
>>>>>>> public support for the war candidate offered up by the
>>>>>>> liberal (sic) wing of the US establishment --
>>>>>>> transparent despite the fact that you've disguised it
>>>>>>> behind the "safe states" strategy.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> John Enyang
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Gilles d'Aymery <[email protected]>
> To: marxism list
> Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 08:33:02 -0800
> Subject: [Marxism] Chomskian logic
>
> The short exchange between John Enyang and Noam Chomsky was
> quite revealing (though not new, by far).
>
> [Chomsky]
> Interested to hear that you favor destroying Social Security, OSHA,
> the limited medical care system, the last vestiges of progressive
> taxation, etc., and that you are in favor of radical escalation of
> militarization of space and eliciting the predicted responses from
> Russia, China, etc., which are driving the world towards likely =
nuclear
> war, etc.
>
> [my comments]
> There is some irony here: Chomsky has often and properly debunked
> how the ruling classes make use of fear to advance their interests,=20
> time
> and again; and here he goes using the same technique. So, to follow
> his syllogistic rhetoric one could  posit that:
>
> 1) Fear is a mass-controlling tool used by the ruling classes to
> advance their interests.
> 2) Prof. Chomsky uses fear, a mass-controlling tool, to advance his
> interests (as he see them)
> 3) Conclusion?
>
> [Chomsky]
> If you are in favor of electing Bush, then it follows that you are=20
> willing
> to see his policies enacted, including those I indicated.  There is no
> red-baiting in pointing that out.  It is just simple logic.  If you=20
> are not
> in favor of electing Bush, then you will adopt the "safe states"
> strategy.  I'm afraid it is as simple as that.
>
> [my comment]
> Old French saying: "la logique m=E8ne =E0 tout =E0 condition de s'en =
sortir."
>
> [Chomsky]
> There is a simple matter of logic.  Either Bush or Kerry will win. =20
> There
> is only one way to stop Bush from winning: to vote for Kerry in swing
> states.  Someone who objects to that is in favor of electing Bush, and
> therefore is supporting the policies of Rumsfeld-Cheney-Wolfowitz....
>
> Some things can be debated.  Simple logic cannot be.
>
> [my comments]
> Ionesco once said, "take a circle, caress it and it will become=20
> vicious,"
> which is where Chomsky is trapped...in a vicious circle.
>
> There is no need to be disgusted (though an understanable emotional
> reaction) or to attack the good man, or his logic for that matter.
>
> It's his premises that deserve questioning.
>
> As to my response to the conclusion of my own syllogism above, let's
> just say that Burdeau defined democracy as the capacity of order to
> manage disorder. Managing disorder takes many forms, from "law
> enforcers" to anarchist "leaders"...
>
> There seems to be two types of people who truly oppose order.
>
> Those whose voice is largely unheard: They are simply ignored.
> Those whose voice reaches a large audience: They end up either in jail
> or killed.
>
> Then there are people in between who oppose order to some extent
> and who, depending on their intellectual or artisitc faculties, can=20
> have
> long and prosperous carreers.
>
> Sincerely,
> Gilles d'Aymery
> Swans Commentary
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Louis Proyect
> To: Activists and scholars in Marxist tradition
> Date: Tue, 05 Oct 2004 08:21:25 -0400
>
> While I think his position on the elections is ill-conceived (but not=20=

> as
> bad as outright supporters of Kerry like the Nation Magazine crowd) =
and
> that his reply to John Enyang was dishonest, he is still one of the=20
> most
> fearless critics of liberalism in the USA. Let's not forget that in =
the
> months following 9/11, he was practically crucified by some of these
> Kerry fans. Here's something I wrote at the time:
>
> Noam Chomsky and His Critics
>
> In the aftermath of September 11th, certain sectors of the US left
> buckled under ruling class pressure and turned against Noam Chomsky.=20=

> His
> uncompromising anti-imperialism might have been acceptable during the
> 1980s when the Sandinistas were under Washington's gun, but in today's
> repressive atmosphere no quarter is given to the dissident=20
> intellectual.
> Of course, no quarter is asked from Chomsky, who remains fearless and
> principled as ever.
>
> To the chagrin of ruling class pundits and weak-kneed leftists, a
> collection of interviews with Chomsky, which has been published under
> the title "9/11," has become a best seller. According to a May 5th
> Washington Post article, the book had already sold 160,000 copies and
> been translated into a dozen languages, from Korean to Japanese to two
> varieties of Portuguese.
>
> In an attempt to warn people away from the book, the Post cites Brian
> Morton, supposedly "a novelist and essayist of the left," who regards
> Chomsky as an important intellectual whose arguments have suffered a
> sclerotic hardening. He says, "Chomsky sees the world in a very stark
> way and gets at certain truths in that way, but ultimately his view is
> so simplistic that it's not useful. He's become a phase that people on
> the left should go through when they are young."
>
> It should come as no surprise that the Washington Post failed to
> identify the segment of the left Morton is associated with. As it =
turns
> out, he is an editor of Dissent Magazine, a publication that might be
> described as social democracy in a state of advanced rigor mortis.
> Irving Howe, the founder of the magazine, was a critical supporter of
> the Vietnam War who reserved most of his animosity for the antiwar
> movement rather than imperialism. The current editor, Michael Walzer,
> stumped for Bush's war against terrorism in the Fall 2001 issue,
> stating: "We have to defend our lives; we are also defending our way =
of
> life. Everyone says this, but it is true. The terrorists oppose and=20
> hate
> our way of life--and would still oppose and hate it even if we lived=20=

> our
> lives far better than we do."
>
> Eric Alterman and Christopher Hitchens, contributors to The Nation
> Magazine, a left liberal weekly that has published continuously since
> the Civil War, have jumped on the anti-Chomsky bandwagon with a
> vengeance. Although the magazine has had a reputation for principled
> anti-imperialism in the past, it has shifted noticeably to the right =
in
> recent years. Most would explain this as a function of tail-ending the
> Clinton administration.
>
> Alterman, admits on his MSNBC.com 'blog' that Chomsky "did a lot of=20
> good
> work on East Timor." But when he accused the United States of
> "perpetrating a holocaust in Afghanistan" and compared the attack on=20=

> the
> pharmaceutical factory in Sudan with that on the Twin Towers, he went
> out of bounds and became "the mirror image of the ignorant jingoism of
> Bennett, Krauthammer, Kelly, Will, etc."
>
> full: http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/fascism_and_war/chomsky.htm
>
> --=20
> The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: John Enyang
> To: chomsky
> Cc: marxism list
> Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 21:37:49 +0900 (JST)
> Subject: [Marxism] Chomsky
>
> Lou Proyect wrote:
>
>> While I think his position on the elections is ill-conceived (but not=20=

>> as
>> bad as outright supporters of Kerry like the Nation Magazine crowd)=20=

>> and
>> that his reply to John Enyang was dishonest, he is still one of the=20=

>> most
>> fearless critics of liberalism in the USA.
>> [snip]
>> In the aftermath of September 11th, certain sectors of the US left
>> buckled under ruling class pressure and turned against Noam Chomsky.=20=

>> His
>> uncompromising anti-imperialism might have been acceptable during the
>> 1980s when the Sandinistas were under Washington's gun, but in =
today's
>> repressive atmosphere no quarter is given to the dissident=20
>> intellectual.
>> Of course, no quarter is asked from Chomsky, who remains fearless and
>> principled as ever.
>>
> and Ilyenkova:
>>
>> But I agree with Mark, Josh and others that the proper response to=20
>> this
>> isn't to scream traitor at Chomsky. As Trotsky used to insist, =
history
>> will eventually whack this professor upside the head. Given his past
>> history, we have every reason to expect Chomsky will be on the right
>> side of the barricades.
>>
>
> Josh Saxe, Ilyenkova and Lou are of course right about Chomsky. I =
would
> argue to Chomsky that the ABB position which he shares with Tariq Ali=20=

> is
> damaging to the left, not only domestically in the US but=20
> internationally,
> since it is bot based on, and fosters liberal illusions about the=20
> nature
> of Democratic Party.
>
> As I read it, the first and immutable axiom that determines Chomsky's
> position on this issue seems to be that the Rumsfeld-Cheney-Wolfowitz=20=

> axis
> controls the Republican administration and that this axis is far more
> evil, as it were, than anything a Kerry Administration could or will=20=

> come
> with. Chomsky is of course wrong about this, since as such=20
> representative
> of the ruling class as William Safire have no trouble recognising, a=20=

> Kerry
> Administration is likely to outflank Bush on the right on issues=20
> ranging
> from Iraq to the US Social Security system.
> (Saffire's column "Kerry, Newest Neocon," New York Times October 4,=20
> 2004
> can be found at
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/04/opinion/04safire.html>).
>
> Anyway Chomsky's presumption, or "fact" as he would, is held in good=20=

> faith
> and, as Ilyenkova notes, history will in all probablility whack this
> professor upside in the head.
>
> As Josh observes, I could have expressed my opinions to Chomsky with
> greater courtesy, but that is another matter...
>
> John Enyang
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