Chomsky on Trump

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Theresa May urged to challenge President Trump on torture comments. Great idea - go over there to try and get some sorely needed business and introduce discussions by telling off for his bad behaviour! Why not just tell him we don’t do business with people who use torture, if we mean it!!??

[ahinton]

Theresa May urged to challenge President Trump on torture comments. Great idea - go over there to try and get some sorely needed business and introduce discussions by telling off for his bad behaviour! Why not just tell him we don’t do business with people who use torture, if we mean it!!??

Good point!

[french frank]

Noam's upcoming lecture in Reading: link

Might be worth a bump as it seems to be relevant to the OP

[Beefy - yes! Better than angling to be Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief of the United States in order to get a 'cash boost' for our NHS ]

[ardcarp]

It's all Dutch to me.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELD2AwFN9Nc&feature=youtu.be

[Serial_Apologist]

It's all Dutch to me.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELD2...ature=youtu.be

I'm wondering if my Dutch friends have seen that one!

[jean]

Here's Robert Crumb, 30 years ago:

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a283/Alastairw/tumblr_o11qhxCnmh1v59m5oo3_1280-1%201_zpsbei8zd8f.jpg

[Lat-Literal]

Here's Robert Crumb, 30 years ago:

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a2...psbei8zd8f.jpg

Extraordinary. I was blissfully unaware of the Don Trump phenomenon in 1987. Not sure how common it was to be so then in Britain? That "J" - it is so much more impressive than "John", don't you think, as it is positioned. More broadly, I am astonished just how many major changes can be agreed in seconds with a signature on an Executive Order in the United States. One wonders why Obamacare and other Democrat concerns have to take years while being blocked at every turn by Congress. If only we had known it was so easy.

Now, "to cherry-pick" and more specifically "not to be permitted to cherry-pick" on the grounds that others will demand to cherry-pick too. What is its definition? I only ask because those who use such a phrase must be required to say where there are rotten cherries rather than the loveliest cherries. If a system is so wonderful not to be challenged at all, then every part of it can only logically be the loveliest cherry. So we need a very public statement from them - where do they think is their dud fruit? Has Mr Verhofstadt a helpful view?

[P. G. Tipps]

Now, "to cherry-pick" and more specifically "not to be permitted to cherry-pick" on the grounds that others will demand to cherry-pick too. What is its definition? I only ask because those who use such a phrase must be required to say where there are rotten cherries rather than the loveliest cherries. If a system is so wonderful not to be challenged at all, then every part of it can only logically be the loveliest cherry. So we need a very public statement from them - where do they think is their dud fruit? Has Mr Verhofstadt a helpful view?

'Pooling Sovereignty' for the benefit of all members means exactly that. All prospective members have to contribute a fee if they expect to join any club. Only the British ... at least about half of them ... appear to think one can demand all the benefits of a club and not be members. In other words, that is 'cherry picking' on the grandest of scales. Quite extraordinary coming from supposedly 'the most mature and sophisticated electorate in the world' ?.

I haven't heard a single pro-European claiming that the EU is without faults. To claim that would be quite absurd. Pro-Europeans simply claim that the benefits of membership have been plain to see for the security and standard of living for the huge majority of Europeans since WWII.

On the other hand we constantly hear ad nauseum from Eurosceptics (and have heard for decades) that the EU has apparently nothing but faults. To listen to them there have been no benefits, they just bang on about the fee (which in any case is mostly wildly exaggerated) and those blasted foreigners in general.

That is just as absurd ... and Wilde's Lord Darlington summed up such a curious attitude perfectly and in far fewer words!

[Lat-Literal]

'Pooling Sovereignty' for the benefit of all members means exactly that. All prospective members have to contribute a fee if they expect to join any club. Only the British ... at least about half of them ... appear to think one can demand all the benefits of a club and not be members. In other words, that is 'cherry picking' on the grandest of scales. Quite extraordinary coming from supposedly 'the most mature and sophisticated electorate in the world' ?.

I haven't heard a single pro-European claiming that the EU is without faults. To claim that would be quite absurd. Pro-Europeans simply claim that the benefits of membership have been plain to see for the security and standard of living for the huge majority of Europeans since WWII.

On the other hand we constantly hear ad nauseum from Eurosceptics (and have heard for decades) that the EU has apparently nothing but faults. To listen to them there have been no benefits, they just bang on about the fee (which in any case is mostly wildly exaggerated) and those blasted foreigners in general.

That is just as absurd ... and Wilde's Lord Darlington summed up such a curious attitude perfectly and in far fewer words!

Yes but I might pay to join the local golf club and opt out of the additional payment to use the members' lounge. The course is fantastic but the lounge is costly, there are all sorts of dress requirements, it is for some reason awfully full and I have heard from some that they have had their wallets pinched. That is me choosing the good bits but according to the club their lounge is utterly wonderful. Why on earth they are telling other people that I am choosing to opt out of paying for the bad bits heaven only knows. It is wholly contradictory and it sounds as if deep down they agree with me that the lounge is rubbish. I have asked them to say in the local newspaper whether their lounge is good or bad.

It's a very important (negotiating) point.

I am now going to write to Theresa. I'm asking her to send The Donald a few episodes of Trumpton so that during the negotiations he can better understand the British way of life!

[Serial_Apologist]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ML9zqBqGxI

[Conchis]

Has Trump even heard of Chomsky? Somehow I doubt it.

[Beef Oven!]

Has Trump even heard of Chomsky? Somehow I doubt it.

I’m not convinced of the relevance of this observation.

[ahinton]

I’m not convinced of the relevance of this observation.

Then perhaps at least consider that Chomsky has heard of Trump...

[Conchis]

I’m not convinced of the relevance of this observation.

Chomsky is a marginal figure in politics - I seriously wonder whether anyone who hasn't got some kind of college degree in a liberal arts type subject has heard of him. His audience seems to consist almost entirely of people who share his politics.

I somehow doubt if he has ever penetrated to the masses who put Trump where he is today; and for all his theorising, I don't think Chomsky is any more capable than Hillary Clinton of developing a strategy to 'deal' with Trump.

[aeolium]

All well argued points, though it's not clear whether you see a return to smaller, individual states as the desirable alternative - a scramble to the top (with Germany, as likely as not, still at the top). The poorer states of Europe were not (economically) impoverished in the first place by joining the EU, and competition with stronger states won't benefit them.

No, they were not impoverished by joining the then EEC or EC, but they are now as a result of monetary union, and the still enduring "project" of political union. Look at these current unemployment statistics for the EU, a full eight years after the economic crash. They are for some countries horrific, nearly 20% in Spain, 23% in Greece, youth unemployment around or in excess of 40% for Italy, Croatia, Spain and Greece. That is not an economic system which can be said to be working for the citizens of the continent in any meaningful way.

I would say that the European Community was broadly a success, in increasing and sharing prosperity and embedding common standards of respect for democracy, the rule of law, human rights as well as the relative political and economic autonomy of individual nation-states, so that different states could pursue a more social democratic, or more free-market orientated system according to their preferences. The European Union I think has broadly been a failure, in its inflexible pursuit of a common monetary and political union even when that pursuit was clearly leading to serious economic damage and political upheaval Monetary union can only work if there is a mechanism for transfer from the richer to the poorer countries, but the Germans would never agree to that principle being embedded without central oversight of national budgets which in itself would lead to a potential repeat of the Greek humiliation for other countries. So my preference is for a co-operative association more like the EC, with either a return to national currencies or a more flexible exchange-rate system. Of course Germany would still be the strongest economy because of its size and productive capacity, but the common currency system disproportionately favours them and harms the weaker countries, who cannot devalue or alter interest rates. The strong Deutschmark - or Euro within a smaller group of states - would limit Germany's advantage.

As for the EU's particular democratic deficit: I'm not sure that it's less democratic than the 'plurality' of the UK's system of democracy in which a succession of minorities change the government (though only to switch from A to B and B to A most of the time). Or a narrow majority losing an election, if you're speaking of the 'popular vote'.

But there's never much one can do, seemingly, about hatred of 'the other'. Except give in to the people of violence, however unjust that may be. Give them what they want.

There are certainly problems with democracies in European nation-states, but the main problem has been the capitulation of the centre-left parties to essentially monetarist and neoliberal economic theories, so that the only recourse for those hostile to these principles has been to support more extreme parties of right or left (and more commonly, of the nationalist right). That capitulation is itself partly a function of the centralisation of decision-making about economic policy within the EU, so that there is relatively little room for manoeuvre for national parties (especially within the eurozone). And that great decision-making power has been accompanied by relatively little democratic accountability, so that failed or failing policies have not been properly challenged, and decisions have in some cases been taken by wholly unaccountable organizations like the European Central Bank and the Eurogroup. In contrast, at least in theory, governments of nation-states can be removed at elections and there can be significant changes of policy (as with the recent US election and with, e.g., UK elections in 1979 and 1997).

As to the question of "hatred of the other" and violence, I think a lot of people in the last decade have suffered a form of economic violence as a result of bad policy-making. There are policies which will increase the likelihood of hatred and division. I have mentioned the move towards monetary union and I add the policy on free movement. It was entirely foreseeable that leaving the free movement principle in place unaltered after the access of the former Soviet Bloc countries would lead to a large increase in migration flows from south and east to north and west, and this was only increased by the Eurozone crisis. To me it is a laissez-faire principle which favours mainly white Europeans from particular countries and classes and discriminates against mainly non-white non-Europeans, including citizens of former European colonies. It also leaves refugees fleeing war, persecution and economic devastation in a desperate situation, pressed out on the borders of Europe while the privileged movement rights of Europeans are preserved. I think it's divisive, discriminatory and unethical, and those who talk about racism and xenophobia should think about how Europe treats non-Europeans.