Jumping To Conclusions

Your fascination with Chomsky is becoming somewhat disturbing, David. It's almost like you think he speaks for everyone to the left of you, even if he quite clearly doesn't. Surely you're better than that, no?

s/

The lady doth protest too much, methinks. I didn't say anything about who Chomsky "speaks for." I was commenting only about Chomsky's m.o. If he doesn't speak for you, the comment wasn't directed at you.

Come now. Coyness doesn't suit you. Posting the link indicates that you think Chomsky is relevant to the discussion of American politics. You think he's indicative of *something.* Else you wouldn't spend bandwidth on it. (And it's not like it's not a recurring theme across the mediums.) So, while the lady might protest too much (or not), it doesn't change the question. Why the fascination with Chomsky?

Come on, Sam, just because he doesn't necessarily represent *you*, or the *entire* left, doesn't mean he's not relevant to American politics. Even if only 5% of the population buys into Chomsky's ideas, if those people all, say, vote Nader next fall, that's enough to swing the national election. I don't think my imagination is too fanciful here.

First, I think 5% is a rather large number to assign to Chomsky's sphere of influence. He might appeal to 5% of the population already committed to "the left", but that's hardly the same thing. And of that 5% of that subset, a minority of them would actually vote for Nader next fall, because they'll be too busy voting for whomever they think can unseat Bush to vote for 3rd parties.

I just don't get the hyper-infatuation of right-wingers for taking pot-shots at Chomsky. The volume of anti-Chomsky rhetoric (usually posted by people who can't be bothered to actually parse his commentary on any level other than their own pre-positioned biases, I might add) is just disproportional to Chomsky's relevance to actual, on-the-ground American politics.

s/

in my opinion, chomsky is a criminal who should have been dumped on by a revolver long ago and nothing he says should go unanswered.
and your responses kinda remind me of when gore was distancing himself from clinton during his election.

i think instead of riding this guy on his opposition to a communist hero you should go study islam's history with it's neighbors(particularly India)perhaps you'll gain some insights into the "insurgency" in iraq.