> I never thought I'd agree with Chomsky
Curious what the disagreement is, Chomsky is a fairly prolific researcher who has published a lot work. Why would you say this and what is your background?
Curious what the disagreement is, Chomsky is a fairly prolific researcher who has published a lot work. Why would you say this and what is your background?
> Putin has settled it for the time being by providing Washington with its fondest wish: a Europe so subservient that an Italian university tried to ban a series of lectures on Dostoyevsky, to take just one of many egregious examples of how Europeans are making fools of themselves.
Subservient? Is he saying that Biden is demanding Italian universities ban discussion of Dostoyevsky, and the helpless Italians are unable to refuse? Could it not be that Europe has suddenly found a sense of common identity in opposing Putin's authoritarianism and military expansion? The unnamed Italian university may be over-reacting, but that's hardly proof that they are taking orders from Washington, or even care about what the US thinks at all.
Also, I think the analogy of Mexico joining China is way off base, and an overly simplistic view of everyday reality in Europe.
i don't understand how you listen to, or read, what chomsky says -- and come away with the idea that chomsky thinks the US and/or Russia carving up a country is a _good_ thing, or that he's in _favor of it_, etc.
that's just weird.
i think that's wrong, but i think you could say he believes in a type of american exceptionalism if your definition of that phrase is something like
- "unique in the world among nations to be able to act with near-total impunity in any way they/we please -- including committing obvious and ongoing war crimes."
Where were the sanctions against the US? They didn't happen - at least, not large ones. Why? Because the US is, by definition, exceptional. We can do what we want.
> the United States is - for now - not a party to this conflict
hasn't, and isn't, the US providing BILLIONS of military and financial aid and training, diplomatic, ideological, and media support, and more, to Ukraine -- for years already?
do you not believe that the US largely controls the world, including Europe, largely runs Nato as a private army to guarantee US supremacy in trade and other geopolitical interests?
do you claim that Nato, in spite of all its offenses and offensives, is for defense only?
> Also, I think the analogy of Mexico joining China is way off base, and an overly simplistic view of everyday reality in Europe.
i'm not sure what is so complicated about the comparison, or Europe today.
was the cuban missile crisis also too complicated?
No, I believe he is talking about Putin’s mockery of western values. You can see this in Putin’s insistence that Ukraine recognize its issues with white supremacy, instead of recognizing this, the west responds with banning Russian artistic works as an example of how
> Europeans are making fools of themselves
> that's hardly proof that they are taking orders from Washington, or even care about what the US thinks at all.
If you’ve read Chomsky’s works on the propaganda model, his main claims are around the continuation of American hegemony. This sounds like what he’s talking about. That the US interests and order are imposed on a subservient population (in this case, Europe) to meet American demands. In this case, fucking anything that is Russian.
Sometimes I see Chomsky is a victim of his own definition of flak within the propaganda model. Basically by laying claim to the hypocrisy of western media making himself a target for them has made him an unperson, so thanks for expanding your views.
In the same way, I question how much "American hegemony" is pushed by America, and how much of it is "pulled" by other countries finding "American" values, perspectives, and positions to be more attractive than other alternatives.
Ukraine has agency. The other countries that joined NATO have agency. The Italian universities have agency. They aren't just helpless pawns of "American hegemony".
i think the pull exists, at least a little, mainly in areas in free speech, personal wealth accumulation, etc.
but i think 99.99% is push, not pull.
for the 'push' part, you can read this by chomsky (free, online there):
https://zcomm.org/deterring-democracy/
it's not necessarily light reading, but...well, i think our reading abilities have dropped so low that it probably does qualify as complex reading now.
if you don't share chomsky's professed values -- The Golden Rule, elementary moral principles, democracy (not just formal, but actually-functional/functioning), etc. -- you'd probably pretty quickly come to hate that book and all of Chomsky's professed views.
No. He's saying that Europe is completely subservient to the US, and this extreme subservience is what leads to foolish acts like banning the discussion of Russian authors -- presumably because Russian authors are the enemy... because they are Russian.
The preceding sentences say as much:
> The major effect, I suspect, will be what I mentioned: more firm imposition of the U.S.-run, NATO-based Atlanticist model and curtailing once again the repeated efforts to create a European system independent of the U.S., a “third force” in world affairs, as it was sometimes called. That has been a fundamental issue since the end of World War II. Putin has settled it for the time being by providing Washington with its fondest wish...