Ronald Reagan and the Taliban

[Old Rocks]

Or maybe some should go back to school so that they can understand non sequiturs. Just because I responded the way I did, does not mean that I don't comprehend what you wrote earlier. I didn't see it as I was busy elsewhere.

Piss off with your baseless and kneejerk assumption and gratuitous insult, EZ.

You saying the word non sequitur means nothing since you abuse it so very much. How do you like those apples, pearl clutcher?

You're an idiot who hasn't a clue to the meaning of non sequitur. However, ever hopeful that the ignorant youth are able to learn, a conclusion of lack of reading comprehension does not follow the facts.

Get a clue, moron. If you actually understood a thing about critical thinking and didn't emotionally recoil at it, you would not look like the immature brat that you are.

My, my, all upset are we? Perhaps your comprehension isn't really what you think it is!

Seems to me the emotional reactions here are all on your part. Or is psychology another science that you are not familiar with.

 

[Diuretic]

Funny story, or sad if you really think about it.......

They were talking about Hamas, a girl raised her hand and said,"Oh, I love Hummus, I eat it all the time!"

My daughter said she just looked at the teacher, the teacher looked at her, and they both burst out laughing.


One thing about my kid, she LOVES learning about World Events.

Don't mess with the Zohan! Okay I admit, I can't ever look at hummus the same way again

 

[midcan5]

It is so funny to read a person with a closed mind criticize Chomsky but lack the ability to see that their own words are as biased and nonsensical (maybe more so) as anything Chomsky may have written or said.

Chomsky's words:

"... In general, I am in favour of decentralisation. I wouldn't want to make it an absolute principle, but the reason I would be in favour of it, even though there certainly is, I think, a wide margin of speculation here, is because I would imagine that in general a system of centralised power will operate very efficiently in the interest of the most powerful elements within it.

Now a system of decentralised power and free association will of course face the problem, the specific problem that you mention, of inequity-one region is richer than the other, etc. But my own guess is that we're safer in trusting to what I hope are the fundamental human emotions of sympathy and the search for justice, which may arise within a system of free association.

I think we're safer in hoping for progress on the basis of those human instincts than on the basis of the institutions of centralised power, which, I believe, will almost inevitably act in the interest of their most powerful components.

Now that's a little abstract and too general, and I wouldn't want to claim that it's a rule for all occasions, but I think it's a principle that's effective in a lot of occasions.

So, for example, I think that a democratic socialist libertarian United States would be more likely to give substantial aid to East Pakistani refugees than a system of centralised power which is basically operating in the interest of multinational corporations. And, you know, I think the same is true in a lot of other cases. But it seems to me that that principle, at least, deserves some thought.

As to the idea, which was perhaps lurking in your question anyway-it's an idea that's often expressed-that there is some technical imperative, some property of advanced technological society that requires centralised power and decision-making-and a lot of people say that, from Robert McNamara on down-as far as I can see it's perfect nonsense, I've never seen any argument in favour of it.

It seems to me that modern technology, like the technology of data-processing, or communication and so on, has precisely the opposite implications. It implies that relevant information and relevant understanding can be brought to everyone quickly. It doesn't have to be concentrated in the hands of a small group of managers who control all knowledge, all information and all decision-making. So technology, I think, can be liberating, it has the property of being possibly liberating; it's converted, like everything else, like the system of justice, into an instrument of oppression because of the fact that power is badly distributed. I don't think there is anything in modern technology or modern technological society that leads away from decentralisation of power, quite the contrary.

About the second point, there are two aspects to that : one is the question how MIT tolerates me, and the other question is how I tolerate MIT. [Laughter.]

Well, as to how MIT tolerates me, here again, I think, one shouldn't be overly schematic. It's true that MIT is a major institution of war-research. But it's also true that it embodies very important libertarian values, which are, I think, quite deeply embedded in American society, fortunately for the world. They're not deeply embedded enough to save the Vietnamese, but they are deeply embedded enough to prevent far worse disasters.

And here, I think, one has to qualify a bit. There is imperial terror and aggression, there is exploitation, there is racism, lots of things like that. But there is also a real concern, coexisting with it, for individual rights of a sort which, for example, are embodied in the Bill of Rights, which is by no means simply an expression of class oppression. It is also an expression of the necessity to defend the individual against state power.

Now these things coexist. It's not that simple, it's not just all bad or all good. And it's the particular balance in which they coexist that makes an institute that produces weapons of war be willing to tolerate, in fact, in many ways even encourage, a person who is involved in civil disobedience against the war.

Now as to how I tolerate MIT, that raises another question. There are people who argue, and I have never understood the logic of this, that a radical ought to dissociate himself from oppressive institutions. The logic of that argument is that Karl Marx shouldn't have studied in the British Museum which, if anything, was the symbol of the most vicious imperialism in the world, the place where all the treasures an empire had gathered from the rape of the colonies, were brought together.

But I think Karl Marx was quite right in studying in the British Museum. He was right in using the resources and in fact the liberal values of the civilisation that he was trying to overcome, against it. And I think the same applies in this case."


While you may not agree with him - I'm not sure I do here - these words are more reasonable than the biased rantings of mdn2000 or his mentor David Horowitz.

Human Nature: Justice versus Power, Noam Chomsky debates with Michel Foucault

 

[eots]

Chomsky' is a wanker..

 

[uscitizen]

Does such a class as reading comprehension 101 exist?