Sign the paper and your brains won't be on it. ~ Guido

“When small drops began to fall and darken the world in penny-shaped circles, no one around him scurried for cover. For lonely people, rain is a chance to be touched.”
— Simon Van Booy

“Those that vote decide nothing, those that count the votes decide everything.” - stalin

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. - Alan Kay, 1971

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

"Is there anything more beautiful than a beautiful, beautiful flamingo,

flying across in front of a beautiful sunset?  And he's carrying a

beautiful rose in his beak, and also he's carrying a very beautiful

painting with his feet.  And also, you're drunk."~ Jack Handy 

Some of the worst things in my life never happened.
   — Mark Twain

romeotuma wrote:
I'll leave the relevance of my post to the Chomsky quote as an exercise to the reader.

Yes, Reagan broke the ATC union. That doesn't change anything about his background.

I might read Chomsky's rant about the Magna Carta...if he weren't a little late in his outrage. It's an important historical document but only three of its 37 original articles are still legally in force in the UK. It hasn't had any legal relevance in the US since the revolution—kind of like complaining about violations of the Code of Hammurabi.

 Lazy8 wrote: 

Your comments don't have anything to do with the Chomsky quote... Chomsky is describing the current presidential election; you are talking about Ronald Reagan... and what you said about Reagan was wrong— he had a college degree, and on Aug. 3, 1981, more than 12,000 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization went on strike and Reagan fired them and broke the union... that 1981 Strike Leaves Legacy for American Workers...  I'll post more facts about Reagan's anti-union history in the appropriate forum...

and I guess you don't have a clue what Chomsky has recently said about current liberty violations of the very Magna Carta— you just want to blindly dismiss his credibility by using the debate fallacy called Argumentum Ad-hominem... (This is a common logical fallacy. Argumentum ad hominem basically means that the argument becomes directed towards the individual as opposed towards the crucial issues being discussed...)

romeotuma wrote:
You're correct, he did graduate from that elite institution, a feat almost a third of all Americans achieve*. In all other respects Reagan fits the description: his family was poor and he was president of the Screen Actors Guild (that's an actual union—you can look it up!).

Reagan's presidency isn't exactly ancient history; the fact that Harry Truman was probably the last American president who never graduated from college isn't something to be ashamed of, it's a reflection of the wealth of our society. College isn't an unattainable goal here even for poor people. In Lula da Silva's Brazil it still mostly is. Unlike Dr. Chomsky I see that as progress on our part (and a lack of progress on Brazil's) rather than a sign of deep class repression, but hey—he's the intellectual.

As for Chomsky's crocodile tears over the US constitution...I'd have a little more time for that if he hadn't spent so much of his political career supporting totalitarian regimes and structures.

*Among younger people the rate is more like 40%—way ahead of Brazil's 10%. Well over half of us have some college, even if we didn't get a bachelor's degree.

 Lazy8 wrote: 

Huh?  The 40th president of the USA was educated at Eureka College, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics and Sociology...  the 40th president was a union buster—  just ask any air-traffic controller...

and anyway, Chomsky is speaking in the present tense—  he is not describing American history in the past...  he is talking about what is happening RIGHT NOW...  I suggest you peruse the recent articles I have posted in the Chomsky forum, where Chomsky describes how not only the U.S. Constitution is under assault, but also the very Magna Carta...

romeotuma wrote:
Peasant background, union organizer, never went to school...who does that sound like?

I acknowledge that Noam Chomsky seems to have forgotten the 40th president of the United States.

...or the ten earlier presidents with similar backgrounds, but hey. He can't be expected to know details like that, he's an intellectual.

 romeotuma wrote: 

"Keep pissing me off with all your negativity and I'll show you how far my size 11 shoe will fit up your A$$!"

Me 

 Proclivities wrote: 

Or "May you live in interesting times."

 Proclivities wrote: 
So true, thanks.

“Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand.”
— Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

Please please please no more moist dreams of confidence fairies from such Disneylanders!!!

"Everything that helps to increase the confidence of households, firms and investors in the sustainability of public finances is good for the consolidation of growth and job creation. I firmly believe that in the current circumstances confidence-inspiring policies will foster and not hamper economic recovery, because confidence is the key factor today."

—Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank, interviewed in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, June 2010