Noam Chomsky on Economic Crisis, Healthcare, and Empire-1/5

[W0KD]

chomsky is ozom™

[toseeornot2see]

he's so right about the whole protectionist thing. I mean, recently , USA has hiked up visa charges for India, in order to "protect" it's own corporations. Now, Indian IT will suffer as a result.

Also, in Mexico, American farmers are protected under the farming bill, while Mexican government can't even interfere with the markets.

[DontEatEggs666]

Can someone explain to me what Chomsky said Lawrence Summers did at 7:58 and Robert Rubin at 8:19? Sorry, I'm stupid. lol

[praetorezekiel]

I love her reaction to Chomsky's question at 5:40. So brilliant!

[whereismybailouttv]

If David Stern was smart, the owners and players would voluntarily take cuts on both sides ("to show their concern for the loyal fans who keep supporting us"). Sounds like basically good corporate pr to me.

Yet, in all of the Lebron/Bosh/Wade Hype, not 1 person has mentioned this. If the CBA runs out and there's no NBA for potentially up to a year, what will the networks do?

Even more "reality tv"?

[whereismybailouttv]

The public sector workers unions would scream and file lawsuits. Pointless Congressional hearings would be held. But would Obama or Congress talke a pay cut (to "lead by example")? Not a chance.

The rich and powerful will fight you every inch of the way before they give up anything. Same goes for other unions as well.

A prediction: when the curent NBA CBA runs out, the players will push to do away with salary caps.

[whereismybailouttv]

Imagine the public reaction if the IMF bailed out the U.K. or the States.

Yet another left wing conspiracy theory to only sell books? Not quite. You can spin economic forecasts all you want. But we all know that eventually, unchecked borrowing will have consequences.

The coaliton govt. in the U..K. is calling for 40% across the board cuts in the public sector (excluding the NHS and the military). Now, what if Obama tried the same thing here?

[Shaikailash]

Unfortunately these enlightening videos have a terribly low number of views, (if you consider that he is one of the biggest analyst in the world), while all the stupid videos sistematically have over million views. These are our societies (I'm European) and I don't see how they can change something.

[BLUEHIPPO47]

I have for part of my childhood existence and all of my adult existence been a democratic socialist..with the emphasis on both words..and through all of my readings,have found few whose philosophies mirror my own (hey i'm not saying i'm a heay weight intellectual..more of a flyweight)..but Tony Benn and Noam Chomsky are two who stand out as seeing the essential beauty and rights of the individual and the need for a fair ,egalitarian and democratic society.

[thordoggie]

we are all BORN EQUAL UNDER THE EYES OF THE LAW, but we do not GROW up to be equal. people that study harder, work harder absolutely deserve more than highshcool dropouts and lazy, unproductive "workers"

If you think we should all end out equal, you have the mentality of a 3 year old...a child that takes his ball and runs home so NOBODY can play. life ISN'T FAIR!

and "democratic socialist" is an oxymoron.

[strode78]

@thordoggie socialism is defined as workers owning and controlling the modes of production. its inherently democratic. there has been a tendency for totalitarians to use the word to get people on their side. but it has nothing to do with stateism.

[dappercad]

You are conflating socialism with communism. This is something American's tend to do a lot. In fact there are a great many political terms which I find the American's I meet (And it's a small sample to be sure) tend to have very emotional rather than analytic reactions to. It does you no favours.

[thordoggie]

as strode78 commented, socialism is defined as workers owning and controlling the Modes ( he meant MEANS) of production. but that is asinine. why should a few invest and take a financial risk to start a company, then turn over ownership to those that did not innovate or create?

socialism is a philosophy of everyone being equal. a juvenile point of view. hard working innovators deserve more than those they employ. and the employees wouldn't have a job without the risk-takers.

[dappercad]

Your point makes moral sense if those who successfuly invest capital are, as a group, more innovative or hard working than those employed in their investment. I submit this may not necessarily be true. 

It's also worth saying that while it is true that employees wouldn't have a job if there was no employer, it is equally true that employers wouldn't have a company without employees. It's like looking at a coin and saying "Heads is lucky because without tails there would be no heads".

[MrSalamander7]

No, he meant MODES of production. Look it up, moron.

[thordoggie]

we can talk semantics, but the fact is capitalism is THE only economic system that allows people to become prosperous.

don't believe me? then why were soviet women standing on breadlines everymorning hoping they got through the door before the bread ran out? in almost 80 years, the soviet union did NOTHING to improve the lives of their people.

neither has cuba, n korea,,,etc.

[MrSalamander7]

LOL. I'm in no mood to fritter away my time arguing with you the virtues of socialism and the horrid immoralities of Capitalism.

MODES of production is a term coined by Karl Marx to describe the combination and relationships of productive forces and social relations of production. MEANS of production are simply the physical tools and capital involved in production. They're two different things.

[darkmiles22]

@thordoggie The soviets and cubans and north koreans all have/had horrible economies because they were totalitarian kleptocracies and forbidden from trading freely with the international community as punishment by the capitalist hegemony. Capitalism/Communism had little to do with it other than being another propaganda tool to justify regression and conservatism.

[xdeliriumx1]

lol

[paolocito]

@thordoggie do you have ANY idea how socialism works? There is no risk, you poor thing, because socialism is not about individuals. But that is a concept your mind is not ready to grasp yet. And there is no economic individualism on this planet. The people that have embarked on one adventurous company are all in the same boat. If it goes wrong, it goes wrong for all of them: head and heels alike. This is corporate indoctrination; to think the risk lies only at the top and they deserve more.

[MrSalamander7]

@dappercad This is true. I'm American and I can tell you that most Americans are illiterate as far as ploitcal idealogies are concerned. They don't only confuse socialism and cummunism, they don't even know what either of them are.

This thordoggie buffoon is a stout example.

[DesmondE]

@dappercad

Very well said and I think you make an excellent point

[S2Cents]

Yeah and you forget people born with a silver spoon up their ass too. They were born even more equal in the eyes of the law, blind eyes they may be. When will these freedom hating lib, socialists learn. See you at the clubhouse thor dawg. Haahaa haa, fuck the poor.

[xdeliriumx1]

are you retarded?

[Gastxu]

@BLUEHIPPO47

I agree with u bro.

[gfbritto]

at 4:36 on this interview, he says: "we lectured the third world that they must accept free trade while we accept protectionism". This is what is wrong with this country right now. For years we have been preaching globalization, when the truth is as long as we can get richer, screw the rest.

[loturos]

gfbritto, whats surprising to me is we're not getting richer.

[mrcarlos15]

Corporate elites are getting richer, big surprise.

[loturos]

has anyone ever eaten a rich person? how does it taste? like chicken?

[loturos]

the host is hot. but why does a pro-democracy org have an anarchist on their show? its good, but surprising.

[jhille85]

He's an anarcho-Libertarian-Socialist, which advocate more democracy for the people.

[poemsbytom]

Noam draws alot of attention to actions and systems that pretend to be democratic but actually aren't

[yakooza]

Anarchism is more democratic than any other political idealogy

[ikislav]

Noam, If majority of US population was intelligent, educated an reasonable like you, we would have a beautiful world.

[pkunzipstardotstar]

Chomsky is so level headed. An hour with Chomsky is so much more productive than with any of the other critics that are rocking up around the issues at the moment.

[kotash2]

Chomsky is senile. The democrats have enough votes by themselves to pass a public option and healthcare refform. The conservatives have no power right now. The reason the dems wont pass it is b/c the people are speaking &dont want it. The majority are deeply suspicious of this egregious attempted expansion of state power. THere is no consitutional justification for the US fed gov to be involved in healthcare in any way.

[MrSuperpunch019]

The Constitution is overrated.

[kotash2]

Thats like saying that human life &freedom are overrated. I expect such stupid & incendiary remarks from the chomsky mob. So in your view the entire enlightenment, the magna carta, RIGHTS of MAN, RULE of LAW....you probably think this is all a tool for the capitalists to exploit the workers RIGHT? What a load of nonsense.

[dempsey981]

@kotash2 if you really knew the first thing about health care,i mean the nuts and bolts about it,you could write,maybe, an intelligent comment.First,if Noam lost 99% of his capacity to reason he would still dwarf you,please dont berate and disrespect him with senile you fool.secondly,and obviously,the majority dont know really health care either,because if they did they wouldnt allow bankruptcy when a major illness happens.ive spent my life in health care,i assure you it is way over priced.

[fomastephanovitch]

This crisis was caused by the exploitation of the proletariat by petty bourgeois capitalists with Ayn Rand novels.

Workers of the world unite!

[Questfortruth86]

For example, I just read a headline that said: "Home construction soars, while general production continues to collapse." This tells me that the housing bubble continues, and the correction has failed to take place. The overall market is attempting to correct itself, but the FED continues to target long term interest rates, not allowing real-estate to reach market equilibrium. The real-estate crash has yet to come.

[Questfortruth86]

But okay, I'll play your stupid little game. This one example of deregulation caused this entire international economic disorder, which will soon translate into the end of the dollar, and 35% unemployment. How then, would you explain the previous boom-bust cycles? What's your ad-hoc explanation for them? Because history, and economics, is very clear. The booms occurred during inflationary periods of increased lending by banks, and were followed by massive deflationary corrections. Every time.

[ashcroftbrian]

Listen guy. Repeal of Glass is a big example with many safety provisions removed, but many others during Regan allowing corps to list their income offshore and avoid paying taxes, Tax Reform act 1986 kept many insolvent S&Ls in business artificially spreading risk around in bs investments (much like the mortgage crisis of today). Also, enforcing current regulations were always difficult. There are usually loopholes written into the laws and even during scandal very few prosecutions or conviction

[ashcroftbrian]

We have never had a free market economy in the US, and big business has always been protected. In NAFTA, the government subsidizes US businesses because they can't compete with foreign labor costs. Yes, the FED has been intentionally inflating our money every since we left the gold standard and moreso lately. Also, no free market bailing out failing companies. Financial companies are huge contributors to election campaigns and they have enormous lobbying power.

[Questfortruth86]

There were many regulations put in place after the snl's none of them prevented this crises at all. This is because the crises manifested itself in different ways.

[ashcroftbrian]

Boom-bust cycles are not related to deregulations. We always have boom bust cycles because you can't have continual growth forever. When there is optimism and innovation and good ideas and places to develop, you use the capital to drive the growth, but eventually it fades and people need to recover and settle down and tighten their belts and sober. Then when they are ready to start again it repeats. The FED helps influence the economy by controlling rates in this way. They should have stopped

[Questfortruth86]

"when there is optimism and innovation and good ideas and places to develop, you use the capital to drive the growth, but eventually it fades and people need to recover and settle down and tighten their belts and sober."

nonsense. Unsustainable booms aren't caused by animal spirits. The "massive wave of optimism" is the effect, not the cause. How can everyone suddenly become optimistic? Are they being mind controlled? No, the FED is making people artificially richer and igniting bubbles.

[ashcroftbrian]

when there is high demand for affordable housing, and relatively cheap development costs, you get everyone trying to build houses and a boom. When there is new technology available, like domain names and the potential for new internet businesses there is a boom. When there is opportunity, capital rushes in to fill the void. Then eventually there are too many houses and too many internet business and the bubble bursts. This is all basic stuff. Why is it hard to understand these simple things?

[ashcroftbrian]

It's true that there has been a shift to make rich people richer and poor people poorer. That isn't just the FED that is the goal of all large businesses. You mix together lots of issues and simplify them by blaming the FED for everything. The world is more complex than you are making it out to be

[Questfortruth86]

All sort of bubble activity stems from this artifically lowered price of investment; Starbucks every 10 feet, coldstone every 20 feet, and entire cities built in the middle of the desert. The way the malinvestments manifest themselves are initially unknown (except by extremely capable economists), but over time, when the market corrects itself, they become blatantly obvious. You choose to focus on how this particular bust has shaped itself, but all of this is inconsequential.

[Questfortruth86]

Say's law, production drives demand. The cost of investment are interest rates, when you artificially lower interest rates, investment becomes more lucrative. Investments which were previously unprofitable, suddenly become profitable (I=f(r)). Bubbles and misallocations don't come from technological growth and innovation. Interest rates shape the structure of production; it tells the producers how much to build. This actually isn't basic at all, this is capital theory, and people dont know this.

[Questfortruth86]

"This is all basic stuff. Why is it hard to understand these simple things?"

This, in fact, is not basic "stuff" at all; it's actually a complicated macroeconomic concept known as capital theory. it's so complicated, that John Maynard Keynes was unable to deal with it, so he completely ignored it.

"he world is more complex than you are making it out to be"

Unfortunately, economics is far more complicated than you're making it out to be.

[BahreNeGash]

Through out human history, empires rise by looting & enslaving as many nations as they can master & empires fall due to internal conflict of interest, corruption, greed, mismanagement & powerful global competitive resistance.

The rules of the game use to be prescribed & manipulated by very few empires, until nations of little significance seek, assert & confirm their share of interest by any means necessary. The rise of China's global market share could be a very good example to consider.

[BahreNeGash]

AP News,,,, June 15, 2009

AIG lawyer: Ex-top exec plundered retirement plan (AP)

[ashcroftbrian]

The unspoken idealogy of America is: look out for yourself and your friends, do whatever you can get away with, lie and cheat anyone you are capable as ends justify the means, and if you have true virtue or morality you should keep it to yourself because those are unwanted commodities in the corporate world. The only desirable part is to have the illusion or appearance of virtue, not the virtue itself.

[Questfortruth86]

The great minds realized many years ago that society is most prosperous when left alone, to individual action. Individual ambition leads to social prosperity. Whenever societies are duped by you do-gooders, freedom is stripped away. People have different wants and different needs; no person, senate, council, or whatever is capable of understanding the wants of all individuals. So they must arbitrarily choose who wins and who loses. Guess how they choose the winners?

[gorgnaga]

A true measure of a great nation is its ability to take care of its citizens in terms of health care like they do in Japan, Europe, Canada, Australia. It scares the shit out of me thinking "what if I get really sick" If you become very ill and require long term care, your health insurance will not want to renew your policy because you will become a financial burden. Then your faced with the stress of losing everything you worked for, and stress only makes you more sick.

[BahreNeGash]

Haven't you heard of the term, "everybody for his own".

Just like the animal world's, "survival of the fittest", nations are created, sustained & maintained by eliminating & decimating the defenseless for the gains of the powerful.

Therefore, the notion that a "civilized nation" is formed to serve & protect it's citizens is nothing more than a marketing skim & "empty promises".

Just imagine, "how many millions of lives has been ELIMINATED & lost for you to have a nation"?

[lordblazer]

Sorry you're an idiot. We're in civilization this no longer applies except in certain areas of life. Things like healthcare is needed to sit here and tell me to put up with the social issues in the USA because of your atittude is idiotic. Nations need to be able to ensure the quality of healthcare for their citizens.

[BahreNeGash]

LordBlazer, Thank you for your compliment. Being young idealist, I understand your utopia. But sooner or later, you will learn the hard truth of the "civilized world serving the best interest of it's citizens", is nothing more than a pipe dream & false promises.

For a starter, please find out to what ever happened to Abraham Lincoln's "emancipation proclamation", promising every FREE SLAVE, "a mule & 40 acres of land".

By the way, why did "civilized Europe" enslaved your ancestors?

[lordblazer]

no one is talking Utopia. We have competition, and it gets fierce thats our society, but you also have cultures and people and communities within society that often times support each other as they realize there is no other way in the world we live in. I am not talking utopia. I am speaking reality. Not everyone subscribes to the American rugged individualism. Atleast the minority groups don't. We network, and keep things such as money flowing between ourselves.

[BahreNeGash]

Lordblazer,

For thousands of years, it's false messiahs of your kind who have been "PROFITING" from the destruction, decimation, looting, exploitation & enslavement of mankind, while all along preaching in "THE NAME OF GOD & NATION or CIVILIZATION".

Justifying the crimes against mankind, your proved THERE IS NO PERMANENT FRIENDSHIP BUT PERMANENT INTEREST", as you clearly stated "We network, and keep things such as money flowing between ourselves".

Like I said, "EVERYBODY FOR HIMSELF".

[Questfortruth86]

Actually, it's the minorities which demand and benefit most from individual freedom and market liberalization. This is why we have so many minority groups here in the United States; they left their collectivist societies and came here. Many of them make it, some don't; but they stay because their children may make it. Economic interventionism leads to disaster and disorder. Collectivism leads to the suppression of free will.

[BahreNeGash]

Quest86, Just like you are blaming the minorities for the global economic melt down, look at history books, ALL FALLEN EMPIRES SINCE THE ROMAN EMPIRE, BLAME THEIR FAILURES & IMMINENT DOWN FALL, ON THE VERY SUBJECTS THEY CAN EASILY SELECT TO VICTIMIZE & GET AWAY WITH IT.

You are beating AGES OLD dead horse.

PS: I wonder why you have NO problem living with slaves picking cottons to enrich your empire, while you are NOT pleased with the same slaves earning a living wage to raise a family?

[Questfortruth86]

What the hell are you talking about?

[MrSuperpunch019]

You have no idea what you are talking about. The reason they come here is because out CIA pus in dictators.

Your a fucking clueless idiot.

[ion1984]

but stuff like that would be on TV right?!?!?!

lmao. id give you +200 if I could.

[ajbellis]

*you're

[pkunzipstardotstar]

I assume you're talking about illegal immigrants. I agree with you. The topic is a sensitive one that needs to be considered very carefully. But the first question to be asked is what influence does my government and my tax dollars have in the country that is being fled. Then pretty much pandora's box is flies open.

[Questfortruth86]

"Nations need to be able to ensure the quality of healthcare for their citizens."

Nations are incapable of "ensuring quality healthcare for their citizens." Health care is not a machine which can be bought and placed in peoples houses. There need to be doctors, innovators, competition. Your chance of survival is the greatest here in the U.S, but you may go broke. In England, Canada, and France, the government chooses who lives and who dies. Government healthcare does not eliminate scarcity.

[ashcroftbrian]

Hey, there are too many things wrong with some of the things you are saying to address here on YouTube. The Western World has used interventionism since the beginning of time, the US included. If executed properly and when it's needed, it can greatly increase productivity and economic prosperity. Freedom from regulation was #1 cause of economic meltdown, the growth we experienced was artificial and very risky. Also, government in Europe doesn't decide who dies, only what is paid for by the gov

[Questfortruth86]

"Freedom from regulation was #1 cause of economic meltdown"

Absolutely incorrect. This economic disorder was caused by imbalances created by interventionist inflationary mandates by banks and the FED. The FED pumps liquidity into the market through open market purchases, lowering the rates of interest (price of investment); leading to over-production and malinvestments, all of which were directed into a few sectors thanks to government tax incentives, most notably, real-estate.

[ashcroftbrian]

Well, I worked for Chase and I have a very good understanding of the history and the factors that led to our economic situation. Yes, the FED has been devaluing our money for many years and as businesses went global, loans were procured internationally, the rate of devaluation increased and yes, certainly malinvestments are to blame. U are funny. Imbalances and malinvestments are the problem, not the deregulation of lending and investment institutions that allowed for them. Symptom is the cause?

[Questfortruth86]

Your working at Chase means absolutely nothing. This issue is a topic of economic investigation, namely business cycle theory. There's a reason why, periodically speaking, all the producers/businessmen/bankers, over-lend, over-produce, and over-buy. It has nothing to do with so-called "deregulation." America is one of the most regulated nations in the world, we have thousands of regulatory agencies. Can you give me some examples of deregulation? I can think of ONE.

[ashcroftbrian]

It's true that we have a boom-bust engine for capitalized worldwide development. This is precisely why government has interference economic policies:to (hopefully) temper periods of growth and kick-start the economic during recession. Not only do we have inadequate regulation, but the agencies such as the SEC aren't competent in enforcing the regulations. The most obvious example of deregulation is the 1999 repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act which had many provisions protecting against instability

[ashcroftbrian]

The Glass-Steagall Act seperated commercial depository lending from banks (the people holding our money) and investment banking (allowing banks to use our money for risky speculative investment). This introduced enormous risk into the economy. Then the banks got into the mortgage business trading on home loans based on their perceived stability and used AIG to guarantee their mortgages with AAA rating. With that high rating they could trade these loans as if they were guaranteed and spread them.

[ashcroftbrian]

Also, the deregulation allowed them to hold less capital in order to back these loans. They were collateralized and spread across many businesses in many transactions. Then the FED lowered interest rates and issued many loans at sub-prime knowing that the prime would rise in the following years and the loans would be worth more if they matured (of course they grew to ridiculous rates as the prime doubled). Now most major companies had assets tied to these loans and began borrowing against them.

[ashcroftbrian]

The banks should never have been in the securities trading business. They hold our money so if they lose it on a risky venture holding very little reserve, they start defaulting. Since many companies were holding portions of those loans and borrowing against them based on their AAA rating, they began taking huge losses as well and it triggered the collapsing effect. The deregulation is what allowed this to occur. International banks were skeptical about the soundness of these types of loans.

[Questfortruth86]

Booms occurred before Glass-Steagall, during Glass-Staegall, and obviously after Glass-Steagall. This claim is so absurd, that only someone completely ignorant in economics could ever truly believe such an ad-hoc explanation.

[kotash2]

RIGHT and this was a result of the banking industry being "activists" meaning they lobbyied the gov for special treatment and the result is disasterous. The same goes for unions: unions lobbied the gov for special favors and as a result the entire manufacturing economy has been rendered uncompetitive and jobs go overseas.

[NocheezRecords]

Did you ever read my final summation of your comments to me b4 rudely blocking me?

[jtfugate]

There may be merit to what you have to say and those particular things may have added pressure on these banks and other businesses...but you should put in some time researching the burden that providing health care for workers puts on these companies and how much money they save on health care by moving their companies to countries with social health care programs...just a thought...it's easy to ignore one problem and place the blame completely on another

[Questfortruth86]

The regulator's are never competent; every time there's a mess, they're the scapegoats, and they promise that next time they'll do better. But regulations can only attempt to block or prevent one type of bust, they can't ever stop the busts from occurring all together. The flaw is a systemic one, deeply rooted in our pseudo-mercantilistic system. The FED pumps the market with liquidity through open market purchases, lowering interest rates, making stupid projects profitable, creating bubbles.

[kotash2]

You are wrong. The government interference in the markets in the form of the federal reserve system and commercial banking system allows for the creation and expansion of money and credit and CAUSES the boom bust cycle. The "regulations" are actually special favors to banks. What we need is a totally free market in money and banking.

[lordblazer]

actually malinvestment is directly linked to deregulation of the entire system. If it was tightly regulated then cases of bad investments would've been significantly lower.

[ashcroftbrian]

blazer is right. With stricter regulations, enforcing them, and not bailing out corporations, you reduce malinvestment and eliminate the kind of risk we all assumed. We could grow our economy by 2% a year with no problems, but the banks wanted deregulation so they could come up with crazy schemes for growth, based on trading on debt. Our economy artificially grew in the 90s because we counted the interest on debt in our GDP. Didn't think about if they couldn't pay for the debt, esp. all at once.

[Questfortruth86]

These are merely the typical political talking points. The democrats blame this entire crises on Glass-Steagall, that's the only example of deregulation they can provide; while republicans blame Freddy/Fanny and the community reinvestment act. But none of this has any real importance. These are merely the effects, the way the malinvestment manifested itself. The root cause is always the same: Excess liquidity created by banks, and lower interest rates, leading to bubbles and contractions.

[Questfortruth86]

No, regulations only attempt to prevent one kind of bubble. But when one path is blocked, the malinvestments will find another one. The liquidity created by the FED will not lie idle, it will eventually manifest itself one way or another. Economics is a science, it's not something you simply guess about. If you want to understand complicated macroeconomic theory, do some kind of investigation, read the intellectual literature. There's a reason why people perfectly predicted this crises.

[Questfortruth86]

"Also, government in Europe doesn't decide who dies, only what is paid for by the gov"

Yes they do, the government has certain "cost reduction mandates," such as denying health care to the elderly, smokers, and over-weight people. The English system literally decides who lives and who dies. They ration health care, and constantly face shortages and increased wait times for patients. Women constantly die from curable diseases such as breast cancer.

[ashcroftbrian]

And the government forbids these women from paying for treatment outside England, correct? They cannot use private (costly) health treatment for the things the government doesn't provide?

[Questfortruth86]

There is no private treatment....

[foahchon]

Gotta love Chomsky's dry sarcasm.

[polymath1944]

Chomsky, Zinn and Parenti, marginilized and muted by the right wing corporate media, are getting on. Who will replace these icons of dissent, speaking truth to power, when they're gone? Disturbing thought eh?

[HauntingTheHoly]

This whole interview reassured me greatly that Chomsky does indeed "have a few more years to go" - I thought he was about done, but he's still this sharp at 80. Excellent Interview.

[erby1kabogey9]

Sucks that this guy is literally banned from the main stream, our society is in desperate need a voice like his!

[aymanzonefly]

@erby1kabogey9 don't be so sad, this happens whenever someone tells blunt truths in any society :(. Al least you people have "some" measure of democracy, I genuinely hope things improve for the next generation as people become smarter.

[urparanoia]

@aymanzonefly -What we have is a society that has little understanding of issues and supports the people who are picking their pocket.All too many voters don't even understand what caused the financial crisis. They have even less idea of what goes on beyond their borders.Conservatives tell them if they buy into the idea of national healthcare they will lose their freedom and without asking how or why they are against such programs. Nothing in this country will change until citizens wake up

[dempsey981]

@urparanoia good comment.

[urparanoia]

@dempsey981 -Thank you. Glad that you agree.

[mdoob11]

He would hate to hear it, but

"ALL HAIL!"

[ubuibiok]

*****

[chumashfalcon]

Chomsky tells the truth

[micahgee]

Chomsky is America's most important intellectual alive!!!

[silversalvo]

That guy is unstoppable.