Pro-reason.info

In response to: ‘The Chomsky Paradox’
by Vasko Kohlmayer, The American Thinker, 17/3/2006

In turn in response to:
‘Latin America and Asia are at last breaking free of Washington’s grip’
by Avram Noam Chomsky, The Guardian, 15/3/2006

Kohlmayer opens by claiming that Chomsky’s article turn on a ‘mind-boggling premise’. This premise is that Latin America and Asia are becoming less influenced by the United States. You might be forgiven for failing to see what is mind-boggling about this. Indeed, one has to be an highly indoctrinated individual to see anything mind-boggling in this. To understand Kohlmayer, one has to realise that Chomsky sees freedom from foreign influence a generally good thing; whereas to Kohlmayer, U.S. influence is by definition good. To him, therefore, a country free of U.S. influence sounds less like a dog free of fleas and more like a dog free of fur — that is to say, the thing is so positive and necessary that to speak of being free of it is nonsensical.

No modern person’s mind would be boggled by talk of Britannia becoming freer of Roman influence after AD410, whether or not they judged the Romans to have been on the whole positive or negative in their effects. On the other hand, I imagine that Emperor Valentinian back in Rome would have been scandalised by the idea of being ‘free’ of the glorious influence of the sole source of civilisation in the world. It is apparently in the nature of rulers and their lapdogs to be incapable even of comprehending language which is not in line with their twisted view of the world — let us call it the Roman or imperial view.
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One of the things that leads one to give great weight to the writings of Noam Chomsky is the incoherence of those vilifying him. One asks oneself, ‘surely, if Chomsky is wrong on the issues, there will be people pointing it out.’ One then looks through material critical of Chomsky, in search of some good points made against him. When one finds virtually nothing but incoherent attacks stuffed full of fallacious reasoning, one is tempted to conclude that there is indeed no major criticism to be levelled at the man.

So, in our quest to find some valid criticism, we have taken advantage of Google News Alerts to receive an e-mail every time an on-line article with the word ‘Chomsky’ in it is published. You will find analysis of the logic of each one in the ‘Chomsky’ category on this site.

In response to:
‘The meaning of Milosevic: how the Butcher of the Balkans changed us’
by David Aaronovitch, The Times, 14/3/2006

Reprinted as:
‘Tyrant gave nations steel to intervene’
The Australian, 20/3/2006

Aaronovitch presents a version of the typical centrist position on the former Yugoslavia. Whilst claiming allegiance with the Left (‘anti-fascists’ and ‘internationalists’), the position chosen is on the Right, in that the righteousness of Western powers is assumed, and international law is disregarded.

Consider the following sentence: ‘There were the lawyers arguing that military action without the imprimatur of the United Nations might be illegal.’ In reality, this means ‘There were lawyers pointing out that aggression is illegal in that it breaches the Geneva Convention, the cornerstone of international law.’

Aaronovitch’s sentence is that of a journalist disdainful of the rule of law. The only alternative to the rule of law is the rule of might.

With this fundamental attitude comes a corresponding tendency to defame those who disagree with it. Aaronovitch objects to The Guardian’s decision to retract an article that defamed the world’s №1 intellectual, Noam Chomsky. The retracted article contained that lie that Chomsky did not believe that the Srebrenica massacre (Bosnia, July 1995) happened. (more…)