oam Chomsky makes one grateful that we have access through Youtube.com, to his far ranging political insight and strenuous logic. Somehow, for me at least, the image and the sound of the voice combine to make for quicker absorption and comprehension of big ideas, although books are a good tool for preservation of thought in low-tech mode. Here is Chomsky recalling a ditty composed by a Canadian Economist on the subject of Globalization:The poor complain, they always do,Be sure to watch the alternative videos parts 2 and 3 of the Government in the Future, which will show themselves after this one is done.
But that's just idle chatter,
The system works for most of us,
At least for those who matter
Once you've established yourself in the basics of political theory by viewing the above series of 3 videos, then it is time to go to the issues which define the present moment in American history: namely, that America is not a Democracy.
So what is it?
Good Question!
America is something now called, technically: A Polyarchy.
A polyarchy is a type of government system put forward by none other than James Madison, (great American that James was, he said with his tongue way into his cheek)) which purports that the people don't really count for anything except as unknowing pawns who through propaganda are persuaded that it is their mission to protect and uphold the handful of the wealth and power elite.
How is this done?
Through the ownership and absolute control of the Main Stream Media. The most blatant example of this tactic is Rupert Murdoch's buying of the Wall Street Journal. And then eliminating whatever integrity of honest journalism the WSJ might have had. Another example which comes to mind because my local newspaper, The Statesman Journal, is run by the huge right-wing conglomerate, Gannett. So? What's the big deal. Try writing a letter to the editor which espouses a liberal point of view. See if they publish your letter. Based on my own experience, I'd say chances are not good. But they will fall all over themselves to publish a letter to the editor, from a tea-bagger, upholding the most extreme kind of Fox News propagandistic thinking.
And here is a short video which speaks to the Republican purview which says that the earth is an infinite garbage can. It also addresses the view that "the private gain is the public good." This is a gloss of the ideas about the so-called Free Market as put forth by Adam Smith in his book, The Wealth of Nations, which Crony Capitalists point to and quote till you want to puke. But the problem is that these Republican idiots did not really read the whole book. Had they read the entire book they would have seen that even Smith qualifies his theories with a warning that the Free Market must be equally available to the smallest citizen or none of it will work. Indeed Smith goes even futher and says that, "A nation is only as wealthy as it's poorest citizen!"
The private gain is the Public good theory was best encapsulated in automaker GM's dictum that "what is good for GM is good for the country." As we have seen, that view wrought immense destruction of our precious infrastructure. And indeed, in this speech, Chomsky adds that
it has long been understood that this view has consistently led to the utter destruction of the very culture which fostered such a notion.The idea has been massaged by conservatives until it has been so corrupted that George Bush, who remarked that the Constitution was merely a piece of paper, and indeed, one that got in his way, could have so twisted the meaning to become perhaps the most appalling treasonous and downright criminal expression of an entire rogue administration, in American history. (Why is he not in Jail?) If the ideas of Freedom and Democracy are not infinitely valuable to each human being, and not just the mouthing of the words by brainwashed stooges who parrot what the power elite tells them to say, we are lost not only as a culture but as a species and as citizens in the Universe.♦
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