Jeremy Scahill on 9/11

[Magda Hassan]

To be sure the JFK assassination is something of a blind spot for Chomsky. As a linguist and academic he can't be unaware of his use of words here. But I take that on board and still find much of his analysis useful. I also find some limitation to structural analysis when it comes to looking into this area in general.

[Paul Rigby]

To be sure the JFK assassination is something of a blind spot for Chomsky. As a linguist and academic he can't be unaware of his use of words here. But I take that on board and still find much of his analysis useful. I also find some limitation to structural analysis when it comes to looking into this area in general.

Language matters

Children must be rigorously indoctrinated in these conventions to ensure that Political Correctness will reign unchallenged. The most extensive study of high school history texts found that the word terror "does not appear once in reference to U.S. or client practices in any of the 48 texts examined in 1979 and 1990..."

Rethinking Camelot (London: Verso, 1993), p.61

Diction and repetition matter hugely, according to the author of RC.

Trouble is, Maggie, his followers don't really read him.

[Magda Hassan]

Well, that is true enough in many cases.

[Jan Klimkowski]

To be sure the JFK assassination is something of a blind spot for Chomsky. As a linguist and academic he can't be unaware of his use of words here. But I take that on board and still find much of his analysis useful. I also find some limitation to structural analysis when it comes to looking into this area in general.

Language matters

Children must be rigorously indoctrinated in these conventions to ensure that Political Correctness will reign unchallenged. The most extensive study of high school history texts found that the word terror "does not appear once in reference to U.S. or client practices in any of the 48 texts examined in 1979 and 1990..."

Rethinking Camelot (London: Verso, 1993), p.61

Diction and repetition matter hugely, according to the author of RC.

Trouble is, Maggie, his followers don't really read him.

Paul - you have taken this massively out of context. In addition, you have only included part of the paragraph and ignored the broader argument within which it sits.

The passage can be seen on page 70 (not p61) here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/3096270/Noam-C...ng-Camelot

The full paragraph is as follows:

Children must be rigorously indoctrinated in these conventions to ensure that Political Correctness will reign unchallenged. The most extensive study of high school history texts found that the word terror "does not appear once in reference to U.S. or client practices in any of the 48 texts examined in 1979 and 1990. The Viet Cong, it is duly noted, murdered and terrorized; one can only wonder how they could possibly out-terrorize Diem's US-backed forces." (Footnote 32). The answer to that question is quite simple: it is true by definition, the same device that expunges the vastly greater US terror, and its aggression itself, from the annals of history.

Footnote 32 reveals that the section in speechmarks is from John Marciano's "Ideological Hegemony and the War against Vietnam: A Critique of United States History Textbooks", 1992. And cites another study.

Chomsky is performing structural analysis of how "ideological hegemony" is maintained by ruling elites. He is not advocating its usage.

Indeed, it's rather curious that your "left gatekeeper" Chomsky, who you seem to consider an asset of American intelligence, talks about "the vastly greater US terror".

Paul - this is precisely why I don't get involved with your "specifics". I've just wasted an hour of my life searching out the original quote in full, and attempting to understand its proper context.

My fundamental point in this thread remains:

Encounter was a CIA organ. It had neocon godfather Irving Kristol on its editorial board. It did not publish original investigative journalism exposing deep black operations.

Counterpunch, Scahill, Democracy Now, the Cockburns, Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Naomi Klein etc have all contributed original investigative journalism. It is entirely possible that one or more of that bunch have been blackmailed or turned by intelligence agencies. However, there is no proof of this.

I will continue to make my own judgement, informed by the knowedgable comments of others, as to the quality of each and every piece published on these sites or by these researchers. I am certain I will disagree with a signficant proportion of what is published there.

However, I am not prepared to tar them all with the label of "left gatekeeper" and "probable intel asset" and therefore ignore everything they publish. To do so would be fundamentalism worthy of Joseph McCarthy.

[Paul Rigby]

My fundamental point in this thread remains:

Encounter was a CIA organ. It had neocon godfather Irving Kristol on its editorial board. It did not publish original investigative journalism exposing deep black operations.

A straw man: Neither Nat nor I argued Encounter undertook "original investigative journalism." You introduced the idea. My point was that both Encounter and Secker & Warburg were used by the CIA to direct left-liberals, the original target audience of the monthly, in certain directions, in this specific instance, concerning the JFK assassination. You're very welcome to address this issue.

Counterpunch, Scahill, Democracy Now, the Cockburns, Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Naomi Klein etc have all contributed original investigative journalism.

Yes, but not one of them - not one of them - has ventured a questioning piece about either Dallas '63 or 9/11. They all, without exception, back the official explanations of both. Remarkable.

Coincidences, don't you just love 'em?

It is entirely possible that one or more of that bunch have been blackmailed or turned by intelligence agencies. However, there is no proof of this.

We don't need to go rummaging through their bins, or speculating about reasons for blackmail - all we need to do is read their very obvious lies and evasions on the subjects of Dallas '63 and 9/11. Their texts incriminate them.

I will continue to make my own judgement, informed by the knowedgable comments of others, as to the quality of each and every piece published on these sites or by these researchers.

Quite right. But I'm puzzled by the implied sense of someone stopping you from using your own judgment. Who is this mysterious censor?

However, I am not prepared to tar them all with the label of "left gatekeeper" and "probable intel asset" and therefore ignore everything they publish. To do so would be fundamentalism worthy of Joseph McCarthy.

A glorious non-sequitur plus another straw man in that first sentence: I am obliged by the evidence to pronounce all those named as left-gatekeepers; and have never advocated ignoring everything they publish. Indeed, it would be daft of me to urge any such thing given my reliance on their work to make the case.

And it isn't Chomsky's critics who ring fence the big covert actions; deny the validity of studying them; or get subsidised by the very establishment forces which allowed Tailgunner Joe such a free run - until, that is, he turned on the CIA.

[Paul Rigby]

To be sure the JFK assassination is something of a blind spot for Chomsky. As a linguist and academic he can't be unaware of his use of words here. But I take that on board and still find much of his analysis useful. I also find some limitation to structural analysis when it comes to looking into this area in general.

Language matters

Children must be rigorously indoctrinated in these conventions to ensure that Political Correctness will reign unchallenged. The most extensive study of high school history texts found that the word terror "does not appear once in reference to U.S. or client practices in any of the 48 texts examined in 1979 and 1990..."

Rethinking Camelot (London: Verso, 1993), p.61

Diction and repetition matter hugely, according to the author of RC.

Trouble is, Maggie, his followers don't really read him.

Paul - you have taken this massively out of context. In addition, you have only included part of the paragraph and ignored the broader argument within which it sits.

The passage can be seen on page 70 (not p61) here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/3096270/Noam-C...ng-Camelot

The full paragraph is as follows:

Children must be rigorously indoctrinated in these conventions to ensure that Political Correctness will reign unchallenged. The most extensive study of high school history texts found that the word terror "does not appear once in reference to U.S. or client practices in any of the 48 texts examined in 1979 and 1990. The Viet Cong, it is duly noted, murdered and terrorized; one can only wonder how they could possibly out-terrorize Diem's US-backed forces." (Footnote 32). The answer to that question is quite simple: it is true by definition, the same device that expunges the vastly greater US terror, and its aggression itself, from the annals of history.

Footnote 32 reveals that the section in speechmarks is from John Marciano's "Ideological Hegemony and the War against Vietnam: A Critique of United States History Textbooks", 1992. And cites another study.

Chomsky is performing structural analysis of how "ideological hegemony" is maintained by ruling elites. He is not advocating its usage.

Indeed, it's rather curious that your "left gatekeeper" Chomsky, who you seem to consider an asset of American intelligence, talks about "the vastly greater US terror".

Paul - this is precisely why I don't get involved with your "specifics". I've just wasted an hour of my life searching out the original quote in full, and attempting to understand its proper context.

You could have saved that hour, Jan, by checking within the book version cited - where the instanced quote is indeed to be found on page 61 - and not an on-line version, which I wasn't citing.

Nor is Chomsky "performing structural analysis of how "ideological hegemony" is maintained by ruling elites" - he's replicating their techniques, having first taken care to suggest his opposition to their methods. That's a very different thing. It's all part of the rich charm of Chomsky's CIA-serving oeuvre.

Does he tell his readers that the US does beastly things all over the globe? Absolutely. He has to, it's part of his brief, and the primary means by which he established, and sustains, his "legend." Critics of left-gatekeepers have never denied any of that. What we argue is all together subtler, as befits the intellectual secret police work we critique.

Chomsky doesn't deny the CIA is guilty of monstrous crimes, he simply transfers responsibility for them to successive US presidents: The CIA, we are to understand, was just obeying orders.

A somewhat ironic defence, no, for a committed Zionist who has dedicated much of his career, as Blankfort details, to defending the state of Israel from the US left?

[Austin Kelley]

Once again, we're looking towards a synthesis ala Peter Dale Scott, where things are not so simple as "the CIA runs the President" nor "the President runs the CIA" but rather that it is the Deep Political System which organizes, frames and defines many of the covert actions with which we are concerned.

As to Chomsky being a "Zionist"- that's rather a stretch. It's always possible to play more radical than Thou (provocateurs do this all the time) but Chomsky is clearly an important critic of the policies of the Israeli State. I don't agree with him in every way but I certainly don't buy the extreme right-wing conspiracy model which often makes use of tropes like the putative world Jewish, er-Zionist conspiracy, broad use of "left gatekeeper" charges, and the like.


All of this sort of gratuitous CIA-baiting seems to be both thoughtless and destructive to me. Isn't it time we moved beyond this, taking guidance from the exemplary lead of Peter Dale Scott?


...

[Paul Rigby]

Once again, we're looking towards a synthesis ala Peter Dale Scott, where things are not so simple as "the CIA runs the President" nor "the President runs the CIA" but rather that it is the Deep Political System which organizes, frames and defines many of the covert actions with which we are concerned.

The obvious, if rarely expressed, objection to find-sounding phrases like "it is the Deep Political System which organizes, frames and defines many of the covert actions with which we are concerned" is that a) such phrases aren't telling us very much; and b) they obscure a key reality - human decision making. Someone or some group chose course of action a) over course of action b) - who and why? A discourse that evades the identity of the perps is simply aiding the perps.

As to Chomsky being a "Zionist"- that's rather a stretch.

Blankfort demolishes your objection. Do read his piece.

It's always possible to play more radical than Thou (provocateurs do this all the time) but Chomsky is clearly an important critic of the policies of the Israeli State. I don't agree with him in every way but I certainly don't buy the extreme right-wing conspiracy model which often makes use of tropes like the putative world Jewish, er-Zionist conspiracy, broad use of "left gatekeeper" charges, and the like.

Ah, what a pity, you were doing so well. The old anti-sem ad hom. Sorry, won't do. Pointing out that Chomsky, Arnoni and Stone - to name but three - chose loyalty to Israel's interests over the truth of Dallas is merely to state a fact. If Zionists don't like it, tough.

All of this sort of gratuitous CIA-baiting seems to be both thoughtless and destructive to me. Isn't it time we moved beyond this, taking guidance from the exemplary lead of Peter Dale Scott?

"Gratuitous CIA-baiting" - you mean Angelton's SIG didn't run Oswald? I'm shocked, Austen, shocked I say...

[Austin Kelley]

There is no inherent contradiction between having a systemic analysis and identifying individual perps.

As to Chomsky's position on Palestine, one can agree with it in its entirety or not, but that hardly makes him a "Zionist shill"...

[Paul Rigby]

There is no inherent contradiction between having a systemic analysis and identifying individual perps.

I wasn't aware I'd ever argued there was, Austin, though for what it's worth, I agree.

As to Chomsky's position on Palestine, one can agree with it in its entirety or not, but that hardly makes him a "Zionist shill"...

Oh yes it does:

http://www.voltairenet.org/article143703...icle143703