Young Jews Disrupt Netanyahu at Jewish General Assembly

[Rue]

Here's a rebuttal Bloody of your attempt to apologize forChomsky's support of Faurison.

Chomsky in my opinion is dishonest. Time and time he is caught making a sweeping generalized statement or engaging in a misquote and then when called on it tries to deny it.

http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2004/11/chomsky_and_hol.html

[Rue]

Here's a direct rebuttal to Bloody's attempt to suggest Chomsky did not defend the Khmer Rouge and deny they engaged in genocide or never supported Faurison's anti holocaust views: source: http://j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/archives/000155.html

" ...

Insights? Like his writing a preface for a book by Robert Faurisson--a guy whose thesis seems to be that "the alleged massacre in gas chambers and the genocide of the Jews is part of one and the same lie, a gigantic political and financial racket for the benefit of Israel and international Zionism"? Like his claiming in said preface that Faurisson seems to be "a relatively apolitical liberal of some sort"? Like his claims that he "know very little" about Faurisson's work, has "no special knowledge" about the topics Faurisson writes about, and--as Jay Parini notes-- continues to "maintain to this day that he has never read anything by Faurisson that suggests that the man was pro-Nazi"? These are supposed to be high quality insights?

But whenever I ask the Chomskyites why he would claim that Robert Faurisson is a "relatively apolitical liberal," and how he could possibly manage to "never read anything by Faurisson that suggests that the man was pro-Nazi," I get one or more of three responses:

What Chomsky wrote and said about Faurisson was written and said in haste, without proper reflection--it's not representative of his thought.

Chomsky is quoted out of context: he's defending Faurisson's right to free speech according to the principles of Voltaire, not endorsing or defending Faurisson.

Yes, he's made some mistakes. And he refuses to back down or make concessions when he is wrong. But it's more than counterbalanced by the extraordinarily good work he's done uncovering the cynical crimes of power-mad governments like the U.S. and Israel.

Which makes me ask, wouldn't it be better not to misrepresent Faurisson's beliefs? Not to claim that he is a relatively apolitical liberal? Not to say that you have seen no evidence that Faurisson is pro-Nazi? It is, after all, a much stronger defense of free speech to say that you are defending a loathsome Holocaust-denier's right to free speech because free speech is absolute, then to say that poor Faurisson--a relatively apolitical liberal--is being persecuted for no reason other than that some object to his (unspecified) "conclusions."

And uncovering the cynical crimes of mad governments? Take a look at Chomsky's 1979 After the Cataclysm:

If a serious study…is someday undertaken, it may well be discovered…that the Khmer Rouge programs elicited a positive response…because they dealt with fundamental problems rooted in the feudal past and exacerbated by the imperial system.… Such a study, however, has yet to be undertaken.

Reflect that it was published three full years after the Cambodian Holocaust of the Year Zero. Ask yourself whether this is an uncovering or a covering of the crimes of an abominable regime. But it gets worse. Go back to your Nation of 1977, and consider the paragraph:

...there are many other sources on recent events in Cambodia that have not been brought to the attention of the American reading public. Space limitations preclude a comprehensive review, but such journals as the Far Eastern Economic Review, the London Economist, the Melbourne Journal of Politics, and others elsewhere, have provided analyses by highly qualified specialists who have studied the full range of evidence available, and who concluded that executions have numbered at most in the thousands; that these were localized in areas of limited Khmer Rouge influence and unusual peasant discontent, where brutal revenge killings were aggravated by the threat of starvation resulting from the American destruction and killing.

Of this, [email protected] writes:

Sounds very impressive, does it not? If... entirely respectable magazines denied the accusations that the Khmer Rouge had committed vast crimes... we cannot take seriously these allegations.... There must be some substantial evidence, presented by these magazines, that shows or strongly suggests that the refugees tales of terror were nonsense, right?... He claims that these are "conflicting reports" that justify disbelief in the alleged crimes of the Khmer Rouge....

In the case of the Economist, there are no [such] articles.... Presumably [Chomsky] refers to a letter to the Economist ... a letter replying to an entirely accurate article.... [T]his letter was indeed... ["provided"] by the Economist, but it is misleading to invoke [its] authority... the Economist opposes Chomsky's claims.

In the case of the Far Eastern Economic review the review did indeed publish an article that said almost, but not quite, what Chomsky represents it as saying.... Nayan Chanda ( Far Eastern Economic Review October 29 1976 ) does indeed doubt the refugees are telling the truth... but he... [presents no] evidence contradicting their stories. He does indeed say "thousands"... he does not say "at most in the thousands"... [he says] "the numbers killed are impossible to calculate."... Chomsky presented the Far Eastern Economic Review as confidently denying the possibility that the killings were vastly higher, but Chanda specifically denies such knowledge and confidence....

Chomsky lies by misdirection.... [H]e said "[provided]" to associate the authority of the Economist with a letter to the editor... [he said] " at most in the thousands" as if it were a conclusion of an article... [in] the Far Eastern Economic Review....

I've looked through the Economist. If there's anything written by the Economist's staff that has evidence casting doubt on the Cambodian Holocaust, I missed it as well.

So why does Chomsky lie about the "highly qualified specialists"? The claim that it is "space limitations" rather than "nonexistence" that prevents their being named cannot be a claim made in good faith, can it? And why would anyone lie for Pol Pot, unless they were either a nut-boy loon or were being mendacious and malevolent in search of some sinister and secret purpose? But when I ask the Chomskyites why he would falsely claim in 1977 that accusations of Cambodian genocide had been disputed in the pages of the Economist and the Far Eastern Economic Review by "highly qualified specialists"judging "the full range of evidence" and that these highly-qualified specialists put a firm upper bound of "at most in the thousands" on Khmer Rouge executions, I get one or more of three responses:

What Chomsky wrote and said about the Khmer Rouge was a mistake, but it's uncharacteristic of his work.

Chomsky never said the Khmer Rouge were genocidal butchers, he only said that there wasn't conclusive evidence that they were genocidal butchers.

W

hen a serious study of the Khmer Rouge is carried out, we will learn that most of the evidence of their "crimes" was faked by the Vietnamese after their conquest of Cambodia

I can't see how anyone can make the second claim in good faith: Chomsky not only said that there wasn't conclusive evidence that the Khmer Rouge were genocidal butchers, he wrote--falsely--that there was reliable evidence that they weren't genocidal butchers.

And I don't see how anyone can claim that Chomsky's lies are "uncharacteristic" of his work. There are just too damned many of them.

I tried (unsuccessfully) to ascertain the reasons for the appeal of Chomsky--to people who don't believe that the Khmer Rouge are benevolent friends of humanity, that Robert Faurisson is an apolitical liberal, and that U.S. intervention in Bosnia was motivated by metal mines and pipeline routes, that is--once before."

You can have him Bloody,I consider him just another weasel of the day.

[bloodyminded]

In regards to his political ideology I would myself define him as a Stalinist. I don't think that is an unfair label.

Of course it's an unfair label. In fact, "Stalinist" appears to be his favourite insult...one he overuses, if anything, in my opinion.

Since he's not a communist, has always opposed Soviet Tyranny, and has been scorned in the past by Soviet apologists for being a "left gatekeeper"...and since he was not allowed into the Soviet Union to speak because of his "anti-revolutionary" views....I'd have to conclude that you don't know what you're talking abput.

Little wonder, considering the ridiculous sources you use as "proof" of Chomsky's baleful iniquity.

I personally disagree with his political views on world conspiracy,

He explicitly disavows conspiracy theories, and again, is held up to ridicule by conspiracists for his views on such matters.

Edited December 8, 2010 by bloodyminded

[bloodyminded]

Here's a rebuttal Bloody of your attempt to apologize forChomsky's support of Faurison.

Chomsky in my opinion is dishonest. Time and time he is caught making a sweeping generalized statement or engaging in a misquote and then when called on it tries to deny it.

http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2004/11/chomsky_and_hol.html

Previously I posted a rebuttal to your charges; unlike yourself, I avoided the points incidental to our debate, carefully selecting only what was relevant to it; and I interjected my own thoughts throughout, and explained why I thought you wrong.

And again, you merely post someone else's diatribe--a long one--without highlighting the salient factors.

Your other posts here include a little more, but nothing from you, and they aren't cohesive. They're confusing.

Perhaps intentionally so.

Further, you ignore my rebuttals, pretending, I suppose, that I never made them, so they don't need to be addressed. That is, you repeat the charges (Chomsky as supportive of anti-semitic neo-nazis, and other preposterous indictments) without adressing the rebuttals. That's hardly honest or fair debating.

If you think, in our debate, I'm going to do all the work, including my own assessments as point and counterpoint throughout...while you're merely going to cut and paste a few arguments by extremists (Cohn, Kamm) which I've already made an attempt to address....you're sorely mistaken.

However, in the faint hope that you are even bothering to read what I write (though I've given up hope that something as trivial as facts are going to have any effect on your adherence to the deceptions of Cohn, Kamm, deLong, et al), I will address a couple of the rare new, unaddressed points you make here:

First, that you call me a "Chomsky worshipper" is a mindless charge, and is consistently levelled (by the gentlemen you cite, in fact) against anyone who disputes the virulent anti-Chomskyism that is part of every pseudo-intellectual ideologue's "education."

In the midst of defending Chomsky's opinions against all the scurrilous lies and distortions you believe (without reservation, I might add), I pointed out that I not only assume Chomsky is wrong about certain things; I take it for granted, and that he might be wrong about a lot of things.

But this doesn't ever seem to occur to you when you cite your sources; since they're criticizing the "Stalinist"[sic], they must be 100% correct.

Is it not possible that you are the hero-worshipper here, rather than myself?

At any rate, the fact that you disagree with my assessment of these writers demands that you are their "worshipper"--by your own standards.

Second--and here's yet another example of where the critics you cite and admire get the plain facts wrong--deLong charges (and both Cohn and Kamm have made identical claims) that Chomsky "wrote a preface" for Faurisson's book.

He did no such thing. This is factually incorrect, and calls the other claims into question (though there's no need, since they're foolish claims anyway).

Chomsky was asked by a third party to offer some remarks on free speech; the same sort of request Chomsky gets from conservative libertarians and radical leftists, requests with which he happily complies on a continual basis.

He didn't "write a preface." He wrote some remarks on free speech which were then included, without his permission, as an introductory element to the book.

The distinction couldn't be more clear....

....which is why you will pretend it's not true, and stubbornly insist on repeating the falsehoods perpetrated by these Chomsky-obssessives you strangely consider insightful.

And if your "four degrees" are insufficient education so that you can't even understand that you're reading reactionary polemics, full of wilful distortions (ie direct lies); and if you can't see the uncontroversial truth that these writers can't even get their (available, demonstrable) facts straight...then I'm afraid I can't help you any further.

Edited December 8, 2010 by bloodyminded

[moderateamericain]

Not every Jew supports the Direction Israel is headed in.

Not every Arab Disagrees with the Direction Israel has taken.

NOt every Arab Supports Hamas

Not every Jew agrees with Hamas.

That being said, My opinion is simply this. Arab, Jew, Christian it doesn't matter to me. Which Government will bring the best standard of Living to Israel. The Jewish Government(current) or the Arab Government(Hamas). IF i were a betting man, my monies on the Jewish government. Which government will give you the most FREEDOM? Again a Jewish Government.

TO mean thats the real crux of the argument. If you look at countries that are deeply Muslim. That standard of living sucks. Muslim Governments DO NOT WORK!