Noam Chomsky signs Jewish International Opposition Statement against Attack on Iran

http://www.monthlyreview.org/mrzine/iran080808.html

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Two recent Chomsky videos

Chomsky on Iraq: "Responsibilities". Channel4.com. March 19, 2008.

Noam Chomsky Lectures on Modern-Day American Imperialism: Middle East and Beyond. Hosted by the Boston University School of Law and the Boston University Anti-War Coalition. April 25, 2008.

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Three additional 2008 interviews with Professor Chomsky

Chomsky on the Kurds. With Namo Abdulla, Leven Magazine. August 11, 2008.

US public irrelevant. With Avi Lewis, Al-Jazeera. June 30, 2008.

Benazir's martyrdom may exacerbate unrest in Sindh. With Farad Faruqui, AAJ TV. February 2, 2008.

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New article by Professor Chomsky

All options on the table?. Khaleej Times. August 6, 2008.

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Two recent e-mail correspondences with Professor Chomsky

Untitled interview (e-mail correspondence). With Wissam Matta, Assafir newspaper (Lebanon). August 1, 2008.

Untitled interview (e-mail correspondence). With Thordur Sveinsson, Campaign Against Militarism in Iceland. August 1, 2008.

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Transcript of 1989 talk: Manufacturing Consent

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. University of Wisconsin-Madison. March 15, 1989.

Many thanks to William Greene for the transcription.

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New documentary featuring Professor Chomsky

In 2004, Noam Chomsky was interviewed for "American Feud: A History of Conservatives and Liberals." The DVD includes many clips from the interview. Professor Chomsky comments on the history of liberalism and conservatism, the 1960's, President Reagan, our dysfunctional electoral processes, "red and blue states" and many other topics.

15 additional minutes of Professor Chomsky are included in the DVD extras. The "American Feud" website explains the project in more detail:

http://www.americanfeud.org

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Interview to Noam Chomsky. With Vicente Navarro. July 18, 2008.

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New Spanish-language Chomsky interview

Gane quien gane, no habra grandes cambios. With Barbara Schijman. July 23, 2008.

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A lengthy unpublished 1989 interview with Professor Chomsky

Unpublished interview. With Phil Gasper and Joe Allen. November 3, 1989.

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Noam Chomsky interviewed in Janauary Magazine

January Interview: Noam Chomsky. By Richard Klin. July, 2008

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Chomsky interview in the Bangkok Post

Resonant and unwavering. With Stuart Alan Becker. July 14, 2008.

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New Chomsky article

It's the oil, stupid!. Khaleej Times. July 8, 2008.

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Recent Chomsky interview

On the Myth of Ape Language. With Matt Aames. 2007/2008.

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Noam Chomsky featured in new film on John Cage, Revenge of the Dead Indians

http://moderecords.com/catalog/197cage.html

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Noam Chomsky signs open letter to Ortega government in Nicaragua

For more details see:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jun/24/2

And the contents of the letter (in Spanish) can be found at:

http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=69048

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Two recent Chomsky interviews

Chomsky Speaks. With Wajahat Ali. June 16, 2008.

Chomsky says U.S. security treaty imposes brazen demands on Iraq. With Press TV. June 13, 2008.

(A p.s. to our readers: recent technical problems with updating the blog/RSS feed are now fixed.)

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Noam Chomsky interviewed (with Ilan Pappe) on the future of Israel and Palestine

On the Future of Israel and Palestine. With Frank Barat. June 6, 2008.

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Noam Chomsky interviewed by Gabriel Mathew Schivone

United States of Insecurity. With Gabriel Mathew Schivone. May 19, 2008.

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Noam Chomsky interviewed as part of latest 1 Giant Leap project

According to artist Jamie Catto, "Noam kindly joined us in our film about The Bombardment - to talk about the assault of the media and the insatiable desire of the dollar - and to explore how even when you turn off your TV the chatter in your mind is even louder."

For a trailer of the episode with Professor Chomsky:

http://www.whataboutme.tv/bombardment

And more information about 1 Giant Leap's work:

http://www.whataboutme.tv/
and
http://www.1giantleap.tv/

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Three recent Chomsky articles from the Khaleej Times

Bush's bankrupt vision. Khaleej Times. June 1, 2008.

Can a Democrat change US Middle East policy?. Khaleej Times. April 3, 2008.

The war everyone forgot. Khaleej Times. February 29, 2008.

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Chomsky videos at bigthink.com

Includes:

"What is the best way forward in Iraq?"
"How will the changing global powers impact the Israel-Palestine conflict?"
"How do you see the global power dynamic in 2008?"
"What are your thoughts about the passing of William F. Buckley?"

http://www.bigthink.com/user/noam-chomsky

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Professor Chomsky interviewed by Doug Henwood of Left Business Observer

http://leftbusinessobserver.com/Radio.html#080207

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Professor Chomsky on the campus circuit:

Harvard University

Boston University

Tufts University

Rock Bridge High School

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Review of The Essential Chomsky

"It's certainly essential."

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/culture/?id=24837

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Chomsky interviewed by Booktalk.org, on Interventions

BOOKTALK.ORG: What's your opinion of the candidates running in the Democratic Presidential primary?

CHOMSKY: Keeping to the viable candidates, I am not impressed.

Interventions, an interview with the author. With Booktalk.org. November 2007.

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Professor Chomsky on "Tips for dealing with information overload"

"I wish I could answer sensibly. I just can't. You should see the room in which I'm working. Piles of books, clippings, manuscripts, notes ... All sorts of lost treasures buried in them."

http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2008-05-09-n27.html

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Chomsky on 1968

Noam Chomsky on 1968. New Statesman. May 8, 2008.

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KPFK interview (MP3 audio) with Professor Chomsky

World Focus (Office of the Americas), with Noam Chomsky. KPFK. February 24, 2008.

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Two more new Chomsky videos:

The Middle East in the Context of the Presidential Elections and the "Surge" in Iraq. Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee and the Arab Student Organization at Boston University. April 5, 2008.

Noam Chomsky and Omar Baddar Debate the Israel Lobby. Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee and the Arab Student Organization at Boston University. April 12, 2008.

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New Chomsky video:

Authors@Google: Noam Chomsky. M.I.T., Cambridge, MA. April 25, 2008.

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Noam Chomsky named one of the world's top 100 "public intellectuals" http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4262

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Noam Chomsky's opposition to missile defense in Eastern Europe, and a petition

"The installation of a missile defense system in Eastern Europe is, virtually, a declaration of war" - Noam Chomsky

For Professor Chomsky's views on "missile defense" see:

http://www.nenasili.cz/en/832_noam-chomsky

The petition can be found at:

http://petice.nenasili.cz/?lang=en

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Noam Chomsky on Humanism -- audio

Chomsky on Humanism. Equal Time For Freethought. May 27, 2007.

Chomsky on Humanism II. Equal Time For Freethought. June 3, 2007.

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Recent Chomsky interview

The US-Kurdish Relations and the Kurdish Question in Iraq. With Peshawa Abdulkhaliq Muhammed. February 17, 2008.

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Three new articles and and interview

Why is Iraq Missing from 2008 Presidential Race?. With Amy Goodman. February 26, 2008.
The Most Wanted List, International Terrorism. Tom Dispatch. February 26, 2008.
"Good News," Iraq and Beyond. ZNet. February 16, 2008.
Where's the Iraqi voice?. Khaleej Times. February 1, 2008.

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Noam Chomsky on the www.rabble.ca site

"It should be no secret that we are living in an era of ever more intensive efforts to 'engineer consent,' as the PR industry describes its task. Narrow sectors of power and privilege are devoting intensive efforts to marginalize the public so as to facilitate policies designed to benefit their own interests, whatever the cost -- often severe -- to the general population and future generations. The need for independent channels of information and interaction is always critical for a free society, but particularly so at times like these. It is no exaggeration to say that the hopes for a decent world rest substantially on the success of the kind of work that http://www.rabble.ca/ has been carrying out with such distinction and dedication."

--Noam Chomsky

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A Personal Message From Noam Chomsky
February 13, 2008

http://www.zcommunications.org

We live in an era of media concentration, vast efforts on many fronts (political, economic, military, ideological) to insulate state and private power from critical discussion or even popular awareness, and to reduce citizens to isolated atomized creatures restricted to satisfying personal 'created wants.' This massive and coordinated campaign has been partially successful, but only in a limited way.

The range and scope and dedication of popular activism has also increased, all over the world, reaching a level of international solidarity and mutual support that has never been seen before. The basic conflicts are very old, but they have taken quite dramatic and significant new forms, and the stakes are far higher than ever before. It is, regrettably, no exaggeration to say that the survival of the species is at risk -- and many others with it. We all know why.

The popular movements are the hope for a decent future. They of course have to have access to information and modes of interaction. In addition to alternative print and video, to a very large extent they have relied on the internet, which allows people to escape from the constraints of the doctrinal systems, to explore and investigate and discuss crucial issues with one another, to plan and organize.

Z Magazine and ZNet have played a crucial role in serving all of these functions. I see that every day. I travel and speak constantly, in the U.S. and abroad, and spend many hours a day just responding to inquiries and comments. I constantly discover that the people and organizations I come in contact with are relying very substantially on Z projects for information, discussion, and opportunities for interaction and organizing, to an extent that is quite remarkable.

Z is also an invaluable resource for me personally, in all of these respects, and also in my case for providing a forum for intense and very constructive discussion, the only one I regularly participate in. And for posting articles, interviews, commentaries, etc., of mine. I know that many others have very much the same experience.

It is of inestimable importance, in my judgment, that Z and ZNet, now composing the new ZCom with their various other projects such as their growing video efforts and incomparable summer school, arguably the most exciting and instructive I have ever encountered.

Again, I do not think it is possible to exaggerate the stakes. I hope that all of us who are committed to resisting and reversing the powerful currents of reaction and oppression and violence, and showing that another world is indeed possible, will contribute as best we can to ensure that the remarkable achievements of Z and ZNet will be carried forward.

Noam Chomsky
U.S.

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Interview: Chomsky on the Rise of the South

Chomsky on the Rise of the South. With Michael Shank. January 23, 2008.

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New Chomsky content

A recent video:
Interventions. Back Pages Books, Waltham, MA. January, 2008. (Requires RealPlayer)

Transcription of a previous talk:
Free Market Fantasies: Capitalism in the Real World. Harvard University. April 13, 1996. (Many thanks to William Greene for the transcription.)

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Important new collection of Chomsky writings

The Essential Chomsky
Edited by Anthony Arnove

In a single volume, the seminal writings of the world's leading philosopher, linguist, and critic, published to coincide with his eightieth birthday.

For the past forty years Noam Chomsky's writings on politics and language have established him as a preeminent public intellectual and as one of the most original and wide-ranging political and social critics of our time. Among the seminal figures in linguistic theory over the past century, since the 1960s Chomsky has also secured a place as perhaps the leading dissident voice in the United States.

Chomsky's many bestselling works -- including Manufacturing Consent, Hegemony or Survival, Understanding Power, and Failed States -- have served as essential touchstones for dissidents, activists, scholars, and concerned citizens on subjects ranging from the media to human rights to intellectual freedom. In particular, Chomsky's scathing critiques of the U.S. wars in Vietnam, Central America, and the Middle East have furnished a widely accepted intellectual inspiration for antiwar movements over nearly four decades.

The Essential Chomsky assembles the core of his most important writings, including excerpts from his most influential texts over the past forty years. Here is an unprecedented, comprehensive overview of Chomsky's thought.

Buy from: Amazon|Powells|Publisher

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New article in 'On Chomsky' section:

Chomsky Draws a Crowd. By Eric Athas. January 18, 2008.

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A new Chomsky interview, with Foreign Policy in Focus:

Chomsky on World Ownership, with Michael Shank, January 23, 2008.

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Two recent articles by Professor Chomsky

We Own the World, January 1, 2008.

Symposium on Margaret Boden, Mind as Machine: A History of Cognitive Science, October 11, 2007.

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Transcript of 1988 Perle-Chomsky debate now available.

http://chomsky.info/debates/1988----.htm

Many thanks to Jerome Henin for the transcription.

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Professor Chomsky Q&A

For interested readers of chomsky.info, Professor Chomsky ocassionally answers questions posted to ZCommunications by "Z Sustainers" at:

http://www.zcommunications.org/blog/noamchomsky

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We Own the World, new Noam Chomsky lecture DVD

In a new DVD from this summer, Noam Chomsky looks at government and corporate elite policies over the years. These policies, Chomsky argues in We Own the World, violate international and domestic laws, and involve imperialist designs that depend on targeted assassinations and the killing of innocent civilians on a mass scale.

Yet, US elites still lay claim to being just, democratic, and humane.

How can they do this? As Chomsky refrains over and over, to the delight of the ZMI audience, they can do it only if we accept the basic assumption that "We own the world"--and therefore have the right to do whatever we want.

Filmed June 2007 at Z Media Institute. 1 hour 30 minutes: talk 60 minutes; Q&A 25 minutes.

Price: $22.00

https://www.zmag.org/store/Details.cfm?ProdID=169

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New collection of Chomsky interviews with David Barsamian
From the publisher:

An indispensable set of interviews on foreign and domestic issues with the bestselling author of Hegemony or Survival, "America's most useful citizen." (The Boston Globe)

In this new collection of conversations, conducted in 2006 and 2007, Noam Chomsky explores the most immediate and urgent concerns: Iran's challenge to the United States, the deterioration of the Israel-Palestine conflict, the ongoing occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, the rise of China, and the growing power of the left in Latin America, as well as the Democratic victory in the 2006 U.S. midterm elections and the upcoming presidential race. As always, Chomsky presents his ideas vividly and accessibly, with uncompromising principle and clarifying insight.

The latest volume from a long-established, trusted partnership, What We Say Goes shows once again that no interlocutor engages with Chomsky more effectively than David Barsamian. These interviews will inspire a new generation of readers, as well as longtime Chomsky fans eager for his latest thinking on the many crises we now confront, both at home and abroad. They confirm that Chomsky is an unparalleled resource for anyone seeking to understand our world today.

http://www.americanempireproject.com/bookpage.asp?ISBN=0805086714

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A note to readers: the Atom (Live Bookmarks) feed has not been recently updated due to some technical difficulties. There has been, however, new material added to the site. Please visit:

http://www.chomsky.info/articles.htm

http://www.chomsky.info/interviews.htm

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[Note that the Washington Post finally published Professor Chomsky's letter, albeit in abridged form, after some pressure from chomsky.info readers; see "The Department of Defense" in the Letters section of this site.] The letter to the Washington Post that follows was written as an experiment, to see just how low the editors would sink in their efforts to block a book containing evidence and analysis that they do not want to reach the public. The letter is a response to a crude and vulgar diatribe, in the form of a review of my collection Interventions. In response, I wrote a point-by-point refutation of each charge, a straightforward matter, as the editors doubtless understand. The letter was sent to the Post immediately, altogether four times, with a request for acknowledgment of receipt. Unpublished, no acknowledgment of receipt. Two weeks after the review appeared, Sept. 16, the Post did publish two letters responding to it. The letters were critical of the review, but acceptable by the standards of the editors, because they left the lies and slanders standing -- the authors could have had no way to refute them without a research project.

I think it is fair to take the editors' silence to demonstrate that they know precisely what they are doing, and are too cowardly even to acknowledge receipt.

-- Noam Chomsky

Editor

Washington Post

Jonathan Rauch's review of my Interventions (WP, Sept. 2) brings to mind Orwell's famous observations on the "indifference to reality" of the nationalist, who "not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but ... has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them."

Rauch runs through a series of what he regards as "flights into a separate reality" and "tendentious whimsy." When exposed, a straightforward matter, his charges may appear to be conscious deceit, but are more charitably understood as a textbook illustration of Orwell's observations.

Rauch is appalled that I should charge Washington with bombing Serbia in 1999 "not to prevent ethnic cleansing but to impose Washington's neoliberal economic agenda." I neither made nor endorsed the statement. Rather, I quoted it -- accurately, not in his words. The source is a high official of the Clinton administration directly involved in the Kosovo events, describing how events were perceived at the highest level. See p. 179.

Another bit of "tendentious whimsy" is the statement that "North Korea's counterfeiting racket may actually be a CIA operation." I neither made nor endorsed the statement, but cited it, accurately, from the respected Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

Rauch finds equally appalling the fact that "In Chomsky's universe, the 2001 U.S. attack on Afghanistan was undertaken with the expectation that it might drive several million people over the edge of starvation." The statement is precisely accurate. That is why aid agencies bitterly condemned the bombing, joined by leading Afghan opponents of the Taliban, including US favorites. It is also why many months after the bombing ended, Harvard's leading specialist on Afghanistan, Samina Ahmed, wrote in the Harvard journal International Security that "millions of Afghans are at grave risk of starvation." That and more is in the book under review, but in these op-eds I did not provide full details that would be familiar to readers of the mainstream press, for example, the increase in estimate of those at the edge of starvation by 50%, to 7.5 million, when the bombing was announced and initiated. If Rauch is indeed unfamiliar with the mainstream press, he can find precise references in books of mine cited here.

Particularly amazing in Rauch's universe is the idea, in his words, that "President Bush -- the first and only U.S. president to declare formal American support for a Palestinian state -- is the obstacle to a two-state solution that Hezbollah, Hamas and Iran are all prepared to accept (I am not making that up)." The tiny particle of truth here is that Bush announced his "vision" of a Palestinian state -- somewhere, some day, a pale reflection of the long-standing international consensus on a two-state settlement. Bush did indeed innovate: he is the first president to officially endorse Israeli annexation of the major illegal settlements in the West Bank, a long step backwards from Clinton's "parameters," and a death blow to any hope for a viable Palestinian state, as minimal familiarity with the region demonstrates.

In contrast, Iran's "supreme leader" Ayatollah Khamenei formally announced that Iran "shares a common view with Arab countries on ... the issue of Palestine," meaning that Iran accepts the Arab League position: full normalization of relations in terms of the international consensus. "Khamenei has said Iran would agree to whatever the Palestinians decide," the prominent Iran scholar Ervand Abrahamian observes. If Rauch reads the journal in which he writes, he knows that Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniye called for "statehood for the West Bank and Gaza..." (Washington Post, July 11, 2006) There are innumerable other examples, perhaps most important among them the statement of the most militant Hamas leader Khalid Mish'al, in exile in Damascus, calling for "the establishment of a truly sovereign and independent Palestinian state on the territories occupied by Israel in June 1967" (Guardian, Feb. 23, 2007). Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has repeatedly stated that as a Lebanese organization, Hezbollah will not disrupt anything agreed to by the Palestinians.

Much as it may distress the nationalist, on this matter the positions of Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah are more moderate -- that is, closer to the long-standing international consensus – than those of the US and Israel.

In Rauch's universe, Washington "tolerates a sovereign, more or less democratic Iraq whose Shiite government is friendly toward Iran." No comment should be necessary for readers of the daily press.

That exhausts Rauch's charges. Orwell triumphs again.

It is perhaps not surprising that Rauch's furious exertions did not unearth even a misplaced comma. As he knows, the op-eds passed through New York Times fact checking. There might be a lesson there for the journal in which he is a senior writer.

Noam Chomsky

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