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Saturday, Nov 7, 2009
Michael Harold writes:
"I went to this link:
http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2007/05/86787.html
and found a fairly interesting discussion of Chomsky's political leanings in the context of anarchism, libertarian socialism and anarcho-syndicalism.
"I have to mull this over.
"This much I do think. The libertarianism of Lew Rockwell is not the libertarianism of Antiwar.com. No way. And the ideas of social democracy and libertarian socialism have a similar distance between them.
"Anarchy as an individual act means one thing. Anarchy as a form of social organization means something entirely different.
"And individualism as a synonym for libertarianism is much further away from libertarian socialism than libertarian socialism is from social democracy."
In the essay to which MH provides the link, the following (under)statement appears: "The truth is that there were – and there are today – many tendencies and different positions concerning organization, labor and rewards, methods and manners of actuation, that is, a wide range of issues."
Google "Individualism" and see what you'll find at Wikipedia. That will give you a very quick education in the mind-boggling variety of individualistic, anarchistic, or libertarian schools of thought.
It always threatens intellectual integrity to label, categorize, and/or generalize, but in the realm of political theory, it is virtually an act of mental suicide to do so.
To the extent that anyone is literal-minded, he/she thinks that political labels (abstract nouns) have essentially one and only one meaning each, and that he/she knows what those meanings are. This manifestation of literal-mindedness is by no means confined to the consciousness of religious fundamentalists. There are as many political fundamentalists as there are of the religious variety, if not more. Everyone who is literal-minded is a fundamentalist, because literal-mindedness is a *state of consciousness* that restricts the meaning of everything we think, feel, or do.
If we're to survive physically as a species, one of the most daunting tasks to be achieved is the liberation of our thinking from the consciousness-contracting structures and strictures of language, interpreted literally or univocally. It is the task of poetry, broadly and deeply understood as anti-hypnotic language, to wake us from our sleep of constricted, restricted meaning.
As that poetic giant, expander of consciousness, and prophet against political empire William Blake puts it:
"Now I a fourfold vision see,
And a fourfold vision is given to me;
‘Tis fourfold in my supreme delight
And threefold in soft Beulah’s night
And twofold Always. May God us keep
From Single vision & Newton’s Sleep!
Strictly speaking and properly understood, all of our "political problems," are derivative from "quality of consciousness" problems.
Practical, pragmatic, action-oriented people do not want to admit that unthinking action is problematic, and of course that's why such people are causing the most problems in the world. For them, feeling and willing are far more important than thinking.
We can and should act politically, but if we are not to make matters worse, as the Nazis, Bolshevics, and Bushevics (to name only three movements) have done so spectacularly with their coercive institutions and *predilection for action at the expense of forethought*, we can and should look first, as Confucius and others have said, at the state of our own consciousness.
Ken Rogers
This is of course the direct result of there being a mind-boggling number of individuals!
One of the parameters by which people vary is the degree to which they view society as a collection of individuals or individuals as members of society. They also vary in the level of detail they're willing to discern when creating groupings.
I personnaly feel that the greatest danger we face in this country today is that our course grained groupings are causing us to alienate people we might otherwise find common cause with.
By analogy, I can then argue that LWM's attacks on Bucky1 are like the US's attack on Iraq. Just as not all brown-skinned ME residants are Al-Qaeda, not all Lew Rockwell fans are closet fascists! (which isn't to say that some aren't....in both cases)
It is true, as you say, that few conservative writers & leaders publicly opposed Bush before his bubble popped, but one who did from the beginning, in phrases equally responsible and strident, was Paul Craig Roberts - who had his man pinned on all points before lefty-whatevers came along, never mind rightwingers, and still does. His articles ought to be collected by a non-rightist editor & published under some title like "Philippics," &c - or reposted, say, in Salon. Others could be named, but Roberts certainly stands above most, right, center, or left.
The Rostra was made from prows of war ships that were captured.
The "plaudits" are from supporters of the plebeian and senatorial classes in the theatre. I need to process slowly too...
...The Rostra dazzles one; redoubled plaudits
of plebs and elders transport yet another
open-mouthed. Revealing in brother;s blood,
they change sweet hearth and home for foreign exile,
seeking their country under alien skies.
...Clearing the earth with crooked plow, the farmer
meanwhile tends to his annual work, sustaining
country, grandchildren, herds, and worthy oxen.
Immediately the year abounds with fruits,
offspring of flocks, and sheaves of Ceres' grain,
burdening rows and bursting barns with produce. Virgil
"The Fields can Rejoice. Wow, wow, wow, and what a pleasant caucus," I say. It is a Nature Party. Be honest.
This is nothing more than an analog of the libertarian habit of "spiritually baptizing the deceased" ( Locke, Smith, Paine, Jefferson, Spooner, etc) as libertarians because they "cannot protest the anachronism". Now that "conservative" is becoming a dirty word, everyone wants to be a liberal, but not just any old liberal, a "classical liberal" sounds better.
Dr. Mengele says: a google search on the term gave me 378,000 hits back; one of which is from George Mason University. (http://gmu.edu/) but I suppose a man full of codswallop will say they do not count in his universe.
http://mason.gmu.edu/~ihs/guide.html
How about the "National Center For Policy Analysis"?
Google UFO or Bigfoot and see how many hits you get. If you want to find a right wing University, you can't go wrong with GMU, or the National Center for Policy Analysis. Scaife money is Scaife money.
George Mason University is a Virginia-based University, situated close to Washington, D.C. It is notable for hosting over 40 right-wing research centers and affiliates including the Institute for Humane Studies and the Mercatus Center...The university began as the Northern Virginia branch of the University of Virginia in 1957. In 1972 it had grown to the point where it officially separated from its parent institution.
It became a "magnet for right-wing money" [1] during the 1990s. From 1992 through 1994, 12 right-wing foundations invested a combined total of $8.55 million in various academic programs and institutes of George Mason University. It was this funding that help establish (and continues to support) the University's unrivalled set of right-wing "study centers", which aim to recruit and support young, free-market-oriented students - typically through paid-for "study trips", seminars, and placements.
The Mercatus Center is currently the main focus of right-wing funding. Between 1999 and 2001, the Mercatus Center was the third largest recipient of conservative foundation money (a position previously held by the Institue of Humane Studies).
http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/06/06/true_conservatives/new/form.html
The National Center for Policy Analysis is a "communications and research foundation dedicated to providing free market solutions to today's public policy problems ... [and] prides itself on aggressively marketing its products for maximum impact by 'targeting key political leaders and special interest groups, establishing on-going ties with members of the print and electronic media, and testifying before Congress, federal agencies, state lawmakers, and national organizations.'" -- NCRP, The Strategic Philanthropy of Conservative Foundations
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=National_Center_for_Policy_Analysis
Q.E.D.
Michael Harold,
An interview with Chomsky, in his own words.
Noam Chomsky on Anarchism
Tom Lane
December 23, 1996
http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/interviews/9612-anarchism.html
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Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
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Salon headlines in your mailbox
