[Peace-discuss] Chomsky on the great danger of Trump

[David Green]

Yes, I think that what Jeff says is fundamentally correct.

DG

On Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:34 AM J.B. Nicholson via Peace-discuss <
peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

> C. G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss wrote:
> > See the second and third parts of this interview (linked at end):
> >
> > https://www.democracynow.org/2020/7/24/noam_chomsky_on_trump_s_troop
>
> I'm afraid I don't agree with Chomsky in much of this interview because
> large
> portions of it came off to me as leaving out significant context and
> participating in
> Trump Derangement Syndrome. Yes, Trump is awful, but the Democrats offer
> nobody
> better because they're okay with Trump and Biden is merely a useful
> neolib/neocon
> insurance policy. Chomsky was said to have shown "massive differences"
> between Trump
> and Biden but as far as policy goes the two major corporate parties (and
> Trump &
> Biden in particular) share so much in common that it seems
> unrepresentative to get
> into what separates them as though there's enough to make a big deal out
> of that.
> When I take into consideration what is likely to be on most Americans
> minds during a
> depression and a pandemic with an upcoming election ahead, I can't concur
> with so
> much of what Chomsky or DN's Nermeen Shaikh got into here.
>
> Domestically, neither supports a UBI, jobs program, or Medicare for All
> (in fact, as
> Jimmy Dore pointed out in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv21BLO-JwI and
> as I've
> written to peace-discuss previously, it wouldn't be hard for Trump to
> shame the
> Democrats by even offering to pass Medicare for All into law knowing the
> Democrats
> will never bring such a bill to the House floor for a vote. Pelosi will
> see to
> that.). Medicare for All alone is an election winner and is massively
> important to
> Americans now. Medicare for All will only become more important as the
> coming weeks
> pass: evictions, more people losing their jobs, and the loss of whatever
> healthcare
> was tied to that job. Medicare for All didn't show up as a talking point
> in any of
> the three parts of this Chomsky interview linked from
> https://www.democracynow.org/2020/7/24/noam_chomsky_on_trump_s_troop and
> that's
> probably because there's nothing a Democratic Party supporter could say
> about
> Medicare for All that would make the Democrats look good. I dare say that
> Medicare
> for All for Americans is more important than traveling to Europe (a topic
> Chomsky
> does reference).
>
> The interview spends a fair bit of time on speculation around imposing
> martial law
> and canceling the elections (perhaps so they don't have to talk about far
> more
> pressing issues where no speculation is necessary like the lack of
> Medicare for All,
> lack of a national jobs program, and no UBI and that this tells us the
> Democrats are
> fine with Trump). It's worth noting that in 2016 the largest bloc of
> registered
> voters did not vote for president. So if 2020 repeats what happened in
> 2016 the
> largest bloc of registered voters might not miss a chance to participate
> in a
> presidential election they would have skipped due to loathing the two most
> prominent
> candidates and their horrid policy choices.
>
> We also get a bit of psychoanalysis -- the kind of talk we'd rightly
> reject coming
> from anyone else (and it's not clear why we should hold Chomsky to
> different
> standards) -- Chomsky said Trump is "desperate", "psychotic. He is in
> extreme danger
> of losing his position in the White House", and "psychologically incapable
> of
> losing". But there's no acknowledgement that establishment pollsters got
> the 2016
> election wrong (and there's no price to pay for being so wrong). Hillary
> Clinton lost
> her 2nd attempt at becoming US President to a TV game show host who had no
> electoral
> history. To shift the blame she backed a now 4-year-long baseless
> conspiracy theory
> (which DN is apparently happy to echo) blaming Russia for her loss known
> colloquially
> as Russiagate. But somehow Trump's speculated "[refusal] to commit to
> accepting the
> outcome of the 2020 election" is supposed to be troubling. Would that
> refusal come
> with sanctions against Russia like Russiagate has? Sanctions hurt and kill
> the poor.
> One would think those sanctions and the harms they cause would merit
> mention.
>
> I'm suspicious that the main reason DN wants to interview Chomsky on this
> topic now
> is because Chomsky is saying things that are compatible with DN's
> neoliberalist Trump
> Derangement Syndrome. Around election time Chomsky seems to favor the
> Democrats
> (witness this interview and the letter Chomsky signed on to not too long
> ago which
> reached a conclusion much like 'any Blue will do').
>
> In another part of the same overall interview --
> https://www.democracynow.org/2020/7/24/man_woman_camera_person_tv_noam --
> which DN
> titled "Noam Chomsky Responds to Trump Bragging He Aced a Dementia Test"
> -- nobody
> brought up Biden's readily-apparent mental problems (which the
> establishment media
> try to paper over by calling them "gaffes"). And his team knows it; Obama
> "bluntly
> counseled Mr. Biden to keep his speeches brief, interviews crisp and slash
> the length
> of his tweets" so as to not give Biden more opportunity to showcase his
> obvious
> mental inadequacy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmoln-XK3Gw). Recently
> a Biden
> staffer cut off Biden's interview with docile media outlet before Biden
> could go
> off-script too much further (https://youtube.com/watch?v=SaX1i4EeQRI).
>
> So I fail to see how Trump is dangerous enough to merit the single-minded
> mentions he
> gets in that DN interview; it would be far more useful to the audience to
> point out
> that Trump is all too typical a US President which means he's merely the
> latest
> leader of a line of rapacious oligarchs (quoting Dylan Ratigan). We got
> Trump because
> of what the Obama/Biden administration did. The country rejected Mrs.
> Clinton in part
> because of what we'd already seen her do as a Senator (which includes
> voting for
> authorizing invading Iraq alongside Sen. Biden who would later go on to
> brag that
> he'd make the same vote again, then when realizing that line is reading
> the room
> wholly wrongly, lie about the reason for his authorization vote).
>
> The Democrats currently give Trump what he asks for while calling Trump a
> traitor to
> the US. The Democrats & Republicans work together against our needs. The
> Democrats
> are not an opposition party. It's shameful to point out only one part of
> the trouble
> we're in with the Democrats and Republicans without the context that the
> other major
> corporate party agrees on all the major issues of the day.
>
> Joe Biden promised his wealthy campaign investors that "Nothing will
> fundamentally
> change". In that same speech he waxed fondly about "memories of working
> alongside
> segregationist senators, and telling wealthy donors they have nothing to
> fear from
> his presidency" according to establishment media outlet Vox, which
> continued:
>
>
> https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/6/19/18690910/biden-fundraiser-controversy-segregationists-donors
> > [Biden] didn’t want to “demonize” the wealthy and added that, though
> “income
> > inequality” is a problem that must be addressed, under his presidency,
> “no one’s
> > standard of living will change, nothing will fundamentally change.” He
> went on: “I
> > need you very badly. I hope if I win this nomination, I won’t let you
> down.”
> Biden should be taken at his word. That's a bad promise for anyone trying
> to pitch
> the idea that Trump is "desperate" and "psychotic" in an effort to only
> talk about a
> part of the story (particularly problematic in the context of a
> presidential election).
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