"You don't get to be a respected intellectual by uttering truisms in monosyllables."
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Noam Chomsky quotes (page 50 of 84)
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"No honest journalist should be willing to describe himself or herseif as 'embedded.' To say, 'I'm an embedded journalist' is to say, 'I'm a government Propagandist."
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"Amusing and perfectly self-conscious charlatans."
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"As in the past, the costs and risks of the coming phases of the industrial economy were to be socialized, with eventual profits privatized."
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"This Sarah Palin phenomenon is very curious. I think somebody watching us from Mars — they would think the country has gone insane."
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"The European reaction to Obama is a European delusion."
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"Of course all such conclusions about appropriate actions against the rich and powerful are based on a fundamental flaw: This is us, and that is them. This crucial principle, deeply embedded in Western culture, suffices to undermine even the most precise analogy and the most impeccable reasoning."
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"I am not too happy with terms like “the left”, to be honest. And I don’t use it much….if by “the left” you mean people who are committed to peace and justice and freedom and so on, there can’t be elements of the left opposed to workers’ movement, at least under that definition."
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"To cite the facts of history is to fall prey to 'moral equivalence,' or 'political correctness,' or 'the error of of atheism,' or one of the other misdeeds concocted to guard against the sins of understanding and insight into the real world."
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"If you claim to have a theory that deduces unexpected consequences from nontrivial principles, let's see it."
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"The 'anti-globalisation movement' is the most significant proponent of globalisation - but in the interests of people, not concentrations of state-private power."
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"For 500 years, since European explorers came, Latin American countries had been separated from one another. They had very limited relations. Integration is a prerequisite for independence."
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"Concentration of executive power, unless it's very temporary and for specific circumstances, let's say fighting world war two, it's an assault on democracy."
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"The major advances in speed of communication and ability to interact took place more than a century ago. The shift from sailing ships to telegraph was far more radical than that from telephone to email!"
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"A number of analysts have observed that although bin Laden was finally killed, he won some major successes in his war against the U.S."
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"Precisely constructed models for linguistic structure can play an important role, both negative and positive, in the process of discovery itself. By pushing a precise but inadequate formulation to an unacceptable conclusion, we can often expose the exact source of this inadequacy and, consequently, gain a deep understanding of the linguistic data. More positively, a formalized theory may automatically provide solutions for many problems other than those for which it was explicitly designed."
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"There's never been anything like the so-called Vietnam Syndrome: it's mostly a fabrication."
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"The Occupy movement did create spontaneously communities that taught people something: you can be in a supportive community of mutual aid and cooperation and develop your own health system and library and have open space for democratic discussion and participation. Communities like that are really important."
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"A very large majority of the U.S. population is in favor of establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba and has been for a long time with some fluctuations. And even part of the business world is in favor of it, too. But the government won't allow it."
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"I hope that a move toward clemency with Judge Afiuni would be a step towards the importance of maintaining a properly functioning justice system."
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