cannabisnews.com: Chomsky Rips U.S. Policy, Calls Upon People! 





Chomsky Rips U.S. Policy, Calls Upon People! 
Posted by FoM on March 15, 1999 at 11:34:58 PT
Work for Change!
Change can happen in the United States, but it can be achieved only by people working together tirelessly toward their goal, one of the chief critics of this country's foreign and domestic policies said here yesterday.
Noam Chomsky, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor, said that there was no foolproof formula for making change and that people working alone or just praying for intervention will accomplish nothing."Join with groups and work every day as much as you can, steadily and convincingly," Chomsky told more than 1,800 people at the Metropolitan Campus of Cuyahoga Community College. His talk was booked for the school's auditorium, but it had to be broadcast into two other large rooms on campus to accommodate the large turnout.His appearance yesterday was sponsored by the InterReligious Task Force on Central America.Chomsky said U.S. foreign policy would even cause the overthrow of a democracy if profits from big business are affected.An example he offered was a U.S.-inspired coup in Guatemala in 1954. He said U.S. involvement was documented by a United Nations study. Chomsky said the report showed when it became obvious in 1954 that the Guatemalan people favored social and economic programs established by their own government rather than imperialism fostered by the U.S., it was time to stamp out a "virus that could spread."Chomsky, 70, said big business and government also work together domestically to the detriment of the common people. He asserted that the Clinton administration was run by Wall St. financiers but did not limit his criticism to the current president.He said politicians and those who want to control policy work to get people to distrust the government."They want you to hate government because they don't want you to learn it can be controlled to help the people," he said.He said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was an advocate of this tactic and used the government to socialize risks for the rich.Chomsky said Gingrich fostered a national policy that trumpeted making single mothers learn to be responsible by cutting welfare benefits, while he handed out government subsidies to developers.Chomsky was a well-known linguistics teacher before he began to gain political prominence as an early opponent of the Vietnam War. Many of his public statements criticize military intervention by the United States.He repeated his assertion that internationally the United States was a "rogue state, a lawless, violent state that does as it chooses."Domestically, he said, the government invented a crime wave and a war on drugs that are actually "a war against the poor and black people." He said they are merely ways to remove people from the street who do not contribute to profit-making.Chomsky encouraged his listeners to work for change, though he cautioned it often comes agonizingly slow. Sometimes, he cautioned, the struggle seems to be in vain. He said each person must make the choice to help on his own."It's very easy to see the other person's crimes," Chomsky said. "It is difficult to look in the mirror. Morally, that is the toughest. We can learn a lot if we are willing to look in the mirror." ©1999 THE PLAIN DEALER. Used with permission.http://www.cleveland.com/news/pdnews/metro/cnoam15.ssf
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