Chomping Chomsky: Debunking a Left-wing icon.

National Review Online ^ | July 19, 2004 | Clara Magram

[Zhangliqun]

Chomsky thinks everyone everywhere is to conservative. Nader is more of a moderate to him.

EXACTLY. THAT WAS PART OF MY POINT.

One of the things people don't get about Chomsky is that he really is a warmonger who talks the pacifist talk.

MOST LEFTIST PACIFISTS ARE. THEY ARE FINE WITH ANY NON-CAPITALIST NON-CAUCASIAN GROUP WARMONGERING, RAPING AND PILLAGING TO THEIR COLLECTIVIST HEARTS' CONTENT.

BECAUSE, REMEMBER, IT'S EITHER YOUR SKIN COLOR OR YOUR IDEOLOGY THAT DETERMINE WHETHER YOU ARE GOOD OR BAD, NOT SOMETHING SILLY LIKE WHAT YOU ACTUALLY DO...

If he had his way, we'd be invading every country on gods green earth and imposing socialist/communist systems, he would still blast us as being evil, but would (after stripping the military bare of course) involve us in every hell hole conflict on earth for "humanitarian" reasons.

AGAIN, EXACTLY.

[Rakkasan1]

I'd rather Hannity air these kooks.
Better to know your enemy than to not.

[Rakkasan1]

didn't you know? being a cunning linguist makes you a foreign policy expert! these same profs should want WF Buckley to be our national security advisor.

[tortoise]

The reason why Chomsky is so effective among collegians and academics is his reputation as a leading professor in the field of linguistics.

Chomsky is a classic example of a pernicious and improper appeal to the authority of a person outside their field of authority. Another classic example is when Roger Penrose tries to wax eloquent about his theories of artificial intelligence.

Unfortunately, this nasty fallacy is a chronic participant in many of the threads on FreeRepublic e.g. in the crevo and science discussions. Being an authority in one field does not confer authority in all possible fields no matter how smart that authority nominally is. Humans do love their idolatry.

[Tamzee]

Partners in Hate - Noam Chomsky and the Holocaust Deniers

[satchmodog9]

all you have to do is say you hate America and you are a star in these circles

[CtBigPat]

I would recommend sending her a copy of Ayn Rand's "The Virtue of Selfishness". It is a wonderful little book for debunking socialist BS.

[RightWingAtheist]

Hit the nail straight on the head there, tortoise. In the field of linguistics, Chomsky is indeed brilliant, and his concept of generative grammar has had an impact beyond the field. Syntactic Structures was recently named the most book in the history of cognitive studies. Outside of this narrow specialty, however, he is invariably and incrediably stupid, playing the role of dissenter and critic while he gullibly accepts any disinformation that appeals to his warped political perspective, refusing to properly verify his sources, and citing items out of context and out of matrix. Having insisted that language is the product of pure intuition, he obviously believes that all knowledge can be obtained that way.

[RightWingAtheist]

Chomsky only started to care about the East Timorese when his denials of the crimes of the Khmer Rouge came back to haunt him. After first denying that there was any atrocities, then trying to blame them on the United States and "counter-revolutionaries", and then minimizing them, he was finally forced to face the music when the widespread genocide committed by Communist forces was revealed. Rather than admitting he was wrong, he instead childishly tried to blame the news media for reporting the atrocities in the first place, and used the East Timor example in a desperate attempt to "prove" that the news media is an anti-communist lackey of the U.S. government.

[Sonny M]

Thanks, my teacher back in college wouldn't answer any questions after the little slip.

He just gave the old grade school b.s. about "if you want to know, you should look it up".

He then just moved on, with a mumble about disagreeing.

[Tamzee]

It's mindboggling how intellectually corrupt college professors can be :-(

[NutCrackerBoy]

In the field of linguistics, Chomsky is indeed brilliant, and his concept of generative grammar has had an impact beyond the field ... Syntactic Structures ...

He is a brilliant mind. On politics, I believe him to be a mentally ill person. I don't know how that impacts on his linguistics. I believe him to be easily brilliant enough that his work has a big impact. But speaking as a philosophy buff, I think his orientation is too rationalist, very like a Bertrand Russell. He never bothered to take account of the insights of Heidegger and Wittgenstein.

[tortoise]

Having insisted that language is the product of pure intuition, he obviously believes that all knowledge can be obtained that way.

To quote someone else on the utility of reasoning from intuition: "Your intuition also tells you that the world is flat, that lead paint chips are tasty, and that everyone isn't as smart as you are. Your intuition is lying to you. It should make you wonder what your intuition is really trying to hide."

[RightWingAtheist]

Here's a list of Phnom Chomsky's campaign donations:


http://www.newsmeat.com/fec/bystate_detail.php?city=Lexington&st=MA&last=Chomsky&first=Noam

[To Hell With Poverty]

Ha, two hundred bucks here, two hundred there....the cheap bastard, he's rolling in money!!