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CHOMSKY_IN_CONTEXT

                                             June       9, 2009
                                             September 10, 2013

Mark Bauerlein, a review of "The Anti-Chomsky Reader",
from Reason,  April 2005
http://www.reason.com/news/show/36575.html

Bauerlein's article is designed to
give the impression that Chomsky is an      You would think that a
unrepetant communist, ignoring the fact     libertarian ("Reason"
that he's essentially a left-wing           is the slick 'tarian
anarchist.                                  organ) could grasp that
                                            political theory is
                                            something a little more
                                            complicated than a game
                                            of two opposing teams.

      This accusation is peculiar:

         "But his most damning discovery is broader: that
         Chomsky lacks a historian's openness to fresh
         evidence. All historians know that understanding
         history is an unfolding enterprise, ever subject
         to revision. And yet not one revelation of the
         last 20 years has led to a moment's reassessment
         by Chomsky. The fall of the Berlin Wall, the
         opening of KGB archives, testimony by dissidents
         and ex-Communists-- nothing alters his outlook."

      But he's never argued that the Soviets were angels,
      just that the Americans are all-too-often devils.
                                                            CHOMSKY_PASS
      Isn't it possible that Chomsky hasn't changed
      his outlook because he hasn't needed to?

                                                         WHAT_ABOUT_THE_WALL
Here Bauerlein refers to something
Chomsky has written (most of this      CHOMSKY_DONT_TWEET
article is just empty sneers):

   "Chomsky's analysis of U.S. actions plunged deep
   into dark U.S. machinations, but when traveling
   among the Communists he rested content with
   appearances. The countryside outside Hanoi, he
   reported in The New York Review of Books, displayed
   'a high degree of democratic participation at the
   village and regional levels.' But how could he
   tell? Chomsky did not speak Vietnamese, and so he
   depended on government translators, tour guides,
   and handlers for information."

Could it be that if we look up this NYRB
article, we'd find that Baurlein has
misrepresented what Chomsky said?

Ah, here we go, Chomsky (1970):
                                                      http://www.nybooks.com/articles/10869
   "Although there appears to be a high degree of
   democratic participation at the village and
   regional levels, and some degree of leeway for
   independent planning at these levels-- limited,
   sure, by the exigencies of war-- still major
   planning is highly centralized in the hands of
   the state authorities. As Hoang Tung explained,
   the Central Committee of the Lao Dong Party
   sets the general lines of policy."

So, here we have Bauerline transmitting a
fine example of a genuine "out of context
quotation" and seriously distorting           This is not, however, a *really*
what Chomsky was saying.  Chomsky's           good job of an out of context
impression of an *apparent* regional          quote, because the trick becomes
independence is turned into a flat            obvious the moment the original
assertion that it is so, and the point        is consulted.  The really
that it's quite different on the national     impressive smears warp your
level has been dropped completely.            understanding of what was said
                                              in a way that makes it actively
    Further: throughout the article           hard to read the original as
    Chomsky himself reminds the               intended.
    reader of that he does not speak
    Vietnamese, and cannot conduct            E.g. distract from the main
    his own investigations.  He               point by raising a secondary
    takes pains to make it clear              issue that wasn't really under
    what he's seen and what he's              discussion.
    been told...

    In some ways, Bauerlein's                    Consider Delong's recent
    maneuver on that point is more               attempt at smearing Chomsky
    interesting than a simple                    as a Maoist, by pointing
    out-of-context quote: he took                out that Chomsky once said
    something stated in the article              he thought Mao had done a
    as a caveat, and treated it as               better job of putting over
    some sort of "gotcha" discovery.             a program of social change
    It's an impressively sleazy                  than Stalin.
    maneuver, an incredibly lazy
    cheap shot, and yet it's                     In context-- verbal remarks in
    difficult to "refute" because                a symposium decades ago-- it's
    it's true, and was actually                  clear that Chomsky was arguing
    stated up front:                             that non-violent methods can
                                                 have practical advantages-- the
       "Since my visit to Vietnam was            point being that Stalin had
       so brief, my impressions are              screwed things up with his
       necessarily superficial. Since            heavy-handed purges, not that
       I do not speak Vietnamese, an             Mao was all that great.
       interpreter was usually
       necessary ..."                                But Delong wins if he
                                                     can get you to read
                                                     from a particular,
                                                     narrow angle:  Did
                                                     Chomsky say something
                                                     positive about Mao?














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