RONNIE... just discovered who Chomsky is.

[KevinTheOmnivore]

Yeah, Cody (Rorschach for the non-believers), I think you're missing a big point here in this Chomsky matter:

MOST OF US DON'T ARDENTLY FOLLOW NOAM CHOMSKY

I have found pages equivelent to Bob's homepage that rant on about how David Horowitz's father was a Stalinist, thus Horowitz was, thus discrediting him, etc. etc.

Chomsky himself, in quite a smug fashion, refutes Horowitz by claiming that he didn't bother w/ Horowitz when he was writing Stalinist apologetics, so he won't bother with him now (not completely true, but I digress).

The reason I, and I'm assuming others like Max, don't want to persue this defense of Chomsky is because we don't really see the point. Is he definitely an anti-semite? I dunno. Is his PhD "in question"??? I dunno, and frankly, I don't care. Show me a professor who MAY have not really earned their degree, and I'll show you maybe 1/4 of the staff at my University.

Chomsky, for better or for worse, IS without question anti-American. EVERYTHING relates back to how bad America is, what wrong has been commited by America to create some obscure global crisis in South East Asia, etc. I'm not saying all of his claims are false, I just feel that he inevitably biases his data from the beginning, because he is ardently anti-American, and it blinds him.

So, since none of us (or at least most of us) aren't truly Noam cheerleaders, the question then is what is the motivation here? A lot of people on the Left follow him devoutly, yes. But, while we're questioning Chomsky's credentials, why don't we begin checking the political credentials (or lack there of) of Rush Limbaugh? What was Bill O'Reilly's day job before he became popular? Who the hell is Sean Hannity anyway, and why do ratings = intelligence? These men dwarf Chomsky here in America as far as followings go, yet we NEVER seem to question their ratings based credibility. At least with Chomsky you generally have to pick up a book and read it in order to digest it. The gentlemen I just mentioned offer no such debate, they automatically have their very public stump, and what they say is truth by default, because it has been broadcasted.

Hence my point: Critique Chomsky, that's fine. But when evaluating his Right-Wing counter-parts, such as the bigoted Mike Savage, who is worse, and WHEN do we start 17 threads trashing them....?