|
NOAM CHOMSKY on the democrats:
The Democratic political opposition is very tepid. There has been very little debate, traditionally, over foreign policy issues. That's recognised right in the mainstream. Political figures are reluctant to put themselves in a position where they can be condemned as calling for the destruction of the United States and supporting its enemies and presenting fantasies, and be subjected to fantasies of the kind that in fact were included in that email. Politicians are unwilling to subject themselves to that, and the result is that the voice of a large portion of the population simply is barely represented, and the Republicans recognise it. Karl Rove, the Republican campaign manager, made it clear before the last election in 2002 that the Republicans would have to try to run the election on a security issue, because if they faced it on issues of domestic policy they would lose. So they frightened the population into obedience, and he has already announced that they are going to have to do the same thing next time in the 2004 election. They are going to have to present it as voting for a war president who will defend you from destruction. Incidentally, they are simply rehearsing a script that runs right through the 1980s, the first time they were in office - the same people, approximately. If you look, the policies they implemented were unpopular. The population was opposed, but they kept pressing the panic button, and it worked. In 1981 Libya was going to attack us. In 1983 Grenada was going to set up an airbase from which the Russians would bomb us. In 1985 Reagan declared a national emergency because the security of the United States was threatened by the government of Nicaragua. Somebody watching from Mars would have collapsed in laughter. And so it went on through the 1980s. They managed to keep the population intimidated and frightened enough so that they could maintain a thin grasp on political power, and that's the effort since. They didn't invent that tactic, incidentally, but it unfortunately has its effects, and political figures and others are reluctant to stand up and face the torrent of abuse and hysteria that will immediately come from trying to bring matters back to the level of fact.
I don't think it will be about the economy and jobs.
|