Noam Chomsky Says GOP Is 'Literally A Serious Danger To Human Survival’
January 26, 2016
By Matt Ferner
Huffington Post Politics (January 25, 2016)
Chomsky said the GOP and its presidential candidates are “literally a serious
danger to decent human survival” and cited Republicans' rejection of
measures to deal with climate change, which he called a “looming environmental
catastrophe.” All of the top Republican presidential candidates are either
outright deniers, doubt its seriousness or insist no action should be taken --
“dooming our grandchildren,” Chomsky said.
Noam Chomsky, the noted radical and MIT professor emeritus, said the
Republican Party has become so extreme in its rhetoric and policies that it
poses a “serious danger to human survival.”
“Today, the Republican Party has drifted off the rails,” Chomsky, a
frequent critic of both parties, said in an interview Monday with The
Huffington Post. “It’s become what the respected conservative political
analysts Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein call ‘a radical insurgency’ that has
pretty much abandoned parliamentary politics.”
Chomsky cited a 2013 article by Mann and Ornstein published in
Daedalus, the journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, analyzing
the polarization of the parties. The authors write that the GOP has become
“ideologically extreme, scornful of facts and compromise, and dismissive of the
legitimacy of its political opposition.”
Chomsky said the GOP and its presidential candidates are “literally a
serious danger to decent human survival” and cited Republicans' rejection of
measures to deal with climate change, which he called a “looming environmental
catastrophe.” All of the top Republican presidential candidates are either
outright deniers, doubt its seriousness or insist no action should be taken --
“dooming our grandchildren,” Chomsky said.
"I am not a believer," Donald Trump, the Republican presidential
front-runner, said recently. "Unless somebody can prove something to me, I
believe there’s weather."
Trump isn’t alone. Although 97 percent of climate scientists insist
climate change is real and caused by human actions, more than half of
Republicans in Congress deny mankind has anything to do with global warming.
"What they are saying is, let's destroy the world. Is that worth voting
against? Yeah," Chomsky said in a recent interview with Mehdi Hasan on Al
Jazeera English's "UpFront."
The policies that the GOP presidential candidates and its
representatives in Congress support, Chomsky argued, are in “abject service to
private wealth and power,” despite “rhetorical posturing” of some, including
House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). GOP proposals would effectively raise taxes
on lower-income Americans and reduce them for the wealthy.
Chomsky advised 2016 voters to cast their ballots strategically. He
said the U.S. is essentially “one-party” system -- a business party with
factions called Republicans and Democrats. But, he said, there are small
differences between the factions that can make a “huge difference in systems of
enormous power” -- like that afforded to the president.
“I’ve always counseled strategic voting, Chomsky said. "Meaning, in a
swing state, or swing congressional district, or swing school board, if there
is a significant enough difference to matter, vote for the better candidate --
or sometimes the least bad.”
Chomsky said if he lived in a swing state, he’d vote for Democratic
front-runner Hillary Clinton.
By no means should this be viewed as an endorsement of Clinton. Chomsky
has been a vocal Clinton critic, saying her presidency would resemble that of
President Barack Obama, who Chomsky has condemned for using drone strikes to
kill individuals the president deems worthy of execution.
In an ideal world, Chomsky might vote for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.),
who Chomsky has called an "honest and committed New Dealer" who has “the best
policies,” despite some criticisms.
Regardless of who wins the Democratic nomination, Chomsky told Al
Jazeera he'd cast his general election vote "against the Republican candidate”
because there may be dire consequences to a GOP victory.
“The likely candidates are, in my opinion, extremely dangerous, at
least if they mean anything like what they are saying,” Chomsky said. “I think
it makes good sense to keep them far away from levers of power.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------
VIEW ONLINE:
https://portside.org/2016-01-26/noam-chomsky-says-gop-literally-serious-danger-human-survival%E2%80%99
SUBSCRIBE: http://portside.org/subscribe
VISIT PORTSIDE.ORG: http://portside.org
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/portsideorg
FACEBOOK: https://facebook.com/Portside.PortsideLabor
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Portside aims to provide material of interest to people
on the left that will help them to interpret the world
and to change it.
Submit via email: ports...@portside.org
Submit via web: http://portside.org/submittous3
Frequently asked questions: http://portside.org/faq
Sub/Unsub: http://portside.org/subscribe-and-unsubscribe
Search Portside archives: http://portside.org/archive
To unsubscribe, click the following link:
http://lists.portside.org/cgi-bin/listserv/wa?TICKET=NzM2MDE5IHNvbmRoZWltQFBBTklYLkNPTSBQT1JUU0lERfOZTTvgvSUN&c=SIGNOFF_______________________________________________
NetBehaviour mailing list
NetBehaviour@netbehaviour.org
http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
