Noam Chomsky

I would prefer to think of anarchism as the libertarian left, and from that point of view anarchism can be conceived as a kind of voluntary socialism, that is, as libertarian socialist or anarcho-syndicalist or communist anarchist [Bakunin, Kropotkin and others.]

Both political parties have moved to the right during the neoliberal period. Today’s New Democrats are pretty much what used to be called ‘moderate Republicans’. The ‘political revolution’ that Bernie Sanders called for, rightly, would not have greatly surprised Dwight Eisenhower.

You can find things in the traditional religions which are very benign and decent and wonderful and so on, but I mean, the Bible is probably the most genocidal book in the literary canon. The God of the Bible – not only did He order His chosen people to carry out literal genocide – I mean, wipe out every Amalekite to the last man, woman, child, and, you know, donkey and so on, because hundreds of years ago they got in your way when you were trying to cross the desert – not only did He do things like that, but, after all, the God of the Bible was ready to destroy every living creature on earth because some humans irritated Him. That’s the story of Noah. I mean, that’s beyond genocide – you don’t know how to describe this creature. Somebody offended Him, and He was going to destroy every living being on earth? And then He was talked into allowing two of each species to stay alive – that’s supposed to be gentle and wonderful.

It’s important to remember that the constitutional system was not designed in the first place to defend the rights of people. Rather, the rights of people had to be balanced, as Madison put it, against what he called ‘the rights of property.’

The United States is unusual among the industrial democracies in the rigidity of the system of ideological control – ‘indoctrination’, we might say – exercised through the mass media.

GATT and NAFTA ought to be called “investor rights agreements,” not “free trade agreements.” One of their main purposes is to extend the ability of corporations to carry out market-distorting operations internally.

I think God has some mechanism that he uses to punish those that make mistakes.

It appears, our partners thought that this would never affect them, this counterproductive politics of restrictions and sanctions. But now we are seeing that this is happening.

There were no strategic mistakes that could affect Russia’s history and it further development. No, there were no such mistakes. Tactical errors were made in some less significant options, problems and so on. But, on the whole, Russia embarked on a correct path and it changed.

The Russian people and Russian culture are the linchpin, the glue that binds together this unique civilization.

The soviet people want full-blooded and unconditional democracy.

As a musician, African American, guy out in Hollywood, all these different things, you know, everyone around me tried to pick my candidate for me, and then told me every time I said I liked Trump that I couldn’t say it out loud or my career would be over, or I’d get kicked out of the black community – because blacks, we’re supposed to have a monolithic thought, we can only be Democrats.

We live in a democracy and the Government has to be responsive to Parliament.

I would prefer to think of anarchism as the libertarian left, and from that point of view anarchism can be conceived as a kind of voluntary socialism, that is, as libertarian socialist or anarcho-syndicalist or communist anarchist [Bakunin, Kropotkin and others.]

[on Trump] It is not our business to asses his worthiness, but he is the absolute leader of the presidential race.

This is a method by which to restrain Russia, the notorious sanctions, because endless accusations lay the groundwork for introducing restraining measures.

If you’ve taken an economics course, you know that markets are supposed to be based on informed consumers making rational choices. You take a look at the first ad you see on television and ask yourself … is that its purpose? No it’s not.

We will make America strong again. We will make America proud again. We will make America safe again. And we will make America great again.

How could this Y2K be a problem in a country where we have Intel and Microsoft?

Attention, must be devoted principally to raising the workers to the level of revolutionaries; it is not our task to descend to the level of the ‘working masses’.

Jefferson, to his credit, at least recognized that the slavery in which he participated was ‘the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other.’