Noam Chomsky: "The U.S. and Its Allies Will Do Anything to Prevent Democracy in the Arab World"

[calybe]

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to the 25th anniversary of FAIR, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, the media watch group in New York, which just celebrated the 25 years of the reports they’ve come out, documenting media bias and censorship, and scrutinized media practices that marginalize public interest, minority and dissenting viewpoints.

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Comments

[supermishelle]

It's true. The US does not give a shit about the Arab people, they only care when something is relevant to their interest. They only want democracy*~*~*~ so they can get the people to elect a government that will go along with whatever they want.

I mean come on, people consider Donald Trump a viable candidate for office and during an interview he was explaining how he basically wanted to exploit them for oil and when the journalist was all "What about the Arab people" Trump just said "what about them?" I wish I could find that interview.

[muppetfromhell]

No one who isn't a complete moron actually considers Donald Trump a viable candidate for anything other than ratings.

[executivehpfan]

I was in Kuwait during the protests, and to my eyes at least, the lack of significant turnout was less about the intimidating presence of the authorities (or America's apparent head-turning) and more about how the Emir had tried to quell any insurrection by giving every citizen 1,000 KD just prior to the time the unrest got out of control in Egypt and Bahrain. The reason given was that it was a gift granted to celebrate the country's independence day, but anyone with a working brain knew that the money was to try and stave off any protesting

[ladyanneboleyn]

I do think this is a taaaad bit fatalistic; for instance, I don't think the main voices in the administration urging intervention in Libya (i.e. Power & company) did so because they felt it was important to make Libya more pliable to U.S. interests, though I think that aspect certainly helped their argument and pushed the administration over the edge to intervention. But the basis of this analysis - that the West just completely ignores populations in order to achieve "stability" with pliable governments - is absolutely sound

[romp]

dun self-depreciate! I haven't written a final paper on this topic so I appreciate hearing about your ~feelings :)

[cyranothe2nd]

If the dictators support us, and the population is under control, then what’s the problem?

Yep. Noam ain't wrong.

[3bird]

Although I think it's a little too black-and-white, this is all basically true and has been known for awhile. The only thing this doesn't explain is why the US let Mubarak go. He's totally right about the press, though.

[hola_meg_a_cola]

mte