This is a very strange post and unrepresentative of either Ron Paul's or Noam Chomsky's views. It's simply not long enough. You can distil their opinions quite considerably, but here they both come across as crackpots and I for one do not believe that either of them are.

They could both be considered libertarian, but in different ways. Let's not forget the radically different government that Chomsky advocates. Ron Paul is nowhere near as revolutionary in his approach to government. He just wants a smaller, less intrusive version of what we have.

I feel that the greater need for active community under a capitalist, small-government regime, lays the foundations for the genuinely public institutions which form the bases of anarchistic activity amongst the general public.

I agree with Chomsky 100% on this

laissez-faire, or "free-market" capitalist economics is a particularly extreme and dangerous form of capitalism. Look at Ron Paul's ideological influences like Murray Rothbard or Milton Friedman...

I E-mailed him.

I'm pretty sure it's him, he's written pretty much the same things about libertarianism in the past.

Here are some quotes from his official web site:

"A consistent anarchist must oppose private ownership of the means of production and the wage slavery which is a component of this system, as incompatible with the principle that labor must be freely undertaken and under the control of the producer."

www.chomsky.info/artic...70----.htm

"I find myself in substantial agreement with people who consider themselves anarcho-capitalists on a whole range of issues; and for some years, was able to write only in their journals. And I also admire their commitment to rationality, which is rare."

~ Noam Chomsky, in an interview entitled "Noam Chomsky on Anarchism," December 1996

In the same excerpt, however, Chomsky goes on to say, "I do not think they see the consequences of the doctrines they espouse, or their profound moral failings." Here he is referring to the alleged inability of anarcho-capitalists to admit that concentrations of private power (as found, for example, in large American and multinational corporations) can be as bad or worse than the coercive power of the state. As far as Chomsky is concerned, this is the additional and vital humanistic element in his preferred, leftist form of anarchism, as opposed to right-anarchism or anarcho-capitalism.

www.chomsky.info/oncho...040817.htm

QUESTION: People have characterized your political beliefs over the years as "anarchist" or "libertarian." I don't think the labels are necessarily important, but what is the basic philosophy behind your political beliefs?

CHOMSKY: Let me just say regarding the terminology, since we happen to be in the United States, we have to be rather careful. Libertarian in the United States has a meaning which is almost the opposite of what it has in the rest of the world traditionally. Here, libertarian means ultra right-wing capitalist. In the European tradition, libertarian meant socialist. So, anarchism was sometimes called libertarian socialism, a large wing of anarchism, so we have to be a little careful about terminology. I was drawn pretty early, maybe in the early teens, towards anarchist thinking and activities, and even spent a lot of time in anarchist bookstores and picking up pamphlets and talking to mostly Europeans who had fled or had been driven out of a pretty ugly continent in the 1930s. And that had a big impact.

www.chomsky.info/inter...99----.htm

If I get a reply I'll post it here or on AnarchismToday.org, or both, but I think if someone doesn't want to believe, no amount of evidence will do.

Everyone knows Chomsky writes for Z net, people who know him personally like Michael Albert hang out on the forum... It would be very surprising to me if what Ron Paul's supporters describe as an obvious forgery would go completely unnoticed by his colleagues.

-personman
AnarchismToday.org

Chomsky doesnt believe in economics. So of course he doesnt believe in Ron Paul. Laissez Faire and economics only concern itself with one class of goods: scarce goods. What does scarce mean? it means there arent enough goods to go around. Neither a corporation nor a democratic collective distribution scheme can put two chickens in every pot when there is only one chicken to go around!
In other words a desperate man will do anything the democratic collective distribution agency asks him to do because his children are starving, just as he would do what the corporation tells him to do.
-Mark

There is a good article and discussion on Ron Paul happening at infoshop:

www.infoshop.org/inews...7#comments

That is a ridiculous statement. The "weak regulatory apparatus" is the source of this country's problems.

Chomsky just ignores the outright special advantages of intensive capital corporations to shut out competition and feed off the purse of the taxation system. State governments should set up wi-fi networks of highspeed internet and they should set-up road systems that function, but by creating such massive regulatory measures they only give incentives to create laws that favor these large capital intensive corporations. In other words nobody else can do the job because the money after being taxed maybe snatched up by the federal government then returned to the state with special strings attached to favor the least competitive environment. PLus with overregulation the attempt to open my network up to my neighbors just gets made illegal by the same forces that claim to protect me from greedy corporations, in the end they only do such collective capital groups favors. Corporations are collectivist in assemblege, get over it folks. Ron Paul for president.

Jo Anonymous:

Something always bothered me about Ron Paul's ideas. He means well, but I think his approach is wrong. I think I like him the most just for the fact that he is laughed at by all those other arse-holes who are worthless compared to him. But I do think he is wrong. The only control people have is not in the "free" market as people like to think (demand/supply). The demand can be easily manipulated by lack of information provided to consumers (basic assumption for free market) and by overwhelming, brainwashing advertisement - think of all the crap you bought for holidays, think of all the crappy holidays that exist, or all the turkey you eat for TG, trees that get cut for Christmass, and lets just remind ourselves of those "awesome", huge, gas-guzzling, and completely obsolete and ridiculous Hummers that kept GM in life - if that is not fake and artificially pumped-up demand, I don't know what it is. Also, in "free" market without any regulation, the rich and powerful will always eliminate the weaker competition, and it will lead to monopoly and oligarchy. I think that is way too obvious after seeing what happened with healthcare and pharm industries, oil industry, military industry, Microsoft, TV media (from 50+ down to 5-6 media corporations), AT&T -> (black box) -> at&t. Add to that many other examples of fraud (WorldCom, Enron (used UNREGULATED energy market in California that sucked every dime out of the state) etc.). Should I mentioned what "free" trade did to other countries, especially in Asia and Latin America, or to jobs in this country?

People only have control in their communities, and by electing their government. The fact is that the government is currently extremely corrupt and that the pundits are always getting re-elected because they have massively more money from lobbyists and corporate donations than their challengers. However, it's the only thing that people can control and change if they really want - by reading/watching more, various, non-main-stream media and by getting involved. Government needs to set the protocols that will keep the jobs in the country, provide healthcare for everyone (and please lets not talk about personal responsibilities anymore, when it comes to life and health of someone's child or family member - healthcare is not a product, it's a common good, a necessity), provide solid education at least at the elementary and highschool level (where affirmative action was a pathetic attempt to play racial card by the white-dominated Washington DC, cause if you really cared, you would start affirmative action from elementary level, not much later - indeed, later it would not be necessary anymore), protect environment, provide social security etc etc... and fight less wars, or to be precise: NEVER fight wars again - oh that would save us enough money not to worry about SS and healthcare. And close down those 725+ military bases OUTSIDE the US that serve only as colonial force.

Chomsky is a political Zionist and a deceiver and Ron Paul is a deceiver and works for the Zionists...and Obama is their Ultimate Goal. Conquering society by division just like Henry Ford said...

Paul reasons with his head, not his heart.

Individual liberty, distrust of government and centralized power, and true free market capitalism (not corporatism) is not only logical but the only solution to much of the world's ills.

Chomsky makes no sense here. He rightfully distrusts government on issues of war and foreign intervention, but readily surrenders economic liberty to the same body of authority. Has he no clue that the evils being perpetrated abroad is funded by false promises to make good on social programs and wealth redistribution with taxation and future taxation (debt)?

Shrink the size and scope of government and taxes accordingly, add a healthy dose of distrust of central authority, including ultra-national bodies like the UN, NATO, WTO, World Bank, and all that Chomsky railed about for the last 5 decades would pretty much subside. Government would not have the funds or the authority to do bad abroad, and individuals would have much more wealth across the board. Personal charity would easily take care of a greatly reduced pool of downtrotten.

"Freedom, Prosperity and Peace!" -Dr Ron Paul

The problem with Chomsky's rebuttal of Ron Paul's positions is that it doesn't deal with the subtleties of federalism. If the power & authority of the federal government were diminished, the power of the several states would occupy the vacuum. Fundamentally, this more local government would be more responsive to the democratic demands of the communities they represent.

Federal labor law already tries to make these distinctions, say for example the allowance of minors to work beyond the typical limits if it is for farm work. I don't think Ron Paul's positions would undermine democratic government at all, it would just bring it closer to the voters and make it more accountable.

The one thing I agree with Noam about, is that there are many types of libertarians. However, I think the libertarian left could still benefit greatly from an anti-federalist position that is more common on the right. The key is localism

Chomsky is not an anarchist and needs to stop being represented as one. Here, once again, he is desperately defending the State the same way some libertarians desperately defend capitalism. It is disgusting.

...seriously. Why do those spammers post stuff here?

Do they ever work? Does anyone ever click (or, c&p) them?

It is 39 years after the moon landing and we have computers coming out of our ears. Have the Libertarians, Socialists, Communists, Capitalists or Anarchists suggested that accounting be mandatory in our schools? Double-entry accounting is 700 years old. It is older than Shakespeare. Why does anyone think it is difficult? It can be very tedious if you don't have a computer.

What do you think computers are for?

Our schools are designed to create jobs for teachers though, and psychologically condition children to be subservient to AUTHORITY.

So here we are with the economy screwing up and our economists haven't been talking about the planned obsolescence of automobiles since the moon landing even though Galbraith talked about it 10 YEARS BEFORE the moon landing. Was he the only economist with any brains since Keynes died?

GlobaLIES

psik

Thanks for posting this interview personman. I've always been suspicious of Alex Jones' (Ron Paul´s biggest supporter) constant blaming of America's problems on conspiracy theories and secret societies. It's clear that what they advocate would potentially be even more right wing as I've written here:

nicholasmead.com/2009/...lfishness/