Noam Chomsky, �The Umbrella of U.S. Power�
Once I was reading Chomsky in the Caravan, my local dive bar. Obviously it was a dull night.
In fact, there were probably nine people in the place. I was reading quietly in the corner, waiting to get my game face on for pool, which means I needed another beer or three, so that my line of vision would be as skewed as the surface on their pool table.
When it�s that slow in the bar, however, people want to talk. I�m assuming it�s because they didn�t have the foresight to bring a book of their own, but then again, I�m not sure the average Caravan patron can read. This place has a posted sign which reads, �If your [sic] thinking of causing a disturbance think of a number between 85 & 87!!�
One guy played the crappy golf game next to me, which has since disappeared. When his game ended he looked over and asked me what I was reading.
At the time, I was reading The Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel & the Palestinians. I held the cover up, figuring the title alone would be enough to make anybody walk away. Then again, I was reading this moderately close to the original Sept. 11, so everybody suddenly had an opinion and I shouldn�t have been surprised when he pulled up a seat next to me.
And this is where I should really stop judging people, because instead of the �bomb the fuck out of both of them� response I was expecting, he sat down and started questioning the validity for Chomsky to write on every world issue known to man.
�The guy isn�t even a historian,� stated the middle-aged male with a lot of crappy jailhouse tattoos, �yet his word is given as fact by nearly everybody.�
�Well, they are heavily documented with where he gets his source material,� I offered.
�Yeah, and how many times does he quote his own books? What I wonder, is how much of these books he actually wrote himself. He�s a full time professor back east right? Yet he has time to write forty different books on Foreign Policy? I�m starting to wonder how many aren�t written by his staff, or other ghost writers. Slap Chomsky�s name on it, and the rest of you will buy it. Meanwhile Chomsky gets rich and powerful while criticizing the rich and powerful.�
�I bought it used, though,� I said, �so he�s not getting rich off of me.�
My turn came up on the pool table, and my vision was perfect. Nobody could beat me. I stayed on table for the next three hours, nearly until closing time. As I was getting ready to leave, I picked my book up from my table and saw the guy had left a long note scribbled on a napkin, tucked between the pages. I looked at the note:
- 1: When was Chomsky hired @ MIT?
2: Why?
3: Need a hint ... $
4: Why does he write?
5: Who wants him to write?
6: $ $ $
7: Why? (Forget the easy answer)
8: Why do �People� get published? $
9: Why Chomsky?
10: The important question — O/T — why do YOU write? Pussy? $? Have something to say? Original idea?
More than two years later, I�m thinking about what this guy said (and discovered I had kept this napkin) and discovered I�m thinking of these first nine questions this guy posed to me surreptitiously. After all, this short book has several items and declarations he�s brought about before, with more detail. The endnotes and works cited pages include thirteen references to other Chomsky works.
But I�m not as cynical as this guy, which brings us to the last question — the one posed to me. Why write? The easiest answer is that I�m home alone, and I hate television. I know that Chomsky doesn�t watch television either. Thank Christ most people do like TV, or I�d have way more stuff to read.
