Why Noam Chomsky...

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Bradford takes issue with Chomsky claim that "In the early 1990s, primarily for cynical great power reasons, the US selected Bosnian Muslims as their Balkan clients..."

He says he only ever sees three responses from the idiotic Chomsky-clones:

So, I found the original source, in entirety (which you'd think Bradford would link to if he had a shred of integrity, but whatever...)

Here it is:

The point here is that there is no clash of civilizations between the Muslim world and the US, or the West generally, because there are great relationships between the US and some Muslim countries, as evidenced for our support for Bosnian Muslims and their fight for an independent state. This is true - we did support that. In all our efforts, we sought to secure their independence, and to punish war crimes perpetrated against them by Christian Bosnian Serbs (with a smattering of Western neo-nazis...). Why did we support the Bosnian Muslim quest for independence? I have no idea. Was it for cynical reasons? I'd be disappointed if it wasn't, as I expect a healthy amount of Realpolitik in every decision made by my government, as we already hashed out at length in the Egypt thread.

The stuff about Robert Faurissan has already been covered at length upthread and never responded to. When Chomsky said that Faurissan is apolitical, he meant precisely that he seems apolitical and is a holocaust denier for reasons that have nothing to do with hating Jews or being a Nazi. Naturally, he's still wrong, etc., but one of Chomsky's great efforts in life to separate any questioning of any beleif held by the Jewish people at large, if there is such a thing, or the state of Israel, from anti-semitism. He wants to say that we can say that Holocaust deniers are crazy, offensive, and totally ignoring the facts, but we shouldn't want to silence them because of their perceived anti-semitism, ever, and we shouldn't *uncritically* label them as anti-semitic. It's a free speech issue.

We can go back to Cambodia - again - I suppose, but we've been there already also, and I can only conclude that Bradford intentionally misrepresents Chomsky's writing or is, sadly for him, just not that bright of a person who is incapable of nuanced thought. I'm actually going with the former for the Balkans thing and the latter for the Nazi sympathizer thing.

Happy?

How about this one?

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/chomsky/loberfeld.pdf

This one too, because it's from a fellow linguist:

http://theanti-chomskyanredoubt.blogspot.com/2006/03/noam-chomsky-and-quest-for-social.html

[sologdin]

i'll take the second one point-for-point later. my quick review of it right now indicates that it is Really Bad.

[Lummel]

Happy?

I might be happy...if I had a Gnome Chomsky.

[Guest Raidne]

Presumably this piece is a criticism of anarcho-syndicalism as outlined in For Reasons of State, published in 1973. There is an excerpt available on line.

Loberfeld, essentially, criticizes the value Chomsky places on so-called positive liberty (while acting as though this is an idea he's having for the very first time, I might add), that is, self-determination on the part of the agent, vs. the conception of negative liberty we generally adhere to in the United States, i.e. the absence of obstacles external to the agent.

So, Loberfeld says that Chomsky has characterized differential wages as a means for robbing the idividual of their own self-determination and then goes to show (again, as if the objections have never been thought of by anyone else before) how utterly impractical it would be to do any other way as a world where we chose careers based on our wants only would lead to a world of Jennifer Lopez's (which makes me wonder if Trey Parker and Matt Stone, at some point, read this essay).

So, what is Loberfeld trying to prove here? That Chomsky is an anarcho-syndicalist, anti-capitalist? Well, I think he wins on that point?

Chomsky quotes this passage from Bakunin:

am a fanatic lover of liberty, considering it as the unique condition under which intelligence, dignity and human happiness can develop and grow; not the purely formal liberty conceded, measured out and regulated by the State, an eternal lie which in reality represents nothing more than the privilege of some founded on the slavery of the rest; not the individualistic, egoistic, shabby, and fictitious liberty extolled by the School of J.-J. Rousseau and other schools of bourgeois liberalism, which considers the would-be rights of all men, represented by the State which limits the rights of each---an idea that leads inevitably to the reduction of the rights of each to zero. No, I mean the only kind of liberty that is worthy of the name, liberty that consists in the full development of all the material, intellectual and moral powers that are latent in each person; liberty that recognizes no restrictions other than those determined by the laws of our own individual nature, which cannot properly be regarded as restrictions since these laws are not imposed by any outside legislator beside or above us, but are immanent and inherent, forming the very basis of our material, intellectual and moral being---they do not limit us but are the real and immediate conditions of our freedom.

Not that it's really relevant, since anarcho-syndicalism doesn't have to be shown to be right just to show that Chomsky's not a fraud, but pretty much all of Loberfeld's objections can be dealt with by putting a Rawlsian spin on it and merely stating that all policies enacted should be those which make individuals more free than they currently are.

Chomsky also spends a good amount of time talking about the value of work, in itself, and how we have created fractured identities in our capitalist system with our "work to live" manner of being, which consigns the majority of waking lives to worthlessness when, instead, we could choose to see work as living - surely anyone of us has felt the joy to be had even in hard labor, done well, and with comraderie, for a necessary purpose? If not, read The Dispossessed. Ursula le Guin is a good writer.

As for Jennifer Lopez, this is a lack of imagination. Nobody would strive to be Jennifer Lopez in an anarcho-syndicalist system - she is, herself, the product of a capitalist world.

[Guest Raidne]

And yes, Solo, it is Really Bad. It is on par with the prisoner claim I had once where the guy was suing his step dad for $20 million dollars for being emotionally abusive during his youth, without which he surely would have earned a master's degree, which surely would have reaped $200K/year, which is, therefore, what his step-dad owes him for what he would have been making during these last ten years in prison.

[sologdin]

Harris book details a titanic battle between Chomsky and Postal at the 1969 Texas Conference on the Goals of Linguistics a sort of King Kong Meets Godzilla affair in which Postals brilliantly argued paper was subjected to a prolonged Chomskyan attack an attack which had all the classic trademarks of Chomskyan argument: vitriol, belligerence, and the intentional mischaracterization of Postals powerful work.

The editors commentary regarding NCs response to an article written by the author of the article posted, infra. The underscored bit is important for later.

His political development has also diverged from that of Chomsky. Whereas Chomsky is ending his career as an unreconstructed Leftist and intellectual leader of the worldwide anti-American movement whose theories on language have, in the view of some, been completely discredited, Postal has placed himself firmly on the right, and has nothing but contempt for the political claims of Chomsky. Hence the article below, which is a response to an article published in the summer of 2005, which represents Chomskys goofy attempt to delineate a connection between his evanescent notions of the universality of language and some equally fevered notion of a corresponding universality of the precepts of social justice.

Editor again. Theres not even a pretense of being serious here. The designation of NCs writing as goofy and fevered indicates a nasty degree of anti-intellectualism. The notion that NC is an unreconstructed leftist is a transparent attempt to lump NC in with cold warrior Stalinists. anti-american movement is just plain fictitious.

Noam Chomsky and the Quest for Social Justice

by Paul M. Postal

Noam Chomsky, in a recent Boston Review article, What We Know: On the Universals of Language and Rights, briefly discusses human rights. His remarks reflect his tediously monomaniacal goal of berating the United States, its government, its officials, its history and its capitalistic and free market economic organization in seeking justification for his own vague and inexplicit collectivist ideas of how society should be organized.

Ok--the critique is to be focused on the noted article. Gotcha.

For those unfamiliar with Chomskys oeuvre, the following quote regarding the 2004 presidential election is fully representative of the standard of seriousness of his political views:

Or, I guess not. Were switching gears in the second paragraph. Mmkay…

"The question of [electoral] fraud, though it may exist, is pretty marginal. There's something much more important about the election, namely, that virtually the entire population was excluded. And we know this very well. Public opinion in the United States is studied very carefully, and we have a huge amount of data. The most prestigious institutions that monitor public opinion came out with extensive studies related to the election. Right before the election, this October. They were scarcely reported, almost not at all. And they are very interesting: they tell you a lot about the election. In fact, what they tell you in effect is that the election didn't take place."

Chomsky refers to scarcely reported studies by organizations operating in unnamed localities with unspecified population samples and unspecified questions studies which were able to reveal in October 2004…(never underestimate the role of time travel technology in this kind of study) that the election many believed would take place in the United States in November 2004, and which numerous citizens less politically informed than Chomsky may still believe did take place, actually did not.

nevermind that the quotation is not referenced, and does not appear in the previously referenced article, that is allegedly the subject matter of this writers intervention: the sarcastic commentary hereinabove of PMP misses the point.

The one hundred and twenty million votes tabulated, along with the thirty one states carried by the winning candidate were just a fantasy apparently, because virtually the entire population was excluded.

Who knew?

The editor had already carped on NC for mischaracterization of an adversarys work--that PMP appears to have turned NCs analysis into something it is not illustrates the basic NC point, from the article that PMP is allegedly critiquing, about universality very well.

In fact, Chomsky is perfectly aware that the 2004 U.S. election took place and that John F. Kerry lost because he got fewer electoral votes. See his article 2004 Elections. Thus, his statement is simply one of his innumerable childish propaganda excesses. This particular one converts his emotional distress at the defeat of the more leftwing candidate he favored as well as the fact that American political opinion has always been vastly to the right of where he would like it into a sour grapes rant to the effect that the American political process is illegitimate.

If PMP is aware that NC believes that the 2004 election occurred, why engage in the ersatz analysis above? Of course NC didnt disbelieve in the existence of the election; quite the contrary. Rather, PMP turns this into classic argumentum ad hominem--he cant contest on the merits, so he turns the argument into something about NC personally. The first is just insult; the second is unauthorized speculation about the motivations of an adversary. Either way, PMP is now losing the debate.

Or consider this comment about public policy from On What Matters:

"Social Security is a democratic system based on the principle that people care about each other, that we have a community responsibility to make sure vulnerable people are taken care of."

A teenager could give a better description of the Social Security system than this mere emotive babbling. Here is what the system is actually based on: workers and employers are taxed jointly at a fifteen point three per cent rate regardless of employee earnings up to $90,000; the funds are distributed to former workers regardless of their wealth or vulnerability, including to those as wealthy as (or wealthier than) millionaires like Chomsky.

And off to the races about yet another article, rather than the one that was identified as the object of critique or in the first digression. PMP erroneously identifies the out-of-context language as mere sentimentalism that fails as a description of the SSA. Of course, the fact that NC is making an allegation about the principle on which the SSA is based should key PMP in to the fact that some sentimentalism is warranted.

To start, let me assert my own view of our rights, a view which reflects the understanding of many others, I should think:

PMP is honest enough to present his own views; he at least is no coward.

The U. S. Constitution, whose first ten amendments are traditionally referred to as the Bill of Rights, specifies a variety of rights. These are constraints on government power and action, generally of the Congress shall pass no law variety and do not involve material benefits;

Manifestly erroneous: right to petition, the warrant requirement, right to grand jury indictment, right to due process, the takings clause, speedy & public trial, right to jury in criminal matter, right to being informed of criminal charges, right to suspoena power, effective assistance of counsel, right to civil jury, and prohibition on certain punishments all compel certain expenditures by the gubmint that are in fact material benefits for citizens.

Inherent in the notion of right is a corresponding obligation. If citizens have the right to keep and bear arms, the government has the obligation not to interfere with their keeping and bearing them, etc;

Correct in the first statement, but not in the second; correlative duties include not only the duty to not interfere, but also the duties to aid and the duty to defend. Of course I understand why PMP does not mention the positive correlative duties, but his failrue to mention them does not abolish them.

The U.S. Constitution doesn't promise anyone any money. Or any stuff.

Manifestly erroneous. This is the problem with non-lawyers talking about law, I guess.

Traditional rights indicate things that the government should do or not do; must haves denote material things which somehow should be supplied. Must haves share with traditional rights the attribute of obligation, of moral force. Like traditional rights then, if some person is guaranteed a particular must have, it stands to reason that some other entities are obliged to supply that person with that must have. I return to this.

Not seeing the distinction. The bill of rights, which PMP valorizes as a statement of traditional negative rights, in fact involves significant expenditure by the state, and I doubt many will contend that jury trial or right to counsel are not must haves.

Now then. A major repository of claimed human rights comes with the imprimata of the United Nations. As Chomsky stated in his Boston Review article:

"The standard codification of human rights in the modern period is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [hereinafter declaration] adopted in December 1948 by almost all nations, at least in principle."

And finally, to the article that is the alleged subject matter herein.

Chomsky had earlier gushed about the importance of the declaration, quoting Harvard professor Mary Ann Glendon:

"The declaration broke new ground in significant respects. It enriched the realm of enunciated rights, and extended them to all persons…Glendon observes that the declaration is not just a universalization of the traditional 18th-century rights of man, but part of a new moment in the history of human rights...belong[ing] to the family of post-World War II rights instruments that attempted to graft social justice onto the trunk of the tree of liberty, specifically Articles 22-27, a pillar of the declaration which elevates to fundamental rights status several new economic, social, and cultural rights.

Chomsky again: "It is fair to regard the declaration as another step towards recovering rights that had been lost to conquest and tyranny, promising a new era to the human race, to recall the hopes of Thomas Paine two centuries ago.

Finally: "Glendon stresses further that the declaration is a closely integrated document: there is no place for the relativist demand that certain rights be relegated to secondary status in light of Asian values or some other pretext."

Ok. Not really. Yet one more article quoted here by PMP--the deferral of analysis through the raising of different, and perhaps irrelevant, items is like a bad derridian metaphor for differance.

Chomsky's more recent article made this additional claim:

"The [declaration] reflected a very broad crosscultural consensus."

Broad crosscultural consensus…? Really? Even given its vagueness, Chomskys claim is impressively preposterous and deceptive.

Manifestly erroneous. The UDHR passed the UNGA in 1948 by a vote of 48 to 0, with abstentions by five votes from the soviet empire, Yugoslavia, south Africa, Saudi Arabia. (USSR and Yugoslavia nonetheless participated in the drafting.)

PMP neglects to make the criticism that UDHR is at best customary international law--but that would lead him to the catastrophic (for his thesis) analysis of ICCPR and ISESCR, which are international treaties based on the UDHR, each of which have been ratified by approximately 160 states party. Even if consensus is lacking in the UDHR (and it isnt), the two treaties have it.

For instance, as Article 17, Part 1 states:

"Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others."

Who would imagine that Western capitalist notions of private property were acceptable to the communist Soviet Union, or to the untold thousands of Marxists throughout the world? Although Chomsky chides the U.S. for picking and choosing among declaration rights it accepts, and writes as though decency required acceptance of the declaration in toto, he himself strongly rejects the ownership of private property, if his other writings are to be believed. For it is easy to argue that Article 17 justifies the existence of corporations, legally recognized economic entities by which individuals (stock holders) voluntarily associate (by buying the stock).

More mischaracterization. Personal property does not exhaust private property.

And yet here is what Chomsky has to say about corporations in History is Not Over:

"I dont think corporations should exist any more than fascism should exist. They are similar totalitarian institutions."

Again into yet another article.

So I guess that means that Chomsky does not agree with the declarations assertion that everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others; but then perhaps if he had ever worked for a real corporation (as, incidentally, I have), he might have avoided such infantile sophistry and grasped some of the subtle distinctions between, say, the United Parcel Service and true totalitarian organizations such as the Soviet Union or the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

This is just intellectually dishonest (or perhaps PMP doesnt understand the law of persons?): corporations are not humans; UDHR does not grant rights to legal fictions--it is an important distinction, and indicates a large degree of conceptual confusion in the thesis that PMP is advancing.

It is also preposterous to accept, as implied by Chomsky's talk of crosscultural consensus, that Moslem U.N. members are fully in accord with the content of Article 2, which states:

"Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status."

bigoted claptrap.

Could even Chomsky pretend that Moslem culture accepts a lack of distinction between men and women, given the following truths?:

That many Moslem governments permit men to have four wives but none permits women to have more than one husband;

That in many such countries women complaining of being raped are viewed as adulterous and subject to death;

That such cultures sanction honor killings of women but not of men;

That in one such country women are not even permitted to drive;

That divorce procedures are entirely asymmetrical for men and women, etc.

This parade of horrible about Moslem culture is not serious. Besides the fallacy of bad generalization, and even assuming that some part, or even the whole of Moslem culture adopts these propositions, it is not obvious that they are inconsistent with the principle that one is entitled UDHR rights irrespective of sex. It may be so from the point of view of PMP, but his position is not exhaustive of legal interpretation of UDHR.

(another parade of horrible intended to show the evilness of Moslem culture)

Clearly, then, what the declaration represented at best was some degree of cultural consensus among the Western powers who were responsible for the creation of the U.N. It is hardly an accident that it is located in New York and not in Moscow, Beijing, Buenos Aires or Riyadh.

Not serious, fallacious, &c. we can cherry pick items inconsistent with UDHR from any state in any period. The fact remains that the rights contained therein have been approved by the overwhelming majority of states.

And then there are the equally important must haves:

"Everyone…has the right to equal pay for equal work." (Article 23)

Chomsky's recent article remarks favorably on this lack of distinction among rights:

"All of [the declarations] components were given equal status, including anti-torture rights, socioeconomic rights, etc. and is critical of the US for not supporting them across the board." He adds:

"Whatever consensus the declaration did or did not represent, there is evidently a vast lack of conformity between contemporary life and the injunctions of the fifty-seven-year-old declaration."

To what is Chomsky referring to here?

And so it is revealed that the PMPs prior workup is conceded hereinabove to be falsely premised: NC does in fact admit that UDHR is not well put into practice. That in itself does not change the fact that it is law, agreed to by the vast majority of states, despite PMPs mendacious protests to the contrary.

(parade of horrible enlisted from official enemies of the US--PMP is nothing if not a jingo)

It appears that, despite Chomsky's endorsement of Glendon's talk of a new moment in the history of human rights and a new era to the human race, rights as enumerated in the declaration describe little more than pious hopes. Nothing in them connects to any practical means of realizing the desired states of affairs.

Manifestly erroneous. Provisions of the UDHR are made legally effective as CIL & jus cogens norms, and via ICCPR/ICESCR, and have led to the construction of the recent international criminal tribunals. Some of the UDHR language is aspirational, but much of it is not. (again, a non-lawyer might get a pass for not being able to understand the text, I suppose--but that does not make PMP less wrong.)

This is hardly surprising. The doctrines embodied in the declaration evolved in that small group of countries in which these most desirable rights already existed. Understanding that to be the case, what, then, was the meaning of the declaration?

Manifestly erroneous. The fact that Miranda and the desegregation cases and much other law came down after UDHR indicates that even basic and seemingly uncontroversial items in the ICCPR were not present in the US at the time--much less so the socialistic rights in ICESCR also contained in UDHR. Given this error, much of what follows is corrupt ab initio.

Governments that in no sense accepted much of the content of the declaration signed on to them without qualms simply because doing so was essentially cost-free. The Soviet Union was as unhindered in running its slave camp gulags after signing as before. Moreover, signing had the minor side benefit for some of making them seem more reasonable in Western eyes! It was mediocre diplomatic theater, which only someone with political ideas as little linked to reality as Chomsky's could take seriously.

Twice manifestly erroneous: USSR did not sign (I.e., no one did, really--they voted on UDHR in the UNGA--and the soviets with their clients abstained.) and NC has critiqued the soviet system on numerous occasions--the suggestion that NC was hoodwinked to soviet carceral systems by UDHR is just silliness.

But perhaps we should make an addendum to the dreary state of affairs outlined above. Despite the vast scale of failure on the part of so many nations to comply with the provisions of the declaration, certain developments in recent history have led to huge improvements in the satisfaction of such rights within certain political entities.

I refer to countries which go by the names of Kuwait…Bosnia…Kosovo…Afghanistan…and Iraq. In each of these countries places where horrible massacres, rape, pillaging, torture, ethnic cleansing, religious persecution, etc. were taking place as a result of the actions of governments or government sanctioned and supported groups such government-sponsored crimes are no longer taking place.

But the actions which brought about these rights improvements were without exception not only not praised but energetically opposed by Chomsky. What, then, did each of these transformations have in common?

Each involved indeed, required the intervention of military forces of the United States. All of these interventions required hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars to pay for military hardware and personnel, as well as for the costs of reconstruction and nation-building. In two cases, Afghanistan and Iraq, thousands of American lives have been sacrificed.

An extreme bit of disingenuous writing.

1) the fact that PMP can identify the horribleness of those places is a direct result of human rights thinking partially generated by UDHR and its sequellae--had no human rights movement been initiated, it might well be that the nastiness of the cited loci would be more palatable, especially to unsavory rightists such as PMP.

2) the suggestion that US invasions helped matters is not in evidence, and much contrary evidence has been marshaled in various places, including the writings of NC.

These circumstances leave no doubt that whatever his lip service to rights, or to the declaration, etc. Chomskys concern for these ideas invariably takes second place to his real Job One, which is the denunciation and denigration of his own country and its actions.

As NC has explained, it is both ineffective and cowardly to criticize official enemies of ones own states from the safe confines of that state. Criticizing ones own state from within the state has both a chance, however slight, of influencing the outcome of policy debates as well as entailing some risk of retaliation. That PMP pooh poohs this type of internal critique and has focused his jingo-rage on a critic of the regime indicates both that he is an agent of that retaliation and prefers to complain about official enemies of his own state from the safety of that state.

I therefore revise my earlier opinion, supra: by this measure, PMP is in fact a coward.

I do not recall, for instance, any writing of his in which he systematically tabulates and praises U.S. humanitarian efforts following disasters like the Asian tsunami or the recent earthquake in Pakistan; but why would there be such a work, which could hardly aid Chomsky's program of demonization of his own country?

To paraphrase chris rock in a different context: youre supposed to, motherfucker! You dont get extra credit!

To the question of why the must haves in Article 25 have not been implemented, Chomsky offers his tediously invariant answer to almost any perceived sociopolitical problem:

the selfish perfidy of wealth and power';

the machinations of large corporations, with their influence over the U.S. government, which has sabotaged the implementation.

To call this viewpoint infantile would be too kind to it. The reality behind the failure to provide these must haves involves several key elements:

the failure of the declaration to obligate specific organizations to effect these rights;

the lack of any enforcement mechanism for the declaration; and,

the fact that any achievement of must have rights would require Im sorry, but there is no other way to say this vast amounts of money.

Not seeing how NCs point is infantile, nor how NCs list is distinguishable from PMPs list of reasons for non-implementation of solemn humanitarian legal obligations.

Consider the initial factor. While it's great that everyone has a right' to all of these must haves, who is obliged to provide them? About such obligations, the declaration is fecklessly vague. The only relevant passage is:

…every individual and every organ of society…shall strive…to promote respect for these rights and freedoms…to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance…

This invocation to some vague universal striving manages through its obscurity to avoid imposing a precise obligation on any specific entity. Good feelings aside, if no fixed entity or group of entities is obliged to any of the must have benefits, then there can be no moral force brought to bear to facilitate their satisfaction.

The only thing that is feckless here is PMPs argument. UDHR is aspirational--everyone admits it, except for the strawperson that PMP is creating ad hoc.

The relevant language in the actual treaties is well exemplified by ICESCR article 14:

Each State Party to the present Covenant which, at the time of becoming a Party, has not been able to secure in its metropolitan territory or other territories under its jurisdiction compulsory primary education, free of charge, undertakes, within two years, to work out and adopt a detailed plan of action for the progressive implementation, within a reasonable number of years, to be fixed in the plan, of the principle of compulsory education free of charge for all.

Call it an aspirational undertaking--it is nonetheless assumpsit. PMP could analyze this, but instead his argument goes after irrelevant low-hanging fruit.

Another characteristic of the must haves is vagueness and obscurity. For instance, the doctrine which demands equal pay for equal work lacks discernible content because equal pay and equal work are undefined, nor is it specified who should define them.

Consider Factories A and B situated in locations where living costs differ radically (Central Mississippi and coastal California), and assume that A and B produce the same product. Does equal pay require equal dollar amounts or different amounts pro-rated for local costs? Suppose that the workers in Factory A produce more product per man hour than those in Factory B. Should their more productive labor nonetheless be remunerated equally? How about differentials due to seniority?

Making an easy question into a difficult one. This is pure Chewbacca defense.

And what of different types of work? Who decides and how is it decided whether logging in Siberia is equal work to doing electric line repair in Spain, or whether functioning as a nurse in India is equal to doing accounting in Finland or translation in Canada, etc.? Is the labor of police in small towns in thinly-populated Nova Scotia to be equated with the more dangerous task of policing large, crime-ridden cities like Mexico City and Detroit? Such questions reveal that the declaration must haves could have no practical meaning in the world.

More Chewbacca defense.

The right to adequate nutrition.

The right to excellent medical care.

More Chewbacca defense

In Canada, polls show that people like their miserable medical system because it is level, which is to say, its bad for almost everyone. Citizens of Canada, a country very positively oriented toward the U.N., say that they prefer theirs to a better system with significant inequalities like ours. Their actions, however, sometimes betray their words, as their frequent appearance in Vermont medical centers, attempting to get quick access to American MRI diagnoses, testifies. (The point is nicely dramatized in Denys Arcand's prizewinning film L'invasion des barbares (The Barbarian Invasions), which depicts health care in socialist Quebec.)

Anecdotal, ad hominem & standard rightwing red herring on this issue.

Chomsky's 2005 article sneers at the heartless U.S. officials Paula Dobriansky, Jeanne Kirkpatrick, and Morris Abraham who rejected the seriousness of the declaration:

Chomsky's dismissal of the view of these officials was not backed by any reasoning or argumentation. He provided no specificity to the various must haves. Still less has he indicated who is obliged to satisfy them and with what resources, or how these are to be obtained. All Chomsky says, in connection with a 1990 U.S. veto of a U.N. resolution on a supposed right to development is:

More fallacious reasoning to demand a complete solution when offered a partial one--lack of a complete solution to an acknowledged problem is no demonstration that a partial solution is erroneous. Of course, as a socialist, NC likely believes that the rights in UDHR should be a matter of public provision; it is purely disingenuousness, or failed irony, to argue otherwise.

In a very real sense then, the declaration serves as a global roadmap toward what the Left often refers to as the concept of social justice. The driving principles of the social justice movement are:

nevermind the strawpersons listed in the above connection.

In reality, the only way to reduce poverty is to increase overall wealth, which is what the Western world has been doing successfuly for centuries, which is why our poor live better than the non-poor of earlier times.

Manifestly erroneous. Poverty reduction can of course occur in situations where wealth increase is static or negative; and poverty can increase in situations where wealth also increases. PMP is just making up principles at this point.

Chomsky has of course nothing coherent to say about any of this: no positive proposals, little more than 1930s communism. Worse, however, he ignores three quarters of a century of experience in the horrors of the communist experiment.

Plain silliness. NC has criticized Stalinism. WTF? And the suggestion that NC has no positive proposals simultaneously with 1930s communism is self-contradictory; PMPs argument is so conceptually muddled that it contradicts itself phrase to phrase.

Enforcement.

If states ignore must have provisions, the consequences are essentially nil.

Standard rightwing error about international law.

For the declaration to be of universal practical significance then, it would require a world government and an associated planetary-wide legal and police system. Many on the left advocate such and imagine the U.N. to be a protoentity of this type.

Manifestly erroneous. A supranational organization would be good, but states have the ability to enforce human rights internally. PMPs argument acknowledges this fact by criticizing bad practices in Moslem culture, supra, while suggesting that UDHR rights were already perfected in the US.

Moreover, given what is known about the U.N.'s corruption, involvement with bribery, sexual abuses, oil for food theft, high-level involvement with Saddam Hussein's government, anti-Semitism, indulgence of terrorism, bureaucratic bloat, pathetic failures to stop ethnic cleansing and attempted genocide in the Balkans, Rwanda, etc., the idea that the U.N. could be a rational candidate for world government fails the laugh test.

Standard role call of bircher whining mixed in with serious criticisms--that the UNJ is ineffective at enforcement can of course be charged to the veto-wielding security council members, such as the US, who uses the veto more than any other state. PMPs jingoism will not acknowledge this, which is likely by design, insofar as the standard rightwing argument that public institutions do not function is necessarily premised on the rightwing first infiltrating those institutions and sabotaging them with the specific intent of later claiming that public institutions simply do not work and need to be privatized.

Wealth and inequality.

Beyond the vagueness of the must haves and the enforcement issue, there remains a third fundamental obstacle: the realities of wealth and inequality.

(dumb island hypothetical)

The simple moral is that any invocation of the term right yields an unavoidable commitment that some of the wealth of some people must be transferred to other people, willingly or not. And this requires some sort of transferring authority. What power is to determine how much wealth is to come from what countries and how much of it is to be distributed to what others? The declaration provides no answers of course, and is again just a structure of empty hopes. For it not to be would require world government.

Insisting on the world gubmint straw person, without specifying why that is bad--simply forensic rhetoric to appeal to birchers and lahaye readers.

The wealth transfer argument is moronic: economic transfers can occur by virtue of the democratic process, via statute--or by private coercive relations, such as the contract of adhesion inherent in a minimum wage job. Of course PMP prefers the latter, which is a fine aesthetic preference without principle.

A balancing act.

The costs of a rich public medical care system can require limitations on national pension systems and national educational support and conversely, since these systems compete for the resources which taxation can extract from the wealth-creating portion of the population. How are such matters to be adjudicated? It is silly to imagine that such fantastically difficult policy questions can be dealt with by vague decrees valid planet-wide and for all time.

Continuing the world gubmint strawperson trope. extract from the wealth creating portion is comical in its atlas shruggery-thuggery. Also not seeing whats difficult to understand here about how production can easily be rationalized to provide the basics by halting production of luxuries, such as military items, britney spears records, narcotics, toxic fast foods, and so on.

Wealth creation sufficient for meeting must haves on a near universal scale is limited with a few exceptions to just those states with the sort of economic organizations Chomsky and other collectivists detest and would undermine if they could. (The United States, Israel, Western European democracies, many of the oil-producing countries.)

What universe is this in again? never mind that the public sector is part of the equation in those states, so are the imperatives of internal and external exploitation, on which NCs writings also focus.

Rationally then, real interest in satisfaction of the must haves leads to promotion of the sort of economic and political arrangements which facilitate the creation of wealth, free markets, the rule of law, limitations on government regulation, moderate taxation, limited government, free trade, etc.

Nothing rational about it. wealth creation is my favorite fiction of the rightwing. wealth creation. as if ex nihilo creation were anything other than a new bastard theology. Considering that PMPs preferred example, the US, used precisely different policies (regulated markets, heavy taxation, large government, protected trade) to arrive at its status of wealth nirvana that apparently protects all rights in the UDHR, PMPs argument here must not be serious. In fact, this thesis is marvelously incompetent, and is exactly the type of koolaid that tea baggers love to drink.

To the problems and questions just sketched, Chomsky's remarks bring essentially nothing of substance. This is unsurprising since his goal is to attack the United States and contrast it with the paradise only possible in a Marxist society.

Indicates a serious misreading or non-reading of NC, who is not a Marxist. (wtf is a Marxist society, anyway? Is it like a Moslem culture?) NB the ad hominem discussion of NCs motivation, rather than dispute on the merits--this rhetoric is forensic, and simply seeks to enlist agreement from like-minded persons, rather than rationally persuade--an old gimmick of people who cant win.

I remember reading somewhere Chomskys having said that the illegal immigration from the south is our fault: they are coming here because we stole their wealth.

What a thinker.

Another incompetent insult. illegal immigration is a term used by persons who dont understand the US immigration statute: all immigration is by statutory definition lawful. Persons present unlawfully have not immigrated. The fact that the people from Mexico come to the US to work might have something to do with the treaty of Guadalupe-hidalgo, where the best parts of mexico were in fact stolen after an instance of nasty aggression. The fact that debt-leverage imperialism and structural adjustment sends public moneys from the Monroe doctrine co-prosperity sphere into US banks should not be underestimated. I can understand if PMP is unfamiliar with such processes--but that understanding does not make PMP correct, nor NC incorrect.

Need we even comment on the baseless mockery in the last line?

Morality as innate.

Finally, I present you with this claim in Chomskys 2005 article:

"In recent years, there has been intriguing work in moral philosophy and experimental cognitive science that carries these ideas forward, investigating what seem to be deep-seated moral intuitions that often have a very surprising character, in invented cases, and that suggest the operation of internal principles well beyond anything that could be explained by training and conditioning."

This incredibly obscure and verbose model of how not to write English prose offers a typical kind of Chomskyan hint that supports his ideas about the justification of the declaration and its list of must haves.

I understood what NC wrote, so the insults about his writing, beyond irrelevant, appear to indicate nothing other than PMPs personal subliteracy. It likewise renders the PMPs critique of same unreliable.

Perhaps some notion of innateness can explicate why the declaration lists a right to equal pay for equal work but not a right to have a private swimming pool. At the least, one might think that such a conclusion would lend some support to the notion that the declaration represents some sort of human consensus. But the implication is spurious: if cognitive science principles suggest that a human consensus exists about things like the declaration, then the clear nonexistence of such a consensus must in part undermine those cognitive science principles. (Why were those who traded in and exploited slaves not in touch with their innate ideas of rights?)

This is the only useful proposition in the entire article, and PMP should have explored it. He doesnt, because its an attack piece/quasi-character assassination.

The discussion that follows is trifling and irrelevant.

The addendum is equally bad. simply pedantic BS. The war was sold to the public on the WMD claim. The other items were ancillary, several of them equally dishonest as the WMD argument. I suppose that PMP must be as ashamed as the rest of the hoodwinked rightwing when no WMD actually turned up and the entire enterprise was revealed to be a lying exercise in naked aggression.

On the whole, PMPs work hereinabove should constitute a severe embarrassment to thoughtful rightwingers. But, given the fact that there is one useful point in the whole thing, that probably makes it the gold standard of rightwing thought. So, congratulations PMP!

[Guest Raidne]

"ersatz analysis" LOL. I'm not sure who else is reading this thread anymore, but this is good shit.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

"ersatz analysis" LOL. I'm not sure who else is reading this thread anymore, but this is good shit.

What do you think of Chomsky's claim that it was U.S. and British support for Hitler that enabled him to gain power, and that the Allies secretly financed armies established by Hitler so as to hurt the Soviets, thereby prolonging the Holocaust?

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/chomsky/newyorker1.html

[Guest Raidne]

I actually posted that entire talk of Chomsky's in full upthread already.

Didn't phase me. Chomsky is clearly referencing what we now call "appeasement" in the first part, when he talks about US and British "support" for Hitler. We had ambassadors over there, we held diplomatic talks, all while he invaded Czechoslovakia, etc., and then Poland. It's true - maybe we should have not decided to "stay neutral" during that time. Seems pretty uncontroversial actually.

As for the latter, I don't know anything about that claim. Seems not unlikely that we would have armed disbanded Nazi troops to prevent the encroachment of the Soviets. Our records show that we were hellbent on not allowing the Russians to take over too much of Germany. From what I understand we nearly had another war, right then and there. It was a very tricky thing. And better for everyone, if you believe in the superiority of Western Democracy, etc., but, as we've stated again and again and again, Chomsky's moral compass is about lives lost period, without reference to the quality of life of those who live. So under his moral calculus, people died because of that military effort, and people may have died that would have lived in the camps had they been liberated earlier by Russians.

What is your problem with that statement?

[sologdin]

What do you think of Chomsky's claim that it was U.S. and British support for Hitler that enabled him to gain power, and that the Allies secretly financed armies established by Hitler so as to hurt the Soviets, thereby prolonging the Holocaust?

the first proposition is correct, insofar as those are contributory causes, though it'd be erroneous to say sine qua non or primary causes.

the second proposition is somewhat obscure, but it may be a reference to the vlasov army--not sure when the US started using it. may be that the US turned that mad dogg lose on the soviets after the war was over.

it's not inconsistent with what we know--the US was running around the reich snatching up high tech gear, nuclear program stuff, rocket scientists, chemical weapons, antiquities, useful espionage personnel--all of it with the intent of using against the soviets after WW2 was done. so of course the US wanted to slow down the soviet advance. fairly certain that the US bombed evacuation routes after the germans had withdrawn (as in yugoslavia) to slow the soviet advance.

does prolonging the war prolong the holocaust? even if the US didn't desire to prolong the holocaust, what result is certain to follow from prolonging the war?

for that reason, it might be said that nazism was instrumental in US geostrategy at the time, and that ending the holocaust was not. that's cool--we get it--great power politics, &c.--but it negates all of the auto-encomia about how the US saved the jews or saved europe or saved civilization or whatever.

[Hereward]

What do you think of Chomsky's claim that it was U.S. and British support for Hitler that enabled him to gain power, and that the Allies secretly financed armies established by Hitler so as to hurt the Soviets, thereby prolonging the Holocaust?

the first proposition is correct, insofar as those are contributory causes, though it'd be erroneous to say sine qua non or primary causes.

Can you back that up, because I'm not aware of any support from state elements, unless you are counting sympathy from individuals or media organisations?

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I actually posted that entire talk of Chomsky's in full upthread already.

Didn't phase me. Chomsky is clearly referencing what we now call "appeasement" in the first part, when he talks about US and British "support" for Hitler.

"Very clearly" to whom, exactly? I don't think it's "very clear" at all, particularly since the alternative to "appeasement" was military action, which is what Chomsky claims to want to avoid. And exactly how did the U.S. appease Hitler? We weren't even at Munich, nor even on the same continent. The Agreement was signed by Hitler, Mussolini, Chamberlain, and Daladier. We were never asked our opinion and weren't present. And unlike the Soviets, we didn't have a treaty or agreements with Czechoslovakia that we abrogated. Of course, Chomsky wouldn't blame the Soviets for Munich anyway, despite their subsequent breach of the treaty with Czechoslovakia. So given that accusing the U.S. of "appeasement" makes no sense in this context, how can we say that's what he's "very clearly" referring to?

More importantly, this guy is a linguist, so he knows the exact meaning of the words he uses, and the inferences people will take from those words. "Support" is an active verb. It implies engaging in certain positive acts. "Appeasement" is the lack of action -- doing nothing. So if Chomsky was really referring just to the historically-well known issue of appeasement, why didn't he just use the word "appeasement"? Too many syllables for him or something? Or perhaps was that word (though accurate) just not strong enough to create the misleading impression he wanted to make?

This kind of statement is just classic Chomsky. People who are well-versed on the underlying subject will either dismiss it as complete bullshit, or excuse/rationalize it by saying "well, he really didn't mean it that way. You really need to put it in a different context., etc., etc." Completely ignoring the fact that there was obviously a way to make the statement unambiguous, and factually correct, that he deliberately avoided by choosing a word that didn't fit and created a false impression instead.

But the toxicity of Chomsky -- and his genius -- is that he spews this crap on mushy-headed college students who very often don't have sufficient background knowledge even to make the distinction you did. And heknows that. So you'll get a lot of students -- like the one he silenced in that discussion -- who may just assume that there's some part of WWII that they just haven't heard much about, and that the U.S. did actually support Hitler. Mission accomplished for Chomsky.

As for the latter, I don't know anything about that claim. Seems not unlikely that we would have armed disbanded Nazi troops to prevent the encroachment of the Soviets. Our records show that we were hellbent on not allowing the Russians to take over too much of Germany. From what I understand we nearly had another war, right then and there. It was a very tricky thing. And better for everyone, if you believe in the superiority of Western Democracy, etc., but, as we've stated again and again and again, Chomsky's moral compass is about lives lost period, without reference to the quality of life of those who live. So under his moral calculus, people died because of that military effort, and people may have died that would have lived in the camps had they been liberated earlier by Russians.

This illustrates the above point perfectly. Because you don't know the underlying history well enough to challenge or question his statement, he slips this one past the goalie, and now has you believing that the U.S. and Britain may well have extended the Holocaust by arming Nazi troops against the Soviets. Are you aware of any positive evidence of that? What conclusion do you think those students sitting in his audience walked away with? Mission accomplished again.

As best as I can figure it, he's probably referring to the Warsaw Rebellion by the Polish Home Army in the late summer/early fall of 1944. Of course, the Polish Home Army has a very well-documented history of having fought the Germans in a number of operations throughout the occupation, and it's anti-German credentials are pretty impeccable. Plus, it did receive support from the U.S. and Britain during the war. So in August 1944, with the Red Army approaching, the Home Army saw its chance, and launched into open rebellion against the Nazis. The rebellion was extremely successful initially, giving the Poles control of Warsaw. Because the Germans had to worry about fighting both the very nearby Red Army -- already in the eastern suburbs of the city, and the Poles in their rear.

Of course, the Soviets were not happy about the Poles rebelling and freeing Warsaw on their own, because the idea of a post-war, free and independent Poland didn't fit with their plans. So, they decided to let the Nazis do their dirty work. Rather than pushing harder on the Nazis when the Poles rebelled, which would militarily have made all the sense in the world, they just stopped their advance altogether along that front. They did that to give the Germans the opportunity to mass troops and suppress the rebellion, without worrying about the temporarily docile Red Army. The Germans eliminated the risk in their rear (tokk them 63 days, but they did it), and the Red Army greatly weakened the free Polish Government in Exile. Worked out beautifully for the Nazis and Soviets, if not for the Poles.

So, I suppose Chomsky is claiming that the allied-supported Polish Home Army "delayed" the Soviet advance (because the Soviets halted, don't you know), thereby ""prolonging" the war and the Holocaust. Because if that U.S./British supported force hadn't fought, the war might have ended earlier. Neat argument, huh?

What is your problem with that statement?

You mean other than him deliberately misleading hundreds of students (and others who read/heard that drivel) with false and/or highly distorted historical claims, all to advance his goal of making the U.S. the ultimate evil and to influence other people to believe the same?

Well, nothing, I suppose.

[sologdin]

Of course, the Soviets were not happy about the Poles rebelling and freeing Warsaw on their own, because the idea of a post-war, free and independent Poland didn't fit with their plans. So, they decided to let the Nazis do their dirty work. Rather than pushing harder on the Nazis when the Poles rebelled, which would militarily have made all the sense in the world, they just stopped their advance altogether along that front. They did that to give the Germans the opportunity to mass troops and suppress the rebellion, without worrying about the temporarily docile Red Army. The Germans eliminated the risk in their rear, and the Red Army greatly weakened the free Polish Government in Exile. Worked out beautifully for them, if not for the Poles.

the red army was fighting nasty engagements with the germans all along the vistula during that time. if the polish resistance had any chance at all it is because of the advance of the russians. (meanwhile, the US was recruiting polish collaborators and war criminals for use in the cold war.)

and if the speculation that stalin wanted to destroy local resistance groups is true, it would not be inconsistent with what we already know about his politics. what of it?

it's not obvious that NC was referring to that episode, regardless.

[sologdin]

extended the Holocaust by arming Nazi troops against the Soviets.

FLOW--

the above-quoted bit adopts one of the standard anti-chomskyite rhetorical devices. the original line was

Britain and the US then began supporting armies established by Hitler to hold back the Russian advance.

whereas you originally presented it as

the Allies secretly financed armies established by Hitler so as to hurt the Soviets, thereby prolonging the Holocaust?

pretty sure both of your presentations involve sublte shifts that may indicate systematic dishonesty, or maybe simply haste and/or failure to pay proper attention. either way, they consitute misrepresentations of the position under examination, rendering thereby that examination a strawperson. that's cool, i guess. go get 'em.

"armies established by hitler" disqualifies your polish resistance group. more likely it is groups within the soviet ambit; the third reich cultivated ethnic separatism from the USSR, just as the US did after the war. that coincidence is not incidental, but rather intrinsic to the US policy of importing rightwing groups after the war was over, including a substantial number of war criminals and collaborators.

i'm fairly sure that he is not referring to a US effort to arm wehrmacht soldiers. although we know that the US, after the war, considered seriously the rearming of nazi armies to attack uncle joe. that's just basic. good for all invovled that same did not occur.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

the red army was fighting nasty engagements with the germans all along the vistula during that time. if the polish resistance had any chance at all it is because of the advance of the russians. (meanwhile, the US was recruiting polish collaborators and war criminals for use in the cold war.)

The Polish Home Army rose precisely because of the Red Army's location. In fact, Radio Moscow urged them to rebel, then let them die on the vine. There's plenty of other reading material out there, but I personally attended a symposium on this in '82 at the Academy. One of the guys present -- among a former British officer who'd been a liaison to the Home Army, a few professors, etc. -- was with the Polish troops who were actually fighting with Stalin's army. He told how they'd initially been told they were going to participate, had liased with the Home Army, then told by the Soviets after the battle started to sit tight, and only were permitted to go on the offensive after the tide had turned. And were denied any artillery support to boot. THe guns were just silent. He was just crying on this dias talking about hearing the radio calls for help, and him, a fellow Pole, just sitting there.

and if the speculation that stalin wanted to destroy local resistance groups is true, it would not be inconsistent with what we already know about his politics. what of it?

Uh right. Doesn't that actually support my point? As for "what of it", the issue is Chomsky's characterization.

it's not obvious that NC was referring to that episode, regardless.

Okay, I assume you've got more than passing familiarity with WWII. What do you think he was referring to? Can you think of anything that fits Chomsky's claim? I can't. This was about as close as I could come. So that leaves Chomsky dropping this relative bombshell out there to a group of hundreds of students, the vast majority of whom I suspect know a lot less about the war than you and I do. So he's managed to paint a terrible picture of the U.S. (we now actually helped the Nazis with respect to the Holocaust), pollute the minds of a bunch of students, and based on...what, exactly?

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

FLOW--

pretty sure both of your presentations involve sublte shifts that may indicate systematic dishonesty, or maybe simply haste and/or failure to pay proper attention.

The first one I corrected myself boefre anyone commented on it. I hadn't memorized the quote correctly, and changed it when I went back to check. I fail to see any substantive distinction in meaning between the second and third at all.

"armies established by hitler" disqualifies your polish resistance group. more likely it is groups within the soviet ambit; the third reich cultivated ethnic separatism from the USSR, just as the US did after the war. that coincidence is not incidental, but rather intrinsic to the US policy of importing rightwing groups after the war was over, including a substantial number of war criminals and collaborators.

Then what the hell is he referring to? Again, I'm pretty conversant with WWII, and I have no freaking clue at all. Which groups? The most likely culprits would be the Ukrainian resistance, but they didn't get U.S. aid. As for "armies established by Hitler" disqualifying the Polish Home Army, I don't see why. If he was willing to accuse the U.S. of having supported Hitler pre-war, why wouldn't he be willing to distort the origins of the Home Army?

i'm fairly sure that he is not referring to a US effort to arm wehrmacht soldiers.

So again, what was he referring to? Or did he just make that shit up out of thin air so as to conveniently bash the U.S. from ever-new directions?

[sologdin]

FLOW--

gonna quote my answer from upthread, which you must have overpassed in this slightly ridiculous volume of posts:

reference to the vlasov army--not sure when the US started using it. may be that the US turned that mad dogg lose on the soviets after the war was over.

that's my best guess. vlasov, or some other soviet group that had been cultivated by the nazis, but began to accept supplies from the US/UK when it looked as though uncle joe was gonna liberate all of europe instead of just the former russian empire.

[Hereward]

FLOW--

gonna quote my answer from upthread, which you must have overpassed in this slightly ridiculous volume of posts:

that's my best guess. vlasov, or some other soviet group that had been cultivated by the nazis, but began to accept supplies from the US/UK when it looked as though uncle joe was gonna liberate all of europe instead of just the former russian empire.

The Allies didn't want anything to do with Vlasov. They didn't want to upset Stalin and thought Vlasov was totally unreliable and unpopular into the bargain.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

FLOW--

gonna quote my answer from upthread, which you must have overpassed in this slightly ridiculous volume of posts:

that's my best guess. vlasov, or some other soviet group that had been cultivated by the nazis,

Okay, I know about them.

but began to accept supplies from the US/UK when it looked as though uncle joe was gonna liberate all of europe instead of just the former russian empire.

Well it falls apart there. Some of Vlasov's troops fought against the allies on the western front, but there is no evidence that the few ROA troops who actually engaged the Soviets ever got supplies from the allies, and it would have been logistically impossible. How would the Allies have gotten supplies specifically to a couple of small, scattered ROA units on the eastern front? The only point at which they were in close enough proximity to have done that was in May 1945, after Hitler was dead, when those troops already had switched sides and were fighting against the Nazis in Czechoslovakia.

And Chomsky's whole point on this is asinine given that the U.S. continued Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union even after Germany surrendered. Why the hell would it have done that if it was trying to slow down the Red Army?

This is just a pure smear by Chomsky.

[sologdin]

Can you back that up, because I'm not aware of any support from state elements, unless you are counting sympathy from individuals or media organisations?

hereward--

yeah, unquestionable private support from industry, banking, rightwing NGOs, various personalities, media outfits, &c., in both states. my impression is that your bank of england was involved with the financing end of the third reich--correct me if i am wrong, or if the bank of england is actually a private concern. there's always your secret services trying to ally with the nazis against the soviets, but i think that occurred long after the "rise of hitler," which was the original point, IIRC. does the royal family count as the public at that time? i'm not sure.

for the US, it's the dawes/young plan moneys funneled through industry to support right wing parties; the industrialists, and their investors in the US, which included the gubmint on the public lending side, some of which moneys paid for the NSDAP's electoral successes and early organizing. the US public moneys are mediated through a series of german investors, like Thyssen or Krupp, but also through US investors and their lawyers, such as the tools at cromwell sullivan, who enrolled allen friggin dulles as the nazi money man, along with his equally abhorrent fascist brother, john f. dulles, both of whom were revolving door types in the government. this isn't a direct chain of influence or decision-making--it's just moneys flowing to predictable places and doing foreseeable things. of course industry is rightwing, and of course it will fund rightwing parties--but the US likely didn't determine which far right idiots got their dawes plan moneys. i'm sure silent cal did not sign an order like "Fund Herr Hitler's beer hall putsch!"

so, did the US government as a matter of policy fund early hitler intentionally? very probably not, though i suspect that many of the pro-business types in government at the time appreciated fascist policy on labor, anticommunism, cordon sanitaire contra bolshevism, and so on. rather, and more importantly, like AQ and the taliban as side effects of anti-soviet policy in the 1980s, so too hitler is an unintentional side effect of irresponsible US policy in the 1920s.

i.e., the US insisted on repayment of WW1 debts from the victorious allies, even while those allies insisted on german reparations. the US likewise insisted that payment of debt was not contingent upon payment of reparation. the solution was for public moneys to be transferred to germany so that it might pay its reparations and the reparations could be used on the war debt bill. the US simultaneously enacted punitive tariffs to prevent imports from abroad that could be used to generate the currency required for either set of obligations, and then later insisted on independence for currency valuation--it was an autarkic recipe, similar in effect to what was brewing in the fascist states. even though FDR's policy internally was debt forgiveness, the foreign policy was a hard line in favor of creditors--this hard line did not extend to germany because the US was not technically an ally in the war, and claimed therefore no reparations--and since she was no ally, she might also claim payment of war debts, which traditionally were not repaid among victorious allies. the basic premise of this cumulation of US policy was to break the british empire and rebuild a regional european rival to the UK and france in germany.

the premise worked too well, of course--the british empire really became a relic prior to the war and a regional rival was in fact produced--but the dawes/young moneys dried up, during the depression, largely because it was the most massive pyramid scheme in history. the germans repudiated reparations, and i don't suspect that the US was interested in giving the allies a break at that point--but it didn't matter, because capitalism up and broke itself at that point.

all that's also rather aside from the massive amounts of collaborator US firms that traded with the fascists lawfully prior to US entry into the war, and aided in the production of german military equipment, concentration camp infrastructure, and other basic implements of the third reich; the IBM case is front and center, but GM, ford, ITT, anaconda, dupont, and so on are complicit. sure, it's an important distinction between state and big capital--but when the ruling class is objectively pro-fascist, what matters it if the state that this class controls as its agent says that fascists are no good?