Noam Chomsky

Freedom, Sovereignty, and Other Endangered Species

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The history of the leaded gasoline additive developed in the 1920s by DuPont, General Motors and Standard Oil...

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Donkeyphant
Volume 2

February 2000

I'm not alone -- someone you might know is voting for Ralph too!

The Real Purpose of the Gulf War

Ten years after CNN declared the Gulf War to be "over," gas prices are at an all-time high, averaging about $2/gallon for the cheap stuff.  "Star Wars," the pork-barrel missile "defense" system, continues to take food out of hungry children's mouths.  The UN (aka the US and the US-backed UK) continues to bomb Iraqi infrastructure (roads, bridges, sewer treatment plants) under the auspices of "keeping the world safe from Saddam Hussein."  And Saddam is still in power!  How long will this last?  Another ten years?  Twenty?

The bombings and embargoes of food and other necessities result in 5,000 innocent Iraqi corpses, mostly children, per month.  There's a word for the U.S.'s tactics:  genocide.

But our complicit corporate-owned media keeps their collective mouths shut.  Maybe once in a while they complain about the price of gasoline.  But there is no follow-through, no intention of investigating the obvious chain of cause and effect.  The media plays up Saddam Hussein's fabricated evil-villain persona, manipulating public opinion so successfully that the majority accept Nazi-style bombings of innocent people.

Why didn't Bush take out Saddam?  It should be obvious:  he's far too valuable as an icon that so easily evokes fear of "the bomb."  After all, someone needs to replace the Evil Empire.

Once again the American public was easily duped by saber-rattling politicians, CEOs, and media pundits.  The real purpose of the on-going Gulf War is obvious:  enriching the shareholders of military-industrial and petrochemical corporations.

Kuwait and Saudi Arabia sure did a number on their neighbors didn't they?  They crushed a market rival resulting in a more controllable supply of crude oil, making themselves fabulously richer than they already were while helping out their fat and happy buddies at Shell, Chevron, and Exxon.  What a stroke of genius!  Still don't think Bush, Powell (President?  Give me a fucking break...), and Schwarzkopf knew this all along?  Still don't think Clinton knows it?  Exxon and Lockheed Martin  bestow millions upon candidates Al Gore and George W. Bush in order to keep the gravy coming in.

More information:

• Colombia's Model City
• Gaviotas, and the Man Who Planted Trees

Tired of boring stale-bread white men discussing the "issues?"  The editors at Donkeyphant have put together a platform for progressives.

There's not a whole lot of hope left for life on this planet.  Join GREENPEACE now.  When someone asks me why I'm vegetarian (I'm vegan actually), I don't go into detail.  I'm not the chairman of the vegetarians club.  If someone is too ignorant to know the answer to that question with all the information at their fingertips on the Internet and elsewhere, chances are they aren't worth talking to.  What I really want to say is, have you ever seen blood pouring out the eyes of a cow?  A whale being sliced open with a chainsaw?  Why isn't cooked dog on the menu?  After all, it's not polite dinner conversation.

Should the people of Oakland have known better than to vote for Governor Moonbeam?  He sure knew what to say and when to say it.  It just goes to show that words and actions are completely different things altogether.  Kind of reminds me of Al Gore, Mr. Earth in the Balance hypocrite himself.  Can we trust white politicians at all?  Is it their whiteness or their politician-ness that makes them liars when they get in the drivers seat.

In the scheme of things, the Europeans were just following a time-honored tradition of kill-or-be-killed.  There are many incidents in which peoples of color decimated their neighbors.  But this doesn't justify the New World settlers.  Even if they were blindly following their beliefs and customs, the Europeans of 1742 committed horrific acts against all living things.  These acts stand at odds with the country's inspirations to be the "City on the Hill," a shining and resilient example of civilization across the globe.

Today, the descendants of Native Americans live disrupted lives, unable to return to the better days of the past and unable to completely opt into the white man's racist "civilization."  We have a rare opportunity to compensate them for the atrocities committed against them in our name.  The fact that some Native Americans are getting rich from gambling does not absolve us from the responsibility of our ancestors' actions.  We benefit each day from every scalp taken by the soldiers of the US Army who "tamed" the wilderness.

Therefore the right thing to do is compensate those who were wronged.  That includes the descendants of African slaves.  That includes the descendants of the Spaniards who claimed California, Texas, and New Mexico first, as well as the descendants of their slaves.  That includes the descendants of the once free Puerto Ricans, the Samoans, the Filipinos, the Japanese interred during WWII, and the Chinese who built the West with simple tools, yes, but mostly with their skin and bone.

The list goes on and on, not because I'm a bleeding heart liberal, but because Teddy Roosevelt and William Randolph Hearst decided to dabble in colonialism.  The American elite obliged and even encouraged them.  How many more generations must bear the shame before some form of olive branch is offered?  Meanwhile the skirmishes, the undeclared wars continue to rage in our backyards, in our classrooms, and in our courts.  At some point building more prisons is not the answer.

How about for just one year, we dedicate our enormous military budget to some sort of pay-back.  Not one single person would receive a great deal of money, but it would be a start.  And if you think it's hard to decide who deserves the money, I think it's pretty simple to figure out:  just ask them.  Computer systems can ensure that nobody gets paid more than once.

After the pay-offs, we evaluate our policies to make sure we won't ever have to make another pay-out.  Such as moving our military bases out of countries that we shouldn't have interfered with in the first place. Such as Cuba.  Madeline Albright and Bill Clinton continue to starve the impoverished children of Iraq and Serbia in our name.  It's time we told our leaders of the Fourth Reich to go to their rooms.

Obviously, the pay-out is a symbolic gesture of remorse rather than a true remedy to institutional racism.  Until all people in the U.S. own property that they can be proud of, until everyone feels like they have a real stake in the game, rampant violence and malnutrition will march onward.  The Megas of the world will get continue to be kicked out of the Big Brother house while the Tigers and Jordans, who spend the bulk of their public lives enriching corporations like all good "blacks" should, will continue to be applauded by their white overseers.

The money won't be enough to own property in most parts of the Union, but it's a start for at least a savings account.  I believe it's our best option even though you can bet Greenspan will spew on and on about inflation.

Justice is a Terrible Thing to Waste

The DOJ action against Microsoft is a waste of taxpayer dollars.  It has nothing to do with choice, consumers, or even technology.  It's about the egos of tech executives who got their asses kicked and their bought-off elected and appointed stooges in Washington DC.

Professional politicians, lawyers, and judges want the public to think they're rescuing consumers around the world from an evil corporation.  But that's not what's going on at all.  The DOJ claims that Microsoft illegally dominated the PC market, somehow.  They cite Apple Computer and Netscape as victims of Microsoft's "predatory" business practices.  

There are age-old reasons why Apple lost its lead in the PC market:  economics and laziness.  Apple monopolized the Macintosh operating system and 'tied' their hardware to it, gouging consumers in the process.  Microsoft worked hard on Windows, matched the Macintosh feature for feature, and surpassed the Apple OS while Apple sat idly by.  It was like watching the Daytona 500, except Apple's car was driving slow-motion. 

Similarly, Netscape employees became insanely rich way too fast.  They were distracted by their own success and lost sight of their mission.  After all, day trading, lavish dinner parties, trendy meat markets, and expensive sports cars are a lot more fun than working on browser code until 4 AM.  Finding fault with Microsoft is like blaming the tortoise who won the race.

Microsoft gave consumers a choice of products to buy:  Compaq, Dell, Gateway, "Taiwan surprise," you name it.  Quite a few companies have benefited from Microsoft's success whereas greedy Pepsi-sucking Apple execs wanted it all to themselves.  Consumers chose the computer that met their needs in the most economical way.  Would consumers be able to buy a 750 MHz system today for under $2000 if it weren't for Microsoft?  Hell no they wouldn't.  

If Apple's, Sun's, or NeXt's business models had prevailed, Americans would need a second mortgage just to surf the Internet.  Furthermore, without Microsoft, the Internet would still be science fiction.  There just wouldn't be enough home computers to make the Internet possible.  Internet companies owe Microsoft big time -- Sun and Oracle especially.

In fact, consumers today can choose to buy a Macintosh.  Like Rocky Balboa, Apple pulled itself off the canvas (thanks to a few million dollars from Microsoft) and is back in the ring fighting with inspired vigor.  So why don't the Microsoft-haters just buy an iMac and rant about really important things like East Timor or biotech companies that use humans as guinea pigs?  How about the U.S.'s human rights abuses against Arabs because U.S. auto manufacturers refuse to develop alternative-fuel vehicles and, in the 1950's, forced municipalities to dismantle public transit?  Could it be... that Microsoft just didn't buy off the right people before it was too late?

Bill Gates is an easy target compared to our faceless overloads who control corporations like AT&T.  When's the last time you saw the "owner" of AT&T?  Is he a descendant of Graham Bell?  AT&T is instead owned by a conglomeration of the world's wealthiest robber-barons who don't in any way deserve to benefit from Mr. Bell's genius and hard work.  Give me Bill Gates, a real person who worked hard for what he has, any day.

...But I digress.  Consumers can even purchase Linux systems from Dell.  Say, I hear that Corel Office runs on Linux.  It's pretty crappy but it works.  Consumers will just have to wait for Quicken, Photoshop, and everything else, I guess.  Could be worth the wait though!

Netscape, Sun, Oracle, and Novell sat on their laurels and cried "Mommy!" when the lights started dimming.  "It's so unfair that Microsoft is beating us this badly," they howled.  And career politicians like Hatch, Feinstein, and Boxer, not to mention an army of lawyers, came galloping on their horses as soon as they heard the pitiful cries of those with so much beautiful money.

With Microsoft out of the way, will these corporations bring innovations to average consumers?  Or will a dark horse appear to save the day?  Doubtful.  Sun makes business computers and Oracle makes business software.  Netscape doesn't even exist anymore, having been swallowed by AOL.  It isn't too far-fetched to presume that Netscape's future products will only benefit AOL customers.  That leaves Apple Computer, and God help us all if we have to wait for Apple to bring us innovations such as  speech and handwriting recognition.  Has everyone already forgotten about the Newton?

The research needed to develop significant technological breakthroughs can only be carried out by entities that have enormous sums of money.  Microsoft spends billions of dollars annually on research.  It's doubtful that a dark horse will bring anything of substance to market.  While Netscape marketed a pivotal technology, Netscape in fact didn't invent anything.  Netscape's browser was developed at a major university, with university funds and university labor.  The original software, known as Mosaic, was arguably stolen from the school; at least it was taken with scandalously skimpy recompense.  A browser doesn't compare to the technology needed for the next generation of computing.  It's like comparing a toy boat to an aircraft carrier.

The term "evil corporation" just doesn't fit Microsoft.  The DOJ's case is conspicuously one-sided.  Most of the findings of fact can be applied to all of Microsoft's competitors.  You can bet they'll do the same thing when they get the chance.  Sure, that doesn't make it right, but why hasn't Sun, Oracle or Apple been sued for anti-trust?  Don't these corporations at least claim to dominate their respective markets?  I see the billboards on 101 saying Oracle runs 96% of the Forbes eBusiness 500 (whatever that is).  96% sounds like a monopoly to me.

Are our leaders saying that Microsoft is the only high-tech company that has used questionable tactics?  How naive does Janet Reno think we are?  The real reason is that California is a much bigger state, in area, population, GNP, and political clout, compared to Microsoft's home state of Washington.  There are trillions of dollars at stake and every state is clawing for a bigger piece of the pie.  If you think the DOJ action is about buying a Linux-based Gateway, you're just another hapless consumer who has fallen into the clap-trap.

Does Microsoft beat its employees to work longer hours?  No.  They work a lot, but that's because they're rewarded for being number one.  Are their workers fairly compensated?  Many of its skilled workers are millionaires but yes, of course, they could pay their janitors and landscapers a lot better.  Let's see how Sun and Oracle measure up on that one.  Does Microsoft dump untreated sewage into the Pacific Ocean?  Do they poach what's left of our wildlife and sell the animals to zoos, aquariums, and pharmaceutical companies?  No and no.  Do Microsoft's products work?  Yes.  Do they get better each year?  Yes.  Are they affordable?  Yes.  What's really going on?

The truly evil corporations chartered by First World nations pay millions of dollars each year to influence public opinion.  Meanwhile they abuse their employees, rape and pillage the environment, and move their operations overseas where they control local and state governments with bribes, threats, and the US military.  The culprits are GE, GM, Macy's, Ford, Daimler Chrysler, Monsanto, Bank of America, Exxon, just to scratch the surface.  Taking Microsoft to court while turning a blind eye to all of the obvious injustices perpetrated by an ever-decreasing number of ever-more powerful corporations is hypocritical.  The DOJ's reckless action action against Microsoft may have permanently damaged the only economy that matters to our children's future. 

Update:  The above properties are all now "unavailable."  I hope you realize what that means. 

Out-Pricing the Help
Out of Silicon Valley

March 2000

I live in the Bay Area of California, a tiny region of the planet known as the Silicon Valley.  The Valley has undergone a surreal transformation over the last twenty-five years.

Silicon Valley is the world's semiconductor and software breadbasket.  Before there was Apple Computer, walnut orchards covered what are now office parks and freeways clogged by Porsches and BMWs.  Yet the natural beauty of this place still abounds, even though the orchards have been subdivided into quarter-acre lots and sold for a half million a piece.

I am grateful for the prosperity because I certainly have benefited from it.  But I am saddened by many of the arrogant residents here, transplants and old-timers alike, who lack perspective and foresight. 

Visit any Peninsula town, such as Palo Alto, on an average sunny afternoon.  Several surface-level observations are readily apparent:

• Markets filled with beautiful, inexpensive food
• A generous supply of excellent restaurants
• Nannies pushing infants in strollers
• Groomed, lush neighborhoods

People of color, mostly Latino, make all this possible.  Those who toil in the fields, those who wash the dishes, those who prepare the food, those who mow the lawns.  Our gratitude belongs to them and to them only.  Not to the vain, self-serving, arrogant CEOs who claim to be "self-made" men and saviors of the human race.

We should all consider how, this very day, we stopped to appreciate the people who make our comfortable lives enjoyable and care-free.  Do they live as well as the "knowledge workers" of this region?  Clearly they do not.  Does it matter?

There will come a time when their meager earnings will not pay the bills.  Day laborers will become scarce.  Wages will increase.   Mr. Greenspan, it has nothing to do with a booming economy.  It has to do with equity.  It has to do with who benefits from the new economy and who is left out.

Without an abundant supply of cheap labor, the price of everything will skyrocket.  Restaurants and other service economies will fail.  Silicon Valley won't be quite as convenient as it used to be.  You might even have to drive to the East Bay for a decent meal.

The exodus has already begun.  Real estate and rent have exceeded the pay of even professional careers such as nursing and teaching.  Only the elite can afford to live on the Peninsula.  Gentrification is pushing lower-income workers out of their homes.  All they have left is their community, and you can bet that will be taken away from them too.  After all, selling out to the highest bidder is the American Way.

If we take the Social Darwinist attitude that workers should move away if they can't afford to live here, they will.  They have no choice.  But maybe we should do something about it before the worst happens.  Imagine if there were propositions on the ballot that spoke to the real issues of the day instead of the mindless blather about homosexual marriage and never-ending school bonds that fund developers instead of teachers.

Such as legislation for affordable housing.  In order for this to happen, the government will have to acquire land on which to build single and multiple-family homes.  Developers, cut out of enormous profits, will interfere.  Anti-tax leagues will cry "welfare."  Interestingly enough, they don't say the same thing about Prop 13 which subsidizes the housing for California's old-time residents.  Homeowners will fear for their skyrocketing property values.  Politicians will warn about increased crime.

Less radical and less effective legislation could be introduced to increase the minimum wage and teachers' pay.  Increasing teachers' pay is conspicuously unpopular among voters.  All the while, administrators quietly increase their salaries without any public protest whatsoever.  Developers continue to siphon the taxpayers' money into immaculate administrative offices.

Even a dollar increase in the minimum wage isn't going to help much when rent for a two-bedroom apartment costs $1600 a month.  A miraculous 5% increase in teachers' salaries, which hover at about $35,000, isn't going to help buy a $600,000 low-end three-bedroom two-bath home.  The abrupt real-estate inflation in this region only means one thing:  the poor and "middle class" who don't own already own their home will be forced to leave the area.

When the supply of starry-eyed twenty-somethings who chose to teach in order to "make a difference" dwindles down to nothing, parents will have no choice but to turn to private education.  Religious private schools grow more and more popular each year in the Silicon Valley.  Many parochial educators live in Church-owned housing, guaranteeing a reliable (and cheap) supply of labor.  Parents who don't want their children brainwashed and physically abused by nuns will have to turn to home-schooling, I guess.

The Bay Area has a vested interest in a quality education system.  Computer programmers and other highly skilled workers are in short supply.  Many start-ups can not get off the ground due to the scarcity and expense of labor.  Start-ups are already turning to shady sweatshops in India and Russia.  An Indian programmer makes about $12,000 compared to his Californian counterpart at $70,000.

The greatest shame of the Bay Area's educational policy is its subtle yet deliberate racism.  Schools attended by poor children are financially neglected and, unsurprisingly, have low test scores.  For example, the predominantly Latino elementary school, Turnbull Learning Academy, in San Mateo scored 1 out of 10 in the student aptitude test in 1999.  Yet just five miles away, predominantly white Washington School in Burlingame scored an 8.  Not only are we denying working-class people modest housing, we're cheating their children out of a future.

Vouchers will not fix the problem.  On the contrary, vouchers will just exacerbate it.  The laws of supply and demand still hold in a voucher system.  Good schools are in short supply.  Desirable schools will cost more than less desirable ones.  Somehow the rich will manage to have more vouchers than the poor.  Somehow the better schools will be clustered around the wealthiest neighborhoods.  The poor will continue to be shut out of an education without even the little bit of hope that the public system provides.  Vouchers won't change the cold-hearted system that we already have. 

America in general and Silicon Valley in particular abuse the people who do the work.  America rewards bureaucrats, stockholders, executives, and other white-collar criminals who sit on their ass and claim victory once the hard work has been done.  The real workers in this country are demonized by the media, cheated by the system, and left out in the cold.

I fear what will happen if we continue to turn our backs on the people who are considered invisible.  Nuisances at best.  Our dirty little secret.  The South had African slaves, California has Latinos.  If we're too cold-hearted to do right for those who make our comfy lives possible, then at least we could tell ourselves that we're trying to preserve the highest quality of life on the planet.

Perhaps we should act now to prolong our good fortune.  If we don't, we deserve what what's coming to us:  a diminished high-tech economy, inflation, crappy chain restaurants, racial tension, inadequate schools, and an expansive prison ("free minimalist housing") system.  Who has the courage to lead with their heart instead of their wallet?  Who will be brave enough in the "new" economy?