Noam Chomsky is smart.  A lot of people know that.  Though we differ on a few key worldview perspectives, there’s a lot to learn from him.  I’m interested in what he says in Imperial Ambitions: Conversations on the Post 9-11 World.

I was particularily intrigued by David Barsamian’s interview style.  It’s cool to be a fly on the wall of intelligent and important discussion.

One Q & A I particularly liked:

At the talks you give to American audiences, you often are asked the question, “What should I do?”

Only by American audiences.  I’m never asked this in the thrid world…. These are poor, oppressed people, living under horrendous conditions, and they would never dream of asking you what they should do.  It’s only in highly privileged cultures like ours that people ask this question.  We have every option open to us….  We can do anything.  But people here are trained to believe that there are easy answers, and it doesn’t work that way.  If you want to do something, you have to be dedicated and committed to it day after day…. You want a magic key, so you can go back to watching television tomorrow?  It doesn’t exist.

From Imperial Ambitions, H.B. Fenn & Company,2005. Page 39.