the mainstream,
that one can find the truth about the roadmap. I
have never seen anything in the mainstream that
discusses the fact that Israel instantly rejected
the roadmap with US support. They formally
accepted it but added 14 reservations that totally
eviscerated it.
It was done instantly.
It's public knowledge - I've written about it,
talked about it, so have others, but I've never
seen it mentioned in the mainstream before. And
obviously they don't accept the Arab
League
proposal or any other serious proposal. In fact
they've been blocking the international consensus
on the two-state solution for decades. But Hamas
has to accept them.
It really makes no
sense. Hamas is a political party, and political
parties don't recognize other countries. And Hamas
itself has made it very clear, they actually
carried out a truce for a year and a half, didn't
respond to Israeli attacks, and have called for a
long-term truce, during which it'd be possible to
negotiate a settlement along the lines of the
international consensus and the Arab League
proposal.
All of this is obvious, it's
right on the surface, and that's just one example
of the deep hatred of democracy on the part of
Western elites. It's a striking example, but you
can add case after case. Yet the president
announced the freedom agenda, and if the dear
leader said something, it's got to be true, kind
of North Korean-style. Therefore there's a freedom
agenda even if there's a mountain of evidence
against it. The only evidence for it is in words,
even apart from the timing.
Shank:
In the 2008 US presidential election, how
will the candidates approach Iran? Do you think
Iran will be a deciding factor in the elections?
Chomsky: What they're saying
so far is not encouraging. I still think, despite
everything, that the US is very unlikely to attack
Iran. It could be a huge catastrophe; nobody knows
what the consequences would be. I imagine that
only an administration that's really desperate
would resort to that. But if the Democratic
candidates are on the verge of winning the
election, the administration is going to be
desperate. It still has the problem of Iraq: can't
stay in, and can't get out.
Shank:
The Senate Democrats can't seem to achieve
consensus on this issue.
Chomsky: I think there's a
reason for it. The reason is just thinking through
the consequences of allowing an independent,
partially democratic Iraq. The consequences are
non-trivial. We may decide to hide our heads in
the sand and pretend we can't think it through
because we cannot allow the question of why the
United States invaded to open, but that's very
self-destructive.
Shank: Is
there any connection to this conversation and why
we cannot find the political will and momentum to
enact legislation that would reduce carbon-dioxide
emission levels, institute a cap-and-trade system,
etc?
Chomsky: It's perfectly
clear why the United States didn't sign the Kyoto
Protocol. Again, there's overwhelming popular
support for signing - in fact it's so strong that
a majority of Bush voters in 2004 thought that he
was in favor of the Kyoto Protocol, it's such an
obvious thing to support. Popular support for
alternative energy has been very high for years.
But it harms corporate profits. After all, that's
the administration's constituency.
I
remember 40 years ago talking to one of the
leading people in the government who was involved
in arms control, pressing for arms-control
measures, detente, and so on. He's very high up,
and we were talking about whether arms control
could succeed. And only partially as a joke he
said, "Well, it might succeed if the high-tech
industry makes more profit from arms control than
it can make from weapons-related research and
production. If we get to that tipping point, maybe
arms control will work." He was partially joking,
but there's a truth that lies behind it.
Shank: How do we move
forward on climate change without beggaring the
South?
Chomsky:
Unfortunately, the poor countries, the South, are
going to suffer the worst according to most
projections - and that being so, it undermines
support in the North for doing much. Look at the
ozone story. As long as it was the Southern
Hemisphere that was being threatened, there was
very little talk about it. When it was discovered
in the north, very quickly actions were taken to
do something about it. Right now there's
discussion of putting serious effort into
developing a malaria vaccine, because global
warming might extend malaria to the rich
countries, so something should be done about it.
Same thing on health insurance. Here's an
issue where, for the general population, it's been
the leading domestic issue, or close to it, for
years. And there's a consensus for a national
health-care system on the model of other
industrial countries, maybe expanding Medicare to
everyone or something like that. Well, that's off
the agenda, nobody can talk about that. The
insurance companies don't like it, the financial
industry doesn't like and so on.
Now
there's a change taking place. What's happening is
that manufacturing industries are beginning to
turn to support for it because they're being
undermined by the hopelessly inefficient US
health-care system. It's the worst in the
industrial world by far, and they have to pay for
it. Since it's employer-compensated, in part,
their production costs are much higher than those
competitors who have a national health-care
system.
Take GM [General Motors]. If it
produces the same car in Detroit and in Windsor
across the border in Canada, it saves, I forget
the number, I think over $1,000 with the Windsor
production because there's a national health-care
system in Canada, it's much more efficient, it's
much cheaper, it's much more effective.
So
the manufacturing industry is starting to press
for some kind of national health care. Now it's
beginning to put it on the agenda. It doesn't
matter if the population wants it. What 90% of the
population wants would be kind of irrelevant. But
if part of the concentration of corporate capital
that basically runs the country - another thing
we're not allowed to say but it's obvious - if
part of that sector becomes in favor, then the
issue moves on to the political agenda.
Shank: So how does the South
get its voice heard on the international agenda?
Is the World Social Forum a place for it?
Chomsky: The World Social
Forum is very important, but of course that can't
be covered in the West. In fact, I remember
reading an article, I think in The Financial
Times, about the two major forums that were taking
place. One was the World Economic Forum in Davos
and a second was a right-wing forum in Herzeliyah
in Israel. Those were the two forums. Of course
there was also the World Social Forum in Nairobi,
but that's only tens of thousands of people from
around the world.
Shank:
With the trend toward vilifying the G77 at
the UN, one wonders where the developing world can
effectively voice its concerns.
Chomsky: The
developing-world voice can be amplified enormously
by support from the wealthy and the privileged,
otherwise it's very likely to be marginalized, as
in every other issue.
Shank:
So it's up to us.
Foreign
Policy In Focus contributor Michael Shank
is the policy director for the 3D Security
Initiative.
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