Another article from Chomsky
Another article from Chomsky which makes for provocative reading. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/05/201251114163762922.html In it in a more sombre perhaps pessimistic tone Chomsky lays out the stark choice before us:- “I’m just old enough to remember the Great Depression…Despite the hard times, there was a sense that, somehow, “we’re gonna get out of it”. It’s quite different now. For many people in the United States, there’s a pervasive sense of hopelessness, sometimes despair. I think it’s quite new in American history. And it has an objective basis. In the 1930s, unemployed working people could anticipate that their jobs would come back. If you’re a worker in manufacturing today – the current level of unemployment there is approximately like the Depression – and current tendencies persist, those jobs aren’t going to come back…We’re really regressing back to the dark ages. It’s not a joke. And if that’s happening in the most powerful, richest country in history, then this catastrophe isn’t going to be averted – and in a generation or two, everything else we’re talking about won’t matter. Something has to be done about it very soon in a dedicated, sustained way.It’s not going to be easy to proceed. There are going to be barriers, difficulties, hardships, failures. It’s inevitable. But unless the spirit of the last year, here and elsewhere in the country and around the globe, continues to grow and becomes a major force in the social and political world, the chances for a decent future are not very high.””The Occupy movements could provide a mass base for trying to avert what amounts to a dagger pointed at the heart of the country…where we’re heading…the Occupy movement is the first real, major, popular reaction that could avert this. But it’s going to be necessary to face the fact that it’s a long, hard struggle. You don’t win victories tomorrow. You have to form the structures that will be sustained, that will go on through hard times and can win major victories. And there are a lot of things that can be done.”What can be done? According to Chomsky its workers’ self-managed co-operatives (see the recent UCS post on Socialist Courier) but less predictably, increased government spending on infra-structure such as high speed trains and even a “Buy American” programme!But there is no denying that a determined fight-back has to be launched and expanded by the working class and that it will find expression in various ways.