An interesting dialogue with Noam Chomsky.


Anyway, this raises an interesting point. If, as we seem to be saying here, th elabels Liberal and Conservative in modern paralnce have lost their traditional meaning and been cast adrift from any specific revised meaning, then we have to ask "what is the actual target of the anger expressed by people against "liberals" or against "conservatives"? Two possibilities present themselves as first approximations: one, that the actual target is a set of attributes (not yet defined) which the peson associates with the term--for example, Ann COulter associates the word liberal with socialistic irresponsibility or some such attribute. Two, that the polarity which is being so vehemently and vociferously articulated by the polemicists is not in fact about anything, but is an artifice generated for some other reason. For example, it may serve one group A to create the apparancy that two other groups B and C should hate each other, because that allows the original group A to avoid attention.

I am inclined toward the latter explanation, except that I can't quite identify group A. ;>)


A