Highlights from Necessary Illusions by Noam Chomsky Last read on July 3, 2021
Highlights from this book
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A 1975 study on "governability of democracies" by the Trilateral Commission concluded that the media have become a "notable new source of national power," one aspect of an "excess of democracy" that contributes to "the reduction of governmental authority" at home and a consequent "decline in the influence of democracy abroad." Putting it in plain terms, the general public must be reduced to its traditional apathy and obedience, and driven from the arena of political debate and action, if democracy is to survive.
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The perception is that democracy is threatened by the organizing efforts of those called the "special interests", a concept of contemporary political rhetoric that refers to workers, farmers, women, youth, the elderly, the handicapped, ethnic minorities, and so on -- in short, the general population. In the US presidential campaigns of the 1980s, the democrats were accused of being the instrument of these special interests and thus undermining "the national interest", tacitly assumed to be represented by the one sector notibly ommited from hte list of special interests: corporations, financial institutions, and other business elites.
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Polls show that almost half the population believe that the US constitution -- a sacred document -- is the source of Marx's phrase "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need", so obviously right does the sentiment seem.
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Given a choice between the Reaganite program of damn-the-consequences Keynesian growth accompanied by jingoistic flag waving on the one hand, and the Democratic alternative of fiscal conservatism "we approve of your goals but fear that the costs will be too high" on the other, those who took the trouble to vote preferred the former -- not surprisingly.
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The process of barring public interference with important matters takes a step forward when elections do not even enable the public to select among programs that originate elsewhere, but become merely a procedure for selecting a symbolic figure.