Professor Chomsky spoke to a packed audience May 13. He organized his analysis of what really drives foreign policy into a 30 minute talk, which we recorded and present here.
A standard justification of foreign policy centers on the supposed concept of maintaining and/or bolstering "national security." However, one must distinguish between official government assertions and actual reality. A vivid illustration of this distinction comes from observing what happened to U.S. foreign policy, and what did NOT happen, when the vaunted Soviet threat to U.S. national security collapsed into nothing. A series of new pretexts were put forward, along with an unchanged foreign policy.
So the question presents itself: what is this "national security"? Security for whom? Certainly, not the population! In fact, the population might even be regarded as the enemy.
Chomsky points out that our society today has ready access to all the information it needs, especially now with the help of Wikileaks, whistleblowers, and the internet, to understand and grapple with our bad government. So let's get up and do it!
Recorded for Truth and Justice Radio by Stan Robinson
Presented here in 3 parts: introduction by the Library Director (not particularly informative; 3 minutes), actual main talk by Chomsky (30 minutes), and followup Q&A session (not as well recorded; 52 minutes).
Truth and Justice Radio is an award-winning public affairs program aired every Sunday 6-10am at WZBC 90.3FM (Newton, MA), also streamed and archived for two weeks at wzbc.org; its primitive website: truthandjusticeradio.org.