The bulk of Chomsky's article was about how no actual evidence has been put forward linking bin Laden to 9/11. This is ridiculous and doesn't require an annotated post. You yourself admit bin Laden took credit in 2004, so that should lead you to see why I thought Chomsky's argument was strange and weak.
They had evidence after 9/11 of bin Laden's involvement, but they weren't about to release all their intelligence findings to the public or to the Taliban, especially since that evidence would have upset intel links with other countries to track finances, etc. The complicated nature of this is evident just from reading the 9/11 Commission report or the work of scholar-journalists like Rohan Gunaratna. The government didn't just pick Afghanistan on a map and say, "Well, we have to bomb somewhere, but we don't know where, so just attack them." That's how it happened in the radical fantasy world, but in the real world things are more complex.

Regarding Bush = bin Laden, no argument I give will convince you that this is not the case. Fine. We're different people.

I don't think he's thoughtful on anything, since it seems he drew all of his conclusions some time in the 1940s.

"I won't begrudge your ignorance of Soviet history..."

Trotsky's politics were indistinguishable from the state terror policies of Lenin (and, later, of Stalin) until he was targeted by the higher ups. He wasn't targeted because he all of a sudden became a Jeffersonian democrat; Russia under Trotsky would have been the same as Russia under Lenin or Stalin. Many so-called Trotskyists during the Cold War were way too soft on the Soviet Union, but it depended on which tradition they were coming from--"left" and "right" Schachtmanism and so forth.

It is actually not "shockingly ignorant" to equate Marxism with Stalinism. Many fine writers have done so, including some like Leszek Kolakowski who knew more about Marxism than any one alive. Hannah Arendt also had that tendency, although I don't believe she came out and said it as bluntly as Kolakowski.

"also doubtful of your knowledge on Hitchens' stated political views. He is no longer a socialist, and says that he still looks at history through Marx's materialist interpretation - something which nearly all mainstream historians do as well."

Fine. I challenge you to a debate on Hitchens's political views. I know more about them than you, I assure you.

You must be joking that "nearly all mainstream historians" look at history through dialectical materialism. This is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard someone say. I have a graduate degree in history from an Ivy League university and I can assure you'd be laughed at by some pretty accomplished historians.

Who mentioned Bogdanor? See Oliver Kamm's work. Much more devastating.

And I'm not going to get into another comments-section war of attrition with a Chomskyite, in which every piece of evidence of Chomskyan distortion simply begets another request for more "substantive" evidence. The discussion quickly turns into something way too large and boring and discursive. These are blog posts, for Christ's sake, not Harvard dissertations. If you want some more "substance" then, as I said, delve into Kamm's many, many articles on Chomsky, all of which are absolutely full of citations.

Chomsky supporters are like Quranic or biblical literalists. Once one thing is admitted as Truth, everything else in the canon is untouchable. I've never, ever (and please prove me wrong on this) met a Chomsky supporter who only agrees with him on some things and not others. No one ever says, "Well, I like his writing on East Timor, but on the mass murders at Srebrenica he's a nutjob."

That's because the Chomsky canon is not about political analysis but emotional satisfaction.

"I think what you offer here is an effort to assuage those that find their faith weakening. What you offer is a substance free means of reassuring people that there's nothing to see here. If you are reading this and you find yourself in that position, know that David is simply completely wrong."

This paragraph makes no sense. Who has "faith" and why would it be "weakening"?

Regarding Chomsky's books, I remain thoroughly unimpressed. It was reading Oliver Kamm's blog posts on him that first got me thinking about how his writings are case studies in how not to use source material. From there, I noticed many other writers saying the same thing and pointing out instances of flagrant deception and subterfuge.

Yes, Chomsky is very widely cited, right up there with Sigmund Freud, another worthless sophist.

My feelings on those murders are probably very much the same as your own. But how come I don't draw the conclusion, as you probably do, that the horrors of East Timor mean that Chomsky is therefore correct on Bosnia, Kosovo, Al Qaeda, etc.?

That's what I meant about using them as talking points. They're supposed to serve as examples of how Chomsky is right about everything, including the absurd position that there's no evidence bin Laden bore any responsibility for 9/11.

Yes, David.

Very few Chomsky cultists have actually read his work. Usually it's enough for them to skim through one of his shorter pamphlets or interview collections, memorize a few talking points (East Timor, Ariel Sharon, etc.) and then proclaim themselves foreign policy experts.

Facebook over this last week has demonstrated the unbound evil of the radical Left.

A piece like this needed to be written. Thanks, Calvin, for being up to the task.