Whoever sets the agenda controls the outcome of the debate

The people I find most impressive are generally unknown at the time of their actions and forgotten in history.

In Turkey also, for a long time, the military was the decisive force but in the past 10 years they have backed off somewhat and the civilian government has gained more independence and autonomy even to shake up the military command. In fact, it even arrested several high-ranking officers [for interfering in governmental affairs]. Maybe Pakistan can move in a similar direction.

The US has been the leading terrorist state in the world for many years.

In Europe there's kind of a reaction to the European Union, kind of a move towards some kind of regionalization. It's more advanced in some regions than others, like in Spain for example. Catelan was repressed under Franco. People spoke it, but not publicly. It's now the language of Catelonia. The Basque language is being revived, not just the language but the culture, the folk music and everything else. So you're getting more diverse societies, and it's happening in Britain as well.

The book [Manufacturing Consent] itself is then devoted to a series of case studies, selected, we hope [with Edward Herman], to offer a fair and in fact rather severe test of those conclusions.

The rise of what's called Islamic fundamentalism is to a significant extent a result of the collapse of secular nationalist alternatives which were either discredited internally or destroyed, leaving few other options. Something like that may be true of American society.