Bear in mind that we [ with Edward Herman] did not devise the terms "manufacture of consent" and "engineering of consent." We borrowed them from leading figures in the media, public relations industry, and academic scholarship.

[After Vietnam] the type of interventions that are carried out are designed so as not to elicit public reactions.

History records endless struggles to enlarge those realms, inspiring ones; it also records painful reversals and setbacks.

The US stole Texas from Mexico by violence, then invaded Mexico on ludicrous pretexts and conquered half of it, what is now the Southwest and Far West. That's why cities have Spanish names: San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Cruz, etc. All of this is suppressed in standard American history. But the victims remember. The conquerors typically have one history, the victims a different one - and often a more accurate one.

On the other hand, a lot of the internet - I don't know the percentage, but I am sure a great mass of internet use - is pretty superficial interaction amongst people. Its not necessarily a bad thing. A teenager wants to talk to her friend, that's fine, but I think it probably contributes to atomization, which is a threat to the society.

I don't really see what can be said about the role of faculty members, or universities, beyond the truisms voiced earlier, and their elaboration in various domains, ranging from focused intellectual pursuits to the concerns of the larger society and future generations.

In Egypt the neoliberal programs have meant statistical growth, like right before the Arab Spring, Egypt was a kind of poster child for the World Bank and the IMF [International Monetary Fund:] the marvelous economic management and great reform. The only problem was for most of the population it was a kind of like a blow in the solar plexus: wages going down, benefits being eliminated, subsidized food gone and meanwhile, high concentration of wealth and a huge amount of corruption.