We went to Bunker Hill Community College Monday night to hear Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn speak on the topic, “Is There Hope In This Desperate Time?”, at a fundraiser for the Homeless Empowerment Project. Our friend Linda Larson, former editor of our local street paper, Spare Change, took us along with KC Chapman from Jackson MS.

Zinn and Chomsky are two very vigorous guys even at there advancing ages.

The big take aways for me are the need for continuous political action whether it is around the war in Iraq, health insurance, homelessness, racism, whatever. Second, not surprisingly, they reiterated and supported the notion that the Republican and Democratic parties are just two different wings of a ruling elite that doesn’t want regular people involved in important issues. Chomsky said that if you are in a swing state you should go to the polls and vote for Kerry. Otherwise, vote for a candidate you like or abstain from the “quadrennial circus”. The important thing is to do something politically active on a regular basis. Voting, even in a real democracy, is just a five minute activity.

The forthcoming series of presidential debates with Kerry and Bush will illustrate how little anyone will talk about issues and how much focus there is on trivial “character” issues.

Chomsky illustrated this in the ongoing health care crisis. The US spends far more per capita on health care but produces results that are not better than Cuba or many other 3rd world countries. Attempts to change the gross inefficiencies of the health insurance and drug companies are always beaten back with phrases like “this isn’t practical”. This is just code language that the health insurance and drug company lobbies in Washington don’t want their times at the trough interrupted (or ended in the case of the useless, incredibly wasteful insurance industry).

It was bracing to hear two radicals speak so clearly and forcefully on public issues. It refocuses me on how little discussion of real issues happens in the US.