Noam Chomsky: bad memory, liar, loon, or what?

from Robert Hinkley's semiskimmed.net blog: bq. Noam Chomsky was asked in the Independent on the 4th of December bq. Where is the "silent genocide" you predicted would happen in Afghanistan if the US intervened there in 2001? bq. To which he replied: That is an interesting fabrication, which gives a good deal of insight into the prevailing moral and intellectual culture. First, the facts: I predicted nothing. Rather, I reported the grim warnings from virtually every knowledgeable source that the attack might lead to an awesome humanitarian catastrophe... bq. He went on: All of this is precisely accurate and entirely appropriate. The warnings remain accurate as well, a truism that should be unnecessary to explain. ... bq. Given the evident lack of millions of people actually starving to death in Afghanistan in the winter of 2001/2002 I would say the warnings of millions of people starving to death (as we will see below) were in fact utterly inaccurate. This should be unecessary to explain. Anyhow, back to Professor Chomsky's claim that he predicted nothing... bq. I did a bit of searching on the the web and found a few instances of him being quoted in late 2001 which looked to me that he was saying exactly that was going to happen in Afghanistan, or what was already happening in Afghanistan, was a silent genocide. bq. So I wrote to him. Rob even went as far as tracking down (and posting links to) audio files of Chomsky saying this at speaches he gave. Earth to Chomsky: You might not want to overlook or underestimate this Internet thingie... It's pretty good for doing research and basic Fact Checking.