Thursday, December 13, 2007
The heart, she bleeds:
"It’s like death," Finkelstein says. "You keep saying you’re going to die, but you never really come to grips with it. And I can see I’m not going to get another job. I haven’t yet fully absorbed it."
His days are now spent in solitary scholarly pursuits; his bookshelves buckle under the weight of tomes by Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky. Notes of support from his students sit on a piano; there’s a photo of him and Noam Chomsky ("my closest friend") bare-chested on the beach at Cape Cod.
He was a Maoist revolutionary in his youth. By his own account, his academic career was bedeviled from the start by his politics: It took him thirteen years to wrest his doctorate from Princeton, since no faculty member would agree to advise him on his thesis, an analysis of Zionism. When he finally did earn the degree, none would write him a recommendation. He went on to take a series of adjunct posts—at Brooklyn College, Hunter, and NYU—rarely earning more than $20,000 a year...
...[After being denied tenure at DePaul], Finkelstein says, he lost seventeen pounds. "People saw me wasting away," he says. A student group held a hunger strike; Chomsky and others defended him. One of his colleagues made him a mix CD with tracks like "I Will Survive" and "What’s Goin’ On?" "I’m an old fan of the Negro spirituals," Finkelstein says. "I was going around singing to myself, ‘Were you there when they crucified my Lord? Were you there?’ That’s how I felt. I was being crucified by the end."...
Get a job. Perhaps "heroic" Hizballah is hiring.
[h/t: Daniel H]
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Norman Finklestein cries himself a river..
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Maybe Finkelstein could start up a 'scared straight' program for young Marxists. He can show young NYU students the ugly, harsh realities that come from an academic obsession with Marx and Engels. Chomsky is the gateway drug. Once you open a copy of "Manufacturing Consent" it's a nonstop path to living in a van down by the river..
"Negro" spirituals???
How about "Colored"?
Norman is SO out of touch with reality.
The man inspires a mixture of pity and contempt. Reminds me of Mordechai Vanunu's pathetic life.
only shows how powerful and effective Jewish interests can be when they want to destroy a man. well done.
Cecil, can you arrange for a Dubai business man to give Norman a stipend or get Norman a meeting with mahmoud ahmenijad of the Islamofascist Regime of iran?
Destroyed?
Finkelstein is on a well-paid speaking tour of Lebanon (I'd love a free tour of Lebanon, wouldn't you?) then on to speak at Oxford (nice gig!) He recently toured Turkey and the Netherlands, and is on a multi-stop tour of California in late February. Oh and Japan, did I mention that just befoe this article ran he was on a speaking date in Japan?
Nice life.
His books have been translated into German and Arabic, and sell in big enough numbers to give the man a comfortable income and lifestyle. Not to mention free foreign tours and lecture fees.
Just think of all the Frequent Jihad Miles he's accumulating!