I'd say ideas need to be judged on their merits, rather than ever trusting who they're coming from. Serial contrarians are interesting because they help us cons

I'd say ideas need to be judged on their merits, rather than ever trusting who they're coming from. Serial contrarians are interesting because they help us consider alternative analyses, not because they've found some hidden secret that makes them fountains of truths. So in general, I'd say the better assumption is that everyone is spewing motivated bullshit. Which applies to the focus of which bullshit we choose to call out, as well. Maybe if I were 20 years younger I'd eagerly go down your list and pick apart Chomsky's positions and your framings of them to analyze for myself. But at this point I'd only care if he had actual serious power, otherwise he just doesn't seem all that relevant. Which is why this focus on him makes it feel like a prong of the next stage of Trump's (boosters') flooding the zone with shit, putting everyone but Trump in the news to distract from the fact we have a rapist-in-chief. And as far as the larger meta-analysis: of course the foreign agents, moneyed elites, etc play "both sides". Thinking otherwise is utterly naive. This however doesn't mean there aren't real principles and values at stake as well.