Hi everyone Renee, I agree with you.  The first thing I was struck by when I began studying chomsky's work was how optimistic he actually is about the world.  Sure, he point out how stuck things are and how awful the events behind the scenes are, but he continually points out that we can imagine how worse they would be if people hadn't begun to ask for change 30 years ago.  In almost every lecture I've seen or conversation I've been a part of, he always makes a point to say how much better things are now then they would have been if  individuals hadn't come together demanding more accurate representation and ethical activies from our elected officials. I'll make my book recs for the other gentelman on another post... Doug