The US is an Aggressor: it is not a pipe
Necessary Illusions: cht 3,The Bounds of the Expressible

One of Chomsky’s key insights into the “Ideological Filter” becomes his topic in chapter three: The bounds of the Expressible. Taking historical reality as his measure, he compares the ideological “totalitarian” system of thought control developed by Lenin to the “liberal pragmatic” ideological thought control system of John Dewey. Both systems depend on, and ultimately defend, the capitalist state that relies for its existence on suppressing democracy especially in the economy. (The US is not ruled by tyranical despot.)
“One notable doctrine of soviet propaganda is that the elimination by Lenin and Trotsky of any vestige of control over production by producers and of popular involvement in determining social policy constitutes a triumph of socialism. The purpose of this exercise in Newspeak is to exploit the moral appeal of the ideals that were being successfully demolished. Western propaganda leaped to the same opportunity, identifying the dismantling of socialist forms as the establishment of socialism, so as to undermine left-libertarian ideals by associating them with the practices of the grim Red Bureaucracy. When both major world systems of propaganda are in accord, it is unusually difficult for the individual to escape their tentacles. The blow to freedom and democracy throughout the world has become immense.”

In the same year, 1917, John Dewey’s circle of liberal pragmatists took credit for guiding a pacifist population to war “under the influence of a moral verdict reached after the utmost deliberation by the more thoughtful members of the community, … a class which must be comprehensively but loosely described as the “intellectuals” who, they held, had “accomplished… the effective and decisive work on behalf of the war. … Dewey, the mentor, explained that this “psychological and educational lesson" had proven “that it is possible for human beings to take hold of human affairs and manage them.” The “human beings” who had learned the lesson were “the intelligent men of the community,” Lippmann’s “specialized class,” Niebuhr’s “cool observers.” They must now apply their talents and understanding “to bring about a better reorganized social order,” by planning, persuasion, or force where necessary; but, Dewey insisted, only the “refined, subtle and indirect use of force,” not the “coarse, obvious and direct methods” employed prior to the “advance of knowledge.”
Since that time, the main body of articulate intellectuals have tended towards one or the other of these poles, avoiding “democratic dogmatisms” about people understanding their own interests and remaining cognizant of the “stupidity of the average man” and his need to be led to the better world that his superiors plan for him. A move from one pole to the other can be quite rapid and painless, since no fundamental change of doctrine or value is at stake, only an assessment of the opportunities for attaining power and privilege: riding a wave of popular struggle, or serving established authority as social or ideological manager.

Maintaining this “farce” of democracy, capitalist democracies frequently require adherents to rely on several devices: the evil past (now corrected), (this can be either personal or national/political past), the expert (whose qualification is the ability to articulate a high level of consensus among power elites and who has no moral conscience), the free market—guided by direct intervention where necessary—to establish conformity and marginalize the “special interests.” “in a democratic system there is always the danger that independent thought might be translated into political action, so it is important to eliminate the threat at its root.”
Maintaining the farce of democracy requires that debate is permitted even encouraged, so long as the bounds of what is expressible are firmly established. As long as debate is constrained to views held by elites, the outcome will be in the best interests of their continued rule. In short, what is important is the power to set the agenda.

So far as containing the “Soviet threat” this comes to adopting double standards. This is especially with regard to wars and other forms of explicit state sponsored terror, when our enemies do it its an atrocity, when we do it its out of charactor or better, it goes unnoticed. This is how much opinion is enforced by the threat and use of force.

This plays out most jarringly in instances where the state invades other countries in order to impose its economic system for prolonged periods against the opinion of large majorities of the invaded citizens. In these cases, such as Vietnam, the Central American Wars, and now the invasion and occupation of Iraq, opinion must be confined to the choice between more violence in order to finally succeed in the ultimately righteous mission, and more prolonged though visually (cognitively, according to the bounds placed by communications media and their implementing institutions) gentler means such as embargos and client-run military states.

Perhaps the founding boundary of elite opinion is that our state’s military invasions are merely defensive. "Our" state is never aggressive. Our people know that people in other countries have an inner yearning to be like us. "We" may even have to takeover their country in order to set them free. Our corporations will then impose the conditions of work and the basic terms of living of the people there and the planning, investment needs, and basic effectiveness can be sacrificed in the interests of the people that have been conqured/liberated. Its particularly noteworthy that justifications for this kind of conquest rely on the assumption that democracy can only arrive as a result of US force. Force such as ours is simply a way to help the democratic aspirations of the conquered citizens blossom inside our corporations. (Which are private tyrannies.) What’s striking is that common sense requires us to admit that democracy can only emerge from the self organization of the people whom, instead, we have conquered.

"This is a free country."

These terms of the debate are non-negotiable although they are also, entirely unfounded in reality. These doctrines are the basis of a mental defensive reaction that permits our participation in genocide including through wars of aggression while believing we are kind and democratic, principled, and reasonable.

Talking and knowing about reality forces a patriot to join a resistance community and practice a counter-articulation (Said’s phrase, see Culture and Imperialism)