Thomas Friedman Shoots His Mouth Off Again
Thomas Friedman shoots his mouth off again.
This time he’s talking about the TPP and the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean.
Here’s a prediction: NATO will eventually establish “no-sail zones” — safe areas for refugees and no-go zones for people-smugglers — along the Libyan coast.
How? Is there really a difference between refugees and “people smugglers?” Do “people smugglers” have some kind of obvious identifying characteristic that will differentiate them to the 20 year old Coast Guard or Navy sailor from a NATO country whose going to have to do the sorting? Does he really think the point of a Navy is to serve as a floating fence to stop immigration?
Here’s another goldmine:
With rising disorder in the Middle East and Africa — and with China and Russia trying to tug the world their way — there has never been a more important time for the coalition of free-market democracies and democratizing states that are the core of the World of Order to come together and establish the best rules for global integration for the 21st century, including appropriate trade, labor and environmental standards. These agreements would both strengthen and more closely integrate the market-based, rule-of-law-based democratic and democratizing nations that form the backbone of the World of Order.
1. ‘Rising disorder in the Middle East’ compared to when? Is there proof that the middle east is more disordered than it was in some unspecified period of time in the past? And more importantly for a Democracy concerned with the proliferation of freedom, were those ‘ordered’ times more of less free than today? Because if we’re prioritizing order over freedom, we’re supporting tyranny. And this time we don’t even have a cold war to excuse it.
2 ‘And with Russia and China trying to tug the world their way’ As opposed to when? At which point in the last century was Russia (and the old Soviet Union) not active in the international community trying to extend it’s community of trading partners, and it’s military sphere of influence? Since 1970 or so China has acted in the same fashion, so why now is it a threat, and what is it a threat to? American (and western) hegemony? How has that worked out for the rest of the world for the last century? Might the history of the last century of western trade, military and economic hegemony inspire South American, African and Asian countries to explore alternatives to western domination?
3 “there has never been a more important time for the coalition of free-market democracies and democratizing states that are the core of the World of Order to come together and establish the best rules for global integration for the 21st century, including appropriate trade, labor and environmental standards.” So why do the rich western nation get to set global standards in these areas? Is it because we’re rich and we’ve set international standards without the input of poorer countries for a century? Might all of the actual nations affected by these unspecified rules not want and deserve a chance to define the rules?
4 “These agreements would both strengthen and more closely integrate the market-based, rule-of-law-based democratic and democratizing nations that form the backbone of the World of Order” Remind me again what’s so hot about the current world order when it can’t even rein in carbon dioxide exhaust?
Has Thomas Friedman ever even heard of confirmation bias? Has he ever imagined it might explain those voices in his head? I understand that even 25 years later, he misses the polarized world of the cold war, and he misses the vast number of things excused by the fight against communism. I get that for generations, starting with the baby boom, American superiority in military might and economic prosperity was a given. But it wasn’t always the case, it won’t always be the case, and setting up any kind of “world order” that doesn’t acknowledge those facts, is setting up a “world order” that will collapse when the US can’t maintain and extend it’s 70 year old military spending spree.
So here’s an idea, Tom. Set up a trade pact that gives labor and environmental issues the same or greater weight than unfettered trade. Throw out the proposed mediation that lets companies sue countries for labor and environmental regulations that could cut into their profit margins. When visiting other countries, talk to labor activists, economists that didn’t graduate from the university of Chicago, and environmental activists, talk to climate researchers and indigenous people. And FFS, stop talking to people in the hospitality and tourism industries as if they possess economic wisdom hidden from ivory tower intellectuals.
Tawwmy Friedman’s lies about the TPP aren’t really any more outrageous than Our President’s.
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With rising disorder in the Middle East and Africa — and with China and Russia trying to tug the world their way — there has never been a more important time for the coalition of free-market democracies and democratizing states that are the core of the World of Order to come together and establish the best rules for global integration for the 21st century, including appropriate trade, labor and environmental standards.
Uh, wasn’t it just the sort of “free-market” policies he espouses that resulted in poor wages, dangerous working conditions, and environmental degradation? Also, it was the “suck on this” foreign policy he espoused that resulted in the chaos in the Middle East.
We need fair-market democracies, at home and abroad.
Obligatory
LOL
I’ll gay porn YOU WP just you fucking wait
“And FFS, stop talking to people in the hospitality and tourism industries as if they possess economic wisdom hidden from ivory tower intellectuals.”
Umm, HELLOOOO, McFLY!!!
The tourism people in these insect-infested, God-forsaken (literally) brown-people hell holes that just happen to also be tropical paradises are the only people that Tommy Friedman can STAND to talk to, so asking him to do otherwise is akin to asking him to voluntarily drink ipecac.
And Tommy Friedman drinks Ipecac for NO MAN!!
There has never been a more important time? Who knows, maybe even true. BUT the really critical thing to do something six months from now.
World of Order
Whuuu? Is that like SPECTRE?
Them damn commies in Cuba, developing a cancer vaccine…
http://www.globalresearch.ca/cuba-develops-four-cancer-vaccines-ignored-by-the-media/5390303
Here in the heartland, we won’t be using this evil concoction but fighting our cancer with manly prayer…
It just keeps getting better. Sen. “Light in His Loafers” Lindsey “Butters” Graham has announced. On Iraq: “I blame Obama.”
HAHAHAHA
Gary,
No offense, but the Ruppert shtick got old a long time ago. Give it a rest, please. Or think of another character.
Friedman’s an idiot.
But the idea of the TPP is that in fact labor will have rights set at a higher level. It’s right there as point number five that Obama has set as goals for the pact.
Now, I can’t say if we’ll get it. But so far, that’s still in the agreed to outline – right to organize and right to a minimum wage. Which is far and away better than what we have now.
I don’t know where he’s getting this crap with Libya. Why doesn’t saying completely anti-factual things get these guys pulled from commentary? I don’t get it. If a liberal in so much as sneezes, unless he’s supporting the right-wing line, he’s fired. These guys just get to jabber on long past the time they’re less right than a broken analog clock.
The fact is, for once I didn’t notice that it was a Fake Gary post. Because he didn’t lead off with “The fact is,” I missed the byline and figured he was being sarcastic as himself, not facetiously stupid as Gary.
Molly Ivins explained it back in 1987, in an essay variously known as “Shooting the Messenger” or “The Fudge Factory”:
http://dailydoubt.blogspot.com/2007/06/molly-ivins-on-fair-and-balanced.html
Yeah, I know, but it still hurts my brain that the second part still exists: A fake spectrum of ideas, nearly all from the right-wing, as though reality and the remainder doesn’t exist. To the point and exclusion that left-wing though and participation has withered to nothing…
Crissa, I share your disgust. It’s not like there aren’t actual fields of inquiry that could benefit from increased funding and attention. The fox news/right wing echo chamber is a clever facsimile of what public discourse used to look like in the US. Not that it would even be possible to recreate “what public discourse used to look like in the US” in the era of internet, and cable news. With the scrapping of the fairness doctrine, and the abolition of monopoly rules that prevented our current giant media conglomerates, we have an apparently broad selection of media outlets, all singing the same tune.
I miss Molly Ivins.
The fact is, Google reveals an actual human being named Gary Ruppert with much the same political beliefs as the ones routinely parodied here…
Why, after all these years, shitbags like Moustache Friedman and Bobo Brooks are still regarded as “Deep Thinkers”, is something I’ll never understand.
Actually National Treasures in reverse, if we went against everyone one of their pronouncements, we’d all have jetpacks and would be living in sky cities on Mars, with everyone a millionaire.
Instead we still have to endure the existence of the Applebees and Taxicab “wisemen”.
Puke-inducing.
Thomas Friedman said something stupid?
In a related story, the Sun rose in the East this morning.
Popcorn time!
http://www.people.com/article/bill-oreilly-denies-domestic-abuse-allegations
Moar popcorn, please!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/20/1386221/-Anti-gay-pastor-in-Michigan-resigns-after-well-you-can-probably-guess
Man, do I have to do all the work around here?
http://gawker.com/court-transcripts-bill-o-reilly-s-daughter-saw-him-ch-1704717356
Get out of bed, you lazy bastards, what we need here is POPCORN!
Man, do I have to do all the work around here?
SG, you are a magnificent bastard and your contributions are appreciated…Seriously!
Also, all of the rest that have stuck around, or drop by from time to time.
I would also like to shout at Helmut, and his lovely way with words….
SG, know you were kidding….
love all you all, even fake gary.
And speaking of fake gary,….Just scroll on by, or ignore entirely, I do, and find the mundane asides regarding his presence annoying as they issue from voices I am happy to hear from, when they are not harping on fake gary….which means I don’t automagically scroll on by….Just saying…If you feel you must, pray continue….
…
Also, too, and as well…New one…
…
This is why outing self-loathing cocksuckers is not only okay, it’s a fucking duty.