In Conversation With Tom Friedman's House, A Continuing Series ....

An attempt at leftist satire using the perspective of the great center-right unwashed? A brain fart caused by conflicting meds?

The best part of the article is: "Frank Rich and Maureen Dowd are off today."

Has anyone read the comments section on the Friedman article? It's disgusting.

I was with Friedman for the first few paragraphs, then after that, not so much

another day, another really poorly written sentence in the NYT.

What a waste of trees, the sorry newspaper and the overly opulent house. Typical of these scourges, when a poor man rants like this, he is deemed stupid or such, but when a obviously rich man rants like this he is deemed eccentric. The world desperatly needs to call idiots and crooks what they are, whether it is this clown, Al Gore Suzuki, Puchauri, Strong etal. The further we get away from telling the truth, the harder it will be to get back, thank-you progressives, you have given the world nothing, you can only be proud of your accomplishments amoungst people of your ilk. Obama Fraudman etc.

Like a true liberal, Friedman doesn't relate that hoard of hungry locusts to the entitlement mentality that drives the Democratic Party. No, he blames tax cuts instead. Those evil rich people, and perhaps a lot of over-privileged middle class people as well, have been selfish. Sadly, they have weaseled out of their obligation to pay for programs that benefit others. He chastises Republicans for "having helped run the deficit to new heights during the recent Bush years", but he ignores that they did so in part by stupidly trying to out-pander Democrats with drug-entitlement programs and the like. The greatest irony, of course, is that Friedman issues his moral pronouncements from the secure position illustrated by his mansion.

Reading between the lines.... The "locusts" are the union parasites.

I watched Friedman on the PBS show with Charlie Rose, ~ week before Copenhagen..He had a fit of giggles at the start, before Rose had asked him any questions... sure looked like he has a drug issue....He was pissed with China...

He is just a Soras toad with Carbon credits.

Let’s see how this works;

“……Republican Party has never been more irresponsible. Having helped run the deficit …… Bush years….. is now unwilling to take any responsibility for dealing with it if it involves raising taxes.”

Actually, the democrats, having control over the congress, have run up the deficit all by themselves, made Bush, Bush made them to go along. The Republican Party did not have much to do with it at all, not that they are blameless.

“……cable TV has transformed politics in our country generally into just another spectator sport……”

Actually, the “journalist” can’t handle the loss of editing power, can’t control the content, must really suck.

“……We watch it…..”

What is it with the “journalists”, referring to themselves “We”. The “journalist” insists to repeat this throughout the article.

How can, apparently educated people be so ignorant of the real world.

Friedman used the word 'alas' twice in his lament.

Overall, the article is fairly accurately describing the situation, only his solution is wrong.

My god that man is an ass.

As an economist, he knows damn well he's full of s**t. He knows. What he's doing is hissing his lies through his pointed, evil teeth.

There are scum and villains in this world. They look down on Friedman, too. Yes, there are people too low for the usual suspects to associate with. Friedman isn't tolerated by them either.

His BS doesn't even make any sense. It goes well beyond his cheap shots against the GOP (when the deficit was a mere 300 billion instead of zero's 2 trillion...)

The idea that there is a "grasshopper generation" which is sucking up all the wealth isn't too far off the truth (and that thought, not surprisingly, wasn't Friedman's.) No, Friedman sees his generation of scum burning through the family fortune and his great idea is to burn through it faster and blame it on the GOP for not wanting to help him do it.

And the NYT PAYS this idiot for his politically motivated agit prop and the imbiciles in Sweeden gave him (and zero) nobels. The mind boggles.

Bin Laden doesn't need to spend his energy talking fools into flying jets into buildings. All he has to do is raise money for the democrats and the Eurotrash socialists. They'll just GIVE the terrorists the keys to the castle.

Friedman has not been paying attention. Barack Obama does not have the self-discipline and grasp of the role of President that George W. Bush DID have. Obama and his First Lady party and spend money as though there's no tomorrow, not understanding nor apparently caring about the gravity of the times.

Jason wrote: "Bin Laden doesn't need to spend his energy talking fools into flying jets into buildings. All he has to do is raise money for the democrats and the Eurotrash socialists. They'll just GIVE the terrorists the keys to the castle."

Ain't that the truth.

Sounder: Yes! The rest is so much statist double-standard boilerplate.
It's long past time for newsies to bury "narrative", next to the corpses of "paradigm", "template", and "meme".

"His calling is to lead The Regeneration. He clearly understands that in his head, but he has yet to give full voice to it. Actually, the thing that most baffles me about Mr. Obama is how a politician who speaks so well, and is trying to do so many worthy things, can’t come up with a clear, simple, repeatable narrative to explain his politics — when it is so obvious."

No one's written it out for him yet. Call his speechwriters,Mr.Friedman.

Or,better yet, write it out for him yourself,Obama has no words of his own.

This guy gets PAID to write this crap?!

Luckily, Thomas Friedman has diplomatic immunity from Michelle Obama's fat children police (FCP).

What I find intreging about the Democrats are firstly two matters.

1) Democrats claim to represent the little guy but in fact are the party of the elites---financially, politically and academically. Kennedy's, Kerry's, Rockefellers.......

2) Democrats claim to champion civil rights and enjoy broad support from the "afro-american." When is fact, the Democrats are really the remnants of the Confederate Government, authors of the "Jim Crow Laws" and segregation.
Lincoln was a Republican----Jefferson Davis was a Democrat.

Soon enough the grasshoppers will be pushing up daisies.

See: www.boomerdeathcounter.com

This says it all for me anyway. Being at the end of the boom, it was like being a fish only to find all the water gone. Locusts who have ravaged every thing they touch. Then & their minions in this generation. Obama anyone?

"The Worst Generation"

by Paul Begala

I hate the Baby Boomers. They're the most self-centered, self-seeking, self-
interested, self-absorbed, self-indulgent, self-aggrandizing generation in
American history. As they enter late middle age, the Boomers still can't grow
up. Guys who once dropped acid are now downing Viagra; women who once eschewed
lipstick are now getting liposuction.

http://www.superseventies.com/worstgen.html

I attended a talk by Friedman hosted by Georgetown University a couple of weeks ago. He has a book to sell (The World is Flat) and I was expecting an Al Gore type who would be adored by the mainly academic audience. Well he was adored but he’s no Big Al. He was a great speaker with a believably folksy manner and self depreciating sense of humour. I know he’s spoken with approval about the authoritarian rulers of China and has some unfeasible ideas on how to make the USA more energy independent but he didn’t talk about that.

He talked about how the internet has leveled the playing field for information workers and their completion will be with the entire world. “The United States work force should keep updating its work skills. Making the work force more adaptable, Friedman argues, will keep it more employable. He also suggests that the government should make it easier to switch jobs by making retirement benefits and health insurance less dependent on one's employer and by providing insurance that would partly cover a possible drop in income when changing jobs. Friedman also believes there should be more inspiration for youth to be scientists, engineers, and mathematicians due to a decrease in the percentage of these professionals being American.”

In the question and answer session he spoke about the need for financial responsibility both individually and nationally. He admired the fact that 23 million Taiwanese living on an island lacking natural resources has now accumulated the fourth largest foreign exchange reserves in the world.
When asked if more regulation is needed internationally to prevent financial crisis’s he said “No, there are already enough regulations and the crisis was brought on by an ethical failure from bottom to top. From the mortgage holders that knew they could not afford them, to the mortgage companies, to the repackagers, right up to the bond rating services.”
Asked about what advice he had for parents, he said that the most important things a parent must do are to instill moral values in their children and prepare them to continue learning throughout their life.
When asked what he thought about the way the local government (Qatari) was developing the country he replied, “He would love to answer that but unfortunately I see my time is up.”

It was quite a different Friedman from the one you get from just listening to his house.

Ah, yes, Dear Leader has failed as an outsider unfamiliar with the practicalities of change, defeated by circumstance.

Stick with that Tom, while U6 unemployment sticks at 20% thru 2011 and inflation rockets upward unprodded by the consumer who's only gratitude is his lost home would now be cheaper than a bowl of porridge.

Obamination "I am death" replaces "Hope and Change".

Ah, yes, Dear Leader has failed as an outsider unfamiliar with the practicalities of change, defeated by circumstance.

Stick with that Tom, while U6 unemployment sticks at 20% thru 2011 and inflation rockets upward unprodded by the consumer who's only gratitude is his lost home would now be cheaper than a bowl of porridge.

Obamination "I am death" replaces "Hope and Change".

Sasquatch said at 10:19 "...The Democrats are really the remnants of the Confederate Government..."

In a very interesting column in last Saturday's National Post, Conrad Black intimated, although he was adamant that he had no proof, that the Liberal party's dominance in Canadian politics was based on the Democrat's dominance in their politics from 1801-1861, winning 13 of 15 general elections. Essentially, talk one way to the south and talk differently to the north. Much like how the LPC talks to Quebec one way and ROC another.

My reguritation here does no justice to Black's argument and I urge fellow readers to read the full thing.

http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/columnists/story.html?id=955a2f12-23b2-4a0e-ad58-682de2b33001

Obama has skills? Who knew?

"If Obama fails, we all fail."

Ok, I can live with that. I do not like his plan anyways.

Things can always be fixed, just not the Friedman / Obama Way and Obama's failure will not undo what we have now, his success will take another generation to repair and get back what we had.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Growth_Properties

Take a look at what the Friedman clan does best:

"The company's problems forced the ouster of CEO John Bucksbaum, though he remained chairman of the board. On October 26, 2008, Bucksbaum resigned after the GGP board learned that the family trust violated company policy by providing loans to company officers without notifying the board. [10] Director Adam Metz became CEO.[10] The value of the Bucksbaum family fortune shrank by 97 percent since December 2007.[11]"

They had 4 billion dollars supposedly.

So, I guess that house is what you'd call "locust housing"?