Does Anyone still take Thomas Friedman seriously?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Ah yes he of the "corporate globalization is going to give you a free lexus, better holidays and give you a better sex life and OMG LOL POOR PEOPLE111!" school of thought, actually quite popular and seriously during the 1990s (at least among middlebrows who ignored his idiocy) but now I have quite possibly seen him write the most daft serious article in the history of newspapers, the first paragraph says everything and the bizarre thing is that it gets even more surreal after that.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Wow. Someone really needs to contact home planet immediatly.

Here

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Granted, he's pointing out the obvious, that diplomacy requires both a carrot and stick to work.  Unfortunately, there are all too many people who fail to see that.  Both the hawks who think that you only need a stick and the doves who reason that even if the carrots don't work, at least the carrot farmers will get money from the expenditure fail there.  Still, anyone who thinks Friedman was seriously proposing an Obama/Cheney ticket is the one who was daft.  He was just using a very colorful example to explain what he meant.

[Cubby]

He's my least favorite New York Times columnist. Even David Brooks is better. (Not that Brooks is bad, I just disagree with his views a lot). Globalization and Free Trade suck. Protectionism and Mercantilism are underrated. (Am I kidding? maybe)

Ah yes he of the "corporate globalization is going to give you a free lexus, better holidays and give you a better sex life and OMG LOL POOR PEOPLE111!" school of thought

lol

[Colin]

Protectionism and Mercantilism are underrated. (Am I kidding? maybe)

Are you kidding? Hopefully. Unless you're Louis XIV I don't see how you could support mercantilism, along with the fact that mercantilist principles have been shown to be completely false by modern economic theory. Hell even Kaynes, as far as I remember, considered free trade a necessary part of any capitalist economy.

[ag]

I definitely take him very seriously.  I'd suggest you did too.

BTW, once the Dems are in White House, chances are he and Krugman would be writing very similar pieces. You might have forgotten, but in the early part of his career as the NYT columnist Krugman used to write a lot about free trade.  Of course, these days he rarely writes about anything other than Bush, but once Bush is history he'd need smthg else to write about, wouldn't he?

[ag]

He's my least favorite New York Times columnist. Even David Brooks is better. (Not that Brooks is bad, I just disagree with his views a lot). Globalization and Free Trade suck. Protectionism and Mercantilism are underrated. (Am I kidding? maybe)

Protectionism is usually pretty good for the very very rich and pretty bad for everybody else.

[minionofmidas]

Did anybody ever?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Did anybody ever?

Excellent Point.

And no I'm not a protectionist or even a mercantilist. (And yes Ernest I know he didn't make that statement literally, it just made me LOL.)

[memphis]

He's my least favorite New York Times columnist. Even David Brooks is better. (Not that Brooks is bad, I just disagree with his views a lot). Globalization and Free Trade suck. Protectionism and Mercantilism are underrated. (Am I kidding? maybe)

Protectionism is usually pretty good for the very very rich and pretty bad for everybody else.

Protectionism is good for those being protected and bad for everybody else.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

He's my least favorite New York Times columnist. Even David Brooks is better. (Not that Brooks is bad, I just disagree with his views a lot). Globalization and Free Trade suck. Protectionism and Mercantilism are underrated. (Am I kidding? maybe)

Protectionism is usually pretty good for the very very rich and pretty bad for everybody else.

I take it that you aren't a fan of Joseph Chamberlain?