What really disturbs me about many comments, here and elsewhere, are their profanity, vulgarity, and "in your face" nastiness. What is this supposed to accomplish? Whatever happened to civil discourse? Who are people that make such comments hoping to convince? Answer: no one. They just want to get things off their chest. I think such rancor and shrillness debases the seriousness of the issues being discussed. It reduces the debate to locker room level.
As for Thomas Friedman, I have always thought of him as an intellectual lightweight with a "gee whiz" adolescent view of things. Sometimes he gets things right, but often not. He has undue influence, which is sad, since for sure he is no Walter Lippman!
greg bachelis
www.gbachelis.com

Clarity:

Turned out to be quite a thread.

"You have to get a grip guys. Tom Friedman is journalist with an opinion which in this country allows hime to write and say what he wants- as do you. Of course he has won pulitzers and gets paid millions for his thoughts- Have you considered why? How many of you have traveled as he has?"

There is a difference between journalism and propaganda.

I just passed 60 and have been around the world, including the Middle East, and have known three journalists over the years and a number of lawyers. My piece was written to define what could subjectively be called criminal and objectively described as flawed journalism on his part. Where do you place the deliberate lies of the White House on the scale of war crimes ? And Friedman and Goebbels is not a stretch as those who ordered the Iraq war could arguably be convicted under the international law used in Nuremberg.

Trying to start a nuclear war is not responsible journalism. There is a point when a writer goes beyond opinion and is inciting violence. His writing gets big coverage for the simple reason that he is basically a corporate hack and economic elitist supporting existing global and national power structures. There are many other finer points of journalistic ethics that he fails to meet. And he is perhaps the best known and most widely published of the post 9/11 warmongers which puts him in a very high category of responsibility.

And if you think Friedman is even remotely objective about the Palestinians you have lost your grip on reality. His attitudes toward Arabs border on cultural racism which often becomes a justification both war and genocide.

The very sick question is how he manages to sell his twisted version of political spin while passing for a professional journalist as opposed to being seen a source of deliberate and dangerous propaganda.

Just my opinion, I suppose.

Declaring that Friedman is a Liberal is an oxymoron.

We liberals do not justify the launching of a war against innocent civilians nor do we support the barbaric actions of a theocratic imperialistic government like Israel.

Please do not place Friedman in the liberal category he is in essence a neo conservative Jew on the AIPAC Alan Dershowitz team who wholeheartedly support Israel right or wrong.

These unscrupulous Jews who have no problem torturing people or bombing civilians in Lebanon are willing to defend Israel no matter what there crime against humanity, they are contributing to the mind set malignancy that is pushing America into expanding a middle east war to defend the land grab of the chosen people.

Of course you need weapons and violence to make capitalism work---it has never worked ANYwhere without them. (Profit/advantage inevitably produces "disadvantaged" people, and they tend to resent it.) I always knew Friedman was a pompous blowbag errand-boy---like the rest of our "journalist" imbeciles

Clarity here is a long article by Noam Chomsky (no pacifist BTW) on how we were lied into war against Serbia:

http://www.chomsky.info/articles/200005--.htm

And here is what former Nuremberg prosecuter Walter J. Rockler, has to say about Clinton's crimes against Serbia:

"By Walter J. Rockler

As justification for our murderously destructive bombing campaign in Yugoslavia, it is of course necessary for the U.S. to charge that the Serbs have engaged in inhuman conduct, and that President Slobodan Milosevic, the head Serb demon, is a war criminal almost without peer.

President Clinton assures us of this in frequent briefings, during which he engages in rhetorical combat with Milosevic. But shouting "war criminal" only emphasizes that those who live in glass houses should be careful about throwing stones.

We have engaged in a flagrant military aggression, ceaselessly attacking a small country primarily to demonstrate that we run the world. The rationale that we are simply enforcing international morality, even if it were true, would not excuse the military aggression and widespread killing that it entails. It also does not lessen the culpability of the authors of this aggression.

As a primary source of international law, the judgment of the Nuremberg Tribunal in the 1945-1946 case of the major Nazi war criminals is plain and clear. Our leaders often invoke and praise that judgment, but obviously have not read it. The International Court declared:

"To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

"Walter J. Rockler, a Washington lawyer, was a prosecutor at the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial. This essay originally appeared in the Chicago Tribune"

http://www.counterpunch.org/rockler.html

The U.S. has been engaging in illegal wars of aggression against small resources rich countries since WWII under BOTH Ds and Rs "Clarity," you are a tool and a koolaid drinker. Ranter? You bet when talking about the U.S. government that has killed quite literally millions of innocents since WWII I am damn angry.

clarity:

re: "Regarding Kosovo only the most pascifist people out there think the bombing was wrong- there is no debate in the US or Europe over the need to stop the genocide- or that bombing is a moral response if it is the only way to stop the genocide. Again, no real argument out there, just in your heads."

The argument is real, it just depends on whether you subscribe to the Golden Rule or not. You know, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." The U.S. exempted itself from prosecution for genocide in the former Yugoslavia when the Clinton Justice Department told the World Court to go screw itself (sounds like Cheney, doesn't it?) because the Genocide Convention didn't apply to it. Etc. etc.

The argument is real if you put down that NYT and take a look at something besides the obviously biased "official story."

Remember, this is an empire, and so logically the truth about what it does will be hard to find.

Conspiracy to commit mass murder is a crime, even if it is openly published in the newspaper. It won't be prosecuted in this country, of course, since so many in the US are also guilty.

With hundreds of thousands dead, people like Friedman are far more guilty of a real crime than John Walker Lindh or Jose Padilla.

No basement here, but I've left the state enough to know that our freedoms are truly hated -- especially the freedom to re-draw national boundaries, support alliances creating races of refugees, and ignore a history of property transactions between the Old Testament and 1948. If I wasn't such a a lazy pacifist, I'd figure out a way to turn it all around.

LAWLESS 1: Love your idea about journalists without credibility facing "term limits."
JJ PETER: GOD has nothing to do with it! This planet is a grand experiment, a petre dish where FREE WILL is allowed to do its thing. Masters have come to offer guidelines, mystics have penetrated the blueprints and tried to convey basic structural premises THAT WORK to their peers... but of course the varied executions that century after century manage to marginalize or silence dissent allow for a status quo where the worst paradigms celebrating the most primitive aspects of human nature are not only tolerated, these function as the NORMS.
PENNING.T. DAVID: Excellent point on exposing Friedman.
FRESH 1: Great points as per the quintessential oxymoron that WAR can be waged for peace.

You have to get a grip guys. Tom Friedman is journalist with an opinion which in this country allows hime to write and say what he wants- as do you. Of course he has won pulitzers and gets paid millions for his thoughts- Have you considered why? How many of you have traveled as he has? How many contacts in the Mid East do you have? Have any of you ravers ever left your state? Your basement?

Perhaps there is value in what he says even if you disagree. Disent and open thinking are essential to any intellectual debate. Now I realize that many if not most ranters on these pages have probably had some big disapointments in life and have anger issues- they blame the world for their failures and it must be some dark mysterious black helicopter evil cabal out there to blame. Honestly if I hear one more idiot talk of how the BushCo owns the world- note: the Bushes are absoloute paupers compared to the real wealth that is out there, much of it in new high tech by the way is really liberal, not to mention a lot of west coast wealth. But there are also many good comments and free thinkers trying to do something about many of the problems we face, so I like to go on.

Regarding Kosovo only the most pascifist people out there think the bombing was wrong- there is no debate in the US or Europe over the need to stop the genocide- or that bombing is a moral response if it is the only way to stop the genocide. Again, no real argument out there, just in your heads.

And this country was founded yes on Conquest starting with the Native Americans who came here, then the Europeans. Peoples the world over fought wars of conquest for land, riches and slaves. Yes Native Americans, South Americans, Africans, Chinese, in a nut shell the whole world fought wars of conquest. People who think that White European Men were the only aggressors have no knowledge of history and through their ignorance perpetuate narratives that make them feel better- so be it- they are destined to remain marginal fringe players ranting nonsense in oh so rightous anger (hey if it's workin for you keep it up?).

People who are serious about changing the course of this nation, which many of us feel has gone seriously off our path as a nation, will engage in the more serious work of coming up with more progressive but realistic alternatives to the Repulicans and some Democrats currently exercising power. They are to my mind misguided, some selfish, and yes some downright immoral- but to paint them as a monolithic evil force is silly and unproductive. The world is a dangerous and complicated place, not really given to quick and easy one liners of goood vs evil with the rare exceptions such as our buddy Adolf, and then, yes even then, there were many in the Vermacht that were victims as well. Of course all this takes some effort of critical thinking and open mindedness, perhaps some are just too lazy?

I'd like to shave Freidman's mustache off and feed it to him. U.S. out of Iraq and Afghanistan!

LOL JZman, I had a conservative, republican customer tell me last night that after listening to Bill Clinton speak lately he really, really LIKES the guy and even thinks Hillary will make a good President. That should pretty much sum it up...

My spouse still gets mad when I call Bill Clinton a Republican. And now there's an election looming with a # of dem candidates. Where do I start?

"One has to ask: What if the man is redeemable?"

Is this a joke? Redeemable like what? A coupon? The man is a fascist piece of human garbage who is indirectly responsible for wholesale slaughter and destruction. If there were any justice in the world, he would already be on trial at the Hague.

wouldn't it be fun if tom turned into a fried man?...seriously though..his take on the former yugoslavia was all justified by it's tremendous natural resources...he really is the most stupendous mouth-piece for the corporate mob which runs the whole world now..no wonder he gets pulitzers

Mussolini started out as a journalist with an ax to grind, not unlike TF.

Unfortunately, TF and his masters won't end up in the Piazzale Loreto.

A friend of mine, a Harvard educated lawyer, once said : "There are very few inherently evil people in this world. Tom Friedman is one of them".

" How do you think our oh so righteous European ancestors rested these lands from their native inhabitants. "

The word "settler" continues to be applied to the Manifestly Destined occupiers of the 19th century. "The only good Indian is a dead Indian' -- thus spake the war hero Phil Sheridan, and most Americans then applauded.

" but
Thomas Friedman? You can be a thousand per cent sure of your negative judgment, fellow opiners, but I'm not. What if Friedman has the ability to listen? Could he not then possibly change some day like Robert McNamara, whose apologies and tears certainly beat a lack of same from Henry Kissinger."

If Thomas Friedman had a conscience, he would blow his brains out after writing a vast mea culpato be published in the Times, and the editor & publisher of the paper would follow suit. But they have another war to promote.

And if you watch "Fog of War" McNamara learned nothing.

jconrad "Palestinians confined to apartheid ghettos are killed or tortured for amusement only as they have no marketable resources"
palestinians' resources are the land that the israelis took and keep taking.
but otherwise i agree with your points
i also think that the israelfirsters like friedman have been desensitized by the israeli brutality that they have ok'd all these years. they have gone nuts. they have lost human decency. it's worse than having kids watch violent tv.

I call this "columnist" Tommy Freedom! He personifies to me all that is greedy, self-righteous, and, therefore, evil in our sad country! He has no empathy and no moral center. In short....... just another psychopath (who happpens to be a billionaire)!

wowza. Got some new voices on here and really good ones too.

fresh1 hit the nail on the head! "There WAS a campaign of ethnic violence with rape and murder against blacks in the Southern US that lasted well into the 1960's and took the lives of THOUSANDS in the 20th century"

While we are at it, let us not forget that the USA was founded on the principles of "mass killings, mass rape, death camps as a way to ethnically cleanse the country". How do you think our oh so righteous European ancestors rested these lands from their native inhabitants.

The holier than thou, self righteous attitude of people like Thomas Friedman or that troll "clarity" makes me want to puke!

"clarity" reveals the absurdity here when he slips in the seemingly gratuitous word "Northern":

"If the people of the Northern US States started mass killings, mass rape, death camps as a way to ethnically cleanse the country then Yes Norman someone should bomb, invade or do anything in their power to stop the slaughter. The Serbs had to stopped. No doubt if you were around in the early 1940s you would have argued that we need peace now- Hitler was none of our business. The world is a very complex place and evidently beyond your comprehension."

Why "northern US states"? Maybe if you would have said "Southern US states" we could have an interesting argument. There WAS a campaign of ethnic violence with rape and murder against blacks in the Southern US that lasted well into the 1960's and took the lives of THOUSANDS in the 20th century (we have no solid evidence that Serb-on-Albanian violence was greater in magnitude-- the reports of genocide turned out to be bogus). No doubt you weren't around then (or weren't black then).

Would (for example) Venezuela have been justified in bombing Washington DC and the northern states in order to bring racial justice to the US in the 1960s?

More interestingly, would it have worked? Does bombing an entire society and destroying its infrastructure, creating thousands of new victims, bring racial justice? Did it have this effect in Kosovo? Absolutely not. Racial intolerance is worse now. Serbs and Roma who had every right to continue living in Kosovo have fled. Before the 1990's Kosovo was autonomous, they even had their own Albanian-speaking university system with a curriculum developed in Albania, a foreign country. Would US politicians coddle separatists in Arizona or Cali by giving them separate Spanish-language universities with curricula developed in Mexico? Belgrade allowed this because of their policy of "multi-culturalism". Its kind of sad that "multi-culturalism", in practice, just encouraged separatism and chauvinism-- its only barely surviving in Canada.

Milosevic was not Hitler. Serbs, Bosnian muslims, Albanians from Kosova, Croatians and Slovenians were at each others' throats throughout the 1990s. Some militants in the provinces wanted independence (they already had enormous autonomy, but that was not enough), and NATO and the EU encouraged this because NATO wanted to dismantle Yugoslavia because it represented an alternative economic-political model (remember the "non-aligned" bloc?), and both NATO and the EU wanted to dismantle Yugoslavia on the grounds of being a relic from the soviet era and therefore unfashionable and a snub to their progressive pretenses.

Human rights had absolutely nothing to do with it. Humanitarian bombing is an oxymoron. Humanitarian air campaigns are an abomination. Can't you see where this had led? You want endless aggressive war for "human rights" (but only in other, much weaker countries)? Just follow the Clinton-Albright-Yugoslavia model.

"One has to ask: What if the man is redeemable?" I have seen nothing from Thomas Friedman that leads me to believe he is redeemable. Then again I have seem nothing that make me think his opinion is worth diddley squat! His world view is seriously flawed, and serves only to perpetuate the current collision course of mankind with it's extinction. To put it bluntly Thomas Friedman is another elitist dickhead with delusions of grandeur.

How was that for too much rant and tirade?

There's too much rant and tirade in these comments. One has to ask: What if the man is redeemable? In the case of Joseph Lieberman I would think not, but
Thomas Friedman? You can be a thousand per cent sure of your negative judgment, fellow opiners, but I'm not. What if Friedman has the ability to listen? Could he not then possibly change some day like Robert McNamara, whose apologies and tears certainly beat a lack of same from Henry Kissinger.

We're not in a bar. You can't hit me. So I will tell you some things I like about Friedman: First, his recent idea that if Bush and the neocons are so good at swiftboating people, why don't they do it to Osama bin Laden? Marginalize him for the fellow dummy he actually is rather than lionizing him as The Desert Fox, Dr. Fu Manchu and John Dillinger all in one; and, creating the Department of Heimat Security, bothering people terminally in airports, spying, torturing, warmongering, rendering, pandering, etc., etc. all of it providing the attention sociopaths crave while creating new ones. Murderers except maybe for MacBeth are stupid and sordid so why not make the least of it--especially since Wonder Woman's bracelets can't really stop bullets, bombs or anything else?!

Second, Friedman went on Talk of the Nation with Neal
Conan. It was a case of two jokers with wives smarter than they (Mrs. Friedman was opposed to invading Iraq from the beginning, and Mrs. Conan, Lianne Hansen, is good at solving puzzles on Sunday PBS with Will Shortz).

But is Mrs. Friedman really worth four billion dollars,
as a previous entry attests? I will have to research that. Write first, research later, I say (if that's not too much about me).

Thomas Friedman is a pompous ass whose ignorance is only exceeded by his ego. He's right about the need for an increased gas tax, but even a broken clock is right twice a day.

Canuckchuck and George W. Bush (if that is your real name), thanks for making me laugh!

Here's something to make you laugh:

http://www.dailyreckoning.co.uk/article/keepitsimplegodfriedmanandthesolutiontoeverything0445.html

Friedman is a disgrace to the US and civilization in general. He is not a journalist; he's a freaking mouthpiece for the Establishment. This fascist idiot is a three-time Pulitzer Prize winner. What does that say about the Pulitzer Prize, eh? The editors of NYT should be ashamed of themselves. Yeah, right. NYT is a complicit rag that doesn't deserve to be used as toilet paper. F#%$ this guy. Bring him home and put him on trial as an accessory to Hate Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity. I am sick and tired of pundits w/ their heads so far up their rich little asses they can lick their own upper GI tract.

Friedman married into a $4 billion fortune and says that everybody should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting has reported that Friedman has used "a few months" or "six months" 14 separate times since 2003 as the critical period for determining success in the Middle East.
He'll be right eventually.

Not a surprise from the man who told us that the world was flat. Friedman has been an Ayn Rand fascist for a long time, why he still gets credit for being a "journalist" is beyond me.

What a shame that reporters, pundits and self styled experts like Thomas Friedman (not to mention most of the White House Press Corp and absolutely everyone on Fox News) can't be canned for being wrong so long so often. Isn't being right as important in the long run as being fair and honest? Certainly, if there is no way for a journalist to lose his right to write when consistently mistaken, then Journalism does not deserve to be called a "profession" as say the licensed practice of doctors, lawyers or accountants surely is.

Perhaps we should insist on "box scores" of being right or at least a warning label in each column/broadcast/story after a certain accumulated history being proven wrong. Every dog is entitled to one free bite. Journalist would get, say, ten stupid glaring errors. Thereafter, their work has to include the tagline of "probable fiction." That way, we would have a better chance of telling which ones are genuine seers and which ones are gullible suckers.

Unfortunately, the newspaper and other media owners have little interest in being right wing than being actually right.

Friedman and Horowitz are two of the most annoying Israeli firster Neocons in the media and lets not forget Kristol and his nausceatng Weekly Standard.

Wait, wait......there's a war in Iraq? How can there be a war in a country which is under U.S. military occupation? Which army is fighting our army or air force or whatever? How dare they? Hell, how can they? Doesn't the U.S. control all the air space over Iraq. Don't our air guys know about this war, wherever it is? Is it in Anbar or Mosul or.....arrrggghhhh. The b.s. is up to my lips.......

Thomas Friedman is a pro-Likud Israeli agent masquerading and an American liberal.

Isn't it interesting how some people call themselves one thing when in reality they are the opposite? Like someone calling themselves "clarity" or "compassionate conservative."

The evangelical dominionist neo-cons CANNOT admit they are wrong, because, in their deluded minds, they are taking dictation from God almighty, and to admit THEY are wrong, would be tantatmount to admitting that God is wrong.

I sometimes imagine that God just rolled the dice, and put all of this madness in motion and is just watching the show, knowing full well that in the end, all the casino's are ground back to dust and a new game will be erected where the old ones were played.

The best example of the poor quality of journalism in the MSM is this. Friedman not only was given a Pulitzer for his post 9/11 columns, they later appointed him to the committee!

I note some very good work has also earned Pulitzers, but they have also "honored" some horribly biased work.

PS: And believe me, I know a thing or two about "pompous overwriting"! ;)

Crossposted at Huffington Post (although why I think anyone would give a shit I can't say):
________________________________________________________________________________

You may be aware that Glenn Greenwald has been writing a lot lately about the macho rhetoric and posturing employed by the pro-war, and generally pro-maladministration, commentariat.

Friedman's right in the thick of that gamy huddle. These characters would have us admire them for both their ostensible intellectual acumen and sophistication, AND for their manly manliness, expressed in the form of tough-guy, simplistic, and chauvinistic pronouncements. They style themselves as Men for All Seasons.

Friedman and his ilk may still be coasting in the ascendancy at the moment, but no one buys into their lame and tired shtick much any more except their co-dependent fellow elites, sycophants, and aspiring thinkers insufficiently advanced to see Friedman's pompous overwriting as the shallow dreck it is.

Don't get me started.

george w. bush: laughed so hard I almost fell off my camel. Was wondering when you were really going to use (abuse?) that moniker.

Yes Friedman is a swarmy little piece of shit who would die of fright in one of his bombing raids. If he were really in Iraq some enterprising young Iraqi could drop a few $1 bills in the street and ol' Thom boy would go chasing after them, around the corner - no more Freakman.

As usual, Friedman has his "hidden fist" clenched tightly around his "puny dick", jacking off to the deaths of the hated "woggs"

Friedman is the epitome of the overly self-inflated chickenhawk closet throatsticking blowhard that constitutes the current MSM. A clone of the Coward-in-Chief, George Wanker Bush, he stands in front of his bathroom mirror, an unloaded .44 Magnum in each hand, a picture of a generic terrorist scotched taped to the wall and says, "Are you feeling lucky, punk?" And this passes for wisdom and erudition in the United States. Pathetic! Absurd!

To understand Friedman you just have to know that he is a pro-Israel liberal, and like every other pro-Israel liberal, he'll cheer on any war with any Muslim nation. The left is not a monolith--pro-Israel lefties are all for "humanitarian intervention," which is code for bomb any Muslim nation that may in anyway be perceived as a threat to Israel. The left is not united on peace issues.

opps ! Please omit redundant sentences. Will proof next time ! Having too much fun !

"And is this a source of shock or awe coming from the New York Times ? It was the Times that produced article after article repeating unconfirmed White House spin about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction so that we could unleash our own endless WMD's."

A brief response with my humble opinions:

Whenever I see the mustached mug of Friedman next to one of his twisted editorials, I think of Hitler. Without a doubt, Friedman is the neoliberal reincarnation of Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels.

Muslims with oil under their land are the victims of his pathological corporate rhetoric. Palestinians confined to apartheid ghettos are killed or tortured for amusement only as they have no marketable resources.

In his infamous September 13, 2001 New York Times editorial, "World War III", Friedman fanned the flames of war while the dust of the towers had barely settled. Within 48 hours of the event, without knowing who was actually responsible, Friedman was not only declaring WW III but he was trying to open the door to nuclear war against all Muslims lacking "modernity." Not long after, Bush and Friedman would be using the same spin phrases.

quote on 9/11/13:

"And unless we are ready to put our best minds to work combating them the World War III Manhattan project in an equally daring, unconventional and unremitting fashion, we're in trouble. Because while this may have been the first major battle of World War III, it may be the last one that involves only conventional, non-nuclear weapons."

SURPRISE, this came from the New York Times. It was the Times that produced article after article repeating unconfirmed White House spin about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Now a million Iraqis have died and $2 Trillion (Joseph Stiglitz) has been looted from American taxpayers via war, along with the dead and maimed. And bingo, defense industry neocons with ties to Israel were promoting this "war" (prior to 9/11), while big oil skulked in the shadows waiting for blood to be turned into oil.

And to a degree Freakman got his heart of darkness dream come true. Radioactive debris in Afghanistan indicates the possible use of small "tactical nukes" but definitely the use of massive quantities of depleted uranium weapons which are essentially radioactive "dirty bombs". Thousand of tons of DU munitions were then used to attack Iraq in the first large scale war crimes of the 21st century. This is exactly what Friedman lusted for, a radioactive slow death for his Muslim evil-doers. Many sources indicate Israel also used DU weapons when punishing civilian Lebanon. So who are the "terrorists".

And is this a source of shock or awe coming from the New York Times ? It was the Times that produced article after article repeating unconfirmed White House spin about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction so that we could unleash our own endless WMD's.

While posing as a clever and "reasonable" neoliberal, Friedman is operating in the great traditions of fascist spin and imperial racist war crimes as a media warmongering demagogue. If there is ever another Nuremberg, Friedman should prosecuted and violated for inciting crimes against peace and humanity.

Heil Thomas !

Most Americans have itchy ears. If it's in the NYT, then that's good enough for them. Most will never critically think through the algaeal slime Friedman sells as wholesome meat.

You have to wonder how long it will take for people to realize that Friedman is a fraud, and a sleazy, stupid, and self-absorbed one at that. His support of Globalization is as poisonous as his cheerleading for war. Years into the future (if there is one) people will wonder how and why anyone ever paid attention to this fool.

I can't think of a single reason why they shouldn't hang me.

Friedman is a gutless wonder. If he had half the courage that the 20-year-olds he gleefully sent over to Iraq have, he'd apologize. It's like Francis Fukuyama said when he acknowledged his error, when talking about the Bush/Cheney cheerleaders, "That's the thing that strikes me – it's the same thing that strikes me about President Bush, as well, I would forgive a lot if any of these people who were very strong advocates of the (Iraq) war showed any reflectiveness about what's happened or any acknowledgement that maybe there was something problematic in what they were recommending. Krauthammer doesn't do that, and President Bush doesn't do that. I take that as a big flaw. It seems to me it's not going to help their case to keep insisting that they were right about everything."

"Give war a chance". You have to be a very large asshole to say such a thing. If I were his mother I would wash out his mouth with battery acid.

Don't forget the "Friedman unit" - the next six months which are always going to be crucial for something. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_unit

Hidden fist? What's hidden about it? Orwell named it more precisely: "a boot stamping on a human face forever."

minitru,

I believe, unlike some, that eventually the Iraqis will pay us back for all that we have done. It is inevitable that some Iraqis will show their gratitude, as Cheney expected all along. But, poor Dick, he will not be the beneficiary of the magnanimity, but instead it will fall to Count Giuliani to enjoy the fruits of it with which he will be able to declare the Bill of Rights a dead letter. And the Iraqis who pay us back will be overjoyed to see how the Count will use their gift to make the lives of Americans as enjoyable as we have made the lives of Iraqis these past few years.

How can someone who has been elevated to such a lofty position as a NYT editor be so blatantly stupid? Year after year? Who hires these guys? The answer, I suspect, lies in the question, "Who pays these guys?" If it were not so extremely lucrative to ones personal finances to blow the horns for the war party, these people most likely wouldn't do it, or more importantly, they would be marginalized where they belong.

Adam Smith who is always presented to us as one of the founding fathers of economic liberalism wrote in The Wealth of Nations: "The principal architects of global policy, our merchants and manufacturers have sought to ensure that their interests have been most peculiarly attended to, however grievous the impact on others, particularly the victims of their savage injustice". (domestic and abroad)

This process has continued to this day - much applauded by the likes of Friedman - and culminates in the "Rise of Disaster Capitalism" as described by Naomi Klein in her most recent book. While we have known for some time that moral or ethical considerations are now "trade barriers" we still thought that at least some remnants of decency can be found in political decision-making. How naive. The destruction of the Iraqi state is not enough, nor the wholesale plunder of its national wealth. Instead of paying reparations to the people of Iraq and let (because their infrastructure was destroyed by a war of aggression)the US has contracted "reconstruction work" to the greatest crooks available who, at the expense of the US taxpayers, do not even pretend to do some real work and - literally - leave a pile of shit...
See "The great Iraq Swindle" by Matt Taibbi http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/08/31/3519/

Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dead, approx. 3 millions refugees, another 2-3 million internally displaced, destruction of the state and the economy, (deliberate?)unleashing of sectarian violence (Iraq was not a segregated society although the Shia majority was suppressed), thousands of weapons unaccounted for, inumerable crimes against civilians, unleashing of Shiites as a political force leads to strengthening of Iran (naturally), inital support for Shiites stopped - the enemy of our enemy...leads to supplying of Sunni insurgents with weapons.... "let them kill each other so they won´t have time to kill US troops"....?

And in the face of all this breathtaking incompetence / malice and the unspeakable suffering of the Iraqi people, in the middle of this unprecedented chaos the US has the audacity to demand that the "Iraqi government" (in the Orwellian sense) must fulfill 18 benchmarks to prove its worth?

The brazen hypocrisy and the arrogance of all this is unbelievable and makes you want to scream...

I used to think that I am a pacifist but I am ashamed to say that my initial, spontaneous reaction to news about the recent prevention of a terror attack on US military facilities in Germany was: what a pity. I am sorry - but feelings of retribution can be very strong and override moral and rational thinking.

Friedman, and Israel's favorite line: 'They hate each other more than love their own kids' is wrong. I would like to see Friedman and the Israelis live under occupation, especially one like the occupation of Palestine, and see whether they would feel the same way when that same line is used on them. This guy is a duplicitous snake that answers to his AIPAC master. AIPAC's whore is what he is.

no one is immune to an iron fist. either in the velvet glove or invisible. ultimatums have a nasty way of backfiring. force always returns when force is used. sad...i know several people who think friedam is right. anyone who says 'give war a chance'........insane.

clarity said
"If the people of the Northern US States started mass killings, mass rape, death camps as a way to ethnically cleanse the country then Yes Norman someone should bomb, invade or do anything in their power to stop the slaughter"

So who is going to stop us from doing those very things?

If the people of the Northern US States started mass killings, mass rape, death camps as a way to ethnically cleanse the country then Yes Norman someone should bomb, invade or do anything in their power to stop the slaughter. The Serbs had to stopped. No doubt if you were around in the early 1940s you would have argued that we need peace now- Hitler was none of our business. The world is a very complex place and evidently beyond your comprehension.

Friedman is a war criminal just like the US war criminals who kill innocent civilians in Irak and Afghanistan, and soon Iran. He is an apologist for the crimes of US imperialism. That makes him a co-conspirator in his nation's crimes against humanity.

Ah, but our civilians are entitled to enjoy themselves while their government is slaughtering other peoples because America is America is America. America can do no wrong. Hail the Fatherland!

Thank you Mr. Solomon for keeping that cowardly freak in the light where he can be watched. It takes a sub-human creature to suggest bombing other humans, regardless of the cause. I doubt if he has ever been on the receiving end where bombs are falling from the sky with him as a target. The terror is enough to make your mind try to leave your body. The survivors pain from the loss of family and other helpless victims is itself enough to drive a person insane, at least for awhile. He takes plaesure in that? What a pathetic fool. Show me a war where the promoters, and benefactors of the war are subject to being killed or maimed and the innocents and children especially will be free from harm. In that case I believe I'd be inclined to say "let them fight".

Yep, very strange bird that Friedman. Funny how the media gets away with painting so many conservatives as liberals. You know like Leiberman a democrate? Too funny!

Even in his letter from Baghdad, supposedly bemoaning the Iraq war, Friedman can't resist. Notice that, according to him, Iraqis are strange inscrutable others (they hate each other more than they love their kids), incapable of being understood by us or redeemed by our manifest beneficence. Of course it is precisely that attitude that has launched us into most of our wars, from the Indian wars and the Spanish-American War to Viet Nam and Iraq the "enemy" is the same menace to our righteous values and in dire need of extermination. So, according to a couple of centuries of American mythmaking about our wars, Friedman's letter promotes the Iraq war while pretending to oppose it. Let no one be deceived.

thabk you Chicanery for the link to dailyreckoning.