Thomas Friedman, why don't you break up?

Now there is only a high-wage, high-skilled job.

you say this, tom, but your continued employment suggests the existence of high-wage, no-fucking-skills jobs.

columnists are basically monopoly rent-seekers

http://thomasfriedmanopedgenerator.com/

aw already posted

One, people don't behave like migratory birds, so attempts to treat them as such are a waste of time. Migratory birds never suddenly set up a black market for Western DVDs.

otm

friedmanomics

xpost i smell new yorker caption

argh, just fucking END this guy already
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/01/opinion/friedman-its-a-401k-world.html?hp&_r=1&

So people like reading this junk:

If you are self-motivated, wow, this world is tailored for you. The boundaries are all gone. But if you’re not self-motivated, this world will be a challenge because the walls, ceilings and floors that protected people are also disappearing. That is what I mean when I say “it is a 401(k) world.” Government will do less for you. Companies will do less for you. Unions can do less for you. There will be fewer limits, but also fewer guarantees. Your specific contribution will define your specific benefits much more. Just showing up will not cut it.

Self-motivation is all it takes, right...

that a-hole is sorta correct, given that for average investors 401ks are basically rigged against them, inefficient, and a total and utter crapshoot that is far too likely to end in woe, as far as retirement income security goes.

that doesn't really make him "sorta correct" -- Friedman is saying this all just means you have to "learn about investing"

I posted this on the "Rolling Economy" thread but it fits here too. Salmon totally destroys Friedman:

http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2013/05/01/the-systemic-plight-of-labor/

youre correct, he is oblivious to the manner in which his analogy has any merit at all.

xpost

that "thought leaders" zing at the end stings, i love it

enjoying juxtaposition of thomas friedman and arkham asylum in SNA tbh

u_u

floors don't protect you, unless he means from vermin

just showing up is all i have in me, motherfucker.

Thomas L. Friedman: This Ain't Yogurt

Saw this blurb in a NY Times email. This sounds too painful to read.

OP-ED COLUMNIST
Blowing a Whistle
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Respecting and caring about civil liberties means supporting the government programs needed to prevent another 9/11.

and now i went and read that whyyyy

mostly cut & pasted the asshole from The Wire, White People's Favorite TV Show Ever

haha yes The Wire, white people's favorite show that had reruns on BET

someone wrote an article on medium about what the next generation's thomas friedman would be like

I appreciate the idea that a countercultural female figure could be the next generation's generalizing annoyance

If Kerry’s mission fails — because either Israelis or Palestinians or both balk — he will either be tacitly or explicitly declaring that this two-state solution is no longer a viable option and “that would plunge Israel into a totally different paradigm,” said Grinstein, who recently authored the book “Flexigidity: The Secret of Jewish Adaptability.”

really only posting for that book title, which is vaguely Friedmanesque but not Friedman

lol

a little grossly sexual too

This has got to be one of his worst:

"Never go to a hockey game with Putin and expect to play by the rules of touch football. The struggle over Ukraine is a hockey game, with no referee."

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/09/opinion/friedman-playing-hockey-with-putin.html?src=me&ref=general

loool

gahhhhhhh!

http://www.seoish.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/inconceivable-1.jpg

This is not a joke. This is actually taking up space in the New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/13/opinion/sunday/thomas-l-friedman-the-world-according-to-maxwell-smart-part-1.html?_r=0

IN the 1960s, there was a popular sitcom — “Get Smart” — about a hapless secret agent named Maxwell Smart, played by Don Adams. Smart went by the code name “Agent 86.” “Get Smart” famously introduced the shoe phone to American audiences, but the show also introduced something else: its own version of the bipolar world. Do you remember the name of the intelligence agency Maxwell Smart worked for? It was called “Control.” And do you remember the name of Control’s global opponent? It was called “Kaos” — “an international organization of evil.”

The creators of “Get Smart” were ahead of their time. Because it increasingly appears that the post-post-Cold War world is cleaving into the world of “order” and the world of “disorder” — or into the world of “Control” and the world of “Kaos.”

can't wait for his take on dick van dyke

"Today, in this globally connected, app-driven, post-Uber world, our mothers are, in a very real sense, cars."

he's NYT quiddities-ness, in the flesh.

seriously, i don't think i can stand both Friedman and Dowd making a "comeback."

have they been away? i thought their voices had just been drowned out by the sea of clickbait crap.

huge lol @ eephus

A+

"I was shocked that my Tunisian cab driver had never heard of the Many Loves of Dobie Gillis Show, but after I recounted the plot of an episode he agreed with me that all of world's Maynard G. Krebs need to be taught the lesson of force."

The Arab Spring is failing not for lack of bandwidth, but for lack of human understanding that can only be forged when someone is late for breakfast, and you say, "Thank you for being late."

Felix Salmon is great

i don't even understand what Friedman is trying to get at

my theory all along has been he's severely aphasic

Among the many questions I have is how do you "forge" a lack of understanding, or a lack of anything for that matter.

i totally get "lack of human understanding which can only be forged", it's just missing a comma--what i don't understand is why the hell anyone would ever thank anyone for being late

Friedman had just explained that he is writing a book called ‘The World is Fast’, a sequel to a previous book of his called ‘The World is Flat’.... The title of the final chapter of his new book is ‘Thank You for Being Late’....

Some dumb new Friedmanism apparently. buy the book and find out

I guess I get that by "which can only be forged" he means "which can only be the result of," but it's a very awkward and inept way of putting it. And I'm not sure who is late and who is thanking the person for being late, and what that means, and I'm also not entirely clear on what "lack of bandwidth" would be with respect to a revolution.

Being important CEO types, Tom Friedman’s friends are sometimes 15 minutes late for their breakfast meetings. And when that happens, Tom Friedman thanks his friend for being late, since his guest’s tardiness has given him 15 minutes of peace and quiet, during which he can think peacefully. Hence the title of the chapter.

This is the only way to forge human understanding.