Thomas Friedman, boorish windbag

[marmar]

from Consortium News:



Misguided Scheme from NYT’s Friedman
April 18, 2012

Exclusive: New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman, who once dubbed himself a “Tony Blair Democrat,” is now a “Mike Bloomberg Independent,” as he seeks a “centrist” challenge to the two parties, even if it might lead to consolidated Republican control of the United States, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry


If you relied on one signpost for where not to go, it might be the columns of New York Times star Thomas L. Friedman: If he’s pointing in one direction, like some humorless Cheshire Cat, it’s usually a safe bet that you should go the other way.

Sure, he’s not always wrong. Sometimes, he does recognize the obvious. I suppose the world has gotten “flatter.”

But Friedman has been grievously wrong many other times at great cost to America and the world – and his newest election scheme of pushing a “centrist” alternative for President could be just his latest catastrophic idea. It’s also not the first time he helped mess up the selection of a new President.

In December 2000, Friedman praised Republican suppression of vote-counting in Florida because he put George W. Bush’s fragile “legitimacy,” as a popular-vote loser being made President, above determining the actual will of the voters. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2012/04/18/a-misguided-scheme-from-nyts-friedman/

[KG]

1. piss on Thomas Friedman

[hifiguy]

2. Wanker of the decade, according to

Atrios. "Blathering idiot gobshite" is my preferred description of The Moustache of Profundity.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

3. One of the worst cheerleaders for the Iraq War...

He's from the Twin Cities, and I once saw him in a local restaurant, apparently visiting friends. It was all I could do to keep from going up to his table and asking him when he was going to recant his support for that disaster.

[HughBeaumont]

4. Trust us, Friedman. NO one is labelling your free-traitor, war-supporting ass as a "liberal".

Why does Friedman think a "centrist" faction is needed to "shake up" an already-right-of-center party and a batshit insane neo-fascist party? Where's the notion of progressivism?

[PoliticAverse]

5. The Friedman Unit...

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

The Friedman Unit, or simply Friedman, is a tongue-in-cheek neologism coined by blogger Atrios (Duncan Black) on May 21, 2006. One Friedman Unit is equal to six months,
specifically the "next six months", a period repeatedly declared by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman to be the most critical of the then-ongoing Iraq War even
though such pronouncements extended back over two and a half years.