Reflections on Thomas Friedman's talk
I saw Thomas Friedman of the NYT, and author of "The World Is Flat," Wednesday night at the World Affairs council of Philadelphia. He gave a very interesting speech that I would like to briefly review and comment on. It will have to be brief, as my Baccalaureate ceremony is literally in 20 minutes.
The first half of his speech was boring and predictable, being mostly a summary of his book. Thought it's an excellent book(even though I disagree with significant sections of his...), all he did was present his book's arguments orally. Big deal. I want to see him speak and say something original, not just read his book to me.
The second half, however, was much more interesting. He had a number of great lines that I can't quote verbatim because my notes are at home. He focused largely on energy independence and its relation to our security here at home. Pointedly, he demonstrated that our national security will always be risk when we rely on oil from such terrible regimes as Iraq, Sudan, Russia, etc.(even Venezuela, a Socialist state that I am highly critical of, by the way!)
He then delivered the best few lines of the night. He said that alternative energy is "red, white, and blue," or something that effect, pointing out that green energy will be a huge growth sector in the years to come. We need more wind farms, biomass, hydroelectricity, etc. It will both fuel economic growth at home, lead to our national security, AND protect the environment. It's pretty much a win-win situation. Too bad the idiots in the White House are too tied to oil to notice this.
To hammer Bush, he closed with one of my favorite lines: "This administration has a poverty of imagination, and that is hurting us dearly." Amen! It was nice seeing a mostly white, male, upper-class audience agree with this...
More later(probably Monday), after graduation...
posted by Ben at 4:05 PM
2 Comments:
congrats on graduation. i know you will go on to do wonderful kick ass work. by the way, what part of the book are you critical of? i heard him on npr a few months ago, shit, maybe a few years ago, now, and i wasn't all that impressed so i didn't pick up the book. but it sounds like the speech was right the dsa alley. thoughts?
i am critical of many parts of his book. mostly it pisses me off that i don't think he ever mentioned labor unions. he practically sucks capitalism and globalization's collective dicks without even giving labor's side. friedman is a brilliant guy, but he is far too in awe of globalization to treat the issue in a "fair and balanced" manner.
he fails to explain why ever-lower weages are good for most americans. he fails to account for how america will move forward when we are losing manufacturing jobs and good, unionized jobs. are we supposed to all work at mcdonald's and in service-sector jobs? and he doesn't mention labor's role in the third world, either. finally, he's incredibly demeaning about the anti-sweatshop movement. i'm obviously very active and supportive of that movement, as well as the whole anti-globalization movement(WTO, IMF, Seattle, etc...). friedman literally argues that most people in this movement are privileged white kids who are acting out of guilt. well, i'm a privileged white kid, and he doesn't know what he's talking about.
there are lots of other things i could hammer away at in his house, but those are my main gripes.
but yeah, a lot of what he said in the speech, especially at the end, was quite liberal...at least the stuff about energy policy.
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