CP:
I’m really interested in the argument that TF kicks ass; tell me more. I’ve read his books and just think he’s an uber-reductionist with an incredible and undeserved platform who fancies himself a much better storyteller/writer than he is. He points at things and says “Oooh Oooh!”

Jaime and I were both exposed to Friedman in our globalization class. He was at the time a free market wonk, he believed in that stuff. The problem with him, I think, is that he is a very good columnist who is often treated as more important than he is.

As a columnist he thinks quippy and his ideas seem to have a half-life of three months. I think this article is a good example of this. This article is pretty antithetical to his previous neolib stances. He is/was a proponent of a rising tides lifts all boats thesis. What he ignored or simply poo-pooed were the real costs, i.e. environmental, stratification, equability, that these polices exploit.

So he left a lot of people wanting, but this is b/c we were reading him in an academic context. We must remember that he rights day to day, and is trained to think as such.

Stir it up, little darlin’ stir it up–comes from my speakers.

TF is certainly free-market. I remember he wrote an article at one point basically saying that yes, China was taking some of our good-paying jobs away, but the plus side was that they were now wealthy enough to be consumers of our goods, and his example he gave was some software engineer was drinking Coke. I remember thinking that was ludicrous. How does that benefit anyone in the US besides Coke shareholders if he drinks a Coke? Plus now he’ll be a diabetic.

Yeah, not so sure about free-trade, but I don’t think it really matters to debate it, it’s happening and will continue to happen. Too many powerful people stand to profit from it in my opinion for it NOT to happen. Large US companies do a large percentage of their business internationally now. OK i’m rambling.

Liz, as far as his statement at the end of that last article, maybe that will have a negative effect on some people who aren’t willing to hear it. But I think what he’s trying to point out is that we (Americans) are going to have to make some sacrifices and shifts in our lifestyle that are larger than just buying some new lightbulbs and a cool new car. I know that you know this of course, but it’s a balancing act he’s trying to accomplish. You have to give people hope on the one hand, but on the other you have to be honest about how big the issue is. I think what he’s also trying to do is re-package what has been a standard right-wing argument against us doing anything about global warming. That we shouldn’t do anything, because China will undo everything we do. Instead of using that as an argument for doing nothing, he’s trying to use it to make us do something.

Hope I’m making sense.