About That Broken Clock...

Will Bunch via Atrios tells us today that Little Tommy Friedman of the New York Times “knocked one out of the park” this morning with this column about the supposed dialogue within Iran about the United States at this moment (titled, “Today Is The Day That The Broken Clock Is Right”).

I beg to differ, particularly here…

...We have to note that obtaining open-source intelligence in America has become more difficult, because traditional news shows have become more comedic and more comedic news shows more authoritative.

How right you are, Tommy. Why, it seems like just the other day when I witnessed your famous “hold your nose and vote for Gore or Kerry for President” act that the Democrats supposedly went through during the 2000 and 2004 elections (captured by the fine folk at Media Matters here), though I never saw a photo of a voter actually doing so. However, I can tell you from my own experience that I have assumed this position when reading many of your columns.

And regarding this claim noted in the Bunch post…

…9/11 has made America afraid and therefore stupid.

That actually is quite correct, and you were the standard bearer in that department around the May 2003 time frame as I recall (here – fortunately for Friedman, the YouTube video for this golden moment has apparently been pulled...afraid and more than a little obnoxious also, right Tommy?).

And I also want to note this excerpt from Friedman’s column…

…all the U.S. presidential candidates are distancing themselves from the core values that made America such a great power and so different from us — in particular America’s long commitment to free trade, open immigration and a reverence for scientific enquiry wherever it leads.

You know, Friedman really should pay attention to the Democratic presidential primary from time to time; I don’t hear any of the candidates speaking against scientific news or discovery in any way. And the only place you’re going to hear opposition to common-sense immigration policy is out of the mouths of Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee and those individuals of the same party.

Also, this country’s “commitment to free trade” is a comparatively recent phenomenon in our history, going back to NAFTA in the 1990s – I suppose that’s what Friedman is talking about here, and his embrace of this misguided policy (in the absence of any sensible U.S. congressional legislation on immigration) has led to the flattening of wages and the hiring of illegals for many jobs in this country (those that haven’t disappeared due to offshoring, that is).

Towards the end of his screed, Friedman typically paints with a broad brush stating that both parties are appealing to “nativist extremes” and imagines a “tooth fairy” that “will make their energy, budget, educational and Social Security deficits painlessly disappear” (and Atrios notes here that the minor problem with that statement is that these “deficits” in Social Security don’t, you know, actually exist).

Wish as I might, I don’t expect any of those items to disappear either. However, I can still hope to see this occur with Friedman’s grandiose and self-indulgent missives of questionable veracity one fine day in the future.