I confess that I do not count myself among the Thomas Friedman sycophants.  I have read some of his books and I just find him trying so hard to be “intellectually balanced” that he often ignores the obvious and the reality all together.  It belies an attitude that there is a truth that only he possesses and the rest of us are intellectually primitive ideologues not to see the obvious road he so generously bestows on us in his New York Times columns.

His column from the New York Times on 5/24/11, “Lessons from Tahrir Square” is a prime example of an attempt to disregard the obvious in order to make a balanced argument.

when it comes to ossified, unimaginative, oxygen-deprived governments, the Israelis and Palestinians are right up there with pre-revolutionary Egypt and Tunisia. I mean, is there anything less relevant than the prime minister of Israel going to the U.S. Congress for applause and the leader of the Palestinians going to the U.N. — instead of to each other?

As for Bibi, his Tahrir lesson is obvious: Sir, you are well on your way to becoming the Hosni Mubarak of the peace process. The time to make big decisions in life is when you have all the leverage on your side.

This idea of drawing an equivalency between Israel and the Palestinian efforts toward peace is absurd.  Not to discount counterproductive actions taken by the Israelis there is no equivalency.  Start with the results.  Israel by any objective observance has built a nation; a modern productive, democratic nation.  The Palestinians have turned down the opportunity to have a nation for 50 years.  Israel has built hospitals, schools, industry, museums and a vibrant culture. The world has spent more money on the Palestinians that they spent to rebuild Europe after WWII and what do they have to show for it?

The Israelis do not parade school children around in suicide vests and take pride in teenage suicide bombers. Those who commit such atrocities, which are rare,  are not heralded as heroes but cause a deep shame for the nation.  There is no call to wipe out the Palestinians.  Claims of “genocide” against the Palestinians are laughable.  Populations do not grow during genocides.

Israelis do not rain down rockets on civilian population. When combat operations do require engagement in civilian areas, which is often given how the Palestinians will use civilians as fodder to create a misleading narrative  of oppression, the Israeli troops take great effort to avoid and minimize civilian casualties.

Israel has a Muslim minority with rights of citizenship. They vote, sit in the Knesset, own property and enjoy religious freedom.  You can hear their call to prayers loudly broadcast from a PA system in the Temple Mount right next to the Jews’ holiest site; the western wall.  In discussions of a Palestinian state it is assumed to be ‘Juden free’.   Jews are expected to be uprooted.

The comparison with Mubarak’s role escapes any sense of reality.  Unlike Mubarak, Netanyahu was freely elected. The Knesset debates with an intensity that makes our Congress look like they have been lobotomized.  Israel has provided a home for the Jews who were thrown out of Egypt in 1948; what have the Egyptians done for the Palestinians?  There is no need to riot in Israel; they can just vote.  Illiteracy and the resulting unemployment is absent in Israel, and this is while being in a semi-permanent state of war.

To even suggest that Bibi has all the leverage on his side is incomprehensible.  Yes they have a strong military, but honestly Thomas, have you looked at the fucking map? Have you read the press about Israel in Europe or even that paper that you call home?  Have you noticed how the UN has treated Israel?  Is there any other nation that faces an existential threat that is unchallenged on the floor of the UN?  To suggest that they should unilaterally forfeit any semblance of security to satisfy your retarded sense of equivalency is ridiculous.

So called intellectuals like Friedman think that such equivalency is a sign of a superior thought process.   The inability to distinguish right from wrong or the unwillingness to support a side that supports the freedom of its citizens and its right to defend itself is not a sign of a higher intellect.  Moral equivalency does not make you smarter; it makes you a coward and a fool.

The March 2006 Washington Post editorial that claimed real median wages had fallen for 25 years also concluded that “the rising tide helped only workers at the top [ 10 percent].” In 2003, a New York Times journalist likewise wrote, “[T]he bottom 80 percent of Americans have seen their incomes stagnate for three decades.” But if all but the top 10-20 percent had experienced no real income gains for 25-30 years, how could real consumption per capita possibly have doubled since 1973?   Although some would have us believe that most U.S. consumers simply got deeper and deeper in debt, year after year, such a claim implies that household net worth fell continually for decades. Yet, as Chapter 7 demonstrates, median household net worth (assets minus debts) has increased steadily and substantially.

Unless the top 10-20 percent could somehow consume unlimited numbers of houses, cars, shirts, and steaks, it is difficult to imagine how each American’s real consumption could have doubled if real wages and salaries had really been unchanged.  The average size of new homes rose from 1,500 square feet in 1970 to 2,349 square feet in 2004, and the national home ownership rate rose from 62.9 percent in 1970 to 69.2  percent by the end of 2004.  How could so many people be living in so much larger houses if only 10-20 percent had significant increases in income?

Could anyone believe that all those shopping malls that have sprung up since 1973, and all the new homes and restaurants, are really catering to just a fortunate few? How many cars and appliances could the top 10-20 percent have purchased?

From Income and Wealth by Alan Reynolds (published in 2006)

HKO comments:

Alan Reynolds’ book is a wealth of information about the statistical misinformation about the distribution of wealth and income in America.  While addressing a lot of statistics and data the book is still readable and incredibly illuminating.

Throughout this last downturn I have observed and noted how many restaurants and some  malls have seemed to remain busy.  I do not believe that all the people I see with shopping bags from high end stores are in the top 10 percent of earners.

Reynolds points out that the data used often compares weekly income rather than hourly, ignores benefits and transfer payments, excludes taxes, farm workers and many self employed.  The data confuses the fact that more people are entering the upper income brackets with the perception that those in the upper brackets are making more.

When you examine the total wages per hour worked or the consumption per capita you find that arguments for middle class income stagnation and the growth in the inequality of income distribution start to vaporize like a mirage.

From Thomas Sowell’s Intellectuals and Society

“In short, many things that the Federal Reserve, Congress and the two Presidents did (during the market crash of 1929) were counterproductive.  Given these multiple failures of government policy, it is by no means clear that it was the market economy which failed.  There is of course no way to re-run the stock market crash of 1929 and have the federal government let the market adjust on its own to see how that experiment would turn out.  The closest thing to such an experiment was the 1987 stock market crash, similar in size but not in duration to the 1929 collapse.  The Reagan administration did nothing, despite outrage in the media at the government’s failure to act.”

“What will it take to wake up the White House?” the New York Times asked, declaring that ‘the President abdicates leadership and courts disaster.”  Washington Post columnist Mary McGrory said that Reagan “has been singularly indifferent” to the country’s “current pain and confusion.”  The Financial Times of London said that President Reagan “appears to lack the capacity to handle adversity” and “nobody seems to be in charge.”  A former official of the Carter administration criticized President Reagan’s “silence and inaction” following the 1987 stock market crash and compare him unfavorably to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose “personal style and bold commands would be a tonic” in the current crisis.”

“The irony in this was that FDR presided over an economy with seven consecutive years of double-digit unemployment, while Regan’s policy of letting the market recover on its own, far from leading to another Great Depression, led instead to one of the country’s longest periods of sustained economic growth, low unemployment and low inflation, lasting twenty years.”

David Broder writes a great piece in the New York Times, The Populist Addiction

excerpt:

It’s easy to see why politicians would be drawn to the populist pose. First, it makes everything so simple. The economic crisis was caused by a complex web of factors, including global imbalances caused by the rise of China. But with the populist narrative, you can just blame Goldman Sachs.

Second, it absolves voters of responsibility for their problems. Over the past few years, many investment bankers behaved like idiots, but so did average Americans, racking up unprecedented levels of personal debt. With the populist narrative, you can accuse the former and absolve the latter.

Third, populism is popular with the ruling class. Ever since I started covering politics, the Democratic ruling class has been driven by one fantasy: that voters will get so furious at people with M.B.A.’s that they will hand power to people with Ph.D.’s. The Republican ruling class has been driven by the fantasy that voters will get so furious at people with Ph.D.’s that they will hand power to people with M.B.A.’s. Members of the ruling class love populism because they think it will help their section of the elite gain power.

So it’s easy to see the seductiveness of populism. Nonetheless, it nearly always fails. The history of populism, going back to William Jennings Bryan, is generally a history of defeat.

That’s because voters aren’t as stupid as the populists imagine. Voters are capable of holding two ideas in their heads at one time: First, that the rich and the powerful do rig the game in their own favor; and second, that simply bashing the rich and the powerful will still not solve the country’s problems.

Richard Cohen writes in the Washington Post “From John Edwards, lessons on celebrity and politics”

“- the lesson to be learned from the John Edwards affair. “We have substituted the camera — fame, celebrity — for both achievement and the studied judgment of colleagues.”

David Brooks warns of the “The Populist Addiction” in The New York Times.  ”

“voters aren’t as stupid as the populists imagine. Voters are capable of holding two ideas in their heads at one time: First, that the rich and the powerful do rig the game in their own favor; and second, that simply bashing the rich and the powerful will still not solve the country’s problems.”

The Supreme Court decision reversing McCain Feingold leaves a lot to consider. Many on the left are as outraged as the right was on Roe vs Wade. Jeff Jacoby tries to calm the storm in “Candidates, campaigns, and New Coke“ in The Boston Globe.

“But even those that do choose to advertise during an election cycle will not make the mistake so many of the court’s detractors are making. They know that Americans are not sheep, easily herded by means of clever commercials. If corporate advertising was irresistible, after all, we’d all be drinking New Coke.”

Finally I have an article at American Thinker:  “Why Elitists Fail.”

“Even the brightest minds cannot escape emotional impediments to a rational conclusion. Combining such emotional rationalism with a focus on theories detached from the verification of practical experience can be downright dangerous. This is why it concerns so many that Obama’s administration has the lowest number of appointees from the private sector in his cabinet of any president in history.”

And yesterday also at American Thinker : “Why Obama’s tax incentives for small business will backfire“

“Such micromanagement of the economy is not surprising from the moral supremacists who are more interested in  imposing their view of social justice than truly enabling the economy to allocate capital and create jobs.”

I greatly appreciate the numerous comments at American Thinker. They are thoughtful and worthy of your reading.

Thanks to all the visitors at Rebelyid.