|
 he
New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman is widely considered
a sage on the Middle East, and he certainly is knowledgeable. But
sometimes, when you read him, you have to ask yourself: “What
kind of a sage says this? Or that? Or this?” I have asked such
questions many times, sometimes in public.
I am not exactly
a Friedmanologist, though I’m an observer, and I commend to
readers a
piece on the columnist by Michael Wolff, the perceptive and
always interesting media critic of New York magazine.
On March 17,
Friedman had a
column praising (though in a backhanded way) President Bush
for a boost in foreign aid. There are many things in that column
that seem to me un-sage-like, but I’d like to concentrate on
only a few.
Writes Friedman,
“Because of Sept. 11, [Bush] has argued, we need even deeper
tax cuts for the wealthy, even more money for a pie-in-the-sky missile
defense that would have been no use on Sept. 11, an even bigger
defense budget and even more drilling for oil in wilderness areas.”
This is more
like the reflexive line of the unthinking liberal than the reasoning
of a sage.
“Even
deeper tax cuts for the wealthy.” The “even deeper”
implies that we have already had deep tax cuts. “Wealthy”
says that the administration intends tax relief to go to . . . well,
the wealthy. But, as anyone who pays taxes knows, the Democrats’
definition of “the wealthy” can get a little weird (not
that there’s anything wrong with cutting taxes for the wealthy,
as Seinfeld might say). (Reagan spoke of the “truly needy”;
maybe, given Democratic rhetoric, we need to resort to the “truly
wealthy.”) Also, Friedman’s statement implies that he
believes that cuts in marginal rates would starve the government
of revenue, which is not only unLafferian, but unmindful of history.
“Even
more money for a pie-in-the-sky missile defense that would have
been no use on Sept. 11.” Amazing that a distinguished public-affairs
commentator should speak of missile defense as “pie-in-the-sky”;
you would think that, at a minimum, he would be concerned about
covering his you-know-what. It’s one thing to be skeptical
(despite the testimony of credible scientists, the impressive tests,
and so on), but it’s another thing to be so categorical, so
foolish. Many technological efforts in history have been scoffed
at as “pie-in-the-sky,” only to prove successful. Why
would you want to be a scoffer of your own generation, if only,
as I said, out of caution, out of a concern for reputation?
And if a workable
missile defense is achieved in the next 20, or 15, or 10 years,
will the likes of Tom Friedman pay any penalty for their “pie-in-the-sky”
talk? Probably not. Memories are short. (But I will try to remember.)
Remember this,
too: that Friedman’s fellow Times columnist, Maureen
Dowd, referred to missile defense as “Star Wars Saran Wrap.”
Such is her considered opinion on possibly the most important scientific
project of these times.
And how about
Friedman’s “that would have been no use on Sept. 11”?
This is an oldie (by now) but goodie. One curious thing is that
the Left, in the beginning, seemed worried that the terrorist attacks
would aid the drive for missile defense. John Lahr, the distinguished
critic of The New Yorker, wrote, “Isn’t it odd
that on the day — the DAY — that the Democrats launched
their most blistering attack on ‘the absolute lunacy’
of Bush’s unproven missile-defense system… the rogue nation
should suddenly become such a terrifying reality?”
Friedman is,
of course, correct: a missile-defense system wouldn’t have
stopped the planes in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. As
a free public service, I will provide a partial list of other things
a missile-defense system would fail to stop: a “suitcase”
bomb; an invasion; poverty; the clap; tennis elbow.
A missile defense
would hope to stop only missiles aimed at our communities, our hearts,
our selves. Isn’t that enough? Isn’t that rather worth
doing? As someone pointed out after 9/11, aircraft carriers wouldn’t
have stopped the terrorists, either, but who is now saying that
we don’t need aircraft carriers, for the purposes those instruments
serve? Who is saying that we don’t need tanks, guns, hand grenades,
and the other things that this nation assembles for its defense?
Oppose missile
defense if you must — but why drag 9/11 into it? We never said
that SDI would be a cure-all, would bring in the millennium; we
said that it had a chance to protect us against missiles, and that
a defense was better than a retaliatory attack killing millions
of innocents.
Continuing
with Friedman: “an even bigger defense budget.” The first
duty of the federal government, of course, is the physical defense
of us citizens. No serious person disputes this. And we are now
engaged in a war of self-defense — which requires a defense
budget equal to the task. This is, indeed, what Washington is principally
for: not midnight basketball, not free false teeth — this.
“Even
more drilling for oil in wilderness areas.” Please: An increase
in domestic oil production is not the end of the world; in fact,
it could prove a nicely beneficial thing. With today’s techniques,
oil can be drilled for with negligible harm to the environment,
and that includes ANWR, which, in any case, is no garden spot for
eco-tourists. One might do a little reading: Opposition to drilling
in ANWR is based either on ignorance or on some kind of mysticism
— a Green religion.
Friedman goes
on to write, “The most obvious conclusion from Sept. 11 —
that fighting terrorism around the globe will require a new, multidimensional
strategy, not just a defense strategy — was the one Mr. Bush
seemed least inclined to draw . . .”
I had to blink
when I read this. We all look at the papers: Haven’t Bush and
his people warned constantly since 9/11 that we are in new,
tricky, unexplored territory, and that this new kind of war requires
a “multidimensional strategy”? Bush, Rumsfeld, et al.
say it nearly every day, and act on this understanding nearly every
day. Reading that sentence was like reading, “Gore really needs
to wake up on this global-warming threat.”
Writes Friedman,
“The 9/11 terrorists did not hit us because they were poor.
But millions of poor people gave passive support to those terrorists
because they resented our greed or our support for their bad regimes.”
What greed?
The United States? The most generous nation in the world —
no, in the history of the world? The only nation that, when all
is said and done, really gives a damn about other peoples? The nation
that has given more in blood and treasure for the good of other
people than has any other nation ever? We not only give massive
amounts of aid to foreign governments directly, we bankroll pretty
much every international institution and event there is. We even
paid for 25 percent of that Hitlerian jamboree in Durban.
“Support
for their bad regimes.” Well, this can’t explain the Syrians,
or the Sudanese, or the Iraqis. Does it explain the Palestinians?
Should we cut off all contact with Arafat and the rest of the PA
thugs and terrorists? This can’t be what Friedman means, of
course.
Does he mean
the Egyptians, Jordanians, and Saudis? Is the “street”
really on the liberal side of those regimes? Does Friedman really
believe that if the U.S. withdrew support for Hosni Mubarak, say,
ordinary Egyptians would rise up in gratitude?
Friedman later
writes, “The reason so many Muslims are angry is because most
of them live under antidemocratic regimes backed by America, with
lagging economies and shrinking opportunities for young people.”
First, it’s questionable whether “most Muslims” live
under America-backed regimes. This is a matter of a little math
— don’t, please, forget the Iranians, or the Indonesians.
Also, it depends on how you define “America-backed.”
Second, people
like Friedman are usually urging the U.S. to make nice to Arab regimes,
to understand the Arab position, to see as “moderate”
any regime not directly killing Israelis. I don’t recall ever
hearing a mainstream commentator say, “Damn it, those Jordanians,
most of whom are Palestinians, should not have to live under that
stinky little Hashemite monarchy.” On the contrary, commentators
are always singing hymns to that monarchy, and doesn’t Queen
Noor look lovely in her gowns and jewels, dancing at parties and
talking with Barbara Walters?
Did you ever
hear a commentator — pre-9/11 — say, “We should really
think about our alliance with the corrupt and stifling House of
Saud”? If you had suggested such a thing, you would have been
denounced as an AIPAC propagandist. Only two seconds before writing
the column in question, Friedman was talking with Saudi rulers and
conveying their (meretricious) “peace plan.” Is not the
House of Saud one of those anti-democratic regimes Friedman decries,
and urges the U.S. to turn its back on?
Along the same
line: The only people who complained when Secretary of State Christopher
waited around for the tyrannical Hafiz Assad in Damascus were pro-Israel
hawks. Everyone else thought this was “nuanced,” “evenhanded,”
enlightened, and so on.
Third, Friedman’s
“angry Muslims” seem at least as anti-democratic as the
regimes that rule them. Are they in the streets appealing for democracy?
Do they oppose the regimes from the liberalizing — rather than
the bin Ladenizing — side? It seems not: They’re taking
their pilgrimages to Mecca and crying there, “Death to America!
Death to Israel!” (This was reported by returning pilgrims
to Detroit.) Fouad Ajami speaks of a “thin layer” of governing
elites, protecting societies — and the world — from what
is worse in the mob. Few thoughts provoke as many shudders.
Then Friedman
says — proffering chestnuts — “We need to find a
way to ratify the Kyoto climate change treaty. It’s not only
the right thing to do, but it would also send a hugely positive
signal to the world — that America understands that if it’s
going to have lasting allies in a global war on terrorism, it has
to be the best global citizen it can be. The attitude that we are
entitled to consume 25 percent of the world’s energy, while
we’re only 4 percent of the world’s population, is obnoxious.
Selfishness and hubris are a terrible combination.”
The Kyoto Protocol
— it’s hard to be polite about this — is a crock,
and everyone knows it, including those governments that pretend
to be for it. It exists only as a bludgeon against the United States.
And, by the way, one important way of being a “global citizen”
is to pursue — on behalf of everyone, really — the terrorists
who take innocent lives, and the governments and groups that support
them. That’s global citizenship.
And we consume
a lot of energy because we are a free economy, uplifting the whole
world, and we produce a lot of energy. Our energy use is
not depriving others of their energy use — the best way to
help the poor and backward is to encourage them to adopt those habits
that have made us prosperous, chief among them freedom, if that
can be called a “habit.”
Do poor countries
want to be closer to parity with the U.S.? Fine; delighted to hear
it. Rather than beg from us, they must imitate us.
Finally, Friedman
writes, “Mr. Bush has repeatedly told the world: If you’re
not with us, you’re against us. He needs to remember this:
The rest of the world is saying the same thing to us.”
Consider what
America has proven in the past century alone — particularly
in two world wars, and then in additional wars in the Far East and
the Persian Gulf. (Let’s not forget the Cold War, either.)
What other nation, in the history of man, has been so “with”
the world’s peoples at large? No nation has ever invested so
much to keep the world safe. As one of my colleagues sighed, France
isn’t patrolling the globe, making sure your country doesn’t
get invaded. Jordan isn’t safeguarding the freedom and success
of the South Koreans. The United States, in addition to looking
out for its interests, has taken on the role of its brothers’
keeper to an astonishing — and, again, unprecedented —
degree.
The U.S. is
not, and cannot be, responsible for every falling sparrow in the
world — but no other nation has tried to catch so many. Friedman
and others ask us to consider whether the peoples of the world think
that America is “with” them. Well, if they don’t
think it now — after all we’ve shown — when will
they? Everyone in his right mind knows that America is “with”
the world. If Muslims hate us, it is perhaps because they despise
the qualities we embody — for example, peaceful coexistence
with other countries, with the various religions. We don’t
shriek at the existence of a sliver of land occupied by Jews in
the vastness of the Middle East.
Besides which,
isn’t it slightly perverse that Muslim terrorists kill thousands
of us, while the Muslim world in general explodes in ululating cheers
— and Friedman and others worry, “Gee, what do they think
of us?” Mightn’t a Muslim worry, “Gee, wonder
what they think of us”?
I
once wrote, in despairing over Tom Friedman, that he “knows
about 100 times more about the Middle East than most of us will
ever know, in that he has devoted much of his career to that region.”
He has won a thousand awards, has been accorded endless honor.
But it’s
hard to see how his reputation as a sage can survive the columns
he is writing.
And why do
I bother to spend so much time — and to heave such sighs —
over one lousy columnist? Because, after 9/11, Friedman became arguably
the most important columnist in the world, or at least the most
important columnist in the United States. He is the dominant voice
on the Middle East at the dominant newspaper. He is the one to whom
everyone’s turning. What Friedman’s opinion is, is on
everyone’s lips. I hear this: from conservatives, from liberals
— from everybody.
So, he bears
a tremendous burden, has a tremendous obligation: like, Don’t
be dumb.
 James
Taranto of the Wall Street Journal had an interesting
note on his “Best of the Web” the other day. Under
the title “Terrorist Welfare Queens,” he quoted an Associated
Press report saying, “Leaders of poor nations warned their
rich counterparts that if they want a world free of terrorism, they
will need to pay for it.” Quipped Taranto, “No argument
there — that’s why America is increasing defense spending
by tens of billions of dollars. But of course, that’s not what
the Third Worlders gathered in Monterrey for the United Nations
International Conference on Financing for Development meant. ‘Drawing
a direct link between poverty and violence,’ the AP dispatch
explains, ‘leaders at a U.N. summit said increased aid to the
world’s neediest is more urgent than ever in the post-Sept.
11 world.’”
This does indeed
smack of blackmail: Give us money, or be subject to terrorism.
It is hard
— for me, at least — to provide aid to such people. You
would think that the goal of stopping wanton murderers would be
enough.
And forking
over dollars, of course, does not guarantee goodwill toward the
U.S. More than a few have noted that the more we gave Western Europe,
the more certain Europeans resented us, feeling their shame, their
dependency, and biting the hand that was trying to feed them.
An Egyptian
friend of mine told me that, whenever a needy Egyptian sees “Food
Gift from the United States of America” on the wrapping around
his chicken, there is a little burning of shame.
Here again,
the U.S. is damned if it does, damned if it doesn’t: and no
government, through its actions or words, can solve the psychological
problems of every twisted or beset denizen of the Third World (or
even the First). The task before us is to beat our enemies —
to stop those trying to kill us en masse. That is job enough for
one country.
Let’s
turn to something cheerier: Andrea Yates. I thought I’d try
out a thought on readers, a.k.a. NRO-visiting guinea pigs: I got
the sense that some people — even if they didn’t state
it — thought Yates’s crime was not so bad because she
merely murdered her own children. She did not murder five of someone
else’s children. There were no outraged parents, demanding
the just punishment of the slayer of their little ones. No, the
parents of the murdered children were both concerned with
saving the murderer’s skin. I can’t help thinking that
it would have been different if the murdered kids were someone else’s
children — and I got a little chill thinking that no one was
crying out for retribution on behalf of those kids. There were no
parents pointing the finger at the murderer saying (for example):
Give her the chair.
It might be
useful to state the elementary: We don’t own, as chattels,
our children, and to kill or harm your own is as bad as killing
or harming someone else’s.
And here come
the letters re abortion!
Regular
readers have heard me speak of one of the bravest and most inspiring
political prisoners in the world, Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, who for
years has been languishing and occasionally tortured in one of Castro’s
dungeons. His “crime,” of course, was to appeal for basic
human rights. (For a brief bio of this remarkable man, try here.)
A few days
ago, his wife, Elsa Morejon, was able to take a statement from him,
which she conveyed by phone to the rest of us. It is a simple statement,
typical of Biscet:
“Here,
from this dwelling of pain, I also defend human rights. I have,
I am, and I will always be on the side of justice and for the liberty
of all Cubans. I give thanks to God and to all the people who know
how to love, because in their hands I have left my family. To my
brothers in exile and to all those who love justice, I shall always
have you in my presence. God bless you all.”
I am continually
amazed, when I interview or read about Cuba’s political prisoners,
at their basic absence of hate, at their calm, at their insistence
that love is a way of defending themselves, and their fellows, against
their persecutors. They are better people than I, I can assure you.
Folks,
this wasn’t the cheeriest of Impromptuses (what is that plural,
anyway?) today. No fun and games. We will return to something more
like our regularly scheduled programming tomorrow. Hang in there.
|
