Magic of metaphors : Op-Ed Journey of Thomas Friedman

Re: # 32

anil mian,

i will quote the devil (and al-lah mian) if it will support my point ! ....... i have no shame ........ i don't like friedman, but when he shares my view of the pathetic state of the ummah, i have to agree with him ........ heck, i even agree with horrible hindoos once in a while, even though i support the liberation of kashmir and can't stand idlee ........

hamidm: other michigan residents - ford, gm - also bet that the future was in George Will's CLEW. And lost their shirts to those left wing whackos at Toyota which started investing in small hybrids rather than suvs years ago.

as for global warming, while perhaps michigan will become the new florida 50 years from now, dont bet on it.

I suppose everyone has seen this one by Kubin.

---
WRITE YOUR OWN THOMAS FRIEDMAN COLUMN!

Write your own Thomas Friedman column!
New York Observer
May 25, 2004

1. Choose your title to intrigue the reader through its internal conflict:

a. War and Peas
b. Osama, Boulevardier
c. Big Problems, Little Women

2. Include a dateline from a remote location, preferably dangerous, unmistakably Muslim:

a. Mecca, Saudi Arabia
b. Islamabad, Pakistan
c. Mohammedville, Trinidad

3. Begin your first paragraph with a grandiose sentence and end with a terse, startlingly unexpected contradiction:

a. The future of civilization depends upon open communication between Yasir Arafat and Ariel Sharon. If the two don't speak to each other, the world edges closer to the precipice of total war. If, on the other hand, they manage to engage in open conversation and resolve their differences, Israelis could soon be celebrating Seders in Saudi Arabia. But for now, the two men can't speak. Why? You can't make a collect call from Bethlehem.

4. Use the next few paragraphs to further define the contradiction stated above, peppered with little questions making it look like you're having a conversation with the reader. Feel free to use the first person:

a. My first thought was to ask: Why no collect calls from Bethlehem? It's easy to call collect from Bosnia, Kosovo, even Uzbekistan. Am I sure? Of course I'm sure. I was in each of those places just a few weeks ago, making collect calls all over the world. No problem. So why can't Arafat call collect from Bethlehem?

5. Remember: Thomas Friedman is the Carrie Bradshaw of current events. Think Sex and the City, write "Sects and Tikriti":

a. How can Islam get to its future, if its past is its present?

b. Later that day I got to thinking about global civilizational warfare. There are wars that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that take you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant clash of all is the one you have with your own civilization. And if you can find a civilization to love the you that you love, well, that's just fabulous.

c. Maybe Arabs and Israelis aren't from different planets, as pop culture would have us believe. Maybe we live a lot closer to each other. Perhaps, dare I even say it, in the same ZIP code.

6. Name-drop heavily, particularly describing intimate situations involving hard-to-reach people:

a. The Jacuzzi was nearly full when Ayman al-Zawahiri, former surgeon and now Al Qaeda's head of operations, slid in.

b. It was Thomas Pynchon on the phone. "Tommy," he said, probably aware we share that name ..

c. Despite the bumpy flight, I felt comfortable in the hands of a pilot as experienced as Amelia Earhart.

7. Include unknowns from hostile places who have come to espouse rational Western thought and culture:

a. I visited Mohammed bin Faisal Al-Hijazi, former top aide to Ayatollah Khomeini, now a reformer and graduate of the Wharton Business School.

b. Last year Nura bin Saleh Al-Fulani worked in Gaza sewing C4 plastic explosives into suicide bombers' vests. I caught up with Nura last week in Paw Paw, Mich., where she sews activity patches on the uniforms of Cub Scout Pack 34.

8. Make use of homey anecdotes about your daughters, Natalie and Orly, enrolled in Eastern Middle School, Silver Spring, Md.:

a. My daughter Natalie, a student at Eastern Middle School, a public school in Silver Spring, Md., asked me at breakfast: "Daddy, if my school has students who are Muslims and Jews and Christians and Buddhists all working together, why can't the rest of the world be that way?" There was something in the innocence of her question that made me stop and think: Maybe she has a point.

9. Quote a little-known Middle East authority at least once in every column:

a. Stephen P. Cohen
b. Stephen P. Cohen
c. Stephen P. Cohen

10. Conclude your column with a suggestion referring back to the opening contradiction, but with an ironic twist. Make sure the suggestion you proffer sounds plausible, but in fact has no chance of happening:

a. Driving into Bethlehem in the back of a pickup, I wonder: What if Yasir Arafat and Ariel Sharon sit down and play a game of poker? And what if the stakes are these: If Sharon wins, the Intifada is over. If Arafat wins, Palestine gains statehood. One game of no-limit Texas hold 'em, and the Middle East crisis is resolved. Just like that. Yasir and Ariel, deal 'em out.

-Michael Kubin

anil to hamidm: Arjun is giving Romair one-side treatment, Arjun can find your almost eulogizing

oh no!! dont sic the monkey god on hamidm!! :-(

Tom Friedman is 10,000 mile wide and 1 inch deep in his analyses. It is good for subway reading..Bhagwati basically tore him a new one when discussing globalization and lambasting the world is flat bit. World is not flat..never was and never will be. Although, Keira Knightly is FLAT.

Re: # 23

Hamidm Sahib:

"george will is my man, even though i disagree with him sometimes ... "

Could it be that you have similar disagreements with Tom Friedman. I believe you quoted Tom Friedman here on Chowk. Arjun is giving Romair one-side treatment, Arjun can find your almost eulogizing quote of Tom Friedman on his Earth is Flat.

hamid pai bhaand every body knows friedman is a hoax, but you supported him in the past and you support the other hoax george will, that means as I had rightly estimated u are a pea brained joker.

If you had any brains u would support Fareed Zakaria, or Brezinski but you have nuts for brains.

And by the way Al Gore might be nuts but global warming is coming and it will submerge most of your coastel areas, so if you have beach front property sell it fast

Look I have been saying......for a long time....that the earth is round......the sky is blue.....and water makes you wet....however, after.....consultation with some top politicians in pakistan.....from all political parties....I have realised that the sun does not shine through my ass......I plan to write a book about it in the future.....

tahmed,

.... i don't consider george will to be a neo-con and will take him any day over these left wing whackos like al gore and tom friedman ...... yea, friedman is a bleeding heart, pot smoking, homo loving, clinton supporting, commie liberal ! .......... and don't worry about global warming - it is all liberal propaganda by the hollywood crowd that can afford solar panels ..... our ancestors were probably worried about it too, before the ice age killed them off ....... besides, we can always use a warm winter in michigan ....

.... and just to show that i am not biased against liberals, i like chris matthews - the man is so sincere, he makes me puke ...

hamidm #24 i normally dont read george will either since i think the man is a fake - he is too smart not to be aware of the incredible risk the entire planet is being placed in due to over-consumption, and yet writes an article (a couple of days back in the WP) where he sings of the miseries of the ultra-rich due to the increase in the CLEW (Cost of Living Extremely Well) without concerning himself with the realities of Global Warming and other costs that future generations will have to pay; and without concerning himself that more waste does not mean more happiness.

The new-cons are like any other ideology-driven nuts - living in a make-believe world, ignoring inconvenient truths (to borrow from Gore).

hamidm: romair may not be the sharpest crayon in the box, but he has a 100% track record of perfect predictions years in advance (and I say this per his own humble admission in #22 below). Indeed, Field Marshall Romair is the new-improved version of the Delphic Oracle and he smokes even more potent gas then they gave to the Delphic Oracle. In his first year of training at Kakul, Romair had already mastered the Theory of Everything and was almost awarded the Sword of Honor and the Nobel Prize at the same time, before they accidentally kicked him out!!

They all look and sound the same to me.

Re: # 22

romair,

.... you idiot ! ...... i don't like tom friedman for the same reason i don't like you - you are both mealymouthed pea brains with an exagerrated opinion of your meager intellect .....

...... for your information, tom friedman doesn't support the iraq war while i still support george bush - i just think that he is not tough enough! ...... given the present circumstances, i would support a division of iraq so that we can turn our attention to iran and saudi arabia ....

Re: # 21

tahmed,

.... i hate to admit this, but i used to like friedman ....over the years i found out that the man was just a salesman who had grown to believe his own bullshit -kind of like romair ... like i said, friedman is an empty suit who caters to a tv audience used to five second sound bites and pompous homilies ......... however, i still read his columns in the ny times to keep up with the trends ....... george will is my man, even though i disagree with him sometimes ...

Re: # 21

tahmed,

.... i hate to admit this, but i used to like friedman ....over the years i found out that the man was just a salesman who had grown to believe his own bullshit -kind of like romair ... like i said, friedman is an empty suit who caters to a tv audience used to five second sound bites and pompous homilies ......... however, i still read his columns in the ny times to keep up with the trends ....... george will is my man, even though i disagree with him sometimes ...

hamidm2 mian: ....you were totally in bed with individuals like tom friedman, and everything they represented, over the past years....i remember spending a lot of time trying to explain to you, how idiotic all these neo-con, bush-loving, world is flat idiots were......and i remember you declaring them to be the best thing since sliced bread.......and how clueless the rest of us were....

now you seem to have totally turned against these guys....have you jumped ship, completely......or are you slowly transitioning away from the losing side, on to the side the rest of us belong to?.......in the process, i see that are trying to associate the rest of us with your old comrades.....

....a bit too clever, for your own good hamidm2 mian....your views on everything tom friedmans of the world supported and the passion with which you defended them, are too well documented.......

as for the rest of us: we are still on the same side we always were......back then most of the usa disagreed with what i stated......and agreed with you and tom.......now it is the other way around.......

however, i would have far more respect for you if you stuck with your old friends, and did not try to ditch them at the first opportunity.......