The ignorance of Tom Friedman and the reality of the Tea Party "movement"

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Yesterday, the NYT's Tom Friedman hit another peak in his long career of myopic, self-absorbed ignorance:

I've been trying to understand the Tea Party Movement. Sounds like a lot of angry people who want to get the government out of their lives and cut both taxes and the deficit. Nothing wrong with that -- although one does wonder where they were in the Bush years. Never mind. I'm sure like all such protest movements the Tea Partiers will get their 10 to 20 percent of the vote. But should the Tea Partiers actually aspire to break out of that range, attract lots of young people and become something more than just entertainment for Fox News, I have a suggestion:

Become the Green Tea Party.

I'd be happy to design the T-shirt logo and write the manifesto. The logo is easy. It would show young Americans throwing barrels of oil imported from Venezuela and Saudi Arabia into Boston Harbor.

The manifesto is easy, too: "We, the Green Tea Party, believe that the most effective way to advance America's national security and economic vitality would be to impose a $10 'Patriot Fee' on every barrel of imported oil, with all proceeds going to pay down our national debt."

Really? Is he serious? Does he really have so little of a clue? For a man who writes so much about the world, Friedman doesn't seem to understand anything beyond the range of his massive ego. Of course, everything he writes is a reflection of, or an extension of, that ego, so perhaps we shouldn't be surprised when he succumbs to idiocy.

Thankfully, John Cole has provided just the sort of blistering response we need:

They weren't around protesting during the Bush years BECAUSE THE TEA PARTY IS REPUBLICANS. They don't care about the deficit. They care that a Democrat (and a black "Muslim," to boot), is in the White House. They don't care about fiscal restraint, they care that a Democrat is in the White House. They don't, as some foolishly pretend, care about the Wall Street excesses. Certainly Cenk Uyger is not the only one who has noticed that the tea party bubbas could all be shipped to protest HCR, but the big money boys aren't running the buses to protest Wall Street. They care that there is a Democrat in the White House.

And those crowds of angry white old people screaming "keep government out of my medicare" and waving signs of "Drill, baby, drill?" They sure as hell don’t care about the environment and are not going to become some sort of "Green Tea Party."

All they care about is that there is a Democrat in the White House.

Has Friedman really never gotten this? Is he really so green? Has he never paid even the slightest attention to the whole Tea Party "movement"? Has he never watched The Daily Show?

Is he not embarrassed to publish such stupidity in the pages of America's (supposed) newspaper of record?