Tom Friedman on Lou Dobbs
By Pat Cleary Posted in Miscellanea — Comments (12) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Ah, the stuff that comes over the transom...
A reader dropped us a line last week to ask if we knew that globalization guru Tom Friedman called Lou Dobbs, "a blithering idiot" in a lecture at Yale Law School last week. Apparently, they knew someone who was in the room and heard it. Our interest, of course, was piqued and so we did a Google search and found nothing. Turns out, the session was not open to press.
Imagine our surprise, then upon receiving an-e-mail from this same person over the weekend...
...sending this link to the February 23 lecture, posted in its entirety on the Yale Law School website. Unfortunately we were not able to download and excerpt it, but we found the actual time sequence.
If you click on the video link and move the slider to the one-hour mark, you'll see a student in a blue button-down shirt stand up and ask a question. In his question, he references Dobbs and asks about "the nativist spirit" and protectionism, asks about the way issues are presented, and whether this is all more about mindset than about policy.
Friedman, three time Pulitzer Prize winner and author of bestsellers "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" and more recently "The World is Flat" (which sold a million and a half copies, far more than Dobbs' viewership), begins his answer. "One of the problems", he begins, explaining that we need leaders who can explain the complexity, not who will just stir the pot, "is we have politicians that are making us stupid, who are throwing sand in our eyes." But then he goes on:
"And then you have a blithering idiot like Lou Dobbs, in my view, who's using the platform of CNN in...the frame of a news show. This is not news. And so we have a political class not making sense of the world for people and that's why the public...is so agitated."
Ouch.
We know that an hour long video may be too long to watch, but Friedman is at times downright spellbinding. "We can't protect our way to prosperity", he says (didn't the President say that in the State of the Union Address...?), and launches into an explanation of the difference between the old model of lifetime employment vs. the new model of lifetime employability. "Education isn't a place", he says simply, "It's a process."
So while we were coaxed in by the Dobbs line, we stayed to watch it all because it's so damned interesting. No two ways about it, though, his message is the anti-Dobbs, and is ultimately one of hope and optimism.
Once again, here's the link to the site, where you'll need to download the latest version of Quicktime, and here's a link to the actual video.
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Tom Friedman on Lou Dobbs 12 Comments (0 topical, 12 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
but I still have issues with our current "free trade" set up. It is not free trade if governments own businesses that our private companies have to compete with. It is also not free trade if US companies cannot outright own Chinese companies, but they can (and expect to) own ours. Until we make a serious effort to rectify some of these issues, I will not fully support us labeling the current regime as free trade.
He's talking about the transformation from an industrial society where once you finish school you've done your learning for life and the new model where training, career-switching, and going back to school multiple times is more normal.
It used to be if you ran a small business that's what you did your whole life. Now most people go through 3-7 careers (not just jobs) over a lifetime. This requires new training, acquiring skills not available when one was in school (think computers for those over 35), etc. He's talking about globalization and its effect on society. I recommend Lexus and the Olive Tree to anyone. It's not always right, but it's worth the time.
...Although I like the term "progressive educrap".
His point is that under the old model, you got your education, punched your ticket and were done. In today's "lifetime employability" model, the process of education continues every day with people constantly learning new skills, to guarantee their adaptation, their employability going forward.
To paraphrase Milton Friedman, if someone wants to sell you buggy wheels below cost, take all the money you save on buggy wheels and use it to invent the automobile. Then thank them.
But "free trade" doesn't have to be fully free. That's to say, freer is better, and I've seen enough arguments to the effect that, since it isn't perfectly free, we need so additional restrictions.
Freer is better.
You know they have those CD lessons available now. Just an hour and you can acquire "Internet Skills" --- whatever that is :-)
I thought maybe the mispelling was on purpose so I was looking for some sort of clever cultural or political reference. Funny...it turned out to be a spelling error. I must be watching too much Dennis Miller.
Education as a lifelong process is definitely key. In this economy, there won't be anyone doing the same job for 20 years because:
- a faster, dynamic economy "eats" entire industries quicker (lots more Western Unions)
- we Gen-Xers will have no Social Security benefit and will likely work until age 80. We'd outlive the company we work for!
- once a job becomes simplified and processed into simple tasks, it will be off-shored, unless it has some natural barrier to offshoring (haircuts and cabrides)
that is rue, but if your trading partners play fast and loose, causeing REAL harm to people and industries in your nation. How does unilateral trade
capitulation make any sense.
It make about as much sense as unilateral disarmament. "Hey look at me I'm a big ole patsy, walk all over me! I read Friedman and the Wall Street Journal, yipee"
actually more efficient at a given industry, you need to learn to compete or switch to a different industry.
If they are "cheating" by subsidizing inefficient industries, they will loose in the end. In effect, their government is helping our consumers buy their products. If they limit imports, they are hurting their consumers.
Free markets win. Fascists can score a local victory by stacking the deck, but they have to steal from elsewhere in their economy to do so. So, net, the free market is always gonna win.
"Education isn't a place", he says simply, "It's a process."
WHAT?? What in hell does that mean? Do I have to watch the bloody tape to find out? Sounds like more progressivist educrap to me.