Thomas Loren Friedman
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Thomas Loren Friedman (; born July 20, 1953) is an American political commentator and author. He is a three-time
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...
winner who is a weekly
columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (newspaper), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the fo ...
for '' The New York Times''. He has written extensively on
foreign affairs ''Foreign Affairs'' is an American magazine of international relations and U.S. foreign policy published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonprofit, nonpartisan, membership organization and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and ...
, global trade, the Middle East, globalization, and environmental issues.


Early life and education

Friedman was born on July 20, 1953, in
Minneapolis, Minnesota Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...
, the son of Margaret Blanche (née Phillips) and Harold Abe Friedman. Harold, who was vice president of a ball bearing company, United Bearing, died of a heart attack in 1973 when Tom was nineteen years old. Margaret, who served in the United States Navy during World War II and studied Home Economics at the University of Wisconsin, was a homemaker and a
part-time Part-time can refer to: * Part-time job, a job that has fewer hours a week than a full-time job * Part-time student, a student, usually in higher education, who takes fewer course credits than a full-time student * Part Time, an American pop band ...
bookkeeper. Margaret was also a Senior Life Master duplicate bridge player, and died in 2008. Friedman has two older sisters, Shelly and Jane. From an early age, Friedman, whose father often took him to the golf course for a round after work, wanted to be a professional golfer. He played a lot of sports, and became serious about tennis and golf. He caddied at a local country club and in 1970 caddied for professional golfer Chi Chi Rodriguez when the US Open came to town. Friedman is Jewish. He attended Hebrew school five days a week until his Bar Mitzvah, then
St. Louis Park High School St. Louis Park High School is a four-year public high school located in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, United States. St. Louis Park High School is ranked by ''Newsweek'' as #290 in their "List of the 1500 Top High Schools in America," #3 among Minnes ...
, where he wrote articles for his school's newspaper. He became enamored with Israel after a visit there in December 1968, and he spent all three of his high school summers living on
Kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...
HaHotrim, near Haifa.''From Beirut to Jerusalem''. 1990, page 5 He has characterized his high school years as "one big celebration of Israel's victory in the Six-Day War." Friedman studied at the University of Minnesota for two years, but later transferred to Brandeis University and graduated ''
summa cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sou ...
'' in 1975 with a degree in Mediterranean studies. Friedman also pursued Arabic studies at The American University in Cairo, where he graduated in 1974 from its Arabic language unit (ALU). Friedman later taught a class in economics at Brandeis in 2006, and was a
commencement speaker A commencement speech or commencement address is a speech given to graduating students, generally at a university, although the term is also used for secondary education institutions and in similar institutions around the world. The commencement ...
there in 2007. After graduating from Brandeis, he attended St Antony's College at the University of Oxford as a Marshall Scholar, earning an M.Phil. in Middle Eastern studies.


Journalism career

Friedman joined the London bureau of United Press International after completing his master's degree. He was dispatched a year later to Beirut, where he lived from June 1979 to May 1981 while covering the Lebanon Civil War. He was hired by ''The New York Times'' as a reporter in 1981 and re-dispatched to Beirut at the start of the
1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon The 1982 Lebanon War, dubbed Operation Peace for Galilee ( he, מבצע שלום הגליל, or מבצע של"ג ''Mivtsa Shlom HaGalil'' or ''Mivtsa Sheleg'') by the Israeli government, later known in Israel as the Lebanon War or the First L ...
. His coverage of the war, particularly the Sabra and Shatila massacre, won him the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting (shared with Loren Jenkins of '' The Washington Post''). Alongside
David K. Shipler David K. Shipler (born December 3, 1942) is an American author and journalist. He won the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-fiction in 1987 for '' Arab and Jew: Wounded Spirits in a Promised Land''. Among his other publications the book entitled, '' ...
he also won the George Polk Award for foreign reporting. In June 1984, Friedman was transferred to Jerusalem, where he served as the ''New York Times'' Jerusalem Bureau Chief until February 1988. That year he received a second Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting, which cited his coverage of the First Palestinian Intifada. He wrote a book, ''
From Beirut to Jerusalem ''From Beirut to Jerusalem'' (1989) is a book by American journalist Thomas L. Friedman chronicling his days as a reporter in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War and in Jerusalem through the first year of the Intifada. Friedman wrote a 17-pa ...
'', describing his experiences in the Middle East, which won the 1989 U.S. National Book Award for Nonfiction. Friedman covered Secretary of State James Baker during the administration of President
George H. W. Bush George Herbert Walker BushSince around 2000, he has been usually called George H. W. Bush, Bush Senior, Bush 41 or Bush the Elder to distinguish him from his eldest son, George W. Bush, who served as the 43rd president from 2001 to 2009; pr ...
. Following the election of Bill Clinton in 1992, Friedman became the White House correspondent for the ''New York Times''. In 1994, he began to write more about
foreign policy A State (polity), state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterall ...
and economics, and moved to the
op-ed An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written prose piece, typically published by a North-American newspaper or magazine, which expresses the opinion of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. O ...
page of ''The New York Times'' the following year as a foreign affairs columnist. In 2002, Friedman won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for his "clarity of vision, based on extensive reporting, in commenting on the worldwide impact of the terrorist threat." List of ten 2001 articles.)/ref> In February 2002, Friedman met
Saudi Saudi may refer to: * Saudi Arabia * Saudis, people from Saudi Arabia * Saudi culture, the culture of Saudi Arabia * House of Saud The House of Saud ( ar, آل سُعُود, ʾĀl Suʿūd ) is the ruling royal family of Saudi Arabia. It is c ...
Crown Prince Abdullah and encouraged him to make a comprehensive attempt to end the Arab–Israeli conflict by normalizing Arab relations with Israel in exchange for the return of refugees alongside an end to the Israel territorial occupations. Abdullah proposed the Arab Peace Initiative at the Beirut Summit that March, which Friedman has since strongly supported. Friedman received the 2004 Overseas Press Club Award for lifetime achievement and the same year was named to the Order of the British Empire by
Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. She was queen ...
. In May 2011, '' The New York Times'' reported that President Barack Obama "has sounded out" Friedman concerning Middle East issues.


Views

Friedman has been criticized for his staunch advocacy of the Iraq War and unregulated trade and his early support of Saudi Royal Prince Mohammed bin Salman.


Aadhaar

Friedman has publicly expressed his support for the biometrics based Unique Identification program of India. When asked about the privacy concerns raised by the UID program in India he said


Globalization

Friedman first discussed his views on globalization in the book ''The Lexus and the Olive Tree'' (1999). In 2004, visits to Bangalore, India, and
Dalian Dalian () is a major sub-provincial port city in Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, and is Liaoning's second largest city (after the provincial capital Shenyang) and the third-most populous city of Northeast China. Located on the ...
, China, led Friedman to write a follow-up analysis, '' The World Is Flat'' (2005). The book was on the ''New York Times'' Best Seller list from its April 2005 publication until May 2007. Friedman believes that individual countries must sacrifice some degree of economic sovereignty to global institutions (such as
capital market A capital market is a financial market in which long-term debt (over a year) or equity-backed securities are bought and sold, in contrast to a money market where short-term debt is bought and sold. Capital markets channel the wealth of savers t ...
s and multinational corporations), a situation he has termed the "golden straitjacket". In 2000, Friedman championed Free Trade with The People's Republic of China, claiming that Free Trade would make China more democratic. He has also expressed concern about the United States' lack of energy independence. He has stated, "First rule of oil—addicts never tell the truth to their pushers. We are the addicts, the oil producers are the pushers—we've never had an honest conversation with the Saudis." In 2007, Friedman viewed American immigration laws as too restrictive and damaging to U.S. economic output: "It is pure idiocy that Congress will not open our borders—as wide as possible—to attract and keep the world's first-round intellectual draft choices in an age when everyone increasingly has the same innovation tools and the key differentiator is human talent." After visiting the San Ysidro Port of Entry in San Diego, California in early April 2019, Friedman wrote, "The whole day left me more certain than ever that we have a real immigration crisis and that the solution is a high wall with a big gate — but a smart gate."


Terrorism

After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Friedman's writing focused more on the threat of terrorism and the Middle East. He was awarded the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary "for his clarity of vision, based on extensive reporting, in commenting on the worldwide impact of the terrorist threat". These columns were collected and published in the book ''
Longitudes and Attitudes ''Longitudes and Attitudes: Exploring the World After September 11'' (reprinted as ''Longitudes and Attitudes: The World in the Age of Terrorism'' in 2003) is the third book by ''New York Times'' columnist Thomas Friedman. Firstly published in Se ...
''. For a while, his reporting on post-9/11 topics led him to diverge from his prior interests in technological advances and globalization, until he began to research ''The World Is Flat''. After the 7/7 London bombings, Friedman called for the
U.S. State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...
to "shine a spotlight on
hate speech Hate speech is defined by the ''Cambridge Dictionary'' as "public speech that expresses hate or encourages violence towards a person or group based on something such as race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation". Hate speech is "usually thoug ...
wherever it appears", and to create a quarterly "War of Ideas Report, which would focus on those religious leaders and writers who are inciting violence against others". Friedman said the governmental speech-monitoring should go beyond those who actually advocate violence, and include also those whom former State Department spokesperson Jamie Rubin calls "excuse makers". In his July 22 column, Friedman wrote against the "excuses" made by terrorists or apologists who blame their actions on third-party influences or pressures. "After every major terrorist incident, the excuse makers come out to tell us ... why the terrorists acted. These excuse makers are just one notch less despicable than the terrorists and also deserve to be exposed. When you live in an open society like London, where anyone with a grievance can publish an article, run for office or start a political movement, the notion that blowing up a busload of innocent civilians in response to Iraq is somehow "understandable" is outrageous. "It erases the distinction between legitimate dissent and terrorism" Mr. Rubin said, "and an open society needs to maintain a clear wall between them." As part of their response to this column, the editors at
FAIR A fair (archaic: faire or fayre) is a gathering of people for a variety of entertainment or commercial activities. Fairs are typically temporary with scheduled times lasting from an afternoon to several weeks. Types Variations of fairs incl ...
encouraged their readers to contact Friedman and inform him that "opponents of the Iraq War do not deserve to be on a government blacklist-even if they oppose the war because they believe it encourages terrorism".


Kosovo War

During the
1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) carried out an aerial bombing campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the Kosovo War. The air strikes lasted from 24 March 1999 to 10 June 1999. The bombings continued until an a ...
, Friedman wrote the following in ''The New York Times'' on April 23, 1999: "Like it or not, we are at war with the Serbian nation (the Serbs certainly think so), and the stakes have to be very clear: Every week you ravage Kosovo is another decade we will set your country back by pulverizing you. You want 1950? We can do 1950. You want 1389? We can do 1389 too." Friedman urged the US to destroy "in Belgrade: every power grid, water pipe, bridge ndroad", annex Albania and Macedonia as "U.S. protectorates", "occupy the Balkans for years," and " ve war a chance." Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) labeled Friedman's remarks "war-mongering" and "crude race-hatred and war-crime agitation". Steve Chapman, critical of the response taken by NATO, referred to Friedman as "the most fervent supporter of the air war" and ironically asked in the '' Chicago Tribune'': "Why stop at 1389? Why not revive the idea, proposed but never adopted in Vietnam, of bombing the enemy all the way back to the Stone Age?" Norman Solomon asserted in 2007 that "a tone of sadism could be discerned" in Friedman's article.


Iraq

Friedman supported the
2003 invasion of Iraq The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including 26 ...
, writing that the establishment of a democratic state in the Middle East would force other countries in the region to liberalize and modernize. In his February 9, 2003, column for '' The Wall Street Journal'', Friedman also pointed to the lack of compliance with the United Nations Security Council Resolution regarding Iraq's weapons of mass destruction: Nevertheless, he found the incoherence of the American position to be an asset, arguing that "the axis-of-evil idea isn't thought through -- but that's what I like about it. (...) There is a lot about the Bush team's foreign policy I don't like, but their willingness to restore our deterrence, and to be as crazy as some of our enemies, is one thing they have right. It is the only way we're going to get our turkey back. After the invasion, Friedman expressed alarm over the post-invasion conduct of the war by the George W. Bush administration. Nevertheless, until his piece dated August 4, 2006 (see below), his columns remained hopeful to the possibility of a positive conclusion to the Iraq conflict (although his optimism appeared to steadily diminish as the conflict continued). Friedman chided George W. Bush and Tony Blair for "hyping" the evidence, and stated plainly that converting Iraq to democracy "would be a huge undertaking, though, and maybe impossible, given Iraq's fractious history". In January 2004, he participated in a forum on ''
Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
'' called " Liberal Hawks Reconsider the Iraq War", in which he dismisses the justification for war based on Iraq's lack of compliance with the U.N. Resolutions: In his September 29, 2005, column in ''The New York Times'', Friedman entertained the idea of supporting the Kurds and Shias in a civil war against the
Sunnis Sunni Islam () is the largest Islamic schools and branches, branch of Islam, followed by 85–90% of the world's Muslims. Its name comes from the word ''Sunnah'', referring to the tradition of Muhammad. The differences between Sunni and Shia ...
: "If they the Sunnis won't come around, we should arm the Shiites and Kurds and leave the Sunnis of Iraq to reap the wind." Critics of Friedman's position on the Iraq War have noted his recurrent assertion that "the next six months" will prove critical in determining the outcome of the conflict. A May 2006 study by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting cited 14 examples of Friedman's declaring the next "few months" or "six months" as a decisive or critical period, dating from in November 2003, describing it as "a long series of similar do-or-die dates that never seem to get any closer". The blogger Atrios coined the neologism "
Friedman Unit The Friedman Unit, or simply Friedman, Note: the General's name is Petraeus. is a tongue-in-cheek neologism. One Friedman Unit is equal to six months, specifically the "next six months", a period repeatedly declared by ''New York Times'' columnist ...
" to refer to this unit of time in relation to Iraq, noting its use as a supposedly critical window of opportunity. In a live television interview aired June 11, 2006, on CNN, Howard Kurtz asked Friedman about the concept: "Now, I want to understand how a columnist's mind works when you take positions, because you were chided recently for writing several times in different occasions 'the next six months are crucial in Iraq.'" Friedman responded: "The fact is that the outcome there is unclear, and I reflected that in my column. And I will continue to reflect." Responding to prodding from Stephen Colbert, Friedman said in 2007: "We've run out of six months. It's really time to set a deadline."


Environment

''Iran's Great Weakness May Be Its Oil'', by Thomas Friedman, challenges and debates conflicts about oil. Friedman states,"The best tool we have for curbing Iran's influence is not containment or engagement, but getting the price of oil down in the long term with conservation and an alternative-energy strategy. Let's exploit Iran's oil addiction by ending ours". In ''
Hot, Flat, and Crowded ''Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution—And How It Can Renew America'' is a book by '' New York Times'' Foreign Affairs columnist Thomas Friedman, proposing that the solutions to global warming and the best method to regain t ...
'', he says that "any car company that gets taxpayer money must demonstrate a plan for transforming every vehicle in its fleet to a hybrid-electric engine with flex-fuel capability, so its entire fleet can also run on next generation cellulosic ethanol". In a Fresh Dialogues interview, Friedman described his motivations for writing the book: "My concern is about America.... Demand for clean energy, clean fuel and energy efficiency is clearly going to explode; it's going to be the next great global industry. I know that as sure as I know that I'm sitting here at De Anza College talking to you. By being big in the next big thing, we'll be seen by the rest of the world as working on the most important problem in the world." Some of Friedman's environmental critics question his support of still-undeveloped coal pollution mitigation technology ("clean coal") and coal mining as emblematic of Friedman's less than "green" commitment to renewable energy.The NYT's Thomas Friedman
January 2007


Israel

Friedman has been criticized by organizations such as Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting for defending Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon as a form of "educating" Israel's opponents; according to FAIR, Friedman was explicitly endorsing terrorism by Israel against Lebanese and Palestinians. Journalist Glenn Greenwald and professor Noam Chomsky also accused Friedman of endorsing and encouraging terrorism by Israeli forces. Political reporter Belen Fernandez heavily critiques Friedman's commentary regarding Israel. Among other criticisms, Fernandez singles out Friedman's suggestion that Israeli forces were unaware that their allied Lebanese militias carried out the Sabra and Shatila massacre while under their guard, contradicting the assessments of other journalists and observers; his encouragement of strong-armed force by the Israeli army against Palestinians; and his opposition to settlements only on the grounds that they are counter-productive, rather than because they violate international law or cause suffering for Palestinians. Fernandez suggests that Friedman is most worried about successfully maintaining Israel's Jewish ethnocracy and actively opposing a "one-man, one-vote" system of democracy. Friedman has also come under criticism from supporters of Israel. In an op-ed, Yitzhak Benhorin criticized Friedman's alleged suggestion that Israel relinquish territory it had occupied in the 1967 Middle Eastern War. Friedman sparked criticism for writing that congressional ovations for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby." A letter from the
American Jewish Committee The American Jewish Committee (AJC) is a Jewish advocacy group established on November 11, 1906. It is one of the oldest Jewish advocacy organizations and, according to ''The New York Times'', is "widely regarded as the dean of American Jewish org ...
objected that "Public opinion polls consistently show a high level of American ... support for and identification with Israel. This indicates that the people's elected representatives are fully reflecting the will of the voters." Friedman responded to criticism by writing: "In retrospect I probably should have used a more precise term like 'engineered' by the Israel lobby – a term that does not suggest grand conspiracy theories that I don't subscribe to." Friedman hailed the Trump-brokered peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates as "exactly what Trump said it was in his tweet: a 'HUGE breakthrough.


China

In September 2009, Friedman wrote an article praising China's one-party
autocracy Autocracy is a system of government in which absolute power over a state is concentrated in the hands of one person, whose decisions are subject neither to external legal restraints nor to regularized mechanisms of popular control (except perh ...
, saying that China's leaders are "boosting gasoline prices" and "overtaking us in electric cars, solar power, energy efficiency, batteries, nuclear power and wind power." The article was in turn subject to critical analysis: Matt Lewis who wrote, "Friedman's apparent wish for a 'benign' dictator is utopian, inasmuch as it ignores Lord Acton's warning that 'absolute power corrupts absolutely.'" and William Easterly who quotes Friedman's one-party autocracy assertions as part of his academic paper in which he concluded that, "Formal theory and evidence provides little or no basis on which to believe the benevolent autocrat story" and that, "economists should retain their traditional skepticism for stories that have little good theory or empirics to support them." However, in a July 2012 article in the NYT, he also wrote that the current Chinese leadership has not used its surging economic growth to also introduce gradual political reform and that, "Corruption is as bad as ever, institutionalized transparency and rule of law remain weak and consensual politics nonexistent." When asked if he had "China envy" during a Fresh Dialogues interview, Friedman replied, "You detect the envy of someone who wants his own government to act democratically with the same effectiveness that China can do autocratically." Likewise, in a 2011 interview with the BBC Friedman says that he wants his children to live in a world where "there's a strong America counterbalancing a strong and thriving China, and not one where you have a strong and rising China and an America that is uncertain, weak and unable to project power economically and militarily it historically did." Friedman's work is popular in China. His book ''The World is Flat'' was a bestseller in the country, although criticism of China in the book was removed when it was published in the country. A translated version of his article from ''The New York Times'', "China Needs Its Own Dream", has been credited with popularizing the phrase " Chinese Dream" in China, a term that was later adopted as a slogan by Xi Jinping. Friedman, in the magazine ''
Foreign Policy A State (polity), state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterall ...
'', has attributed the phrase to Peggy Liu and her environmental NGO JUCCCE. In September 2020, Friedman told CNBC that "Trump is not the American president America deserves, in my opinion. But he definitely is the American president China deserved. We needed to have a president who was going to call the game with China. And Trump has done it, with I would say more grit and toughness than any of his predecessors. I give him credit for that."


Iran

As the Iran nuclear deal agreement reached between Iran and a group of world powers (the P5+1). In Friedman's interview, he mentioned that "Our view of the Middle East is deeply colored by Israel, Saudi Arabia and Turkey and they all have their own interest. 15 of the 19 hijackers on 911 were from Saudi Arabia, none from Iran! Iranians had a spontaneous demonstration to support Americans on 911." He added, "What strikes you most about Iran (vs. Saudi Arabia) is that Iran has real politics... A country of 85 million people, a great civilization, many educated men and women, if they want to get a bomb they will get it. They have demonstrated they could do it under the most severe sanctions... Show me where Iranians have acted reckless ike Saddam Hussein These are survivors."


Radical centrism

In the 2010s, Friedman wrote several columns supporting the politics of radical centrism. In one he stated that, if the "radical center wants to be empowered, it can't just whine. It needs its own grass-roots movement". In another column Friedman promoted
Americans Elect Americans Elect was a political organization in the United States known primarily for its efforts to stage a national online primary for the 2012 US Presidential Election. Although it was successful in obtaining signatures to get on the ballot i ...
, an organization trying to field a radical-centrist candidate for the
2012 U.S. presidential election The 2012 United States presidential election was the 57th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. Incumbent Democratic President Barack Obama and his running mate, incumbent Vice President Joe Biden, were r ...
. That column decried "the two-party duopoly that has dominated American political life". Friedman's radical-centrist columns received a considerable amount of criticism, particularly from liberals.


Criticism

American journalist Glenn Greenwald, writing for ''
Salon Salon may refer to: Common meanings * Beauty salon, a venue for cosmetic treatments * French term for a drawing room, an architectural space in a home * Salon (gathering), a meeting for learning or enjoyment Arts and entertainment * Salon (P ...
'' on July 25, 2012, commented: "His status among American elites is the single most potent fact for understanding the nation's imperial decline."
John Esposito John Louis Esposito (born May 19, 1940) is an Italian-American academic, professor of Middle Eastern and religious studies, and scholar of Islamic studies, who serves as Professor of Religion, International Affairs, and Islamic Studies at Geor ...
criticized him in 2014 for writing twice that Muslims do not speak up against terrorism, and yet "his own newspaper has had these denunciations
y Muslims Y, or y, is the twenty-fifth and penultimate Letter (alphabet), letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the English alphabet, modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. According to some auth ...
" Some critics have derided Friedman's idiosyncratic prose style, with its tendency to use mixed metaphors and analogies. Walter Russell Mead described his prose as being "an occasionally flat Midwestern demotic punctuated by gee-whiz exclamations about just how doggone irresistible globalization is – lacks the steely elegance of a
Lippmann Lippmann is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Alexandre Lippmann (1881–1960), French Olympic champion fencer * Bernard Lippmann, American physicist, known for the Lippmann–Schwinger equation * Edmund Oscar von Lippman ...
, the unobtrusive serviceability of a
Scotty Reston James Barrett Reston (November 3, 1909 – December 6, 1995), nicknamed "Scotty", was an American journalist whose career spanned the mid-1930s to the early 1990s. He was associated for many years with ''The New York Times.'' Early lif ...
or the restless fireworks of a Maureen Dowd and is best taken in small doses." Similarly, journalist Matt Taibbi has said of Friedman's writing that, "Friedman came up with lines so hilarious you couldn't make them up even if you were trying – and when you tried to actually picture the 'illustrative' figures of speech he offered to explain himself, what you often ended up with was pure physical comedy of the
Buster Keaton Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton (October 4, 1895 – February 1, 1966) was an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is best known for his silent film work, in which his trademark was physical comedy accompanied by a stoic, deadpan expression ...
/ Three Stooges school, with whole nations and peoples slipping and falling on the misplaced banana peels of his literary endeavors." In a column for the '' New York Press'',
Alexander Cockburn Alexander Claud Cockburn ( ; 6 June 1941 – 21 July 2012) was a Scottish-born Irish-American political journalist and writer. Cockburn was brought up by British parents in Ireland, but lived and worked in the United States from 1972. Together ...
wrote: "Friedman exhibits on a weekly basis one of the severest cases known to science of Lippmann's condition, named for the legendary journalistic hot-air salesman, Walter Lippmann, and alluding to the inherent tendency of all pundits to swell in self-importance to zeppelin-like dimensions". Cockburn said Friedman's hubris allowed him to pass off another war correspondent's experience in Beirut as his own. In December, 2017, Hamid Dabashi wrote about Friedman: "Thomas Friedman is an ignorant fool - and I do not mean that as an insult. I mean it as a clinical diagnosis of an almost-illiterate man who has been cheated out of a proper undergraduate education, sold as a liberal Zionist to the highest bidder, and thus has managed to ramble and blabber his way up as a top-notch ''New York Times'' columnist." In November 2017 Mehdi Hasan criticized "Saudi Arabia’s Arab Spring, at Last", a column written by Friedman, in which the latter characterized Mohammed bin Salman as a modernizing reformer and a champion of a moderate form of Islam. Hasan described Friedman's article as "nauseating", and suggested that "if the Saudi Arabian government were to set up a Ministry of Truth and Propaganda, they could offer the job of minister to Tom Friedman", critiquing the piece for only mentioning the Yemeni Civil War in passing despite Saudi Arabia and bin Salman's significant involvement in the conflict, and arguing that Friedman's claim that bin Salman was returning Saudi Islam to a state of moderation that existed before the 1979 Grand Mosque seizure in Mecca ignored the long history of ties between the
Salafi movement The Salafi movement or Salafism () is a reform branch movement within Sunni Islam that originated during the nineteenth century. The name refers to advocacy of a return to the traditions of the "pious predecessors" (), the first three generati ...
and the
House of Saud The House of Saud ( ar, آل سُعُود, ʾĀl Suʿūd ) is the ruling royal family of Saudi Arabia. It is composed of the descendants of Muhammad bin Saud, founder of the Emirate of Diriyah, known as the First Saudi state (1727–1818), and ...
. In April 2018, Barrett Brown criticized Friedman for "his serial habit of giving the benefit of the doubt to whoever happens to hold power", such as Friedman's column supporting Vladimir Putin as a modernizing reformer, in which he urged Americans to "keep rootin' for Putin". Retrieved November 17, 2021 Brown also used this phrase in the title of his 2014 book "''Keep Rootin' for Putin: Establishment Pundits and the Twilight of American Competence''".


Documentaries

Friedman has hosted several documentaries for the
Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...
from several locations around the world. In ''Straddling the Fence'' (2003), he visited the West Bank and spoke to Israelis and Palestinians about the Israeli West Bank barrier and its impact on their lives. Also in 2003, ''Thomas L. Friedman Reporting: Searching for the Roots of 9/11'' aired on the Discovery Times Channel. This program investigated how the Sept. 11th attacks in New York, Pennsylvania, and the Pentagon were viewed in the Muslim world. In ''The Other Side of Outsourcing'' (2004), he visited a call centre in Bangalore, interviewing the young Indians working there, and then travelled to an impoverished rural part of India, where he debated the pros and cons of globalization with locals (this trip spawned his later book ''The World is Flat''). In ''Does Europe Hate Us?'' (2005), Friedman travelled through Britain, France and Germany, talking with academics, journalists, Marshall and Rhodes scholars, young Muslims and others about the nature of the strained relationship between Europe and the United States. ''Addicted to Oil'' (2006) premiered at the Silverdocs Documentary Festival at 5:30 PM on June 16, 2006, and aired on June 24, 2006, on the Discovery Times Channel. In it he examined the geopolitical, economic, and environmental consequences of petroleum use and ways that green technologies such as alternative fuels and energy efficiency and conservation can reduce
oil dependence Energy independence is independence or autarky regarding energy resources, energy supply and/or energy generation by the energy industry. Energy dependence, in general, refers to mankind's general dependence on either primary or secondary energ ...
. In '' Green: The New Red, White and Blue'' (2007), Friedman elaborates on the green technologies and efforts touched on in ''Addicted to Oil'' and in doing so, attempts to redefine green energy as ''geostrategic, geoeconomic, capitalistic and patriotic''. He explores efforts by companies and individuals to reduce their carbon footprint and save money with conservation, efficiency, and technologies such as solar, wind, biomass, nuclear, and clean coal. In 2014, Friedman served as a correspondent for '' Years of Living Dangerously'', a documentary show about climate change. For the show's first season, he traveled to cover the role climate change has played in conflicts in the region. He also interviewed U.S. President Barack Obama. For the show's second season in 2016, he traveled to Africa.


Personal life

Friedman's wife, Ann (née Bucksbaum) is a teacher and a native of Marshalltown, Iowa. A graduate of
Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
and the London School of Economics, she is the daughter of real estate developer Matthew Bucksbaum, whom Friedman describes as his "best friend". They were married in London on Thanksgiving Day 1978 and live in an 11,400-square-foot mansion in Bethesda, Maryland. They have two daughters, Orly (b. 1985) and Natalie (b. 1988). Friedman supported Hillary Clinton for President of the United States in the
2016 election The following elections occurred in the year 2016. Africa Benin Republic *2016 Beninese presidential election 6 March 2016 Cape Verde * 2016 Cape Verdean presidential election 2 October 2016 Chad * 2016 Chadian presidential election 10 A ...
, and supported
Michael Bloomberg Michael Rubens Bloomberg (born February 14, 1942) is an American businessman, politician, philanthropist, and author. He is the majority owner, co-founder and CEO of Bloomberg L.P. He was Mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, and was a ca ...
in the 2020 primaries. He supported Joe Biden in the
2020 United States presidential election The 2020 United States presidential election was the 59th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. The Democratic ticket of former vice president Joe Biden and the junior U.S. senator from California Kamala Ha ...
. Friedman is on the board of directors for
Planet Word Planet Word is a language arts museum that opened in Washington, D.C., in October 2020. The museum is described as "The museum where language comes to life" and features interactive exhibits dedicated to topics such as the history of the English ...
, a Washington, D.C. based private museum dedicated to language.


Published works

* ''
From Beirut to Jerusalem ''From Beirut to Jerusalem'' (1989) is a book by American journalist Thomas L. Friedman chronicling his days as a reporter in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War and in Jerusalem through the first year of the Intifada. Friedman wrote a 17-pa ...
'' (1989; expanded edition 1990) – winner of the National Book Award in its first edition * '' The Lexus and the Olive Tree: Understanding Globalization'' (1999; revised edition 2000) * '' Longitudes and Attitudes: Exploring the World After September 11'' (2002; reprinted 2003 as ''Longitudes and Attitudes: The World in the Age of Terrorism'') * '' The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century'' (2005; expanded edition 2006; revised edition 2007) * '' Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution—And How It Can Renew America'' (2008) * '' That Used to Be Us: How America Fell Behind in the World It Invented and How We Can Come Back'' (Co-written with Michael Mandelbaum 2011) * '' Thank You for Being Late: Finding a Job, Running a Country, and Keeping Your Head in an Age of Accelerations'' (November, 2016)


Awards and recognition

Friedman has won the
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...
three times: * 1983: for his coverage of the war in Lebanon. A distinguished example of international reporting * 1988: for coverage of Israel: a distinguished example of reporting on international affairs * 2002: for his commentary illuminating the worldwide impact of the terrorist threat Additionally, in 2004 he was elected as a member of the Pulitzer Prize Board, from which he retired in 2013. In 2003, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society that same year.


See also

*
Curiosity quotient Curiosity quotient is a term put forth by author and journalist Thomas L. Friedman as part of an illustrative formula to explain how individuals can be powerfully motivated to learn about a personally interesting subject, whether or not they posse ...
* New Yorkers in journalism


References


External links

*
Columns for ''The New York Times''
* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Friedman, Thomas 1953 births Living people Alumni of St Antony's College, Oxford American columnists American male journalists American non-fiction environmental writers Brandeis University alumni Bucksbaum family Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs George Polk Award recipients Jewish American journalists Jewish American writers Marshall Scholars National Book Award winners People from Bethesda, Maryland People from St. Louis Park, Minnesota Pulitzer Prize for Commentary winners Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting winners Radical centrist writers The New York Times columnists University of Minnesota alumni Writers about globalization Writers from Maryland Writers from Minnesota Members of the American Philosophical Society