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Finally: The Tom Friedman op-ed generator

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Okay, that has to be AP writing the headline. Classic.

John the Libertarian on December 30, 2012 at 10:04 PM

If ethnic conflict is Burkina Faso’s ironing board, then freedom is certainly its alarm clock.

steebo77 on December 30, 2012 at 10:05 PM

Krugman next?

BKeyser on December 30, 2012 at 10:06 PM

So he really doesn’t get paid for this drivel..?

d1carter on December 30, 2012 at 10:07 PM

Last week’s events in Equatorial Guinea were truly historic, although we may not know for years or even decades what their final meaning is. What’s important, however, is that we focus on what this means to the citizens themselves. The current administration seems too caught up in dissecting the macro-level situation to pay attention to how their people are doing. Just call it missing the shirts for the cloth.

When thinking about the recent troubles, it’s important to remember three things: One, people don’t behave like computer programs, so attempts to treat them as such are a waste of time. Computer programs never suddenly shift their course in order to fit with a predetermined set of beliefs. Two, Equatorial Guinea has spent decades torn by civil war and ethnic hatred, so a mindset of peace and stability will seem foreign and strange. And three, capitalism is an extraordinarily powerful idea: If ethnic conflict is Equatorial Guinea’s glass ceiling, then capitalism is certainly its flowerpot.

Priceless.

Wethal on December 30, 2012 at 10:09 PM

Friedman actually does this with this own article, the man hasn’t typed so much as a single word for his op-eds in over 15 years.

In fact ol’ Tom might have passed on already, his corpse sitting mummified in a cellar bathtub while the widow gleefully cashes the NYT paychecks.

Bishop on December 30, 2012 at 10:11 PM

This made my year

So clutch

blatantblue on December 30, 2012 at 10:14 PM

When I visited Thailand in 1998, Tintin, the cabbie who drove me from the airport, couldn’t stop telling me about how he had to take a second job because of the high cost of higher education. I caught up with Tintin in Bangkok last year. Thanks to Thailand’s reformed approach toward higher education, Tintin has enough money in his pocket to finally be able to afford a soccer ball for his kids.

If HotAir had smilies, I would be using a laughing/crying smiley right now.

Transpo on December 30, 2012 at 10:15 PM

Friedman, once again, is in fairytale-land.

But the Republican party of Rand Paul is not the Republican party of Ronald Reagan. Reagan wouldn’t refuse to budge, he’d reach across the aisle because he’d understand that the fate of the country, and his own political career, depended on a lasting solution to the problem of gas prices.

But Obama is always a charlatanic thug “I won” tyrant.

This is Friedman’s home. Start by spending less, hypocrite.

Schadenfreude on December 30, 2012 at 10:32 PM

This is absolutely hilarious. I keep hitting the generate button to see where all the word segments are plugged in; it’s quite thorough.

theperfecteconomist on December 30, 2012 at 10:45 PM

It’s good to see the talks between the president and congress getting off to a solid start, but we know there will be plenty of partisan fireworks before any deal is cut. If I had fifteen minutes to pitch my idea to politicians, I’d tell them two things about same-sex marriage. First, there’s no way around the issue unless we’re prepared to spend less: and not just spend less, but spend smarter by investing in the kind of green energy that makes countries succeed. That’s going to require some tax cuts as well, but as they say, “When in Rome.”

vegconservative on December 30, 2012 at 10:51 PM

That’s all it takes. Don’t expect to see any solutions as long as fringe bloggers insist on playing a high-stakes game of chess with one another. America has to become a first world country again.

vegconservative on December 30, 2012 at 10:51 PM

LOL. Friedman bungles the Zambian translation:

She pondered for a second, and then smiled and said, shakka-do-lakka-the, which is a local saying that means roughly, “~~Fish~~ Marxists are no respectors of human ~~boredom~~ liberty, so why go ~~angling~~ on writing — or breathing for that matter.”

ShainS on December 30, 2012 at 11:01 PM

Chomskybot
http://rubberducky.org/cgi-bin/chomsky.pl

Paul-Cincy on December 30, 2012 at 11:04 PM

Finally: The Tom Friedman op-ed generator

AP’s best of 2012!

BTW, remember that old postmodernism speech generator. It was a hoot. Wish it were still online.

petefrt on December 30, 2012 at 11:17 PM

LOL:

Second, I’d tell them to look at Sweden, which all but solved its same-sex marriage crisis over the past decade. When I visited Sweden in 1998, Kiki, the cabbie who drove me from the airport, couldn’t stop telling me about how he had to take a third job because of the high cost of same-sex marriage. I caught up with Kiki in Stockholm last year. Thanks to Sweden’s reformed approach toward same-sex marriage, Kiki has enough money in his pocket to finally be able to afford winter coats for his kids.

Baerwulf on December 31, 2012 at 12:17 AM

This thing is hilarious.

Mr. D on December 31, 2012 at 6:13 AM

On the rare occasion when it isn’t spot-on, it’s even funnier:

If I had fifteen minutes to pitch my idea to politicians, I’d tell them two things about same-sex marriage. First, there’s no way around the issue unless we’re prepared to spend more: and not just spend more, but spend smarter by investing in the kind of human capital that makes countries succeed. That’s going to require some tax increases as well, but as they say, “them’s the breaks.”

HitNRun on December 31, 2012 at 8:13 AM

Dear Samoa: Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way

So what should we do about the chaos in Samoa? Well, it’s easier to start with what we should not do. We should not lob a handful of cruise missiles and hope that some explosions will snap Samoa’s leaders to attention

Comedy Gold!

RadClown on December 31, 2012 at 9:28 AM