A Hot Review of "Hot, Flat and Crowded"

The best thing about a new book by Thomas Friedman is that it gets reviewed by Matt Taibi. New book "Hot, Flat and Crowded" is reviewed at: http://www.nypress.com/article-19271-flat-n-all-that.html

This one is another classic!

On Friedman's style:

"The first rule of holes is when you're in one, stop digging.When you're in three, bring a lot of shovels."

First of all, how can any single person be in three holes at once? Secondly, what the fuck is he talking about? If you're supposed to stop digging when you're in one hole, why should you dig more in three?


On Friedman's content:
"I laid out my napkin and drew a graph showing how there seemed to be a rough correlation between the price of oil, between 1975 and 2005, and the pace of freedom in oil-producing states during those same years."


Friedman plots exactly four points on the graph over the course of those 30 years. In 1989, as oil prices are falling, Friedman writes, "Berlin Wall Torn Down." In 1993, again as oil prices are low, he writes, "Nigeria Privatizes First Oil Field." 1997, oil prices still low, "Iran Calls for Dialogue of Civilizations." Then, finally, 2005, a year of high oil prices: "Iran calls for Israel's destruction."Take a look for yourself: I looked at this and thought: "Gosh, what a neat trick!" Then I sat down and drew up my own graph, called SIZE OF VALERIE BERTINELLI'S ASS, 1985-2008, vs. HAP- PINESS. It turns out that there is an almost exact correlation!
...
If you're going to draw a line that measures the level of "freedom" across the entire world and on that line plot just four randomly-selected points in time over the course of 30 years—and one of your top four "freedom points" in a 30-year period of human history is the privatization of a Nigerian oil field—well, what the fuck?


What the fuck indeed!

The final verdict?

There's so much shit flying around the book's atmosphere that you don't notice the only action is Friedman talking to himself.

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