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The Idiocy of Thomas L. Friedman

by Rush Limbaugh - May 19,2011

RUSH: I mentioned yesterday Thomas L. Friedman of the New York Times has often written of the beauty of the ChiCom system. A one party autocracy, he has written, is oftentimes preferable to a democracy or a republic if the right people are the dictators because they can more efficiently get things done. By the way, I did not see this, but I have to tell you a story. I didn’t see it, but it was relayed to me. Last Saturday I went out and played golf at a golf course here. I walked outta the locker room, I walked down the steps, said hello to the caddy master, said hello to my caddy, Eli, and I went and grabbed my cart and so forth. A friend of mine said, ‘You may not know it, but Thomas Friedman is on the putting green over there with a broken neck.’ I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ ‘Yeah, Thomas Friedman did a double-take when he saw you. He jerked his neck around so fast he’s on the putting green with a broken neck.’ I said, ‘Are you kidding?’ I looked over there and I didn’t see Thomas L. Friedman. The story was not relayed to me immediately, but apparently Friedman played the same golf course, teed off four or five groups ahead of me.

So when I arrived he’s on the putting green, which is the last thing you do before you go tee off. (interruption) What is Friedman doing playing on a golf course for the rich? I don’t know. I’m not a member of this place. He is. I do know that. But there isn’t a golf course in the world that isn’t for the rich, right? (laughing) Isn’t that the rub? Yeah, a good friend of mine said, ‘You shoulda seen the double-take this guy did when he saw you, neck jerked around. I wouldn’t be surprised if they had to take him to the hospital.’ I missed it. Wished I’d seen it. Anyway, Thomas L. Friedman of the New York Times has written that the Chinese autocracy is much more preferable to our system if the right people are running it. He was on a cable network this morning, and he was asked, ‘Is there any president capable of pulling Congress and the American people together to fix the problems that we have in this country?’


FRIEDMAN: We had the president of China here. There’s only one thing worse, in my view, than one party autocracy, the Chinese system, and that’s one party democracy. Okay, so you got one
party autocracy —

RUSH: Stop the tape and recue it. Now, remember what I told you to set this up. Thomas L. Friedman believes a one party autocracy, a dictatorship, is much preferable to what we have if the right people are running it, members of the approved ruling class. Okay. Now, listen carefully here. He was asked if there is any president capable of pulling Congress and America together to fix the problems that we have. Now, listen very carefully to the opening of this bite.

FRIEDMAN: We had the president of China here. There’s only one thing worse, in my view, than one party autocracy, the Chinese system, and that’s one party democracy. Okay, so you got one party autocracy, at least if it has some vision of the future, but when you have one party democracy, that is you have one party trying to do things and the other sticking a spoke in its wheels constantly, you can’t get anything big done, and that, to me, seems to be our real dilemma today.

RUSH: Well, there he is. He just got through saying the only thing worse than the ChiCom system is ours. The only thing worse, in my view, than one party autocracy, the ChiCom system, is one party democracy. So I guess now we have one party democracy. We got a Democrat running the show in the White House. We have the Democrats running the Senate. We have for the first time in, what, four years, the Republicans running the House, and all of a sudden — and this is the lead column — and folks, I have friends, I am ashamed to admit this, I would love to publicly humiliate them by mentioning their names, I won’t do it, but I have friends who have left the golf course at 11:30 in the morning to go hear Thomas L. Friedman speak at a place they have here where they import usually New York Times liberals and network television liberals to come down and share their view of the world. Well, acquaintances, golf buddies, and this guy goes, ‘I gotta go.’ I said, ‘Where you going?’ ‘Thomas Friedman’s speaking.’ ‘What? You’re leaving here to go listen to Thomas L. Friedman?’ ‘Yeah, what’s wrong with that?’ ‘Why do you want to dumb yourself down? He is clueless.’ ‘Rush, he writes for the New York Times.’ ‘And that’s a plus?’

So, anyway, one party autocracy, if it has some vision of the future, that’s great. But when you have one party democracy, one party trying to do things — i.e., Obama — and the other sticking a spoke in its wheels constantly, you can’t get anything big done. Now, this makes no sense. How can you have one party democracy when one party can stop the other? Isn’t that two party democracy? I’m sorry, it’s the way I think. Now, granted, I didn’t break my neck on the putting green on the golf course Saturday and the blood flow to my brain’s not restricted here, but if you have one party democracy, they can do whatever they want, right? But he claims a one party democracy here, you got one party trying to do things and the other sticking a spoke in its wheels, that’s two party democracy to me. So none of this really makes any sense. But, that doesn’t matter. To the ruling class types, to the establishment types, that is the essence of unique brilliance. This is the kind of thing that causes people to pause and be dazzled and say, ‘Gosh, I wish I had that kind of brain.’ And it’s just nonsense, all of that is absolute nonsense.