Centerfield

The Middle East is publishing peer reviewed scientific papers at a far higher rate now than just a couple of years ago. In 2002 Egypt alone had 2,492 papers. Friedman needs to use current ISI data to see that the trend is steeply up. Atrois and his choir are ignorant wankers.

back40,

Now that is a comment with substance (and a touch of snideness)

Well Rick, I must say that if you really think Friedman is 'engaging' then I see very little future for the centrists. I'd like to be a radical centrist--really. But if Friedman is in the room, count me out. As long as "to engage" means enumerating the problems with the ominous other, and that U.S. policy can't be blamed, then I think it may be time to disengage. You don't really believe that the reason the Saudis don't like us is simply because we're American, do you? Don't you think a bit of agressive corporate imperialism might rub them the wrong way just a wee bit? Friedman's observations belong in the pages of Reader's Digest--lite and abridged foreign policy.

Sloo,

Other centrists may differ from me, and I invite them to join in.

I was raised in a very traditional religious household, and I believe I understand the religious triumphalism that is growing in the Islamic world. All three of the Abrahamic religions have a deep vein of intolerance.

Far from oppressing the Saudis, we shovel money at them. Maybe the Iranians have a complaint, but we're not responsible for the repression in Saudi Arabia, not a wee bit.

The fundamental problem in the Middle East is Future Shock, to use Alvin Toffler's expression. The money the West has pumped into Saudi Arabia since 1973 has allowed the most reactionary, facist ideas on the planet to globalize. Formerly tolerant nations on the geographic fringes of the Islamic world, like Nigeria and Indonesia, are growing increasingly fundamentalist because of Saudi money that funds scholarships and fundamentalist religious education.

I consider it patronizing to assume that Arabs are not independent actors, but simply reactors to what we do to them.

Friedman may not have the right prescription for the patient, but he's the best diagnostician of that region of anybody I've read. In my view, he is a centrist, because unlike the right, he doesn't bash all Arabs, he knows who the good guys are. But he doesn't make excuses their failures, like blaming their problems on us, as the left is wont to do.

Sloo: What is "agressive corporate imperialism"and how does it apply.

The problems of the Arab world have been well documented but they revolve around culture, religion, intolerance, corruption, and resentment due to the massive failures. The US and the West have little to do with their failures except as to how much worse they look compared to the advanced countries.

If there is any hope for the ME, it will come when they accept responsibility for their problems and when some of us stop encouraging them to blame us.

Also, I don't think Friedman says that "U.S. policy can't be blamed". He is at times very critical of the administration. He blames Bush for a lot of stuff.

Friedman has an independent point of view and a touch of iconoclasm. He doesn't like to be told what to think.

This is, I think, about Friedman's favorite topic, globalization. Atrios and Kos are unwilling to even think about the topic atall.

sloo: if you want to convince us, or anybody else not already convinced that Friedman is wrong, you need to 'engage' with what he says rather than calling him names and distorting what he says. If anything, you're convincing us that Friedman's right. Now, as it happens, your chance of convincing me, personally, that he's wrong is about zero. But there are many people on this blog and on others who aren't so sure. You can serve the anti-globalization cause by engaging his arguments and explaining why he's wrong.

As long as the ME is full of countries that severly restrict free speech, leaders who are afraid of words, they are going to remain backward.

Yep, National Geographic candidates -- except for oil. Which the Allies of WW I and WW II allowed the Arab leaders to benefit from when deposing the Turk Muslims empire. They have not gone through the required cultural changes that lead to modern, property market oriented wealth creating societies -- yet their leaders are rich.

The Arab street is right to be angry, but the US (& corps, etc., puh leeese) is the wrong target--it is their own leaders who are oppressing them.

Arafat of the PA is a fine example; elected, once, for life (?), with thugs to beat up any Pali who questions any of his mistakes or corruptions. No free speech, little development; lots of resentment, but why isn't there "enough to change leaders"?

The thing about Friedman is that his sense of self-importance exceeds the generally sensible though not terribly profound or original things he says. He's got the Barbara Streisand and Barbara Wa-Wa problem.