Don't you know that China is one of the biggest polluters in the world? LMAO--This guy is nuts.

Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

It's as if he thinks that once a law is passed it can never be undone. Does he not know about Prohibition? Even an amendment to the US Constitution can be undone if the country feels it should be.

Why doesn't Friedman go live in China for a year ( a rural agrarian area, not a major city) and then come back and tell us if he want's us to "be China for a day".

We don't even have a democracy for crying out loud! We have a representational republic. Friedman probably doesn't understand the differences between those either.

Hey, I got the wrong "CHANGE"!

Alan Keyes / Sarah Palin - 2012

What a crock. There is no "clean power system" currently available and science has been working on it for decades. Perhaps we'll capture fairy farts and use them to power our generators, or maybe he's got some dilithium crystals he'll share with us.

Even such 'clean' energy as solar and wind cause lots of polution in the manufacturing process and the disposal of them when they wear out. [ and yes.... solar cells 'wear out', the covering fogs over and the silicon gets adulterated to the point it no longer produces a net positive current flow unless it's high noon in Arabia ]

"China for a lifetime for Friedman", because he up and leaves this country and goes to his idea of paradise.

And from the transcript, it looked like Colbert did a pretty good job responding to this quack. Probably had to get over the "I can't believe what this whacko is saying" reaction.

"Thoroughly worldly people never understand even the world; they rely altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true."

Chesterton, Orthodoxy 

...as we are going to turn into China on January 20th.

And its going to last far longer than a day, too.  :-(

-Dave

Did this country just elect Obama/Biden, or was it Soros/Ayers?

Color me raging red....I am filled with fury that I have at destructive over-rated creatures like Friedman who makes a nice capitalist living right here in the USA....

Move to China Friedman... take all the greenies with you...fix China while you are there, it ought to keep you busy for the rest of your louse-bound lives....therefore our problems here in the US are solved and we can flourish!

Just go-away with your false know-how knowledge.

"America isn't the problem...America is the solution." ~ Rush Limbaugh

and rid ourselves or idiotic liberal media sluts like yourself and your worthless paper!  Great idea.  Maybe 25 years in a Chinese prison will alter your love of socialism and communism! 

Jeff Lebowski

www.angrywhitedude.c...

Have you heard how well the latest "5-year Plan" is working out for the Chinese? How many millions were deemed "unnecessary" during the Cultural Revolution? What have the Chinese produced in the past 100 years that wasn't copied or stolen from some other country? How's that Tianaman Square thing going? How many families live in a house the size of one of your garages, Tom?

You seem like a fairly smart man until you actually explain your thoughts. You are as flat upstairs as your books.

What this fool does not realize is that in China, it is one culture, one people.  We are one people out of many cultures.

Pretty soon, this whole "green" thing is going to implode on itself.  There are too many variables in the theory, and with time, these are slowly failing.

His argument about plastic bags is both flimsy and stupid. Remember why we went to the plastic bags? Because trees were in jeopardy. Now these people have lost their minds.

It is funny how time heals all.  In this case, it will bring the environmentalist movement to its demise.  With time, their foolish antics and flip/flopping slowing chisels away the great stone pillars revealing the doublewide behind the facade.

Lastly, Americans love to talk. We love the dialogue, arm-chair quarterbacking, backpeddling, etc.  It is when we have to commit to these things that we step back and rethink what we were setting ourselves up for.

I doubt this loon has the fortitude to execute any of the things he pontificates.

"Friedman explains his envy that China could effectively ban the thin plastic bag, and it is banned. Why can’t we be like that?"

He might be on to something. China says build new coal burning powerplants, and they are built....I think about one new plant each day; they say drill for oil, and oil wells are drilled. People like Friedmen tell them to go green or else, and those people are locked up.

Yeah, I'm thinking China for a day might not be so bad..... 

Friedman probably helped to write the goals in the following piece...American Communist Education - Special Edition w/Video

 Making Fun of AGW http://giovanniworld.wordpress.com/  

Ok, I don't have the time but I did..I'd go over the reader's comments with a fine tooth comb and completely destroy most of the misconceptions written about China on this thread.  The ignorance is astounding. 

 In reference to the idiot Friedman's ignorant comment that China has banned plastic bags I will say that is an out and out lie.  China has not banned plastic bags...repeat CHINA HAS NOT BANNED PLASTIC BAGS (forgive the caps).  I can still get any size of shape plastic bag in any supermarket or convenience store in China.  What China has done is levy a fee for the bags themselves.  In other words when I'm grocery shopping and I want a large plastic bag to take home my goods then I must pay approximately 3 cents/each for the bag.  That does not constitute bag banning and in this day and age any Chinese person can afford to pay 3 cents for a bag.  The stores are still stocked with bags and all you have to do is ask, pay 3 cents and take your bag home.  Friedman is either ignorant or a liar of epic proportions. 

As for the other ignorant comments on this thread I'll have to take issue with them on another day. 

(sarc on) Hmmmm, let's see.....If we had a Green Revolution similar to that of Mao's Cultural Revolution then we could cull 40,000,000 leftists leaving the good ol' U.S. of A in much better shape. 

OUTSTANDING idea Tom!!! 

Where can I sign up for my little green book?

(sarc off)

I wonder, what kind of pharmacueticals must one be prescribed to view reality through a prism like Friedmans? 

If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you.

Don Marquis 1878-1937

Late in his book, in his "China For A Day" chapter, Friedman explains his envy that China could effectively ban the thin plastic bag, and it is banned. Why can’t we be like that? But that takes not only a day of enactment, but an eternity of enforcement. Friedman isn’t worried about Day Two forward, because the liberal groups will enforce it (page 374):

...because if it is ignored by companies or local governments, a dozen public interest groups, led by the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, will sue the violators (including the federal government) all the way to the Supreme Court. That is why being China for a day – imposing all the right taxes, regulations, and standards needed to launch a clean power system in one day – would be so much more valuable to Washington than Beijing. Because once the directions are given from above, we would be overcoming the worst part of our democracy (the inability to make big decisions in peacetime), and the next day we would be able to enjoy the best part of our democracy (the power of our civic society to make government rules stick and the power of our markets to take advantage of them.)

What Friedman is advocating is that the will of a minority be imposed on the majority without discussion, discourse, debate or weighting of the arguments. That is not freedom. That is tyranny, plain and simple.

He, of course, does not see it as such. No, he sees it as the leadership of the sheople by the enlightened elites of which he is at least a bishop, if not a cardinal.

The source of Friedman's frustration is that America is not full of sheople who bow down in awe and reverence when he deems to grace us with his spoken or written words. No, America is populated with free and thinking people who revel in their freedom to choose and do, indeed, dare to question legends in their own minds--the Friedman elitists--who only want blind obedience.

--

Ignorance, our most costly commodity - paraphrased from Rush Limbaugh