Thomas L. Friedman: Dear Iraqi friends

[Ken White]

Ken,

Really don't know where you are coming from, but to call Tom Friedman irrelevant is silly. While this is done a little tongue in cheek -- I think his read on U.S. approach to Iraq and the nature of our current economic crisis on U.S. grand strategy.

We can disagree on that, though I'd note that I didn't call Friedman, personally, irrelevant (actually, he's one of the more sensible examples of the breed) -- I called the genre irrelevant. IMO, they mostly are; all of them have occasional flashes of lucidity but they generally lapse into gobledygook and idle blathering. As I said, that is in my opinion. I pay little attention to any of them, a habit acquired over a good many years of trying futilely to make sense of what they were saying. They're like Doctors and Lawyers; don't like what one says? Listen to another...

In this particular case, I can broadly agree with his desires for the Iraqis while believing that his expression of American fears is significantly overstated. In total, the draft letter approach is, I believe, a poor methodology that lends itself to charges of irrelevance. Friedman is not the only pundit to use that style; most who do fail to convince me that they really have much to say...

I think I posit the strategic defensive some time ago -- nothing in this article I can't agree with...

Kirk

We can differ on that; my belief is that a strategic defense has merit in some cases while it fails miserably in others. Friedman has spent more time in the ME than have I and he's more current but we have an intense disagreement about the correct approach needed to dissuade the bulk of the people in the ME from counterproductive efforts...

Strategic defense will not work against the ME. It will be misunderstood and simply invite more problems. I may not have been there recently and I may not have that much time there but in a couple of years of fairly extensive travel looking at military forces there, I did discover that willingness to compromise is seen as a debilitating weakness and any statement of own weakness will be seized upon and deployed against you. Among other things...