Why Tom Friedman Is the Ayn Rand of Our Times

Continued from previous page

San Francisco's one of the most desirable tourist destinations in the country. It doesn't seem to have occurred to Friedman that not everybody lives in such a desirable location - or that some of us would rather not give up a large chunk of our personal space to strangers while serving as their personal cooks and chauffeurs. What's next? Hiring ourselves out to millionaires as "faithful family retainers," antebellum-style ?

As I read this column my mind kept wandering to the recent Bill Moyers program about Milwaukee, " Two American Families," and to a recent visit to my equally hard-hit home town of Utica, New York. Trust us, Mr. Friedman: There won't be a lot of "Airbnb" tourists looking to rent beds or cars in Milwaukee or Utica.

hellonearth.com

Friedman seems blithely unaware of the role of regulation in keeping us safe. Do we really want to rent cars from strangers without knowing whether they've been properly maintained? A "branded reputation" is fine until the brakes give out on a steep incline. And power tools?  One broken chain-saw blade and you could wind up looking like a bit player in a Tobe Hooper movie.

But safety, important as it is, barely scratches the surface of the problem.  Friedman's overall vision, his conception of a "new economy," is what's truly terrifying.

Any rational person who has glimpsed Friedman's dystopian future - which he has pretty accurately envisioned, based on current trends - would urgently begin seeking out alternatives and solutions. They'd want to prevent our economy from becoming an electronic marketplace where the needy and desperate peddle their time, space and possessions to the well-to-do in a desperate bid for survival.

They certainly wouldn't celebrate this sci-fi dystopia, as Friedman does.

Mirror, mirror ...

There are alternatives we can pursue collectively: An aggressive government program of job creation. A return to the days of social mobility. An end to the gross concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. And, above all, affordable education for all so that we can restore the American dream of self-advancement.

Instead Friedman glorifies globalization and the destruction of good jobs. He's indifferent to the loss of social mobility and infatuated with mediocre or at best mildly clever web enterprises. Friedman is the praise singer of Palo Alto, the  griot of Los Gatos, and he's never met a Internet billionaire he didn't like.

Thomas Friedman is the perfect mirror for the undeserved self-infatuation which has infected our corporate, media, and political class. He's the chief fabulist of the detached elite, the unfettered Id of the global aristocracy, the Horatio Alger of self-deluded, self-serving, self-promoting techno-hucksterism.

But give the man his due: When it comes to "building your brand reputation," Friedman's a master of the art. It helps to have the perfect platform, of course. As soon as the New York Times is ready to hire 20 million more columnists, our employment problems will be over.