Anti-Democratic Impulses
That’s the vibe I’m getting from both David Brooks and Thomas Friedman lately. Yesterday, Brooks, who expressed little concern with GOP governance or the intellect of American voters during W’s Administration, suddenly sees a Republic on the rocks:
If we can’t trust the people and we can’t trust the elites, who can we trust?
Today, it’s Friedman’s turn, with this wet kiss to China:
One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.
I didn’t have to scroll long through the reader comments before seeing the same thought that sprang to my mind after digesting the column:
I think Friedman overstates the charm of the Chinese leadership and system. It sounds too much like “they make the trains run on time” of a previous generation for my taste. While our system seems dysfunctional at this point, I don’t think the Chinese model is where we want to go.
The Left and Right may inhabit separate worlds but they sometimes share the same anti-democratic impulses.
“when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today”
Tell that to the millions in the work camps, re-education centers or the thousands and thousands of dead Chinese “criminals” who were arrested, tried, convicted and then shot so their organs could be harvested so the “enlightened group” of Chinese leadership doesn’t need to be inconvenienced by having to wait for a new kidney.
Friedman is mind-numbingly dorky, stupid and bigoted.
People should read more Hayek and less Friedman…