THOMAS FRIEDMAN INTERVIEW - Wednesday, 15th October, 2008
TRANSCRIPT
With the turmoil on global financial markets escalating, world leaders,
most of them unequivocal champions of the so-called free market, met on
the weekend to prop up their ailing banks and financial institutions,
largely at their taxpayers' expense. At the same time one of America's
great soothsayers released his latest book, 'Hot, Flat and Crowded'.
But was Pulitzer Prize winner, Thomas Friedman a bit too clever by half
with this clever title? He actually bashed out his book before the
current credit crisis and wrote that in order to save the planet we
urgently needs a total green revolution led by the - wait for it - the
US. Hang on a tick did I hear you say, wasn't it the US that caused the
current economic chaos crashing its way around the globe? George Negus
spoke with the 'New York Times' Thomas Friedman from London.
GEORGE NEGUS: Thomas, I've been an avid leader of your columns
for
years and I have devoured your books, but you must be wondering if your
new book should be called 'Hot, Flat Crowded and Broke'.
THOMAS FRIEDMAN, JOURNALIST AND AUTHOR: I've thought of
calling it "Hot
Crowded and Busted".
GEORGE NEGUS: Do you feel a little bit gazumped by history,
because
that chapter 18 you said you might have to write for this book would
obviously be about the current financial crisis, but it is ironic that
these things can happen as quickly as they have.
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: There is no question this we have gone from
the
world's solver to the world's problem in record time here and I think,
George, the really big change that Australians and Americans have to
think about is, you know, we really spent a lot of the last two
decades, since the fall of the Berlin Wall, worrying about a world of
too much American power. That's what people outside the United States
were worried about. Now you will have to worry about a world with too
little American power. That might be more problematic for Australia and
others than a world of too much American power.
GEORGE NEGUS: There was a quote from probably a gentleman that
you know
Jonathan Freeland, he actually said that Americans were craving for a
leader that they could feel good about, in fact the very phrase he used
was a Bill Clinton phrase where he thought that the world would want to
be, if you like, awed by an America, not by the example of its power,
but by the power of its example. I mean, how is America going the
regain its status in the world, its reputation, because this latest
crises that we find ourselves in, most people would stamp "made in
America" on it.
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: There is no question. First of all, we've got
to get
our basics back under control. We've got to get back to prudent lending
and prudent borrowing and getting ahead in the world and buying the
American dream based on really hard work. That's the obvious thing.
Beyond that, we need a great mission worthy of America that we are not
the United States of fighting terrorism. You know, we are capable of so
much more and we need a great project worthy of the innovative prowess
and the inspirational prowess of the United States. For me, that
project is leading the green revolution, being the country that sets
the example in the world by growing rich, respected, entrepreneurial,
competitive, energy-secure, nationally secure by becoming the greenest
country in the world. We don't just need a bail-out, but we need to
green the bail-out.
GEORGE NEGUS: Isn't the problem going to be that people might
want to
put this justifiably concerned about climate change and global warming
on the back-burner on hold until this financial chaos, the economic
crisis is sorted out?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: There is a huge danger in that, George. One
of the
things that I've been trying to point out is we had a big bubble and
then bust in railroads in America in the 19th century, but when it was
all said and done and people lost a lot of money on railroads, it left
us with an amazing national railroad system on which many people were
able to travel more cheaply and shift freight more cheaply. As you know
in the 20th century we had a big dot com boom bubble and bust economy.
Most people lost money, but in the end we were left with an amazing
band super highway on which Google and Microsoft was built. The real
tragedy of this moment is that this financial boom bubble and bust has
left us with a bunch of empty condos in Florida and a bunch of dead,
derivative contracts that no-one understands. That is why it is
critical as we bail ourselves out, as we inject money into the economy
that we do it in a way that will launch a green revolution. We spend
the money on green technologies, and on, you know, more mass transit,
things that will leave us with a new infrastructure for a new economy.
It is critical.
GEORGE NEGUS: We will come back to your suggestion of GO
greenism, I
think is what you refer to it as. But the situation at the moment in
America that we are all preoccupied by, because it is now a global
problem, 22 world leaders meeting on one weekend to see what they can
do about it, is a pretty unique state of affairs. Is it America that's
lost the plot or just Wall Street?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: Good question. I think it is a little of
both. You
know, we got into a financial situation I think, George, where the very
people running these companies did not understand the things that they
were owning, that they were involved in. You know, people has asked me
about the world is flat and what this says about it. I feel like
writing a column and saying, "Sorry, it is so much flatter than I
thought. Who knew that Iceland was a hedge fund with glaciers? Who
knew?" Here I am in UK and it turns out that UK municipalities that are
going to go bankrupt because their money was tied up in Icelandic banks
that owned American mortgages - gee, I knew it was flat but not that
flat.
GEORGE NEGUS: Could you say this in fact is globalisation gone
mad?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: It is. This is globalisation on steroids. You
know,
the upside of it, George, was that a lot of people in the developing
world from India to China to Brazil, saw their income rise enormously
during the last 20 years because of this global movement of capital.
Also a lot of people got fantastically rich at the high end, but it is
clear this was built on a lot of financial instruments that people did
not understand and we need to get back to basics and understanding what
we own, get back to more real engineering and less financial
engineering.
GEORGE NEGUS: As I heard Barack Obama saying in the last few
hours,
"People learning to live all over again to live within their means."
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: There is no question about it. The long-term
implications of this are going to be enormous. I've been telling my
girls, "Girls, take notes. You're living through a historic period
about which you will tell your own grandchildren", the way my parents
did with the great depression. God forbid we should go that far, but
this is a historic period.
GEORGE NEGUS: You talk about the green revolution what is
necessary and
America needing a green president, maybe we could top that up by
saying, "Yes, a green president by all means, but one that also knows
something about economics and finances."?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: There is no question. We've paid a huge price
for
George W. Bush here in the last month. I mean, we've paid a huge price
for him in the last ate years, but in particular in the last month, we
have paid a huge price for having a president who has behaved like a
troll who comes out of the White House every four or five days and
tells us it is OK and disappears into the White House. The reason we
have paid a price is because we haven't had a president who could sit
down calmly and clearly and vividly explain to Americans what is the
problem we are in and what is the solution. That's why we have all of
this crazy, messy politics with the House of Representatives rejecting
the bail-out one day and then coming back five days later. People
telling you it is all about Wall Street and it is not about Main
Street. We've paid a huge price for a president who could not speak the
English language.
GEORGE NEGUS: It seeps to me that combining a lot of your work
over the
last few years and this current - your latest, what you are saying to
me now, it seems what we are looking for is simultaneously, if that is
possible, a new green order for the globe and a new economic order,
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: It is a big ask, but the two actually
entwine. I would
argue that in a world that is getting hot, flat and crowded, we have to
have a new green order. It is absolutely essential. I think what I call
ET energy technology will be the next great global industry. I know
that for sure in the world we are heading into. What I don't know is
which country will lead that. Will it be Australia, Europe, Japan,
India, China, America? I don't know. All I know is that the country
that leads that is going to also be THE dominant economic country. You
cannot be big without being big in big things and the biggest thing is
going the be ET. So there is no way to get out of this economically
without also seizing the economic high ground and it will be around ET.
GEORGE NEGUS: Thomas, this is coming also at a strategic
moment in the
globes history, the upcoming American election in less than a fortnight
really, does it matter one iota in this current situation, with the
green problem on the one hand and the financial problem on the other,
which of the two – Obama or McCain pulls it off because
whoever it is, is going to have to lead the world through this whole
mess – America and the world – through this whole
shambles.
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: It matters enormously, this is certainly the
most
important election in my lifetime and I think the most important
elections in many, many decades in the United States. We need a
president who is a calm cool customer, we need a president who is
articulate enough to talk to the world and we need a president who is
not wedded to crazy ideologies like ‘drill baby
drill’ when our motto in the world must be ‘invent
baby invent’.
GEORGE NEGUS: Does that mean that you think that Obama is the
man, that
the wrong person in the White House could spell even bigger trouble for
the globe?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: I’m not allowed to endorse
candidates but
I’ll let your viewers figurer it out.
GEORGE NEGUS: I think they probably have Thom. It has been
great
talking to you and I’ll let you go because you have to go off
and write that 18th chapter for ‘Hot Flat Crowded and
Busted.’
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: Thank you very much George.
GEORGE NEGUS: Thomas Friedman, journalist and thinker and no
doubt
there will be a lot of what we just heard in that extra Busted chapter
Thom has promised to add to his book - not though I tip- until after we
see who ends up in the White House in three weeks time, once bitten
twice shy would have to be Thom’s watch word after being
pipped by history on the credit crisis.