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Iraq today does have a chance to shape its own future. They may not do that, or this generation may not do that. But maybe the next one will, I don't know. They may try and fail, and stumble, get up and fall back.

Thomas Friedman

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Thomas Friedman
Age: 71
Born: 1953
Born: July 20
Columnist
Journalist
Screenwriter
Television Producer
Writer
Saint Louis Park
Minnesota
Thomas Loren Friedman
Thomas L. Friedman
Future
Fail
Fall
Iraq
Next
Shapes
Doe
Generation
Today
Failing
May
Generations
Back
Maybe
Stumble
Trying
Chance
Shape

More quotes by Thomas Friedman

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Optimists are usually wrong. But all the great change in history, positive change, was done by optimists.
Thomas Friedman
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So what am I? I guess I would call myself a sober optimist...If you are not sober about the scale of the challenge, then you are not paying attention. But if you are not an optimist, you have no chance of generating the kind of mass movement needed to achieve the needed scale.
Thomas Friedman
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In Globalization 1.0, which began around 1492, the world went from size large to size medium. In Globalization 2.0, the era that introduced us to multinational companies, it went from size medium to size small. And then around 2000 came Globalization 3.0, in which the world went from being small to tiny.
Thomas Friedman
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Arnold Schwarzenegger said it best: Your son is sick. Ninety-eight doctors give you one diagnosis, two doctors give you another. Who are you going to go with? Well, why would it be the conservative position to go with the two? That's not conservative, that's crazy.
Thomas Friedman
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The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist -- McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the builder of the F-15. And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technologies is called the United States Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps.
Thomas Friedman
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I think that competition will exist even if we discover more oil. We're never going to know how much we have, or how long will it last. You are always going to want to have diversity of supply. I think the Middle East will remain a region of competition, of global competition, fighting for a long time.
Thomas Friedman
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Never before in the history of the planet have so many people, on their own, had the ability to find so much information about so many things and about so many other people.
Thomas Friedman
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There are elites that are real leaders and role models. There are elites that are really selfish and want to pull up the ladder once they've reached the roof.
Thomas Friedman
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Two things are going on at the same time with the flattening of the world: The relentless quest for efficiency is squeezing some of the fat out of life.
Thomas Friedman
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Syria is on the back end of basically a decade-long drought. Over the last decade, farmers and herders have been ravaged in Syria forcing them to give up and move to urban areas. This has put a huge strain on urban resources, and it's surely one of the reasons for the uprising there.
Thomas Friedman
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American young people have got to understand from an early age that the world pays off on results, not on effort. Not everyone should win a prize no matter where he or she finishes.
Thomas Friedman
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Guantanamo Bay is the anti-Statue of Liberty.
Thomas Friedman
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If you don't visit a bad neighborhood, it might visit you.
Thomas Friedman
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I love America. I think it's the best country in the world. But I also think we're not tending to our sauce.
Thomas Friedman
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That's right-the striking thing about greenhouse gases is the diversity of sources that emit them. A herd of cattle belching can be worse than highway full of hummers.
Thomas Friedman
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In China today, Bill Gates is Britney Spears. In America today, Britney Spears is Britney Spears-and that is our problem.
Thomas Friedman
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When you study history and look at every civilization that has grown up and died off, they all leave one remnant: a major sports colosseum at the heart of their capital. Our fate can be different but only if we start doing things differently.
Thomas Friedman
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Scientists tend to focus on what they don't know more than what they do know. And there are a lot of things we still don't know about the climate. But we know the difference between climate variability and climate change, and right now the amount of carbon in the atmosphere is well outside the variability pattern - and that's quite quantifiable.
Thomas Friedman
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We have to fight the terrorists as if there were no rules and preserve our open society as if there were no terrorists.
Thomas Friedman
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If we don't have a more serious energy policy, the difference between a good day and bad day for America from here on will hinge on how the 86-year-old king of Saudi Arabia manages...change.
Thomas Friedman