Book Review: The Lexus and the Olive Tree by Thomas L. Friedman
(1999, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux)


Supposedly a best-seller, "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" is the latest salvo by the Power Elite to promote their agenda. Their frontman, author Thomas L. Friedman, is the globe-trotting, name-dropping Foreign Affairs columnist for the New York Times.

The dubious honor of popularizing globalism, or globalization, and making it appear inevitable has fallen to Mr. Friedman. As an American internationalist, Friedman promotes the idea that if United States gets even more entangled with other nations and mega-corporations in financial-economic alliances like WTO, GATT, NAFTA, MAI, and IMF, global peace and prosperity are a sure thing.

As a promoter of Pax Americana, Friedman writes that America truly is the "ultimate benign hegemon and reluctant enforcer" -- as if globalist noblesse oblige will convince everybody to hand over their liberty.

"The very reason we need to support the United Nations and the IMF, the World Bank and the various world development banks," writes Friedman, "is that they make it possible for the United States to advance its interests without putting American lives or treasure on the line everywhere, all the time.