Cartoonist/Writer Henry Payne Raps Columnist Thomas Friedman

Posted Thursday, May 8, 2008 12:00 am

By: E&P Staff New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who has been slammed from the left for things like his early support of the Iraq War, got rapped by the right today in a National Review Online article by Detroit News editorial cartoonist/writer Henry Payne.

In his "Fuelish Friedman" piece, Payne notes that the author/Times pundit uses lots of jet fuel for his U.S. and world travels while "lecturing President Bush for the umpteenth time for 'not buckling down to break our oil addiction.'"

Payne adds that "oil is an economic necessity, not an addiction, as Friedman himself inadvertently reveals three graphs later [in a column] when he tells how he and his wife 'flew from New York's Kennedy Airport to Singapore' -- on a jet plane gulping 3,000 gallons of fuel an hour.

"Global commerce ... runs on carbon jet fuel. It is a necessity not only for Friedman's journalistic junkets, but for commercial transport, multinational salesmen, etc."

Friedman's column is distributed via the New York Times News Service. Payne's editorial cartoons are syndicated by United Media.

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Cartoonist/Writer Henry Payne Raps Columnist Thomas Friedman

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