Thomas Friedman Quotes

Optimists are usually wrong. But all the great change in history, positive change, was done by optimists.

Our bailout of Detroit will be remembered as the equivalent of pouring billions of taxpayers' money into the mail-order catalogue business on the eve of the birth of eBay.

In the hyperconnected world, there is only “good” “better” and “best.

We have to be the best global citizens we can be.

Rock stars get room keys, I get business cards.

It's easy to kind of say it's the elite that's putting you down. Well, it wasn't really the elite, technology will do that.

In a hyper-connected world where average is over, there is one thing we know absolutely for sure: Every good job will require more education.

I don't think a monarchy led by 75- and 80-year-old men [Saudi Arabia] in today's modern world is really sustainable.

I love America. I think it's the best country in the world. But I also think we're not tending to our sauce.

I'm a capitalist. I believe in capitalism. But capitalism only works if you have safety nets to deal with people who are naturally left behind and brutalized by it.

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.

Combating climate change requires government policy, and most conservatives hate the idea of more government regulation. Because they hate the prescription, they deny the diagnosis.

Everyone needs to get together and say: "Our objective is to preserve and enhance the game and the planet on which it's played. To make golf a leader in greening the world."

I'm pretty much an open book. I am a fanatic golfer and golf nut. If I have three free hours any day, my first choice is to run to the golf course if the weather is nice.

If you don't visit the bad neighborhoods, the bad neighborhoods are going to visit you.

I think there are different kinds of elites. I think there are venal elites, and self-interested elites, and selfish elites, and I think there are visionary elites.

Every golf course should have its carbon rating on the scorecard, alongside its Course Rating, Slope, par and yardage.

Obviously China is clearly taking the lead in some areas, but when it comes to the most advanced innovation, it's still America.

America is interested in change and reform in the Middle East but in a stable way.

I attended public school with the same group of kids from K through 12.

Rock stars get room keys, I get business cards. Wherever I go I meet innovators of wind power equipment, solar energy operators.

If you don't have an ethic of conservation, you basically have a license to drive a Hummer through the Amazon.

Desktop freelancers and innovative startups all over the world

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.

America needs rebooting.

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.

Iraq may still have a decent outcome...but even if it becomes Switzerland, we overpaid for it.

If you don't visit a bad neighborhood, it might visit you.

In China today, Bill Gates is Britney Spears. In America today, Britney Spears is Britney Spears-and that is our problem.

Almost all the students who make it to Caltech, one of the best scientific universities in the world, come from public schools. So it can be done.

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.

When you can't rely on sticking a pipe in the ground, what you have to rely on is unlocking the energy and talent of all your people - men and women.

The great thing about cheap natural gas, again it's cheap, and it provides a cleaner alternative to coal. But it's still a fossil fuel, and because it's still a fossil fuel, it still emits carbon.

We've given Iraq six months and I don't think things are really working out, so we should probably bring our troops home.

The Arab world had a big problem of frankly venal elites. That is why these revolutions happen, because people didn't think the opportunities were being shared fairly.

Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby.

Saudi hijackers first came into contact with al-Qaeda and went through Terrorism 101 when they signed up for the jihad in Afghanistan.

The Golden Straitjacket is the defining political-economic garment of globalization. [...] The tighter you wear it, the more gold it produces.

There is something more severe than the problem with Thomas Friedman, which can be generalized to represent someone causing action while being completely unaccountable for his words.

The only engine big enough to impact Mother Nature is Father Greed.

You'll know the green revolution has been won when the word 'green' disappears.

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.

Once people get a taste for whatever you want to call it - economic independence, a better lifestyle, and a better life for their children - they grab on to that and don't want to give it up.

Communism was a great system for making people equally poor - in fact, there was no better system in the world for that than communism. Capitalism made people unequally rich.

There is a connection between energy, climate, food and political stability. That has played out in the Arab awakening and is not done playing out.