Hot, Flat, and Crowded; Why We Need a Green Revolution--And How It Can Renew America
New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008. First edition [stated]. First printing [stated]. Hardcover. [10], 438 pages. Illustrations. Index. Inscribed by author on fep. Thomas Loren Friedman (born July 20, 1953) is an American journalist, columnist and author. He has written extensively on foreign affairs including trade, the Middle East, globalization, and environmental issues. He has won the Pulitzer Prize three times. He was hired by The New York Times as a reporter in 1981 and dispatched to Beirut at the start of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. His coverage of the war won him the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. Friedman served as the New York Times Jerusalem Bureau Chief from June 1984 until February 1988. That year he received a second Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. He wrote From Beirut to Jerusalem, describing his experiences in the Middle East, which won the 1989 U.S. National Book Award for Nonfiction. In 1994, he moved to the op-ed page of The New York Times. The author brings a fresh outlook to the crises of destabilizing climate change and rising competition for energy. A wag once quipped that Thomas Friedman's bountiful bestseller The World Is Flat calmed the storms about globalization. In his latest effort, the influential New York Times Op-Ed columnist presses his case that Green is the new Red, White, and Blue. Friedman argues that environmentalism isn't just a survival imperative; it's the best way to make America richer, more productive, and, not least, more secure. Spanning the globe, he presents case study after case study that shows that Green-oriented practices and technologies are the key to revitalizing our country and stabilizing an increasingly energy-starved world. Derived from a Kirkus review: The world is flat, New York Times columnist Friedman told us in his bestselling 2005 book of that name. Now things are getting worse, and the clock is ticking. Americans have squandered most of the goodwill extended since 9/11, writes Friedman, and in the years of the Bush administration no thought has been given to what 9/12 is supposed to look like. The climate is changing, but the administration has spent most of its tenure denying it and insisting on a particularist view that we deserve to be profligate because we’re Americans. Our political blindness and ignorance vis-à-vis other nations now butts up against the world’s instability and, Friedman continues, “the convergence of hot, flat, and crowded is tightening energy supplies, intensifying the extinction of plants and animals, deepening energy poverty, strengthening petrodictatorship, and accelerating climate change.” The way out of those tangles, he says, is for America to go green in any way possible—and to do it right away, investing in every kind of alternative and renewable energy form imaginable, setting the best of examples for the rest of the world and exporting green technologies everywhere, thus winning back allies and influencing people. Readers who have been paying attention to Fareed Zakaria, Jared Diamond or similar writers know most of this, but still the word has been slow getting out. Many others have written about these subjects, but few enjoy Friedman’s audience, so it’s good that he’s turning to such matters, if a touch belatedly. His case studies—from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s insistence on a fleet of hybrid taxis on the street to British firm Marks & Spencer’s insistence that going green is Plan A and that “there is no Plan B” —are well-selected, detailed and, in the end, quite inspiring. That inspiration is needed, along with a lot of hard work. A timely, rewarding book. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Mike Ahearn, Biodiversity, Biofuels, Climate Change, Deforestation, Energy Efficiency, Greenhouse Gas, Globalization, Global Warming, Renewable Energy, Solar Power, Fossil Fuels, Pollution, Carbon Dioxide, Environmentalism, Innovation, Natural Resour
ISBN: 9780374166854
[Book #75836]
Price: $125.00