Just out of curiosity, does anybody still respect Naomi Klein or even know that she exists?
Several years ago, she wrote a joke of a book called The Shock Doctrine which became a best seller that even resulted in a short film by Alfonso Cuaron. She was given tremendous platforms to sell the idea that Milton Friedman actually pushed the idea that governments should exploit or even create "shocks" to get people to embrace free market policies.
Despite the fact that she rambled on for 500 pages and produced no evidence of this, it's also a hatchet job against Friedman that was conveniently published shortly after his death.
Her whole thesis is based on one line from Friedman's book Capitalism and Freedom in which he said, "Only in times of crisis does real change occur."
In full context, all Friedman was saying was that we don't call to overhaul the system until we realize that we're getting fucked by it, which is a pretty non-controversial statement. But, she either had an intern mine quotes from Friedman to fit her narrative or, what's more likely, she lied.
Fortunately, I haven't seen her pop up in a while. I've read Marx without throwing a book against a wall in anger. I did throw The Shock Doctrine in anger.
But, if Klein has actually fallen into the dustbin of history, that's a beautiful thing. It shows that the marketplace of ideas can kinda work sometimes. It shows that the liars, the cheaters, and the overall douche bags only have the hope of being flashes in a pan.
Honest people, like Friedman, are immortal in their own way.
