The New York Times’s mustachioed “China for a Day” propagandist Thomas Friedman is having a nervous breakdown because President Donald Trump isn’t a climate change nut like he is. And true-to-form, he’s simping for the Chi-Coms to get Trump… Again.
“I Have Never Been More Afraid for My Country’s Future,” read Friedman’s grossly embellished April 15 item that was plastered on A22 of his newspaper’s April 17 print edition. After bellyaching over the allegedly “[s]o much crazy [that] happens with the Trump administration every day,” Friedman then freaked over Trump’s April 8 decision “to sign an executive order to bolster coal mining.”
Oh my goodness! Wow! The horror! But what made his babbling even more nonsensical was that he tried to do some free PR for the communist Chinese government by legitimizing it as some budding climate crusader, despite it being the undisputed leader in CO2 emissions: “Wait, wait, you say, but isn’t China also still digging coal? Yes, it is, but with a long-term plan to phase it out and to use robots to do the dangerous and health-sapping work of miners." Just take a genocidal government’s word for it, right?
When a Hong Kong protester famously exclaimed in 2020, “Donald Trump don’t trust China. China is asshole,” he wasn't saying it just for the kicks and giggles. The overarching point: China can't be trusted. Period. And that even it applies to its so-called climate-friendly commitments.
China’s commitment to fighting so-called climate change is an unmitigated farce. CarbonBrief reported on February 13, 2025, that China’s mass construction of new coal-power plants reached a “10-year high” in 2024, to the tune of 94.5 gigawatts (GW) of new coal-power capacity, with an additional 3.3GW of suspended projects being resumed. In fact, Reuters reported in 2024 that China was developing 1.28 billion tons in coal-mining capacity, which is underscored by the fact that China “accounts for more than half of the world's pipeline of new coal mines.”
Energy journalist Robert Bryce noted in a March 24, 2025, Substack blog, despite “China claiming it will hit net zero ‘before 2060,’” the communist state along with India “now account for more than 70% of global coal use, and their coal demand and CO2 emissions will continue rising for years to come.” Of course, Friedman didn’t bother expounding on any of this context while he was busy making out with Chinese dictator Xi Jinping’s ring.
Friedman stupidly tried to compare China’s legitimacy with the U.S. as being somehow superior: “And that’s the point. While Trump is doing his ‘weave’ — rambling about whatever strikes him at the moment as good policy — China is weaving long-term plans.” Yes Thomas, China is “weaving long-term plans” for more coal!
Readers should not be surprised at Friedman’s “China good, America bad” ranting. After all, this is the same kook who had the temerity to blurt out that Trump’s 2016 electoral victory was a “moral 9/11.” And being a Beijing sycophant has been Friedman’s modus operandi for years. In 2009, Friedman drew fire for fawning that when a one-party communist autocracy that “is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.” Alexa, define communism for Friedman.
The Times columnist’s pro-China tomfoolery wasn’t even the only nonsense plaguing his latest column.
Friedman even hilariously tried to invert the meaning of wokeism by accusing Trump of genuflecting to a so-called “right-wing woke ideology that doesn’t recognize green manufacturing jobs as ‘real’ jobs.” Uh, that’s not how wokeism works Thomas. Friedman also threw a fit over how Trump “singles out coal miners for praise while he tries to zero out development of clean-tech jobs from his budget — in 2023, the U.S. wind energy industry employed approximately 130,000 workers, while the solar industry employed 280,000.” He must have missed Reuters' recent concession that the multitrillion-dollar “pursuit of net zero carbon emissions has been a resounding failure.” Not exactly a good return on investment eh, Friedman?
