The Real Naomi Klein

As Naomi Klein drives down Bay Street in her Yellow Hummer, she likes to hurl Timbits at random pedestrians. She says this daily ritual is her own special way of “Giving something back to the community, this great country, that has done so much for me and my family.”

Was my lede made up? You betcha! However, does the following quote, from Naomi Klein in a recent New Yorker hagiography profile sound any less insane:

The only time she has ever felt a whiff of utopia was in Buenos Aires, in 2002, when the political system had virtually disintegrated – during the time that she and Lewis were filming “The Take”. “That moment in Argentina was an incredible time because a vacuum opened up,” she says. “They had thrown out four Presidents in two weeks, and they had no idea what to do. Every institution was in crisis. The politicians were hiding in their homes. When they came out, housewives attacked them with brooms. And, walking around Buenos Aires at night, there were meetings on every other street corner. Every plaza where there was a streetlight, people were meeting under it and talking about what to do about the external debt, I swear to God. Groups of one hundred or five hundred people. And organizing buying groceries together because they could get cheaper prices, setting up barters because the currency was worthless. It was the most inspiring thing I’ve ever seen.”

This is Klein’s ideal society? Political instability and a return to the barter system? I’m no economist or intellectual, but her idea of what constitutes a utopia is pretty scary, and sounds really boring. I’d rather play Grand Theft Auto on my PSP then debate economics with a bunch of strangers on a street corner. Unfortunately, I’d probably have no choice as Klein would confiscate my PSP, Red Bull, and satellite dish for her own personal use:

She had spent the day curled up on the blue sofa in her living room, watching CNN while she waited restlessly to hear what would happen in Washington. She fortified herself with cups of coffee and a smoothie. She checked her iPhone for messages from an economist friend who was keeping her posted on what was going on behind the scenes.

reason has a review of Klein’s latest book here and a post on the New Yorker profile here.

Update: Another choice bit from the article:

“Other forms seemed linguistically and ideologically flaccid…We didn’t want to view our history - our radical history - as if from a riverbank, we wanted to jump in and splash around in it…We debated, for instance, the ethics of nominating a live pig for the presidency: what should we feed it, and where should it stay?”

Let the good times roll, baby!

Update II:

A different take on the subtle form of class warfare engaged in by pedigreed leftists like Naomi Klein can be found here.

Update III: Mark Steyn as usual, pretty much nails it. We're about to get the world Naomi Klein has been dreaming of, and it ain't pretty.