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See NY Times Columnist Thomas L. Friedman Bomb at ‘Jeopardy’

May. 21, 2012 7:48am Billy Hallowell

NY Times Thomas Friedman Appears on Jeopardy For those who got a “thrill” seeing MSNBC’s Chris Matthews bomb at “Jeopardy,” you’re in luck. On Friday, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman took his turn appearing on the game show along with CNN’s Anderson Cooper and NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell. Rather than wowing the audience with his intellect, the three-time Pulitzer Prize winner ended up coming in last place — even falling short of the $2,300 Matthews was able to win just days before.

Newsbusters’ Noel Sheppard provides a recap of Friedman’s first two answers, which were less than successful:

With the category “21st Century Lingo,” the answer was, “In 2011, BusinessWeek said European government bonds were this ‘poisonous’ kind of debt.”

Friedman responded, “Sub-prime.” I guess he missed the clue in quotation marks “poisonous.”

The correct response of course was “toxic.”

In the same category moments later, the answer was, “It’s the ‘tiny’ term for a person who writes short posts about one’s personal life on Tumblr or Twitter.”

Once again, the word in quotations marks was the clue, and once again Friedman missed it.

“What is a tweeter?” he replied.

Of course, the answer was “micro-blogger.”

Then, came Final Jeopardy. Going into it, Cooper, who was in first place, had a sum of $15,600. Friedman was at $8,400 and O’Donnell was in third place with only $2,000. Interestingly, Friedman wagered a whopping $7,400, O’Donnell put up $500 and Cooper only placed $1,201 on the line.

When all was said and done, none of the three answered the Final Jeopardy question correctly, thus — Friedman was left with only $1,000 (and for those inquisitive minds, the question was: “The National Inventors Hall of Fame said his work ‘brought the south prosperity,’ but he was out of business within 5 years.” The answer? Eli Whitney).

Watch the spectacle, below:

(H/T: Weasel Zippers)

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Comments (71)

Volsense
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:41am
Its obvious that an intelligent liberal is a misnomer.

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- lukerw
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 10:15am
  Smart people… are never as Smart… as they think they are; MENSA accounts for only a few Leaders or Rich!
  
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- Jim in Houston
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 10:40am
  It’s an oxymoron. Those words should NEVER be used in the same sentence.
  
  Report this comment
- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 11:34am
  Highly educated certainly does not mean highly intelligent. The video was funny.
  
  Report this comment
- cosette
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 1:02pm
  He can join Matthews in the Jeopardy pseudo intellectuals Hall Of Fame. Birds of a feather…..
  
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- FreeCarolJoy
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 2:23pm
  Yes, they seem to be bombing out a lot on that show.
  
  Report this comment
flipper1073
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:21am
Education an Intelligence are not Synonymous.
Ever watch a Man on the street with College Students ?
Most Can’t Answer Simple Questions.
an would lose on are you smarter than a 5th grader.

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TIME_2_END_THE_PAUL_CAMPAIGN_IN_12
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:14am
Liberals are usually purveyors of useless information but I guess in the case of Cwis Maffews and Thomas Friedman… not so much when the game is on the line.

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- Bluebonnet
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 11:26am
  Have you ever noticed how many “overly intelligent” people have NO Common Sense?
  
  Report this comment
sWampy
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:10am
I thought everyone in the world knew that people who used twitter are twits and twats.

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PRESENTSOFMIND
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:08am
Libberalizum wurks fer me!!

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Mr.Fitnah
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:07am
I knew the Eli Whitney answer. I . of course didnt know the other answers.

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- Duey2000
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 1:02pm
  I was just thinking the same thing. I would have got the same ones wrong that Friedman did, but I knew the Eli Whitney answer.
  
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hauschild
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:02am
This is one of the problems with this country – people falling for the notion that rote memory skills equate to intelligence. It’s why liberals bamboozle themselves into believing having a degree makes you immediately qualified for any job at all. They incorrectly correlate “education” with “intelligence”.

I don’t know this Friedman character and certainly would be suspicious of his motives considering who he accepts his paycheck from, but this Jeopardy nonsense must be put out of our misery. It has very little to do with anything other than being really good at memorizing a lot of things.

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- trolltrainer
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:13am
  You suck at Jeopardy, huh?
  
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- Duey2000
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 1:04pm
  I agree. Thes Jeopardy stories are just really a way of Beck (who I usually have great respect for) to get back at the other people in the media that he doesn’t care for. Glenn, you’ve got us. We’re here. You don’t have to convince us that everybody else in MSM is a moron. We know. That is why we are on the Blaze every day…
  
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GoodCook
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:59am
Typical Liberal… Long on talk short on knowledge!

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- IndyGuy
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:02am
  My thought exactly….DOH…
  
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flipper1073
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:59am
Just another case of a Supposedly Brillant Journalist.
Proving they Aren’t

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ddg7
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:52am
He probably doesn’t know what a ‘hooter’ is either.

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jhaydeng
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:41am
No common sense!

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- trolltrainer
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:14am
  Bingo! More to the point, he probably is extremely smart at one or two things and dumb as hell at the rest of life…Typical academic…
  
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mikenleeds
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:38am
DO we really expect more from a dumb freaking Yankee that works for MSNBC ,
he s so brainwashed with liberal garbage he s unable to think out of the box

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hempstead1944
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:32am
This idiot has been “bombing” most of his professional life…..the TV show simply revealed what everyone outside New York always knew…..

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thegodfather
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:24am
Proving once again… liberals = dumbbells

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Truth and Justice
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:24am
So the big intellectually elite Liberal was a total failure. Need we say more?!!

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rflemingtx
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:10am
@ Billy Hallowell…No, The ANSWER was, “The National Inventors Hall of Fame said his work ‘brought the south prosperity,’ but he was out of business within 5 years.” The The QUESTION was “Who is Eli Whitney?”.

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MiCurmudgeon
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:09am
IQ = Plant life +3

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AJAYW
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:09am
All liberals and shows they are dummer than a door nails, but think they know it all. makes one smile and wonder how they are got the jobs they have.

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progressiveslayer
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:08am
Friedman also believes the myth of man made global warming so it’s no shocker he isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer.

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Kathleen
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:06am
Friedman really picked up as he went along. No matter how much I disagree with him politically, this story does not do his performance justice. Chris Matthews really did bomb; Friedman did not.

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- trolltrainer
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 9:11am
  Hey, that is a non-partial, objective call on your part! These people are not going to want to hear that!
  
  Better strap yourself in, this could get ugly…
  
  Report this comment
- mayihelpyou
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 11:44am
  He came in last with only a thousand dollars to his credit. Couldn’t have been that great of a performance.
  
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- trolltrainer
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 12:11pm
  MAYIHELPYOU,
  
  I did not watch the show or even watch the clip, but I did read the story. Did you?
  
  “Then, came Final Jeopardy. Going into it, Cooper, who was in first place, had a sum of $15,600. Friedman was at $8,400 and O’Donnell was in third place with only $2,000. Interestingly, Friedman wagered a whopping $7,400, O’Donnell put up $500 and Cooper only placed $1,201 on the line.”
  
  Report this comment
Juniemoon
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:04am
Explains how Obama got a noble , be a radical, Marxist, Commie or Socialist. High IQ not needed.

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BigBadBud
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:04am
I love it when supposed liberal intellectual I’m better than you types bomb miserably when it comes to basic world knowledge. They’ve been stuck in there little bubble for so long they longer can grasp reality. This is why the newspaper is going the way of the dodo bird.

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MiCurmudgeon
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:00am
IQ= 3 above plant life!

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contkmi
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 7:59am
It’s funny when libs think they’re the smartest people in the room.

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randy
Posted on May 21, 2012 at 7:54am
Used to be, any10 year old knew who Eli Whitney was.
And these are the people spoon feeding you the news every night? LOL

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- teebubba
  Posted on May 21, 2012 at 8:06pm
  I agree they all should have gotten Eli Whitney but as liberals they were not thinking of the South’s “cotton economy” but rather as a slave economy and couldn’t think of a device to enforce slavery…
  
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