After reporting for years from Beirut and Jerusalem for the New York Times, Thomas Friedman is now featured as that newspaper’s diplomatic correspondent and resident expert on the Middle East, his status enhanced by a cozy tennis court relationship with Secretary of State James Baker. An article in the Times of October 28, 1990, gives us some insight into Friedman’s thinking -- and should make us worry even more about how elite policymakers and their buddies in the media think about the Middle East.