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Undoing the Brainwashing
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Wimps Versus Barbarians
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Looking Back — And Forward
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Lies About Libya
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Bouncing Ball Politics
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A Further Perspective
Random Thoughts
Random thoughts on the passing scene.
Random thoughts on the passing scene:
Even squirrels know enough to store nuts, so that they will have something to eat when food gets scarce. But the welfare state has spawned a whole class of people who spend everything they get when times are good, and look to others to provide for their food and other basic needs when times turn bad.
The 14th Amendment to the Constitution prescribes “equal protection of the laws” to all Americans. But what does that mean, if the President of the United States can arbitrarily grant waivers, so that A, B, and C have to obey the laws but X, Y, and Z do not — as with both Obamacare and the immigration laws?
Two reports came out in the same week. One was from the Pentagon, saying that, in just a few years, Iran will be able to produce not only a nuclear bomb but a missile capable of carrying it to the United States. The other report said that the American Olympic team has uniforms made in China. This latter report received far more attention, both in Congress and in the media.
People who lament gridlock in Washington, and express the pious hope that Democrats and Republicans would put aside their partisan conflicts, and cooperate to help the economy recover, implicitly assume that what the economy needs is more meddling by politicians, which is what brought on economic disaster in the first place. (Skeptics can read The Housing Boom and Bust.)
Racism is not dead, but it is on life support — kept alive by politicians, race hustlers, and people who get a sense of superiority by denouncing others as “racists.”
One of the arguments for Medicare is that the elderly don’t want to be a burden to their children. Apparently it is all right to be a burden to other people’s children, who are paying taxes.
Those who talk as if more people going to college is automatically a Good Thing seldom show much interest in what actually goes on at college — including far less time spent by students studying than in the past, and a proliferation of courses promoting a sense of grievance, entitlement, or advanced navel-gazing and breast-beating.
One of the most dangerous trends of our times is making the truth socially unacceptable, or even illegal, with “hate speech” laws. It is supposed to be terrible, for example, to call an illegal alien an “illegal alien” or to call an Islamic terrorist an “Islamic terrorist.” When the media refer to “undocumented” workers or to violence committed by “militants,” who is kidding whom — and why?
After the charismatic — and disastrous — Woodrow Wilson presidency, the voters did not elect another president in the next decade who could be considered the least bit charismatic. Let us hope that history repeats itself.
For more than two centuries, the U.S. military never had a public celebration of anybody’s sex life — until the recent “gay pride” event under the Obama administration. Here, as elsewhere, the gay political agenda is not equality but privilege.
Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” Then he proceeded to generate fear among businesses for years on end, with both his anti-business rhetoric and his anti-business policies. Barack Obama is repeating the same approach and getting the same results — namely, an agonizingly slow economic recovery, as investors hang on to their money, instead of risking it in a hostile political environment.
If we wake up some morning and find some American cities in radioactive ruins, courtesy of a nuclear Iran, nobody is going to care whether the president who lets this happen is the first black president or the last WASP president. But, in the meantime, many people will keep on voting for symbolism, as if an election is a popularity contest, like choosing a college’s Homecoming Queen or Parade Marshal.
There seems to be something “liberating” about ignorance — especially when you don’t even know enough to realize how little you know. Thus an administration loaded with people who have never run any business is gung-ho to tell businesses what to do, as well as gung-ho to tell the medical profession what to do, lenders whom to lend to, and the military how to fight wars.
COPYRIGHT 2012 CREATORS.COM
About the Author
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His website is www.tsowell.com. To find out more about Thomas Sowell and read features by other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (40) | Leave a comment
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Gary B| 7.25.12 @ 6:53AM
"There seems to be something "liberating" about ignorance -- especially when you don't even know enough to realize how little you know."
At first, I thought this said, "There seems to be something 'liberal' about ignorance -- especially when you don't even know enough to realize how little you know."
Ahhh... liberals. Living under the protective dome of ignorance, oblivious to the laws of supply and demand, waiting for their government check, sitting in judgement of others and pushing for the enforcement of fairness in every nook and cranny of our society. Must be nice...
JD| 7.25.12 @ 11:20AM
A liberal would say "conservative 'knowledge' is wrong, and we'll do better than they ever did by not knowing it."
Gary B| 7.25.12 @ 11:50AM
Saying "conservative knowledge is wrong" is saying the free market is wrong. It's never wrong. It isn't fair, but it's never wrong. If you want fairness, head on back to the second grade and leave the adults alone.
JD| 7.25.12 @ 11:57AM
Of course it's fair. The problem most people have is that it's too fair.
WillyP | 8.1.12 @ 11:15AM
Liberals don't get the difference between fairness of results, which is virtually impossible, and fairness of opportunity, which rarely produces fairness of results.
Brookschwarzenegro | 7.25.12 @ 7:04PM
Sowell is a solid guy, if he ran for office (if he were much younger) he probably could do a decent job of it-- better than most of your officeholders and candidates.
But it is obvious the mediocrities are the norm from now on-- there's little consensus.
Brookschwarzenegro | 7.25.12 @ 11:36PM
...but it is my damning him with faint praise to write Sowell is solid and decent-- so was Grandma Moses.
I could say: "for his age, Sowell is doing great"-- but so are Bob Dole and John McCain.
And Sowell overdoes his Iran nuking American cities. Only China and Russia have what it takes to nuke America.
Appleby| 7.25.12 @ 7:10AM
Somehow Obama has mired himself in 1968, which he is not old enough to really remember the way the people he vilifies do.
chuck| 7.25.12 @ 7:14AM
Brilliant, as always.
RJ| 7.27.12 @ 6:06AM
I second that comment. It is refreshing to read such honest insight. I wish it wasn't such a rarity in our society. Dr. Sowell is a national treasure.
jaytrain| 7.25.12 @ 8:32AM
Dr Sowell: I would like to hear your further thoughts on the notion of'' voting for a synbol' . In particular what psychological roots or cultural underpinings can produce such behavior . It was understandable to vote in 2008 for Hope and Change but after 4 years of failure on every front , how does one vote for more of the same ? I would truly like to hear more on that .
JD| 7.25.12 @ 11:21AM
They vote for more of the same because they have been told, by Obama and his media, that all of our problems are the fault of the rich and the Republicans, and that Obama is doing as well as can be expected in spite of them. They believe this.
ebonystone| 7.25.12 @ 1:37PM
"how does one vote for more of the same ? "
Easy! The same way that lefties always blame the failure of any of their programs on lack of money, and always say the remedy is spending more.
Remember the "War on Poverty"? It was supposed to cost only a few billion dollars/year. But now we're spending a trillion/year in welfare hand-outs, and it's still not enough according to the left.
The same thing with education: we had to have a federal dept. of education, and massive federal spending, in addition to increased state funding. The result: the SAT's have been dumbed down twice, public school graduates know less than ever, and the schools are in terrible shape. The left's answer? "We're not spending enough!"
Jobe| 7.25.12 @ 9:46AM
I have the same problem as does the 4th commenter. I have given up discussing the political situation with obama supporters because I believe that anyone who cannot easily see the horrendous damage that this moron/communist has wrought with his marxist advisors, his lazy arrogance, and his inability to understand what every 8 year old with a lemonade stand figures out almost immediately (you cannot sell for less than you buy for), I certainly will not be able to make them see.
John Navratil| 7.25.12 @ 10:07AM
I went to view "2016" last weekend. As an aside, let me say that it's read meat for the conservatives, but nothing new for anyone paying attention.
Some "gentleman" sat in the middle of the back row laughing inapropriately and engaging in loud banter with anyone asking him to tone it down. As the movie ended, he was the first to the exit and, in stentorian tone, announced that the sad thing was that we fools believed all this propaganda.
My brother and I came across him in the parking lot and engaged him (a foolish proposition). I asked if him Mother hadn't raised him properly as to how to behave in public. My brother suggested that in his arrogance he has happy to ruin the experience for everyone else in the theatre (it was quite full, I'm happy to say).
His response to me was that he always laughed at comedies, didn't I. To my brother he suggested that he take his problem up with the theatre management. Apropos of nothing, he stated that he had a different vision for America than we "capitalists". Clearly, that was true. He then invited us to take a swing at him - why on earth would either of us do that?
The stereotype was complete with grey pony-tail, sandals and a 30-year old Mercedes 300D. It was an experience.
JD| 7.25.12 @ 11:23AM
Liberals desperately need their straw men. When we fail to be as evil as they imagine us to be, they try to goad us into bad behavior so that we match their imaginations.
Drunken Sailor| 7.25.12 @ 11:54AM
He railed against capitalist america by paying to see a conservative movie? In the liberal mindset that must be logical somehow but I fail to see it.
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 10:06PM
Dear John: it was unfortunate that his car was not keyed "inadvertently."
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 10:08PM
John: you should have calibrated your verbal response to make him take a swing at YOU. Penis size, prediliction for receiving anal sex, slurs on patriotism, discussing what a hypocrite he was for driving a Mercedes, all of these things should have been carefullt reviewed until you found the one that stuck. After he threw the punch, things could have been enjoyably broken.
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 10:09PM
"carefully"
In short, imagine that he is Jack from Wi. (He might have been) Work from there. I am sorry that you had to deal with the Libtard.
Mike G| 7.25.12 @ 10:19AM
"There seems to be something "liberating" about ignorance -- "
Well after all, ignorance is bliss.
Gary B| 7.25.12 @ 10:31AM
Especially with other people's money. Is this a great country, or what?
JD| 7.25.12 @ 11:25AM
"But the welfare state has spawned a whole class of people who spend everything they get when times are good, and look to others to provide for their food and other basic needs when times turn bad."
Theirs is rational behavior, given the knowledge that the government will force those others to provide for them. Why take care when your losses will be so covered?
Albertus Magnus| 7.25.12 @ 11:35AM
In “Wag the Dog” Stanley Motss (played by Dustin Hoffman) says that he didn’t do it for the money, he did it for the CREDIT! Likewise, Keynesian economics is practiced today by politicians only interested in CREDIT! In a practical world, people who work, invent, create, engineer, get the credit for the work they do. The consequence of all such people working and getting credit for their own work is a healthy economy. But this leaves the arrogant, ego-centric politician out of the loop. So, he steps in anyway, using the power of government. Instead of a free market, government “regulates” and suppresses free enterprise, but the politician can claim credit for “creating the conditions” wherein economic prosperity is created. Thus the politician gets the credit, as they do in Socialist countries. Stalin and Mao claimed great credit for feeding the people through government control, while millions starved to death in artificial famines created by government incompetence. That millions starved under socialized food production is ignored, so that the great leader can claim credit for something that isn’t happening. This is President Bozo’s motivation for “regulating” the economy, taking credit for something he did not do and cannot do.
Albertus Magnus| 7.25.12 @ 11:38AM
Continued: Funding failures like Solyndra is an attempt to gain credit for “creating the conditions” wherein success and economic prosperity flourish. Of course, this never works, but arrogant, ego-centric politicians like President Bozo, nevertheless claim credit for a success that never happens. This is what is behind the phony unemployment figures, figures that deliberately under-report the true numbers of unemployed people. The incompetent fools in government cannot legitimately claim credit for economic prosperity because they are incapable of fostering prosperity, but they claim it anyway. Government cannot build, it only destroys, or at best leaves things alone to flourish independently. That politicians continue to follow the failures of Keynesian thinking is a tribute to their arrogance, ego, and narcissism and it is nothing more.
Petronius| 7.25.12 @ 11:52AM
1 The 'Welfare Nuts" enjoy blowing their checks at casinos. Isn't it their right?
2 Equality is only a word. The true meaning for them is preference and satisfaction at my expense.
3 So what if the bomb drops so long as those we hate die first. And why would the USOC have people here manufacture clothes for the team; that's work?
4 Code for sand box economics.
5 Racism is a vehicle for political reprisal. It morphed into a sector of the self serving legal establishment as a sinecure for professional parasites. That's why the trial lawyers are unregulated.
6 People not only want others to pay their medical bills, they don't want to manage anything themselves. They want their hands held.
7 We know that schooling of any kind on any subject beside hard sciences is hoop jumping and bullshit. The college degree is just a ticket of admission to the managerial class and a line of social demarcation.
8 The undergrad is the lowest form of life on any campus where never is heard a Conservative word unless used as a term of derision and contempt. That's because college is for those who control it. Pat Buchanan will tell you Dr. Sowell. Education is a Racket.
9 Most people never learn anything which does not interest them: pannae et circusum. Ergo, charisma and emotion always trump reason.
10 Perversion used to be a crime. Now it's the state religion. And the State is God.
Petronius| 7.25.12 @ 11:56AM
Bad, bad edit
#3 should read
And why would the USOC have people here manufacture clothes? That's work.
Ken (Old Texican)| 7.25.12 @ 12:30PM
Mr. Sowell,
I respect your thoughts no end.
Nevertheless, to we tuned in persons here...why keep chewing the same old cud?
Please help us find a choice other than a national sit-down strike...(no taxes due), or armed resistance to tyranny.
Thank you.
Bill84728| 7.25.12 @ 12:42PM
We sit by and watch the Barbarian. We tolerate him. In the long stretches of peace, we are not afraid. We are tickled by his reverence, his comic inversion of our old certitudes and our fixed creeds refreshes us: we laugh. But as we laugh, we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond. And on these faces, there is no smile.
—Hilaire Belloc on the ruins of Timgad
KennesawJack| 7.25.12 @ 1:25PM
I wonder if anyone has taken any time to think about how many of our young men and women in uniform are going to die in the next 10 or 15 years because of Obamarx the Appeaser-in-Chief. At least Neville Chamberlain was a patriot. An immature, foolish appeaser but, nonetheless, he loved his country. No rational, objective review of the policies of this incompetent buffoon currently residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue would lead to the conclusion that he loves this country. Quite the contrary, it would lead to the inescapable conclusion that he is doing all he can to destroy her. I admit to a strong dislike for many of our elected officials, Barney Frank, Sheila Jackson Lee, Maxine Waters, and Patrick Leahy (especially Patrick Leahy) come to mind, but this is the first time I have ever felt such deep disdain for a President.
KennesawJack| 7.25.12 @ 2:18PM
Dr. Sowell, Further reflection on your excellent essay provokes a few additional thoughts, primarily surrounding your comments relative to voting for symbolism and our failure to understand the threat from a nuclear Iran. As it happens, I am in the process of re-reading Churchill's master work on the causes of and events during, the Second World War. Given that those who ignore history are, indeed, doomed to repeat it, I offer the following excerpt from Volume 1, "The Gathering Storm". Where Churchill uses the League of Nations, simply think United Nations, and consider Iran, not Germany as the object of the discussion. I quote, "There was, perhaps, still time for an assertion of collective security, based upon the avowed readiness of all members concerned to enforce the decision of the League of Nations by the sword. The democracies and their dependent states were still actually and potentially far stronger than the dictatorships, but their position relatively to their opponents was less than half as good as it had been twelve months before. Virtuous motives, trammelled by inertia and timidity, are no match for armed and resolute wickedness. A sincere love of peace is no excuse for muddling hundreds of millions of humble folks into total war. The cheers of weak, well-meaning assemblies soon cease to echo, and their votes soon cease to count. Doom marches on."
Kind of sad, don't you think?
JD| 7.25.12 @ 2:57PM
Stupid government programs of the day:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012.....n-collage/
Bill84728| 7.25.12 @ 3:17PM
Yet more proof, not that we needed it, that "the law is a ass."
Bill84728| 7.25.12 @ 4:53PM
More Hillaire Belloc on the Barbarian:
The Barbarian hopes and that is the mark of him, that he can have his cake and eat it too. He will consume what civilization has slowly produced after generations of selection and effort, but he will not be at pains to replace such goods, nor indeed has he a comprehension of the virtue that has brought them into being. Discipline seems to him irrational, on which account he is ever marvelling that civilization, should have offended him with priests and soldiers .... In a word, the Barbarian is discoverable everywhere in this, that he cannot make: that he can befog and destroy but that he cannot sustain; and of every Barbarian in the decline or peril of every civilization exactly that has been true.
* * * *
...the Barbarian will trade civilization for a cheap joke...
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 7:50PM
When the first American City is nuked by Islamists, I will run for President on the ONLY THUS! Party platform.
There will be very few planks:
1) Minimize taxes.
2) Eliminate all Spending, other than Defense, that does not meet the "shoot your grandma" criterion as per PJ O'Rourke. NPR, NEA, etc. down the toilet, along with Commerce, VA, HHS, and as many others as I can. State to be cut dramatically, as we need not those Anti-American swine.
3) Those Bastards are Going to Pay. I will have a very expansive view of this (Thank you, Colonel Tom Kratman, for Caliphate).
4) Citizenship open to anyone willing to serve 10 years as a member of the military, from anywhere, as long as they spit on a Koran and swear to fight against Sharia.
5) Illegal aliens can either do 4), leave, or be shot.
6) Drill, baby, drill---but no DOE---that will also be disbanded---necessary functions to go under the DoD.
7) All crimes of politically motivated murder to become Federal Crimes, subject to Presidential Pardons.
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 8:12PM
8) Islam to be considered a Political party, not a religion, and removed from 1st Amendment protection.
9) All able bodied welfare recipients to be offered a place in the armed forces; if they refuse or fail to to get through, welfare payments stop, payments for welfare "volunteers" to be set at 50% of equivalent military pay---this will encourage real volunteers.
10) The Molon Labe party envisions a 100 division army, and expects many Hindus and other world wide victims of Islam to come from overseas to apply. That, too, is fine---we are not Nativist or Racist---we are pro-West and anti-Sharia, in a US reeling from a Islamic nuclear attack---no nuclear attack, no Molon Labe party at this time. I would not expect a Molon Labe party to flourish in the current political atmosphere; but I WOULD expect it to flourish post nuclear attack by Iran or its allies.
11. Severe Imperialist designs upon the Islamic world and its oil, with no concern for native populations. Severe aggressive actions against the Islamic world, propelled by a massive 100 division US Army and MASSIVE domestic spending cuts and economic expansion due to war and low taxes. We will take the oil we want, we will not pay for it, and we will do with the Natives of the Islamic world as we wish---DO NOT NUKE US. Again, all of this shall not be necessary if the Islamic world does not foolishly use WMDs against the greatest power in world history.
But if they do,the heavens will fall.
Occam's Tool| 7.25.12 @ 10:01PM
By the way, some non-science courses I took at TCU:
Biblical Literature and Life---loved it.
Religions of mankind---loved it.
A multidisciplinary (science, history, sociology if I recall) course on the Holocaust---loved it.
An American History course (I think it was revolutionary to Civil war---OK).
I Claudius---a class on the first Five Roman emperors---we read Suetonius' 12 Caesars and Tacitus' Annals---loved it.
I, of course, was in college to round myself as a precursor to attending Medical School. My plan was to get an education at the Doctorate level, and I obtained the MD at age 25. For me, College made ample sense, and my humanities courses HAVE been helpful as a psychiatrist.
But we could knock out 50% of college students and not lose much intellectually, except the joy of busting the curve on them.
rocky01| 7.25.12 @ 11:21PM
"People who lament gridlock in Washington, and express the pious hope that Democrats and Republicans would put aside their partisan conflicts, and cooperate to help the economy recover, implicitly assume that what the economy needs is more meddling by politicians, which is what brought on economic disaster in the first place."
Exactly. What's more alarming is the geniuses who parry with the pubic with taling heads statements like "the President lacks leadership" or fails to lead on this or that issue. Ridiculous. Come up for air and look at the destruction of a civilization. We do NOT need any more LEADERSHIP of any kind from this administration. Ever again.
Controse| 7.25.12 @ 11:50PM
Mr. Sowell hits the nail on the head again. It explains how tightly liberals cling to their core talking points: Ignorance is liberating. Ignorance is a thought vacuum that gets filled with liberating wishful thinking. But liberty does not survive the grand scale ignorance we have had in public policy since FDR.
TLP| 7.26.12 @ 10:54AM
What do Margaret Sanger, Tiller the Killer, Planned Parenthood, Bill Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, the Democrat Party, and The Muslim, all have in common?
The Brutal Extermination of Millions of Innocent Human BABIES.
One of them did it to Cull the Number of Negros, whom she deemed Inferior, and a Danger to the Gene Pool.
One of them did it for Money.
Another one did it for A LOT OF MONEY.
Ayers and Dohrn just wanted to kill ALL THE WHITE BABIES.
One of them Promotes It, with the idea that Every Dead Baby represents a Vote For Them.
And, the last guy wants them Dead, because he's all about Death.
Communism, Marxism, Progessivism.
These are all Political Death Cults, with a long History of Forced Labour Camps, Concentration Camps, Gulags, Iron Curtains, Forced Starvations, Death Marches, Holocausts, and Killing Fields.
Besides.
These are all Infidel Babies.
And, his God of Murder wants them dead, anyway.