Thomas Sowell from Creators Syndicate

The Galbraith Effect? for 08/12/2008

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Many years ago, when I was a college student, I took a course from John Kenneth Galbraith. On the first day of class, Professor Galbraith gave a brilliant opening lecture, after which the students gave him a standing ovation.

Galbraith kept on giving brilliant opening lectures the whole semester. But, instead of standing ovations, there were now dwindling numbers of students and some of ...

Updated: Tue Aug 12, 2008

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Amateurs Outdoing Professionals for 08/19/2008

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

When amateurs outperform professionals, there is something wrong with that profession.

If ordinary people, with no medical training, could perform surgery in their kitchens with steak knives, and get results that were better than those of surgeons in hospital operating rooms, the whole medical profession would be discredited.

Yet it is common for ordinary parents, with no training ...

Updated: Tue Aug 19, 2008

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Georgia on Our Mind for 08/19/2008

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

What is happening in the republic of Georgia is all too reminiscent of what happened back in 1956, when Russian tanks rolled into Hungary— and the West did nothing.

An argument might well be made that, realistically, there was nothing the West could have done— then or now— that would have forced the Russians out.

But there was bitterness, then as now, that the We ...

Updated: Tue Aug 19, 2008

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Anarchy on the Internet for 08/26/2008

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The Internet provides vast amounts of information but it can also spread vast amounts of misinformation, or even deliberately misleading disinformation.

For more than two weeks, scarcely a day has gone by without e-mails pouring in to me, asking about columns that someone has written and brazenly spread around the Internet with my name on them.

Most of these e-mails have come from ...

Updated: Tue Aug 26, 2008

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Random Thoughts for 08/26/2008

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Random thoughts on the passing scene:

If you took all the fraud out of politics, there might not be a lot left.

The reason so many people misunderstand so many issues is not that these issues are so complex, but that people do not want a factual or analytical explanation that leaves them emotionally unsatisfied. They want villains to hate and heroes to cheer— and they don't ...

Updated: Tue Aug 26, 2008

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Changes in Politics for 08/29/2008

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

One of the few political cliches that makes sense is that "In politics, overnight is a lifetime."

Less than a year ago, the big question was whether Rudolph Giuliani could beat Hillary Clinton in this year's presidential election. Less than two months ago, Barack Obama had a huge lead over John McCain in the polls. Less than a week ago, the smart money was saying that Mitt Romn ...

Updated: Fri Aug 29, 2008

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Foreign Policy "Experience" for 09/02/2008

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Now that the Democrats have recovered from the shock of Governor Sarah Palin's nomination as the Republican's candidate for vice president, they have suddenly discovered that her lack of experience in general— and foreign policy experience in particular— is a terrible danger in someone just a heartbeat away from being President of the United States.

For those who are satisfie ...

Updated: Tue Sep 02, 2008

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A Knock or a Boost? for 09/02/2008

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Since Governor Sarah Palin's daughter is not running for election this year, it is amazing how much the media has suddenly become obsessed with her. Her pregnancy not only made the front page of the New York Times, a printed announcement of her pregnancy stayed at the bottom of the television screen on CNN for what seemed to me to be about an hour or more.

Investigative reporters have ob ...

Updated: Tue Sep 02, 2008

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The Vision of the Left for 09/09/2008

Tue, 09 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Conservatives, as well as liberals, would undoubtedly be happier living in the kind of world envisioned by the left.

Very few people have either a vested interest or an ideological preference for a world in which there are many inequalities.

Even fewer would prefer a world in which vast sums of money have to be devoted to military defense, when so much benefit could be produced if ...

Updated: Tue Sep 09, 2008

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Idols of Crowds for 09/16/2008

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

"A human group transforms itself into a crowd when it suddenly responds to a suggestion rather than to reasoning, to an image rather than to an idea, to an affirmation rather than to proof, to the repetition of a phrase rather than to arguments, to prestige rather than to competence."

Jean-François Revel was not referring to the United States when he wrote those words, nor to h ...

Updated: Tue Sep 16, 2008

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The High Cost of Racial Hype for 09/16/2008

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Sometimes you don't know when you are lucky. Certainly I did not consider myself lucky when I left home at seventeen and discovered the hard way that there was no great demand for a black teenage dropout with no experience and no skill.

In retrospect, however, those days of struggling to earn money to pay the room rent and buy food left little time or energy for navel-gazing over things ...

Updated: Tue Sep 16, 2008

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A Political "Solution" for 09/23/2008

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Who was it who said, "crack-brained meddling by the authorities" can "aggravate an existing crisis"? Ronald Reagan? Milton Friedman? Adam Smith? Not even close. It was Karl Marx. Unlike most leftists today, Marx studied economics.

Is the current financial crisis going to lead to crack-brained meddling or to some rational actions? Predicting what politicians are going ...

Updated: Tue Sep 23, 2008

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A Political "Solution": Part II for 09/23/2008

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Estimates of how much money a government program will cost are notoriously unreliable. Estimates of the cost of the current bailout in the financial markets run into the hundreds of billions of dollars, and some say it may reach or exceed a trillion.

Many people have trouble even forming some notion of what such numbers as billion and trillion mean. One way to get some idea of the magnit ...

Updated: Tue Sep 23, 2008

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Penny-Wise Politics for 09/30/2008

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Congress is never more ridiculous than when it tries to look like it is serious.

In the midst of a major national financial crisis, what was one of the first things Congress zeroed in on? The pay of Chief Executive Officers of financial institutions.

If all those CEOs agreed to work for nothing, that would not be enough to lower the bailout money by one percent. Anyone who was rea ...

Updated: Tue Sep 30, 2008

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Bailout Politics for 09/30/2008

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Nothing could more painfully demonstrate what is wrong with Congress than the current financial crisis.

Among the Congressional "leaders" invited to the White House to devise a bailout "solution" are the very people who have for years created the risks that have now come home to roost.

Five years ago, Barney Frank vouched for the "soundness" of Fannie ...

Updated: Tue Sep 30, 2008

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Do Facts Matter? for 10/03/2008

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Abraham Lincoln said, "You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time."

Unfortunately, the future of this country, as well as the fate of the Western world, depends on how many people can be fooled on election day, just a few weeks from now.

Right now, the polls indicate that a whole lot of ...

Updated: Fri Oct 03, 2008

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The Real Obama: Part II for 10/07/2008

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

A recent Republican campaign ad sarcastically described as Barack Obama's "one accomplishment" his supporting a bill to promote sex education in kindergarten.

During an interview of a Republican spokesman, Tom Brokaw of NBC News replayed that ad and asked if that was something serious to be discussed in a presidential election campaign.

It was a variation on an old theme ...

Updated: Tue Oct 07, 2008

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The Real Obama for 10/07/2008

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Critics of Senator Barack Obama make a strategic mistake when they talk about his "past associations." That just gives his many defenders in the media an opportunity to counter-attack against "guilt by association."

We all have associations, whether at the office, in our neighborhood or in various recreational activities. Most of us neither know nor care what our asso ...

Updated: Tue Oct 07, 2008

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The Real Obama: Part III for 10/07/2008

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

What about those "real issues" that Barack Obama's supporters in the media say we should get back to, whenever some new unsavory fact about his past comes out?

Surely education is a real issue, with American school children consistently scoring below those in other countries, and children in minority communities faring worst of all.

What about Senator Obama's position on ...

Updated: Tue Oct 07, 2008

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"The Real Issues": Part IV for 10/07/2008

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Barack Obama's supporters often try to sidestep questions about his character and judgment by saying that we should stick to what they arbitrarily define as "the real issues." But Senator Obama's record on specific issues is as bad as his record of repeatedly allying himself over the years with people who make no attempt to hide their hatred of America.

Among the so-called &quo ...

Updated: Tue Oct 07, 2008

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