Posted on 11/29/2005 10:30:15 PM PST by smoothsailing
Random Thoughts
By Thomas Sowell
November 30, 2005
Random thoughts on the passing scene:
Bumper sticker in Berkeley: "Animals are little people in fur coats."
My tastes must be behind the times. When I see women in "before" and "after" advertisements, I often think they looked better before.
What enables ex-President Jimmy Carter to be taken seriously is that millions of people are too young to remember what a disaster the Carter administration was. He lost his bid for re-election in a landslide for a reason.
Who would have dreamed that "Merry Christmas" would become a controversial phrase? But increasingly schools and other institutions avoid it like the plague, in order to be politically correct.
Is there something about being rich that makes some people go off the deep end? The limousine liberals among the Democrats and the country club Republicans are the most unrealistic people in each party.
Cartoons in "The New Yorker" magazine used to make me burst out laughing but those in recent years don't even produce a smile. Could it be that political correctness makes it impossible to see and portray the humor in the many absurdities all around us?
Nightmare for the 2008 Presidential election: Hillary Clinton versus John McCain. I wouldn't know whether to vote Libertarian or move to Australia.
It apparently does not occur to some engineers who design products that most of the people who will be using those products are not engineers.
We are so much more rational about sports than we are about politics. No one considers it "unfair" that Tiger Woods does so much better than the average golfer, or resents him for it, or accuses him of "gouging" when he collects big bucks.
One of the many affectations of the political left and the intelligentsia is to disdain crass material things. But it is the increased production of crass material things which has released hundreds of millions of human beings from the curse of grinding poverty and endless toil, and given them longer lives.
British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher gave the best definition of "consensus": Lack of leadership.
A liberal can be found standing over a dead body with a smoking gun in his hand and the media will remind us that everyone is innocent until proven guilty. But the same media have for months been hyping insinuations that Karl Rove is guilty of something he has not even been charged with.
It is usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.
Since neither the creationists nor the evolutionists were there when the world began, why are our schools teaching either set of beliefs, when there are so many hard facts that the schools are failing to teach?
A recent e-mail from a man who says that my writings have changed his mind notes that this has not been all to the good. He says he was perfectly happy as a liberal but now he is frustrated when he hears the kind of nonsense that he used to accept without having to think about it.
Someone once said that the most important knowledge is knowledge of our own ignorance. Our schools are depriving millions of students of that kind of knowledge by promoting "self-esteem" and encouraging them to have opinions on things of which they are grossly ignorant, if not misinformed.
I have long suspected that there is a part of the male brain -- perhaps most of it -- which automatically shuts off at the sight of a good-looking woman.
Popularity can change very quickly in politics. During the boom times at the end of the 1920s, when Herbert Hoover was President, there were several times as many baby boys named Herbert as there were named Franklin. But just a few years later, after the stock market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression, there were several times as many boys named Franklin as were named Herbert.
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Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His Web site is www.tsowell.com.
COPYRIGHT 2005 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
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That would be tagline material if it were short enough... :(
Thomas Sowell is even smarter than Andy Rooney!
> It apparently does not occur to some engineers who design products that most of the people who will be using those products are not engineers.
I once tried to make a design I was working on idiotproof. I found out that idiot are more persistent and more creative than I ever gave them credit for.
"Neither any LAPD officer nor any member of the Dream Team was there when Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman died. Why did the courts bother with OJ Simpson when there were so many cut-and-dried cases they might have handled? "
A bloody glove, a bloody hand, no alibi, a bloody knife, a motive. Aside from that, you are correct.
"Nightmare for the 2008 Presidential election: Hillary Clinton versus John McCain. I wouldn't know whether to vote Libertarian or move to Australia."
I would vote for Hillary. I figure her VP choice is probably going to be better than her and I give Hillary three months in office before someone a lot saner than those voting for her takes her out.
McCain has one thing to show me. The Alito nomination.
These are great!
OJ...is that you?
One question, if this is true:
"Bumper sticker in Berkeley: "Animals are little people in fur coats."
Then are the PETA loonies going around splashing red paint on them?
"But the bacteria is and was and will be bacteria, right?"
Touche!
Ping....
I was in grade school and I still remember
What does moral superiority have to do with TOE?
My reference was not to TOE. It is those who insist that their closed system is the sole source of truth who trouble me. As I said, a two edged sword, since the same criticism can be levelled at both sides.
We bought a house that was built by an engineer for himself and his family. When you walked in the door there was a single rotating 24 volt wall switch that controlled 12 different 120 volt light fixtures around the house. His wife said that even she hadn't figured out how to work it after living for 30 years in the house. It still works.
Qˆ” What does moral superiority have to do with TOE?ˆ”
Aˆ” My reference was not to TOE. It is those who insist that their closed system is the sole source of truth who trouble me. As I said, a two edged sword, since the same criticism can be levelled at both sides.ˆ”
Exactly, Amos. When the truth, or what is true, are viewed through an ideological or political prism, they become caricatures of themselves. It is by exposing these caricatures of reality, that such people as Dr. Sowell are able to make a living. And a valuable service it is, when in the hands of someone as capable as the good professor.
My favorite colomnist. He keeps me tethered when the whole world seems lost in some weird pc dimension.
Unfortunately, that is only partially true today. While Sowell's columns appeared regularly in the NY Post during the 90's, they only appear sporadically nowadays, perhaps only once or twice a year.
During the 80's and 90's, the NY Post was the only reasonably right-leaning major newspaper in NYC, contrasting sharply with their counterparts: NYT, Daily News, and (since defunct) New York Newsday. Published then by Peter Kalikow, and now Rupert Murdoch, the Post featured an editorial staff second to none, consisting of astute Eric Breindel and the inimitable Jerry Nachman (a grizzled hard-core "journalist's journalist" in the truest sense of the phrase). Regular columns by Ray Kerrison, who was so far to the right that he'd make Pat Buchanan look like a flaming liberal (!!!), also appeared on a regular basis.
Then things changed (as they always do): Breindel passed away at age 42 in 1998, Nachman went on to bigger and better things (TV) and also passed away last year, Kerrison (who has a penchant for 'playing the ponies')'retired' from political writing in the Post and now only writes 'guest columns' in the sports section whenever a big horse race comes to town.
It was around early '00 that we saw less and less of Thomas Sowell's op-ed columns in the Post, although some did and still do appear occasionally. My guess was that Sowell had also gone on to bigger things (television appearences and such) so I didn't think much about why there was a lack of columns by him in the Post.
Anyway, not to get longwinded here, but Thomas Sowell's regular writings can be found at Townhall.com for free reading. Enjoy :)
(to Admin Moderator: I hope that my above anecdotes and references are permitted in this forum, if not then please edit as you see fit. Thanks -- MM :)
Enjoyed reading it.
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