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Random Thoughts (Thomas Sowell)
GOPUSA ^ | October 7, 2009 | Thomas Sowell

Posted on 10/06/2009 8:44:59 PM PDT by jazusamo

Random thoughts on the passing scene:

Upon learning that the Constitution requires a president to be a natural born citizen, a college student said: "What makes a natural born citizen any more qualified than one born by C-section?"

Airlines that keep passengers trapped for hours in planes sitting on the runway should be prosecuted for unlawful imprisonment.

When politicians propose some hugely expensive new program and are asked how the government is going to pay for it, a standard ploy over the years has been to claim that they will pay for it by eliminating "waste, fraud and abuse." At a recent town hall meeting, a citizen raised the obvious question: If you can do that, why haven't you done it already?

Marxism is an ism that has become a wasm.

What is called "universal health care" can turn out to be universal "don't care" medical treatment, when Washington bureaucrats can over-rule what you and your doctor want to do.

Whatever happened to Samantha Brown on the Travel Channel? Could she have met with foul play? Where is the FBI when we need them?

The older I get, the more I learn to tolerate human shortcomings-- and the less I tolerate bad attitudes.

After political crusades for "affordable housing" ended up ruining the housing market and much of the economy with it, many of the same politicians are now carrying on a crusade for "affordable health care." But what you can afford has absolutely nothing to do with the cost of producing anything. Refusing to pay those costs means that you are just not going to continue getting the same quantity and quality-- regardless of what any politician says or how well he says it.

Want to win an easy bet? Bet someone that Babe Ruth had a lower lifetime earned run average than Cy Young, Whitey Ford or Sandy Koufax. During his early years with the Red Sox, Ruth pitched nine shutouts in a season, which is still the American League record for a left-handed pitcher. He would have made the baseball hall of fame, even if he had never hit a home run.

Congressman Joe Wilson got into more trouble for telling the truth than President Barack Obama got into by telling a demonstrable lie about adding millions of people to the insurance rolls without adding a dime to the deficit. As regards providing medical insurance for illegal immigrants, I doubt that the president will do that. More likely, he will legalize them first and then give them medical insurance.

The way Hollywood elites have sprung to the defense of Roman Polanski to keep him from being extradited to the United States, despite the heinous crime he is accused of, suggests that-- like other egalitarians-- they consider those who are "one of us" to be more equal than others.

When I contemplate the direction in which this government and this society are moving, my biggest consolation is that economists' predictions are often wrong. I can only hope that my expectations are wrong by miles.

What is most frightening about the political left is that they seem to have no sense of the tragedy of the human condition. All problems seem to them to be due to other people not being as wise or as noble as they are.

Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "Think things, not words." In words, many see a need for "social justice" to override "the dictates of the market." In reality, what is called "the market" consists of human beings making their own choices at their own cost. What is called "social justice" is government imposition of the notions of third parties, who pay no price for being wrong.

Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Muammar Qaddafi and Vladimir Putin have all praised Barack Obama. When enemies of freedom and democracy praise your president, what are you to think? When you add to this Barack Obama's many previous years of associations and alliances with people who hate America-- Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers, Father Pfleger, etc.-- at what point do you stop denying the obvious and start to connect the dots?


TOPICS: Editorial; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: randomthoughts; sowell; thomassowell
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1 posted on 10/06/2009 8:44:59 PM PDT by jazusamo
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To: abigail2; Amalie; American Quilter; arthurus; awelliott; Bahbah; bamahead; Battle Axe; ...
*PING*
Thomas Sowell

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Please FReepmail me if you would like to be added to, or removed from, the Thomas Sowell ping list…

2 posted on 10/06/2009 8:46:03 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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To: scripter

ping


3 posted on 10/06/2009 8:50:08 PM PDT by latina4dubya ( self-proclaimed tequila snob)
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To: All
Please bump the Freepathon and donate if you haven’t done so!

4 posted on 10/06/2009 8:50:37 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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To: jazusamo
Marxism is an ism that has become a wasm.

Yeah, tell that to the Free Cubans

5 posted on 10/06/2009 8:52:54 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (ACORN: Absolute Criminal Organization of Reprobate Nuisances)
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To: jazusamo
Airlines that keep passengers trapped for hours in planes sitting on the runway should be prosecuted for unlawful imprisonment.

This sentence justifies the whole column.

6 posted on 10/06/2009 8:55:23 PM PDT by GOPJ (MSM BIAS: the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell)
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To: GOPJ

It sure does, especially if you’ve ever been one of those unlawfully imprisoned. :)


7 posted on 10/06/2009 8:57:50 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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To: jazusamo
I can add one

Someone sent me a cartoon a few days back, it had a couple talking over the table, the man had the Newspaper with Joe Wilson on the page, and he is saying, “If someone is sitting in a room full of politicians, and yells ‘You Lie,’ How do they know which one he is talking about?”


From the desk of
cc2k:

8 posted on 10/06/2009 9:01:30 PM PDT by cc2k (Are you better off today than you were $4,000,000,000,000 ago?)
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To: jazusamo

i didn’t know that dr. sowell was a baseball fan. cool.


9 posted on 10/06/2009 9:07:20 PM PDT by sig226 (Real power is not the ability to destroy an enemy. It is the willingness to do it.)
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To: sig226

Yes, this isn’t the first time he’s mentioned baseball in Random Thoughts and other columns.


10 posted on 10/06/2009 9:09:43 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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To: jazusamo

While it is a long journey to the park bench, one’s arrival is not the end of the trip but a blessed pause while the world catches up.


11 posted on 10/06/2009 9:14:27 PM PDT by Old Professer (The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, then writes again.)
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To: jazusamo
It sure does, especially if you’ve ever been one of those unlawfully imprisoned. :)

Before cell phones I almost lost my job over that. No one could find me and I was supposed to be conducting a seminar for about 100 people.

12 posted on 10/06/2009 9:24:00 PM PDT by Mind-numbed Robot (Not all that needs to be done needs to be done by the government)
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To: jazusamo
"Marxism is an ism that has become a wasm"

-m +n. Stupid unchanged.


13 posted on 10/06/2009 9:25:10 PM PDT by I see my hands (_8(|)
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To: jazusamo; hiredhand; NFHale
thanks jaz, love the random thoughts...

what you can afford has absolutely nothing to do with the cost of producing anything. Refusing to pay those costs means that you are just not going to continue getting the same quantity and quality-- regardless of what any politician says

14 posted on 10/06/2009 9:32:14 PM PDT by Gilbo_3 (Gov is not reason; not eloquent; its force... Like fire, a dangerous servant & master. GW)
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To: jazusamo
^After political crusades for "affordable housing" ended up ruining the housing market and much of the economy with it, many of the same politicians are now carrying on a crusade for "affordable health care."^

Not only that, but they want to expand the CRA that allowed con artists like ACORN to shake banks down for free loans > Forbes: A Poisonous Cocktail-Expanding the Community Reinvestment Act (affirmative action mortgages)

As we try to shake off the financial crisis, here's a bright idea. Take a law that has led to the writing of an enormous amount of bad mortgages and expand it. Then take enforcement away from bank examiners and give it to housing activists.

15 posted on 10/06/2009 9:37:38 PM PDT by the anti-liberal
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To: jazusamo

Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Muammar Qaddafi and Vladimir Putin have all praised Barack Obama. When enemies of freedom and democracy praise your president, what are you to think? When you add to this Barack Obama’s many previous years of associations and alliances with people who hate America— Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers, Father Pfleger, etc.— at what point do you stop denying the obvious and start to connect the dots?

******************************

Too bad this can’t fit in my tagline.


16 posted on 10/06/2009 9:41:42 PM PDT by ROTB ("By any means necessary"=EvilExcusd "The urge 2 save humanity is [often a ruse] for the urge 2 rule")
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To: ROTB

Agreed, he said that so very well!


17 posted on 10/06/2009 9:49:00 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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To: potlatch; devolve; PhilDragoo; MeekOneGOP; bitt

“At what point do you stop denying the obvious and start to connect the dots?”

Sowell hits it out of the park once again.


18 posted on 10/06/2009 9:57:17 PM PDT by ntnychik
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To: jazusamo
I would correct only one thing:

.....defense of Roman Polanski to keep him from being extradited to the United States, despite the heinous crime he is accused of been convicted of.....

19 posted on 10/06/2009 10:07:28 PM PDT by Graybeard58 ( Selah.)
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To: Graybeard58

Correct, I picked up on that and Polanski actually pleaded guilty to the crime.


20 posted on 10/06/2009 10:14:22 PM PDT by jazusamo (But there really is no free lunch, except in the world of political rhetoric,.: Thomas Sowell)
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