Envy was once considered to be one of the seven deadly sins before it became one of the most admired virtues under its new name, ‘social justice.’
Tag: Thomas Sowell
(1930- ) American economist, turned social theorist, political philosopher, and author. He is currently Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.
Labor is not the source of wealth
Brilliance — even genius — is no guarantee that consequential factors have not been left out or misconceived. Karl Marx’s Capital was a classic example of an intellectually masterful elaboration of a fundamental misconception — in this case, the notion that “labor,” the physical handling of the material and instruments of production, is the real source of wealth. Obviously, if this were true, countries with much labor and little technology or entrepreneurship would be more prosperous than countries with the reverse, when in fact it is blatantly obvious that the direct opposite is the case.
The urge to censor
What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don’t like something to saying that the government should forbid it. When you go down that road, don’t expect freedom to survive very long.
Who’s responsible?
We seem to be getting closer and closer to a situation where nobody is responsible for what they did but we are all responsible for what somebody else did.
False compassion
Compassion is the use of public funds to buy votes.
Complete failure
The whole political vision of the left, including socialism and communism, has failed by virtually every empirical test, in countries all around the world. But this has only led leftists intellectuals to evade and denigrate empirical evidence.
Slavery vs. the welfare state
New York Times writer Nicholas Kristof asserts that there is ‘overwhelming evidence that centuries of racial subjugation still shape inequity in the 21st century’ and he mentions ‘the lingering effects of slavery.’ If we wanted to be serious about evidence, we might compare where blacks stood a hundred years after the end of slavery with where they stood after 30 years of the liberal welfare state.
Comparative greeds
It is amazing how many of the intelligentsia call it “greed” to want to keep what you have earned, but not greed to want to take away what somebody else has earned, and let politicians use it to buy votes.
Life support for racism
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.”
Protect the Constitution
The Constitution cannot protect you if you don’t protect the Constitution with your votes against anyone who violates it. Those government officials who want more power are not going to stop unless they get stopped.