Thomas Sowell's blog

Playing freedom cheap

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 16:42:50 -0500

If eternal vigilance is the price of freedom, incessant distractions are the way that politicians take away our freedoms, in order to enhance their own power and longevity in office.

The fallacy of “Fairness”

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:44:26 -0500

Most of us want to be fair, in the sense of treating everyone equally. We want laws to be applied the same to everyone. We want educational, economic or other criteria for rewards to be the same as well.

Politicians in Wonderland

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:22:33 -0500

There was a recent flap because three different members of the Obama administration, on three different Sunday television talk shows, gave three widely differing estimates of how many jobs the president has created.

“Notional” Security

Thu, 14 Jan 2010 16:53:37 -0500

The latest “screw-up” that let a man with explosives get on a plan on Christmas day is only part of a larger laxness and irresponsibility when it comes to national security. This administration pays lip service to national security and gives out with a lot of rhetorical notions that makes it notional security instead of national security.

Intellectuals and society

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 16:20:34 -0500

There has probably never been an era in history when intellectuals have played a larger role in society. When intellectuals who generate ideas are surrounded by a wide range of others who disseminate those ideas — whether as journalists, teachers, staffers to legislators or clerks to judges — the influence of intellectuals on the way a society evolves can be huge.

The “science” mantra

Thu, 24 Dec 2009 12:23:08 -0500

Science is one of the great achievements of the human mind and the biggest reason why we live not only longer but more vigorously in our old age, in addition to all the ways in which it provides us with things that make life easier and more enjoyable.

Christmas Books

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:52:37 -0500

One way to reduce the wear and tear of Christmas shopping at the mall is to give books as presents. Books can be bought on the Internet, and they can be matched to the person who receives them without having to know that person’s measurements.

Jobs or snow jobs?

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 16:56:14 -0500

President Obama keeps talking about the jobs his administration is “creating” but there are more people unemployed now than before he took office. How can there be more unemployment after so many jobs have been “created”?

Solving whose problem?

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 14:58:18 -0500

No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems — of which getting elected and re-elected are number one and number two. Whatever is number three is far behind.

Bowing to “world opinion”

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:57:33 -0500

In the string of amazing decisions made during the first year of the Obama administration, nothing seems more like sheer insanity than the decision to try foreign terrorists, who have committed acts of war against the United States, in federal court, as if they were American citizens accused of crimes.

The ‘costs’ of medical care

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:04:33 -0500

We are incessantly being told that the cost of medical care is “too high” — either absolutely or as a growing percentage of our incomes. But nothing that is being proposed by the government is likely to lower those costs, and much that is being proposed is almost certain to increase the costs.

Dismantling America

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:31:46 -0400

Just one year ago, would you have believed that an unelected government official, not even a Cabinet member confirmed by the Senate but simply one of the many “czars” appointed by the President, could arbitrarily cut the pay of executives in private businesses by 50 percent or 90 percent?

Magic numbers in politics

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:11:33 -0400

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, two Russian economists who had never lived in a country with a free market economy understood something about market economies that many others who have lived in such economies all their lives have never understood.

A letter from a child

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:22:11 -0400

Recent videos of American children in school singing songs of praise for Barack Obama were a little much, especially for those of us old enough to remember pictures of children singing the praises of dictators like Hitler, Stalin and Mao.

The Brainy Bunch

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:50:21 -0400

Many people, including some conservatives, have been very impressed with how brainy the president and his advisers are. But that is not quite as reassuring as it might seem.