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Dismantling America: and other controversial essays
These wide-ranging essays -- on many individual political, economic, cultural and legal issues -- have as a recurring, underlying theme the decline of the values and institutions that have sustained and advanced American society for more than two centuries. This decline has been more than an erosion. It has, in many cases, been a deliberate dismantling of American values and institutions by people convinced that their superior wisdom and virtue must over-ride both the traditions of the country and the will of the people. Whether these essays (originally published as syndicated newspaper columns) are individually about financial bailouts, illegal immigrants, gay marriage, national security, or the Duke University rape case, the underlying concern is about what these very different kinds of things say about the general direction of American society. This larger and longer-lasting question is whether the particular issues discussed reflect a degeneration or dismantling of the America that we once knew and expected to pass on to our children and grandchildren. There are people determined that this country's values, history, laws, traditions and role in the world are fundamentally wrong and must be changed. Such people will not stop dismantling America unless they get stopped -- and the next election may be the last time to stop them, before they take the country beyond the point of no return.
353 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 31, 2002
636 people are currently reading
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About the author
Thomas Sowell
88 books5,550 followersThomas Sowell is an American economist, social philosopher, and political commentator. He is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. With widely published commentary and books—and as a guest on TV and radio—he became a well-known voice in the American conservative movement as a prominent black conservative. He was a recipient of the National Humanities Medal from President George W. Bush in 2002.
Sowell was born in Gastonia, North Carolina and grew up in Harlem, New York City. Due to poverty and difficulties at home, he dropped out of Stuyvesant High School and worked various odd jobs, eventually serving in the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War. Afterward, he took night classes at Howard University and then attended Harvard University, where he graduated magna cum laude in 1958. He earned a master's degree in economics from Columbia University the next year and a doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago in 1968. In his academic career, he held professorships at Cornell University, Brandeis University, and the University of California, Los Angeles. He has also worked at think tanks including the Urban Institute. Since 1977, he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he is the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy.
Sowell was an important figure to the conservative movement during the Reagan era, influencing fellow economist Walter E. Williams and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He was offered a position as Federal Trade Commissioner in the Ford administration, and was considered for posts including U.S. Secretary of Education in the Reagan administration, but declined both times.
Sowell is the author of more than 45 books (including revised and new editions) on a variety of subjects including politics, economics, education and race, and he has been a syndicated columnist in more than 150 newspapers. His views are described as conservative, especially on social issues; libertarian, especially on economics; or libertarian-conservative. He has said he may be best labeled as a libertarian, though he disagrees with the "libertarian movement" on some issues, such as national defense.
Sowell was born in Gastonia, North Carolina and grew up in Harlem, New York City. Due to poverty and difficulties at home, he dropped out of Stuyvesant High School and worked various odd jobs, eventually serving in the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War. Afterward, he took night classes at Howard University and then attended Harvard University, where he graduated magna cum laude in 1958. He earned a master's degree in economics from Columbia University the next year and a doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago in 1968. In his academic career, he held professorships at Cornell University, Brandeis University, and the University of California, Los Angeles. He has also worked at think tanks including the Urban Institute. Since 1977, he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he is the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy.
Sowell was an important figure to the conservative movement during the Reagan era, influencing fellow economist Walter E. Williams and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He was offered a position as Federal Trade Commissioner in the Ford administration, and was considered for posts including U.S. Secretary of Education in the Reagan administration, but declined both times.
Sowell is the author of more than 45 books (including revised and new editions) on a variety of subjects including politics, economics, education and race, and he has been a syndicated columnist in more than 150 newspapers. His views are described as conservative, especially on social issues; libertarian, especially on economics; or libertarian-conservative. He has said he may be best labeled as a libertarian, though he disagrees with the "libertarian movement" on some issues, such as national defense.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 176 reviews
October 20, 2010
Reading Sowell is like watching a man smash the idols of progressive thought with a sledge hammer. Sowell gives no quarter while disclosing the negative effects of political correctness, moral relativism, and the thoughtless interference of congressman in our economy.
Chris Dodd and Barney Frank may have escaped judgement from their peers and the press. But Sowell pins the responsibility where it belongs!
Chris Dodd and Barney Frank may have escaped judgement from their peers and the press. But Sowell pins the responsibility where it belongs!
February 18, 2024
Essays from Sowell covering everything from economics to baseball are covered in this book, and I liked each of these essays! The tone of this book is different from other Sowell books. That is, Sowell sounds more opinionated here than in other books. That said, he’s as sharp as always and his commentary on hot button issues at the time these essays were written were enjoyable to read.
October 9, 2011
i've been reading thomas sowell here and there for...i dunno...8-10 years? plain english w/an eye to understanding, to relaying information. sowell, i believe, is an educator as well as an economist.
read him and you want to pull out your hair because eventually it begins to dawn on you that yes, what you have long-suspected is true...we are being played for fools.
and we are allowing it to happen...we have allowed our servants to become our masters.
speak for yourself did you say?
yesterday, the president of the united states spoke on national television. there he was, playing the part of leland gaunt from stephen king's needful things, pandering to envy greed selfishness.
incredible that the man knows that he can get away w/speaking like that.
sowell offers a different perspective...some of the things he says are mind-boggling, as they contradict all i have been told, all that has been informed...
....but one of the recent columns (these appeared, all, i believe, in newspapers, online)....in
"cultural issues":
"today, whole classes of people get their jollies and puff themselves up by denigrating and denouncing american society."
i believe i read walter williams writing the same thing.
dostoyevsky wrote about his time that there was an intense animal hatred for all things russian. we know what happened to dostoyevsky's russia...and yet we are too blind to what is happening to us....
...i hazard to say the same thing...we are "Dismantling America"
sowell writes of the "great global warming swindle" in several places...p 200 in one..and in his "random thoughts" the final chapter/section...."
now that the british television documentary, "the great global warming swindle" is available on dvd, will those schools that forced their students to watch al gore's movie, "an inconvenient truth" also show them the other side? ask them." p341
yes. we should ask our schools that question.
there's many quotable quotes within...from marx: "the working class is revolutionary or it is nothing." p229
to wit: the people on wall street are getting paid...some of them, some of the hispanics...whereas the people who speak the lingo have no excuse....holding up the signs, misspelled words, "feild" in one script for "field"...and so on.
"the essence of bigotry is refusing to others the rights that you demand for yourself..." p 251
"some people seem to think that we live in more 'liberated' times, when all that has happened is that one set of taboos has been replaced by another and more intolerantly enforced set of taboos." p 334
he talks/writes about this, with the column about homosexual marriage, the reaction to states voting down, or voting for the idea that marriage is and shall be between a man and a woman....this review, consequently....will be noted as a "hate crime" by those whose superior wisdom shall not be questioned...
"some people are so busy being clever that they don't have time enough to be wise." p 335
"can you cite one speck of hard evidence of the benefits of 'diversity' that we have heard gushed about for years?" 335
"what is your 'fair share' of what someone else has worked for?" 335
talking points? sure....
but there's more...he has several columns on the duke rape case, a case that alas i failed to follow. some of us...most of us...me...have to work for a living...we have to work hard...my neighbor, bless his heart, told me once: you'll never work in this town again.
alas...what to do...dueling went out about the time the west was won.....so?
release the drones!
good read...the pieces were written for a newspaper, their opinion page....heh!....and there's a lot of information presented here...if only "the other side of the coin"
so...read it....unless your motto is, tails i win heads you lose.
or...unless you have access to drones.
read him and you want to pull out your hair because eventually it begins to dawn on you that yes, what you have long-suspected is true...we are being played for fools.
and we are allowing it to happen...we have allowed our servants to become our masters.
speak for yourself did you say?
yesterday, the president of the united states spoke on national television. there he was, playing the part of leland gaunt from stephen king's needful things, pandering to envy greed selfishness.
incredible that the man knows that he can get away w/speaking like that.
sowell offers a different perspective...some of the things he says are mind-boggling, as they contradict all i have been told, all that has been informed...
....but one of the recent columns (these appeared, all, i believe, in newspapers, online)....in
"cultural issues":
"today, whole classes of people get their jollies and puff themselves up by denigrating and denouncing american society."
i believe i read walter williams writing the same thing.
dostoyevsky wrote about his time that there was an intense animal hatred for all things russian. we know what happened to dostoyevsky's russia...and yet we are too blind to what is happening to us....
...i hazard to say the same thing...we are "Dismantling America"
sowell writes of the "great global warming swindle" in several places...p 200 in one..and in his "random thoughts" the final chapter/section...."
now that the british television documentary, "the great global warming swindle" is available on dvd, will those schools that forced their students to watch al gore's movie, "an inconvenient truth" also show them the other side? ask them." p341
yes. we should ask our schools that question.
there's many quotable quotes within...from marx: "the working class is revolutionary or it is nothing." p229
to wit: the people on wall street are getting paid...some of them, some of the hispanics...whereas the people who speak the lingo have no excuse....holding up the signs, misspelled words, "feild" in one script for "field"...and so on.
"the essence of bigotry is refusing to others the rights that you demand for yourself..." p 251
"some people seem to think that we live in more 'liberated' times, when all that has happened is that one set of taboos has been replaced by another and more intolerantly enforced set of taboos." p 334
he talks/writes about this, with the column about homosexual marriage, the reaction to states voting down, or voting for the idea that marriage is and shall be between a man and a woman....this review, consequently....will be noted as a "hate crime" by those whose superior wisdom shall not be questioned...
"some people are so busy being clever that they don't have time enough to be wise." p 335
"can you cite one speck of hard evidence of the benefits of 'diversity' that we have heard gushed about for years?" 335
"what is your 'fair share' of what someone else has worked for?" 335
talking points? sure....
but there's more...he has several columns on the duke rape case, a case that alas i failed to follow. some of us...most of us...me...have to work for a living...we have to work hard...my neighbor, bless his heart, told me once: you'll never work in this town again.
alas...what to do...dueling went out about the time the west was won.....so?
release the drones!
good read...the pieces were written for a newspaper, their opinion page....heh!....and there's a lot of information presented here...if only "the other side of the coin"
so...read it....unless your motto is, tails i win heads you lose.
or...unless you have access to drones.
October 3, 2010
Great book which exposes the hidden agenda of the progressives in both political parties. This book is a great read and easy to understand. However, if you read "Economics in One Lesson" first, then read this book, you will better understand the deeper implications of what this book exposes...
January 17, 2024
"There are Americans alive at this moment who may experience the national equivalent of “a perfect storm,” either domestically or internationally, or both.
To have what is called “a perfect storm,” many dangerous forces must come together at the same time. Those dangerous forces have been building in the United States of America for at least half a century..."
Dismantling America was another excellent book from Thomas Sowell. IMHO, he is one of -if not the sharpest contrarian thinker in the public sphere. He drops the above quote in the book's intro, setting the pace for the writing to follow.
Author Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social theorist, and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Sowell has served on the faculties of several universities, including Cornell University and the University of California, Los Angeles. He has also worked at think tanks such as the Urban Institute. Since 1980, he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he served as the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy. Sowell writes from a libertarian–conservative perspective. Sowell has written more than thirty books, and his work has been widely anthologized. He is a National Humanities Medal recipient for innovative scholarship which incorporated history, economics and political science.
Thomas Sowell:
Dismantling America is my 7th book from Sowell. He is one of my favorite authors/pundits/social commentators. Sowell's writing here was exceptional, as usual. His analysis is super-nuanced and insightful, in line with other titles of his that I've read.
Sowell writes with a no-nonsense, matter-of-fact style here, as he does in his other books. As the title implies, this book is a compilation of short essays on the current state of American politics and economics.
The quote from the start of this review continues below:
Sowell lays out the aim of the book in this quote:
I'll include one of the better short essays here, both for my own future reference, as well as for anyone else interested. I'll cover it with a spoiler, for the sake of the brevity of this review:
********************
Dismantling America was another great read from a super-sharp mind. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone reading this review.
5 stars, and a spot on my favorites shelf.
To have what is called “a perfect storm,” many dangerous forces must come together at the same time. Those dangerous forces have been building in the United States of America for at least half a century..."
Dismantling America was another excellent book from Thomas Sowell. IMHO, he is one of -if not the sharpest contrarian thinker in the public sphere. He drops the above quote in the book's intro, setting the pace for the writing to follow.
Author Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social theorist, and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Sowell has served on the faculties of several universities, including Cornell University and the University of California, Los Angeles. He has also worked at think tanks such as the Urban Institute. Since 1980, he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he served as the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy. Sowell writes from a libertarian–conservative perspective. Sowell has written more than thirty books, and his work has been widely anthologized. He is a National Humanities Medal recipient for innovative scholarship which incorporated history, economics and political science.
Thomas Sowell:
Dismantling America is my 7th book from Sowell. He is one of my favorite authors/pundits/social commentators. Sowell's writing here was exceptional, as usual. His analysis is super-nuanced and insightful, in line with other titles of his that I've read.
Sowell writes with a no-nonsense, matter-of-fact style here, as he does in his other books. As the title implies, this book is a compilation of short essays on the current state of American politics and economics.
The quote from the start of this review continues below:
"...By 2010, increasing numbers of Americans were beginning to express fears that they were losing the country they grew up in, and that they had hoped—or perhaps too complacently assumed—that they would be passing on to their children and grandchildren.
No one issue and no one administration in Washington has been enough to create a perfect storm for a great nation that has weathered many storms in its more than two centuries of existence. But the Roman Empire lasted many times longer, and weathered many storms in its turbulent times—and yet it ultimately collapsed completely.
It has been estimated that a thousand years passed before the standard of living in Europe rose again to the level it had achieved in Roman times. The collapse of a civilization is not just the replacement of rulers or institutions with new rulers and new institutions. It is the destruction of a whole way of life and the painful, and sometimes pathetic, attempts to begin rebuilding amid the ruins.
Is that where America is headed? I believe it is. Our only saving grace is that we are not there yet—and that nothing is inevitable until it happens."
Sowell lays out the aim of the book in this quote:
"When we look back at the decades-long erosions and distortions of our educational system, our legal system and our political system, we must acknowledge the chilling fact that the kinds of dangers we face now were always inherent in these degenerating trends. The essays that follow deal with these trends individually, but it may help to keep in mind that they were all going on at the same time, and that these are the dangers whose coming together can create a perfect storm."
I'll include one of the better short essays here, both for my own future reference, as well as for anyone else interested. I'll cover it with a spoiler, for the sake of the brevity of this review:
********************
Dismantling America was another great read from a super-sharp mind. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone reading this review.
5 stars, and a spot on my favorites shelf.
December 25, 2020
Dismantling America: and other controversial essays by Thomas Sowell is a collection of some of Dr. Sowell's earlier writings focused on the intentional deterioration of America's core values. Some people of a more leftist bent who question our traditional values, laws, history, and traditions are determined to take down America by discrediting as many of these as possible in the eyes of the American people. It is already having an impact as many of our children and grandchildren are taught (indoctrinated) in our schools how racist and unfair America is while reality and now politically incorrect history say differently. There is an organized radical leftist effort to erase factually proven history and substitute an agenda driven view of history that some people use as excuses to tear down statues of historically important figures including some who were decidedly anti-slavery. Dr. Sowell explores many of these strategies and tactics used by the left who want to show that America is not special, capitalism is racist, whites are responsible for all the evils in America, and lots of other insane ideas from the litany of progressive talking points. I highly recommend this book and anything else by Thomas Sowell if you are open minded and want a fact-based logical analysis of what is going on in America today. I will caution you that once you are exposed to facts and logic, you can't go back to the insanity of the world the left wants to to believe where America is destined to be a socialist/communist state!
June 23, 2020
Thomas Sowell is anything but neutral in this book but he has a lot of interesting views and wise observations, especially the last chapter of random tidbits. I don't agree with him 100%* (do I agree with anyone that much?). But I respect him because he thinks and isn't afraid to be blunt. I wish he had a legit social media account. His opinions on the current crisis would be really interesting to read.
*global warming, for one.
*global warming, for one.
September 5, 2022
This is Thomas Sowell's most accessible book that I've read. It is a collection of essays, but this makes it low commitment (all chapters are a tight three pages with large font), and also keeps the ideas from going too deep in data, while still getting a great flavor of Sowell's writing. Maybe the perfect intro to Sowell's work for the apprehensive reader.
April 27, 2024
This is a series of essays by the economist Thomas Sowell, whose a perspective I wish I'd had during the early 2010s. Of particular interest are his essay about Israel's retaliation against Hamas, which shows what he turned out to be wrong about. I've also gotten a lot of mileage out of the Lincoln quote about the dog with five legs. Go read it.
November 15, 2021
This book was a heavy hitter - not a nice light read that will help you fall asleep at night! In fact, it kept me up several nights thinking about it. It's a collection of essays, so I'll just leave several quotes here:
"To understand political issues, you have to understand the incentives facing the politicians who frame those issues and craft "solutions." To expect politicians to put the public interest above their own personal interests is to defy thousands of years of history, in countries around the world...One of the trends that can become part of a perfect storm of disasters for American society has been a decades-long dumbing down of education, producing a citizenry poorly equipped to see through political rhetoric, and even more poorly supplied with facts and the ability to analyze opposing arguments."
"Among the differences between the parties is that Democrats are more articulate. Admittedly, the Democrats have an easier case to make. It takes no great amount of thought, nor much in the way of persuasive powers, to sell the idea of government handing out benefits hither and yon. It is only when you stop and think about the consequences for this generation and generations to come, that some grim questions arise...Sometimes it doesn't matter that you have a better product, if your competitors have better salesman."
"A higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1965. It was Republicans whose "Philedelphia Plan" in the 1970s sought to break the construction unions' racial barriers that kept blacks out of skilled trades."
"for people on the left, however, blacks are trophies or mascots, and must therefore be put on display. Nowhere is that more true than in politics...
In academia, lower admissions standards for black students are about having them as a visible presence, even if mismatching them with the particular college or university produces high dropout rates...
Leaping to the defense of black criminals is another common practice among liberals who need black mascots. Most of the crimes committed by black criminals are committed against other blacks. But, again, the actual well-being of mascots is not the point."
"When people came here from Europe, they came here to become Americans. There was no prouder title for them...Both legal and illegal immigrants have come here primarily to work and make a better life for themselves and their families. But a country requires more than workers. It requires people who are citizens not only in name but in commitment. Americanization did not happen automatically in earlier times and it will not happen automatically today. Immigrants in an earlier era had leaders and organizations actively working to transform them into Americans - the Catholic Church with the Irish and numerous organizations among the Jews, for example."
"Just what problem will amnesty solve? Illegal aliens will benefit and politicians will benefit by sweeping the illegality under the rug by making it legal. But how will American citizens benefit? America can lose big time."
"The 'trickle sown theory' has been a stock phrase on the left for decades and yet not one of those who denounce it can find anybody who advocated it. The tenacity with which they cling to these catch words shows how desperately they need them, if only to safeguard their vision of the world and of themselves."
"Here, as elsewhere, there is no free lunch - even though politicians get elected by promising free lunches. A free lunch in medical care is one of the most dangerous illusions of all. Waiting in long gasoline lines at filling stations was exasperating back in the 1970s, but waiting weeks to get an MRI to find out why you are sick, and then waiting months for an operation, as happens in countries with government-run medical systems, can be not only painful but dangerous. You can be dead by the time they find out what is wrong with you and do something about it. But that will 'bring down the cost of medical care' because you won't be around to require any."
"Do not expect sound judgments in a society where being "non-judgemental" is an exalted value. As someone has said, if you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything."
"Regardless of how much suffocating regulation may have been responsible for an economic debacle, politicians have learned that they can get away with it if they call it "Deregulation."
"Perhaps more important, nobody told me that I couldn't make it because I was poor and black, or that I ought to hate white people today because of what some other white people did to my ancestors in some other time."
"One of the problems with trying to help underdogs, especially with government programs, is that they and everyone else start to think of them as underdogs, focusing on their problems rather than their opportunities. Thinking of themselves as underdogs can also dissipate their energies in resentments of others, rather than spending that energy making the most of their own possibilities."
"In other words, people on the left want the right to impose their idea of what is good for society on others - a right that they vehemently deny to those whose idea of what is good for society differs from their own. The essence of bigotry is refusing to others the rights that you demand for yourself. Such bigotry is inherently incompatible with freedom, even though many of the left would be shocked to be considered opposed to freedom."
"Negative depictions of marriage and family are common not only in our newspapers but also wherever the left is concentrated, whether in our schools and colleges, or on television or in the movies...The New York Times was not the first outlet of the left to play fast and loose with statistics in order to depict marriage as a relic of the past. Innumerable sources have quoted a statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce - another conclusion based on creative manipulation of words, rather than on hard facts. The fact that there may be half as many divorces in a given year as there are marriages in that year does not mean that half of all marriages end in divorce. It is completely misleading to compare all the divorces in one year - from marriages begun years and even decades earlier - with the number of marriages begun in that one year. Why these desperate twistings of words and numbers by the left, in order to discredit marriage? Partly is is because marriage is a fundamental component of a social order that the left opposes."
"The 1960s marked the end of many beneficial trends that had been going on for years -and a complete reversal of those trends as programs, policies, and ideologies of the liberals took hold...As for black economic advances, the most dramatic reduction in poverty among blacks occurred between 1940 and 1960, when the black poverty rate was cut almost in half, without any major government programs of the Great Society kind that began in the 1960s."
"The lefts' jihad against gun ownership by law-abiding citizens has produced a flood of distorted information. International comparisons almost invariably compare the US with some country with stronger gun control laws and lower murder rates. But, if facts really mattered, you could just as easily compare the US to countries with stronger gun control laws and higher murder rates - Brazil and Russia, for example. You could compare the US with countries with more widespread gun ownership - Switzerland and Israel for example - and lower murder rates. But that's only if facts are regarded as more important than the dogmas of the left. Millions of crime victims pay the price of the left's illusions about crime - and about themselves."
"the left has long confused physical parallels with moral parallels. But when a criminal shoots at a policeman and the policeman shoots back, physical equivalence is not moral equivalence...If we have reached the point where we cannot be bothered to think beyond rhetoric or to make moral distinctions, then we have reached the point where our own survival in an increasingly dangerous world of nuclear proliferation can no longer be taken for granted."
"To understand political issues, you have to understand the incentives facing the politicians who frame those issues and craft "solutions." To expect politicians to put the public interest above their own personal interests is to defy thousands of years of history, in countries around the world...One of the trends that can become part of a perfect storm of disasters for American society has been a decades-long dumbing down of education, producing a citizenry poorly equipped to see through political rhetoric, and even more poorly supplied with facts and the ability to analyze opposing arguments."
"Among the differences between the parties is that Democrats are more articulate. Admittedly, the Democrats have an easier case to make. It takes no great amount of thought, nor much in the way of persuasive powers, to sell the idea of government handing out benefits hither and yon. It is only when you stop and think about the consequences for this generation and generations to come, that some grim questions arise...Sometimes it doesn't matter that you have a better product, if your competitors have better salesman."
"A higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1965. It was Republicans whose "Philedelphia Plan" in the 1970s sought to break the construction unions' racial barriers that kept blacks out of skilled trades."
"for people on the left, however, blacks are trophies or mascots, and must therefore be put on display. Nowhere is that more true than in politics...
In academia, lower admissions standards for black students are about having them as a visible presence, even if mismatching them with the particular college or university produces high dropout rates...
Leaping to the defense of black criminals is another common practice among liberals who need black mascots. Most of the crimes committed by black criminals are committed against other blacks. But, again, the actual well-being of mascots is not the point."
"When people came here from Europe, they came here to become Americans. There was no prouder title for them...Both legal and illegal immigrants have come here primarily to work and make a better life for themselves and their families. But a country requires more than workers. It requires people who are citizens not only in name but in commitment. Americanization did not happen automatically in earlier times and it will not happen automatically today. Immigrants in an earlier era had leaders and organizations actively working to transform them into Americans - the Catholic Church with the Irish and numerous organizations among the Jews, for example."
"Just what problem will amnesty solve? Illegal aliens will benefit and politicians will benefit by sweeping the illegality under the rug by making it legal. But how will American citizens benefit? America can lose big time."
"The 'trickle sown theory' has been a stock phrase on the left for decades and yet not one of those who denounce it can find anybody who advocated it. The tenacity with which they cling to these catch words shows how desperately they need them, if only to safeguard their vision of the world and of themselves."
"Here, as elsewhere, there is no free lunch - even though politicians get elected by promising free lunches. A free lunch in medical care is one of the most dangerous illusions of all. Waiting in long gasoline lines at filling stations was exasperating back in the 1970s, but waiting weeks to get an MRI to find out why you are sick, and then waiting months for an operation, as happens in countries with government-run medical systems, can be not only painful but dangerous. You can be dead by the time they find out what is wrong with you and do something about it. But that will 'bring down the cost of medical care' because you won't be around to require any."
"Do not expect sound judgments in a society where being "non-judgemental" is an exalted value. As someone has said, if you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything."
"Regardless of how much suffocating regulation may have been responsible for an economic debacle, politicians have learned that they can get away with it if they call it "Deregulation."
"Perhaps more important, nobody told me that I couldn't make it because I was poor and black, or that I ought to hate white people today because of what some other white people did to my ancestors in some other time."
"One of the problems with trying to help underdogs, especially with government programs, is that they and everyone else start to think of them as underdogs, focusing on their problems rather than their opportunities. Thinking of themselves as underdogs can also dissipate their energies in resentments of others, rather than spending that energy making the most of their own possibilities."
"In other words, people on the left want the right to impose their idea of what is good for society on others - a right that they vehemently deny to those whose idea of what is good for society differs from their own. The essence of bigotry is refusing to others the rights that you demand for yourself. Such bigotry is inherently incompatible with freedom, even though many of the left would be shocked to be considered opposed to freedom."
"Negative depictions of marriage and family are common not only in our newspapers but also wherever the left is concentrated, whether in our schools and colleges, or on television or in the movies...The New York Times was not the first outlet of the left to play fast and loose with statistics in order to depict marriage as a relic of the past. Innumerable sources have quoted a statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce - another conclusion based on creative manipulation of words, rather than on hard facts. The fact that there may be half as many divorces in a given year as there are marriages in that year does not mean that half of all marriages end in divorce. It is completely misleading to compare all the divorces in one year - from marriages begun years and even decades earlier - with the number of marriages begun in that one year. Why these desperate twistings of words and numbers by the left, in order to discredit marriage? Partly is is because marriage is a fundamental component of a social order that the left opposes."
"The 1960s marked the end of many beneficial trends that had been going on for years -and a complete reversal of those trends as programs, policies, and ideologies of the liberals took hold...As for black economic advances, the most dramatic reduction in poverty among blacks occurred between 1940 and 1960, when the black poverty rate was cut almost in half, without any major government programs of the Great Society kind that began in the 1960s."
"The lefts' jihad against gun ownership by law-abiding citizens has produced a flood of distorted information. International comparisons almost invariably compare the US with some country with stronger gun control laws and lower murder rates. But, if facts really mattered, you could just as easily compare the US to countries with stronger gun control laws and higher murder rates - Brazil and Russia, for example. You could compare the US with countries with more widespread gun ownership - Switzerland and Israel for example - and lower murder rates. But that's only if facts are regarded as more important than the dogmas of the left. Millions of crime victims pay the price of the left's illusions about crime - and about themselves."
"the left has long confused physical parallels with moral parallels. But when a criminal shoots at a policeman and the policeman shoots back, physical equivalence is not moral equivalence...If we have reached the point where we cannot be bothered to think beyond rhetoric or to make moral distinctions, then we have reached the point where our own survival in an increasingly dangerous world of nuclear proliferation can no longer be taken for granted."
December 16, 2021
Audible.com 8 hours 7 min. Narrated by Robertson Dean
Thomas Sowell could see in the first term of President Barack Obama the beginning of the end of the America in which I grew up. This series of short essays speaks first to left leaning of the Democrat party lead by Obama and now controlled in 2022 by the Progressives. Dr. Sowell had foresight and offered answers to problems which have ignored by the majority of Republicans who have become a part of the Capitol Swamp. In the second part he speaks on the fallacy of "fairness," the "right" to win, the "science" of global warming. I wish I'd read this book when it was first published, but it's still a valuable resource. I have the highest respect for Dr. Sowell.
Thomas Sowell could see in the first term of President Barack Obama the beginning of the end of the America in which I grew up. This series of short essays speaks first to left leaning of the Democrat party lead by Obama and now controlled in 2022 by the Progressives. Dr. Sowell had foresight and offered answers to problems which have ignored by the majority of Republicans who have become a part of the Capitol Swamp. In the second part he speaks on the fallacy of "fairness," the "right" to win, the "science" of global warming. I wish I'd read this book when it was first published, but it's still a valuable resource. I have the highest respect for Dr. Sowell.
August 9, 2012
Terrible rambles from a mad man. He actually believes that the American Republicans, despite their complete failures of the past decade, are the way forward. Right wing nut, who is almost as bad as Rush himself. Steer clear of this book and this author.
January 6, 2022
Thomas Sowell is always very good at exposing how the virtuous self-congratulation of the Left regarding their own policies never quite squares with reality.
June 20, 2019
Well, this book certainly lives up to its claim of being filled with controversial essays. For some, especially those who really love Thomas Sowell's perspective as well as his tendency to get at the heart of issues, this is recommendation enough. And admittedly there is a lot to enjoy here, if you agree largely with the author's positions. Like many books by people whose political beliefs are rather strong, they are not the sort of books that are likely to be appreciated by those who do not share the author's positions or are at least not willing to give a high degree of respect to the author's views. Although I did find a lot to agree with, I tended to find a great many of the essays somewhat rambling or repetitious, but that is the sort of thing that comes easily when a book is assembled out of shorter polemical pieces as this one was. One does not then edit the essays to make sure that the same examples or same statements don't appear over and over again, likely because one is not likely going to be reading all of them straight through at the same time either.
And there are a lot of essays to be read here, as this book is more than 300 pages and is divided into six parts with four pages worth of essays, some of them multi-part. The book begins with various essays on government policies, including the necessity to deal with ugly realities, the limitations of cheap political theater, and the limits of power, as well as the author's concerns about America being at a point of no return. After that the author talks about various political issues, dealing with more ugly realities as well as political parties and politicians. After that comes essays on economic issues ,including the costs of medical care as well as various fallacies and confusion about economics. There are some essays on cultural issues as well, including several parts on the fallacy of fairness as well as essays about de-programming students and dealing with grating generations as well as too many fake apologies. After that the author writes some about legal issues, including the relationship between the left and crime as well as the Duke rape case. Finally, the author concludes with some random thoughts, and it must be emphasized that these thoughts are very random.
What it is that makes this book worthwhile even if it is a bit rough around the edges because it is made of smaller essays combined together without a great deal of editing into a larger work? For the most part, this book succeeds because of its firm commitment to telling brutal truths that many people are simply unwilling to deal with. The author does not strike me as a sentimental person--he is pretty harsh on Republicans who fail to be conservative enough for his tastes and he is absolutely brutal when it comes to demolishing the bad logic that runs so rampant when it comes to questions of politics and economics at present. Obviously, the author has a lot to say about economics and politics, and most of it should be red meat to conservative readers, but it is vital to recognize that the author gives no credit at all to good intentions or the way that people like to feel warm and fuzzy or want something to be done even when something should be done. This is a book for those who are unsparing when it comes to dealing with the truth and facts of existence rather than for those who want to feel as if they are good and noble-hearted people.
February 20, 2011
What a colossal waste of time. I picked up Sowell expecting an erudite Libertarian scholar, but he's in the same category as Bill Maher on the left and Beck on the right. Key styles in the book: Highfalutin moral grandstanding, lack of intellectual depth, simplification of issues to the extent that it becomes moronic to even argue, choosing whatever statistics suit your blend of ideology, and above all, painting everyone on the other side as not just wrong but on a crusade to dismantle America and everything that he finds sacred in it. Maybe I picked up the wrong work. I wanted to get 'A Conflict of Visions,' but that being unavailable, settled for this. But considering how this is written for morons, I am wary of anything else by this fellow. Ruined my sunday afternoon.
April 8, 2019
So good. Like reading Proverbs, only about modern economies and culture, as if Proverbs doesn't cover those as well.
February 6, 2014
Bullshit on stilts.
March 18, 2021
I came over this book, having heard positive things about Sowells economics and social insights. Having seen some interviews with him where he didn’t quite live up to it, I thought a book of his own design would create a different picture.
Boy was I wrong.
If I were to go through all the fallacies, contradictions and down right lies (or just lack of 5 minutes of research) it would fill up at least 20-30 pages.
My notes from this book, with these points, are over 6 pages long.
I understand that this book is based on essays written by Sowell, but even so I find the repetition to be bothersome. He never brings any new arguments or even arguments at all. He just complains, doesn’t show to sources and most of the time doesn’t have solutions either.
One of the few people he actually quotes in any of these, is Tim Harford and his book Undercover Economics. He, ofc, doesn’t mention anything in the book except one line about china.
If he had just taken a look at mostly anything else, he would find his views challenged. Sowell doesn’t seem the type to actually read both sides of something.
Take universal healthcare. He talks about how it is impossible for the government to keep up the same quality, give everyone healthcare and cut costs at the same time. I agree that it seems like a bit much to chew, but it does seem possible.
Look to Europe. Sowell is completely right when he talks about healthcare queues and such, but most countries have a private sector as well. So you can pay extra if you want to.
It covers more of the population and gives the government a higher negotiation power.
Undercover Economist even covers this, as does many other books and articles.
Not once does Sowell take up this point. He just says it is impossible, without going into any details what so ever.
He talks a lot about freedom. His view is that the government shouldn’t go into the private life of individuals and give the marked and the people total economic freedom.
I can understand that point and many agree with him.
He however, multiple times says that the government should regulate our privatelife MORE.
He says that laws that were removed in the 60s lead to higher murder and crime rate, but never says what laws were removed. All I understand from his rambling, is that he wants the government to limit our freedoms where he sees fit, but not where he doesn’t
Which means he is a huge hypocrite.
Another point, which he never mentions, is that it might be other reasons why crime rate went up.
At any given year, at least 10% of Americans crime charges are drug related. Laws and regulations against narcotics came almost exactly when Sowell blames deregulation by the government.
I’m not saying it is a direct cause, the whole cause or even part of the cause. Just saying it is weird it isn’t even mentioned.
He targets Obama a lot in this book. I understand that it is the whole point. It is just that the right side of US politics is covered by his rhetoric, as well as the left. He never acknowledges this, since that would go against his whole point.
He mentions that the media and the left are using rhetoric to create enemies.
Well, so does Sowell. Against the left, against the “inteligencia” and against Iran and others.
Iran might, at some point in time, get Nuclear weapons. Therefor we shouldn’t even talk to them about it, but just directly declare war, without any warning and bomb them all to oblivion.
Talk about someone that is for less government intervention!
One would think he would be positive to Obama, but Obama might have started bombing more after this book came out. This book came out very early in Obamas presidency.
Sowell thinks it is positive that Japan doesn’t really have a military, but later he condems any country that doesn’t have one to protect themselves.
The US should never learn how to govern, what laws are effective and what to do from other countries. The left is ruining the country and trying to sabotage it by doing so. We can however learn what not to do. Thus spoke Sowell.
Well, except for when Obamas government doesn’t see the need to get tips from someone from Israel. Then it just shows how corrupt and incompetent they are.
You can’t have it both ways Sowell!
Have I mentioned how often he talks about bombing the shit out of Iran?
Is he clueless of how many terrorist organizations got started?
Has he even talked to some of the experts on this? Or does he just want to bomb everything?
His points on gun control are so mind numbingly narrow.
His examples show that he hasn’t read up on the matter at all and just sprouts nonsense.
So. He uses Switzerland and Israel as examples of countries with more guns than the US.
Well, both countries have very strict gun control laws.
In his examples of were gun control has failed, he uses the US and Brittain.
He gives no context to how things have progressed internationally at the same time, he doesn’t talk about the war on drugs or other things that could have escalated it.
And ofc, he doesn’t mention Australia, or others who have made gun control stricter and crime with guns has gone down. He just lives in his own buble and keeps away from anything that might burst it.
I still have 5 more pages of notes from this book. On everything he misunderstands about payday loans, how he says that rehabilitation of prisoners never work (while the US has the most people in jail and countries like Norway has a low return rate), gay marriage, comments about government interference in the market (which is how the US economy works), a lot more about healthcare, how he focuses on just amount of jobs instead of quality when it comes to unions, how he misrepresents arguments by the left while blaming the left for doing the same, how he doesn’t understand unions, how he mentions the middle class becoming richer, but not really expanding on it or explaining it, how he thinks focusing on wage brackets is a waste of time (forgetting that it shows income growth over all, and not just individually), how most people in the US are for healthcare, that he things torture works and doesn’t seem to have seen interviews or read books by CIA agents, that he thinks the CIA works like a episode of 24 (like really. WTF?), talks about homeless people being able to not be homeless, but forgetting that they might not be able to shower or have clothes to even be able to transport themselves to interviews, it was warmer in the middle ages (yes, in notrhtern Europe. Not the rest. And read up on why), how many use talking points instead of facts or discussions with meaning (hello Sowell. Talking about yourself in thirdperson again?), how he thinks everyone are talking about lowering prices when they are talking about lowering executive wages (have you even listened to the arguments? We are talking about increasing wages of the workers. A cut from 100m to 50m gives 5000 dollars more to 10 000 workers.), how he talks about wages of the 1%, while the rest are talking about their total fortune, talks about Obama not creating jobs, while Obama has been in office like 2 years at that point
AND SO MUCH MORE.
Sowell has some good points here. Some few.
He, however, comes off as someone who hasn’t read up on anything he talks about.
Which is something he even talks about how people shouldn’t do, and by his own arguments, only people on the left do.
If Sowell had been a younger dude, he would have been called a troll
If anyone has good arguments for anything I write here, shoot. Sowell, however, doesn't
Boy was I wrong.
If I were to go through all the fallacies, contradictions and down right lies (or just lack of 5 minutes of research) it would fill up at least 20-30 pages.
My notes from this book, with these points, are over 6 pages long.
I understand that this book is based on essays written by Sowell, but even so I find the repetition to be bothersome. He never brings any new arguments or even arguments at all. He just complains, doesn’t show to sources and most of the time doesn’t have solutions either.
One of the few people he actually quotes in any of these, is Tim Harford and his book Undercover Economics. He, ofc, doesn’t mention anything in the book except one line about china.
If he had just taken a look at mostly anything else, he would find his views challenged. Sowell doesn’t seem the type to actually read both sides of something.
Take universal healthcare. He talks about how it is impossible for the government to keep up the same quality, give everyone healthcare and cut costs at the same time. I agree that it seems like a bit much to chew, but it does seem possible.
Look to Europe. Sowell is completely right when he talks about healthcare queues and such, but most countries have a private sector as well. So you can pay extra if you want to.
It covers more of the population and gives the government a higher negotiation power.
Undercover Economist even covers this, as does many other books and articles.
Not once does Sowell take up this point. He just says it is impossible, without going into any details what so ever.
He talks a lot about freedom. His view is that the government shouldn’t go into the private life of individuals and give the marked and the people total economic freedom.
I can understand that point and many agree with him.
He however, multiple times says that the government should regulate our privatelife MORE.
He says that laws that were removed in the 60s lead to higher murder and crime rate, but never says what laws were removed. All I understand from his rambling, is that he wants the government to limit our freedoms where he sees fit, but not where he doesn’t
Which means he is a huge hypocrite.
Another point, which he never mentions, is that it might be other reasons why crime rate went up.
At any given year, at least 10% of Americans crime charges are drug related. Laws and regulations against narcotics came almost exactly when Sowell blames deregulation by the government.
I’m not saying it is a direct cause, the whole cause or even part of the cause. Just saying it is weird it isn’t even mentioned.
He targets Obama a lot in this book. I understand that it is the whole point. It is just that the right side of US politics is covered by his rhetoric, as well as the left. He never acknowledges this, since that would go against his whole point.
He mentions that the media and the left are using rhetoric to create enemies.
Well, so does Sowell. Against the left, against the “inteligencia” and against Iran and others.
Iran might, at some point in time, get Nuclear weapons. Therefor we shouldn’t even talk to them about it, but just directly declare war, without any warning and bomb them all to oblivion.
Talk about someone that is for less government intervention!
One would think he would be positive to Obama, but Obama might have started bombing more after this book came out. This book came out very early in Obamas presidency.
Sowell thinks it is positive that Japan doesn’t really have a military, but later he condems any country that doesn’t have one to protect themselves.
The US should never learn how to govern, what laws are effective and what to do from other countries. The left is ruining the country and trying to sabotage it by doing so. We can however learn what not to do. Thus spoke Sowell.
Well, except for when Obamas government doesn’t see the need to get tips from someone from Israel. Then it just shows how corrupt and incompetent they are.
You can’t have it both ways Sowell!
Have I mentioned how often he talks about bombing the shit out of Iran?
Is he clueless of how many terrorist organizations got started?
Has he even talked to some of the experts on this? Or does he just want to bomb everything?
His points on gun control are so mind numbingly narrow.
His examples show that he hasn’t read up on the matter at all and just sprouts nonsense.
So. He uses Switzerland and Israel as examples of countries with more guns than the US.
Well, both countries have very strict gun control laws.
In his examples of were gun control has failed, he uses the US and Brittain.
He gives no context to how things have progressed internationally at the same time, he doesn’t talk about the war on drugs or other things that could have escalated it.
And ofc, he doesn’t mention Australia, or others who have made gun control stricter and crime with guns has gone down. He just lives in his own buble and keeps away from anything that might burst it.
I still have 5 more pages of notes from this book. On everything he misunderstands about payday loans, how he says that rehabilitation of prisoners never work (while the US has the most people in jail and countries like Norway has a low return rate), gay marriage, comments about government interference in the market (which is how the US economy works), a lot more about healthcare, how he focuses on just amount of jobs instead of quality when it comes to unions, how he misrepresents arguments by the left while blaming the left for doing the same, how he doesn’t understand unions, how he mentions the middle class becoming richer, but not really expanding on it or explaining it, how he thinks focusing on wage brackets is a waste of time (forgetting that it shows income growth over all, and not just individually), how most people in the US are for healthcare, that he things torture works and doesn’t seem to have seen interviews or read books by CIA agents, that he thinks the CIA works like a episode of 24 (like really. WTF?), talks about homeless people being able to not be homeless, but forgetting that they might not be able to shower or have clothes to even be able to transport themselves to interviews, it was warmer in the middle ages (yes, in notrhtern Europe. Not the rest. And read up on why), how many use talking points instead of facts or discussions with meaning (hello Sowell. Talking about yourself in thirdperson again?), how he thinks everyone are talking about lowering prices when they are talking about lowering executive wages (have you even listened to the arguments? We are talking about increasing wages of the workers. A cut from 100m to 50m gives 5000 dollars more to 10 000 workers.), how he talks about wages of the 1%, while the rest are talking about their total fortune, talks about Obama not creating jobs, while Obama has been in office like 2 years at that point
AND SO MUCH MORE.
Sowell has some good points here. Some few.
He, however, comes off as someone who hasn’t read up on anything he talks about.
Which is something he even talks about how people shouldn’t do, and by his own arguments, only people on the left do.
If Sowell had been a younger dude, he would have been called a troll
If anyone has good arguments for anything I write here, shoot. Sowell, however, doesn't
June 1, 2021
I guess reviews in this case are reflecting political views of readers (and closeness of author's opinions with these). Similarly, as I'm allergic to phrases like 'our ways of living', 'national threats', 'in Europe they already experienced' etc I probably haven't manage to stay objective.
If you are after some divisive language, half-baked arguments, aggressive yet inconsistent attacks e.g. judges are stretching theirs powers vs. Obama should be prosecuted (not quite sure for what? if that was for rhetoric then I'm quite sure that author can be safe ;-)
Basically, as another reviewer skillfully put it, a bucket of bullshit. I thought I might steal a contrarian thought or two (suggestion to make a clear cut and distinction between health-care and medical-care or the observation that different sources of data gives you inconsistent income growth picture), but even here author failed to either stay real (apparently health insurance cost is high, because it needs to cover day-to-day checkups, second observation (on discrepancy between how the Bureau of Labor Statistics vs. IRS report income distribution over time) on closer inspection doesn't seem to hold. In summary, it's a dump of a hot-headed opinionated column preaching to converted, reflection, humour, critical nor even rational thinking apparently weren't consider whilst it was being typed and printed.. Waste of time.
If you are after some divisive language, half-baked arguments, aggressive yet inconsistent attacks e.g. judges are stretching theirs powers vs. Obama should be prosecuted (not quite sure for what? if that was for rhetoric then I'm quite sure that author can be safe ;-)
Basically, as another reviewer skillfully put it, a bucket of bullshit. I thought I might steal a contrarian thought or two (suggestion to make a clear cut and distinction between health-care and medical-care or the observation that different sources of data gives you inconsistent income growth picture), but even here author failed to either stay real (apparently health insurance cost is high, because it needs to cover day-to-day checkups, second observation (on discrepancy between how the Bureau of Labor Statistics vs. IRS report income distribution over time) on closer inspection doesn't seem to hold. In summary, it's a dump of a hot-headed opinionated column preaching to converted, reflection, humour, critical nor even rational thinking apparently weren't consider whilst it was being typed and printed.. Waste of time.
May 12, 2011
I finished reading Dismantling America by Thomas Sowell. Published last year it is a collection of his columns on very recent current events. It is reasoned commentary, opinion, and common sense.
The format suits my attention deficits well. Each column/chapter is about 3 pages long, all the way through the book. It is easy to absorb a few chapters at a time and put the book down. There are a hundred or so chapters grouped into the topics of Government Policies, Political Issues, Economic Issues, Cultural Issues, and Legal Issues. It makes for a great bedside reader or one anywhere you want bite-size morsels of intelligent insight.
I like his solution on political corruption:
"The stakes are too high for us to be penny-wise and pound-foolish by putting trillions of dollars of the taxpayers' money in the hands of elected officials who are paid less than the beginning salary of a top student from a top law school.
If we paid every member of congress $10 million a year, that would not increase the federal budget by one percent.
Chances are that it would reduce the federal budget considerably, when members of the Senate or the House of Representatives no longer needed campaign contributions or the personal favors of special interest groups and their lobbyists." (p. 113-114)
Hmm. OK, that insight is a bit out there, but a novel idea! How do you implement that?!
In The Great Escape he notes: "The great escape of our times is escape from personal responsibility for the consequences of one's own behavior." (p. 208)
Personal responsibility, one of my favorite themes. Especially since I took up reading Ayn Rand (rational self interest, taking care of oneself, but NOT at someone else's expense) and listening to Rush Limbaugh (individual rights, self responsibility, pursuit of happiness). It seems like politicians these days want everything at some else's expense.
In Too Many Apologies he follows up with: "Aimless apologies are just one of the incidental symptoms of an increasing loss of a sense of personal responsibility -- without which a whole society is in jeopardy."...
..."Yet increasing numbers of educators and the intelligentsia seem to have devoted themselves to undermining or destroying a sense of personal responsibility and making "society" responsible instead. Aimless apologies are just one small symptom of this larger and more dangerous attitude." (p. 339)
His final chapter, Random Thoughts (8 pages! the exception to the rule), has numerous zingers and aphorisms:
"Ronald Reagan had a vision of America. Barack Obama has a vision of Barack Obama." (p. 334) (Did I mention that Sowell is Conservative?)
"Some people are so busy being clever that they don't have time enough to be wise." (p. 335)
"We can only hope that the rumor that Israel is going to take out Iran's nuclear weapons facilities is true. If they do, Israel will be widely condemned by governments that are breathing a sigh of relief that they did." (p. 338) (As they will sigh with Gaddafi's demise.)
"We have now reached the truly dangerous point where we cannot even be warned about the lethal, fanatical and suicidal hatred of our society by Islamic extremists, because to do so would be politically incorrect and, in some European countries, would be a violation of the law against inciting hostility to groups." (p. 338)
"Socialists believe in government ownership of the means of production. Fascists believed in government control of privately owned businesses, which is much more the style of this government. That way, politicians can intervene whenever they feel like it and then, when their interventions turn out badly, summon executives from the private sector before Congress and denounce them on nationwide television." (p. 338-339) (Reminds me of this article I saw in the news the other day:
Fed Won't Let Bank of America Raise Dividend) (Please Mr. Government, may I mind my own business?)
I'm not one to discourage book sales, but in addition to obtaining this book at your local county library you can read nearly all the essays, and many, many more, at http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1.asp. (The internet exploratorialy astute will look up the table of contents at Amazon.com and then look for the same essay at Jewish World Review, but I digress.)
As I thought a majority of Jewish people voted Democratic, I was pleased and amazed to find this bastion of conservative thought. Quite a few of my favorite conservative writers can be found listed in the margins of most any page.
I have heard Sowell's book A Conflict of Visions highly recommended, and I have read his Basic Economics (a great primer, one can never get too much basic economics).
(Update: Great essay from Sowell today, IMO:
MARCH 29, 2011 6:30 P.M. Measuring Force by Thomas Sowell)
The format suits my attention deficits well. Each column/chapter is about 3 pages long, all the way through the book. It is easy to absorb a few chapters at a time and put the book down. There are a hundred or so chapters grouped into the topics of Government Policies, Political Issues, Economic Issues, Cultural Issues, and Legal Issues. It makes for a great bedside reader or one anywhere you want bite-size morsels of intelligent insight.
I like his solution on political corruption:
"The stakes are too high for us to be penny-wise and pound-foolish by putting trillions of dollars of the taxpayers' money in the hands of elected officials who are paid less than the beginning salary of a top student from a top law school.
If we paid every member of congress $10 million a year, that would not increase the federal budget by one percent.
Chances are that it would reduce the federal budget considerably, when members of the Senate or the House of Representatives no longer needed campaign contributions or the personal favors of special interest groups and their lobbyists." (p. 113-114)
Hmm. OK, that insight is a bit out there, but a novel idea! How do you implement that?!
In The Great Escape he notes: "The great escape of our times is escape from personal responsibility for the consequences of one's own behavior." (p. 208)
Personal responsibility, one of my favorite themes. Especially since I took up reading Ayn Rand (rational self interest, taking care of oneself, but NOT at someone else's expense) and listening to Rush Limbaugh (individual rights, self responsibility, pursuit of happiness). It seems like politicians these days want everything at some else's expense.
In Too Many Apologies he follows up with: "Aimless apologies are just one of the incidental symptoms of an increasing loss of a sense of personal responsibility -- without which a whole society is in jeopardy."...
..."Yet increasing numbers of educators and the intelligentsia seem to have devoted themselves to undermining or destroying a sense of personal responsibility and making "society" responsible instead. Aimless apologies are just one small symptom of this larger and more dangerous attitude." (p. 339)
His final chapter, Random Thoughts (8 pages! the exception to the rule), has numerous zingers and aphorisms:
"Ronald Reagan had a vision of America. Barack Obama has a vision of Barack Obama." (p. 334) (Did I mention that Sowell is Conservative?)
"Some people are so busy being clever that they don't have time enough to be wise." (p. 335)
"We can only hope that the rumor that Israel is going to take out Iran's nuclear weapons facilities is true. If they do, Israel will be widely condemned by governments that are breathing a sigh of relief that they did." (p. 338) (As they will sigh with Gaddafi's demise.)
"We have now reached the truly dangerous point where we cannot even be warned about the lethal, fanatical and suicidal hatred of our society by Islamic extremists, because to do so would be politically incorrect and, in some European countries, would be a violation of the law against inciting hostility to groups." (p. 338)
"Socialists believe in government ownership of the means of production. Fascists believed in government control of privately owned businesses, which is much more the style of this government. That way, politicians can intervene whenever they feel like it and then, when their interventions turn out badly, summon executives from the private sector before Congress and denounce them on nationwide television." (p. 338-339) (Reminds me of this article I saw in the news the other day:
Fed Won't Let Bank of America Raise Dividend) (Please Mr. Government, may I mind my own business?)
I'm not one to discourage book sales, but in addition to obtaining this book at your local county library you can read nearly all the essays, and many, many more, at http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1.asp. (The internet exploratorialy astute will look up the table of contents at Amazon.com and then look for the same essay at Jewish World Review, but I digress.)
As I thought a majority of Jewish people voted Democratic, I was pleased and amazed to find this bastion of conservative thought. Quite a few of my favorite conservative writers can be found listed in the margins of most any page.
I have heard Sowell's book A Conflict of Visions highly recommended, and I have read his Basic Economics (a great primer, one can never get too much basic economics).
(Update: Great essay from Sowell today, IMO:
MARCH 29, 2011 6:30 P.M. Measuring Force by Thomas Sowell)
May 2, 2022
Dismantling America does not reflect well on Sowell.
I am a huge fan of Sowell and the intellectual rigor I encountered in his other books. This book seems to be Sowell at his worst: ranty, hypocritical, one-sided and sometimes just plain wrong.
There are a few good essays in the collection, but unless you're already a fan of Sowell I'd stay away. I feel sorry for people for whom this is their first introduction to Sowell because they might never read another of his excellent books.
I am a huge fan of Sowell and the intellectual rigor I encountered in his other books. This book seems to be Sowell at his worst: ranty, hypocritical, one-sided and sometimes just plain wrong.
There are a few good essays in the collection, but unless you're already a fan of Sowell I'd stay away. I feel sorry for people for whom this is their first introduction to Sowell because they might never read another of his excellent books.
January 5, 2023
Typical Sowell. Well researched and well written. I'm hoping to add in some quotes. I recommend this book to people from every walk of life who seek intellectual honesty. I'm happy to make it my first book of 2023. Let the games begin, Brent.
December 19, 2020
Have enjoyed reading thus book as much as I have read Black Rednecks and White Liberals. Even though there were many topics Thomas Sowell spoke on, and we're not as lengthy in detail as my mentioned read earlier, he has provided details to start the conversation. Look forward to his other books. Would recommend this book to everyone! Happy reading!
July 20, 2020
A fascinating account of political factors and observation that are leading to a “dismantling” of American values and standards.
Well worth the listen/read irrespective of I nes political bias.
Well worth the listen/read irrespective of I nes political bias.
November 12, 2021
Listened to the audiobook read by Robertson Dean.
I was looking for a collection of Sowell's syndicated newspaper columns; this audiobook contains 8 hours of his columns about topics ranging from the mortgage crisis to terrorist suspects detained in Guantanamo to global warming to late-speaking children, and much more.
I was looking for a collection of Sowell's syndicated newspaper columns; this audiobook contains 8 hours of his columns about topics ranging from the mortgage crisis to terrorist suspects detained in Guantanamo to global warming to late-speaking children, and much more.
July 4, 2023
Though I consider myself slightly left-leaning with regards to social politics (but, somewhat conservative in laws and juridicial matters), no person in their right mind can deny the wisdom of this man. He's very clever, thorough and clearly has thought about these things for quite a while.
I disagree with some notions he has (some policies will have bad consequences, yet the overall utility -both type and reach- must be pondered), but it's a pleasure to listen to him.
The narrator did a great job. He has quite some gravitas in his voice.
I disagree with some notions he has (some policies will have bad consequences, yet the overall utility -both type and reach- must be pondered), but it's a pleasure to listen to him.
The narrator did a great job. He has quite some gravitas in his voice.
August 6, 2021
Everyone should know this man’s name and read at least one of his brilliant books 👏🏽
July 26, 2019
This is a collection of short (about 600-word) essays drawn from columns written by economist Thomas Sowell. As the book was published in 2010, and the items inside originally appeared over the two or three years just prior to that, they are in some ways now dated. But they're not so old that I don't remember reading a few of them back then, and I definitely remember the heartsick feeling prompted by so many events of those days.
Also, the articles are somewhat repetitive. After all, Sowell is addressing on different days issues that had not changed much. Every time he references, say, the 2008 economic downturn, he's going to make pretty much the same basic point (that it was due to government meddling). But repetition is not necessarily bad, since it allows him to return to the issues from a slightly different angle and achieve more depth than might otherwise be possible with individual short pieces.
They're easy to read, or at least they are for me. I think Sowell's view on things is just common sense, which actually is not so common of late. Examples:
Money:
"People with low skills or little experience usually get paid low wages. Passing a minimum wage law does not make them any more valuable. At a higher wage, it can just make them expendable. Raising the minimum wage in the midst of a recession was guaranteed to increase unemployment among the young—and it has."
Put another way:
"You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics to know that jacking up prices leads fewer people to buy. Those people include employers, who hire less labor when labor is made artificially more expensive."
(Sowell also addresses the sore subject of sky-high CEO compensation. This is an area in which I've been a little conflicted, because although I don't believe in mandated minimum wages, I also don't think it's possible for anyone's work to be worth, say, a million dollars a year. Sowell's rebuttal seems to be that someone in my position doesn't have insight into what that person contributes, whereas the people paying the money do. Maybe, but it's safe to say there are highly-paid people who do more harm than good. To that, presumably, he would argue the market will eventually correct for them, i.e., they'll get the ax. Again, maybe...)
Politics:
"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."
I cannot quibble with this observation. For years I've been dismayed by the naiveté of fellow citizens who become excited by some candidate or office-holder, as if this new person is finally going to do what no one else could: fix things for them and/or bring the world into alignment with the way they think it should be. Personally, I would like to think of people in public office, regardless of party, presidents definitely included, as boring functionaries doing mostly unglamorous work. But in claiming to solve problems for us, what politicians are really doing is cementing their hold on power over us. Sowell compares them with magicians who distract viewers with an illusion while in reality doing something altogether different.
When he points to the way politicians like to demonize corporate executives as being greedy, and calls it "the opening salvo in the battle to take over their roles," I realize their sleight-of-hand may have contributed to the misgivings I express above. "Those who want more power have known for centuries that giving the people somebody to hate and fear is the key."
Thus, even if you're not enthusiastic about your politician, you can still be made into a useful supporter if convinced that somebody else is Evil Incarnate.
"One of the scariest aspects of our times is how easy it is for glib loudmouths to turn us against each other, weakening the whole fabric of society, on which we all depend."
Reform
“If everything that is wrong with the world becomes a reason to turn more power over to some political savior, then freedom is going to erode away, while we are mindlessly repeating the catchwords of the hour.”
"Rahm's Rule"—Never let a crisis go to waste—may well have become the dictum of this age. And if there is no real crisis, people who have the public's attention have learned the value of claiming otherwise. Thus we hear that something has got to be done, and done now! And the time for debating about it is over! Sowell observes that "almost by definition, everybody thinks their cause is just." But why does the perceived justness of your cause and your priority mean I have no voice in what happens?
Shouldn't you be required to convince me, through rational discussion, before forcing me to adapt to your ideas? But no. There is "a growing list of subjects where rational discussion has become impossible—and where you are considered a bad person even for wanting to discuss them rationally."
None of the essays addressing this topic are out of date, although in the decade since their publication the virulence with which would-be reformers attack our society's imperfections has grown more alarming. Sowell suggests that their goal is "the promised land, where the wise and noble few—like themselves—can take the rest of us poor dummies in hand and tell us how we had better change the way we live our lives." If only we were as impressed with them as as are with themselves.
Sure, I too regret things done through history by Americans and the US government, but that is no justification for trusting upstarts who condemn the country's very founding and innate nature while smearing their critics as bigots and fascists. "The beauty of doing nothing is that you can do it perfectly. Only when you do something is it almost impossible to do it without mistakes. Therefore people who are contributing nothing to society, except their constant criticisms, can feel both intellectually and morally superior." While themselves becoming fascists.
Also, the articles are somewhat repetitive. After all, Sowell is addressing on different days issues that had not changed much. Every time he references, say, the 2008 economic downturn, he's going to make pretty much the same basic point (that it was due to government meddling). But repetition is not necessarily bad, since it allows him to return to the issues from a slightly different angle and achieve more depth than might otherwise be possible with individual short pieces.
They're easy to read, or at least they are for me. I think Sowell's view on things is just common sense, which actually is not so common of late. Examples:
Money:
"People with low skills or little experience usually get paid low wages. Passing a minimum wage law does not make them any more valuable. At a higher wage, it can just make them expendable. Raising the minimum wage in the midst of a recession was guaranteed to increase unemployment among the young—and it has."
Put another way:
"You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics to know that jacking up prices leads fewer people to buy. Those people include employers, who hire less labor when labor is made artificially more expensive."
(Sowell also addresses the sore subject of sky-high CEO compensation. This is an area in which I've been a little conflicted, because although I don't believe in mandated minimum wages, I also don't think it's possible for anyone's work to be worth, say, a million dollars a year. Sowell's rebuttal seems to be that someone in my position doesn't have insight into what that person contributes, whereas the people paying the money do. Maybe, but it's safe to say there are highly-paid people who do more harm than good. To that, presumably, he would argue the market will eventually correct for them, i.e., they'll get the ax. Again, maybe...)
Politics:
"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."
I cannot quibble with this observation. For years I've been dismayed by the naiveté of fellow citizens who become excited by some candidate or office-holder, as if this new person is finally going to do what no one else could: fix things for them and/or bring the world into alignment with the way they think it should be. Personally, I would like to think of people in public office, regardless of party, presidents definitely included, as boring functionaries doing mostly unglamorous work. But in claiming to solve problems for us, what politicians are really doing is cementing their hold on power over us. Sowell compares them with magicians who distract viewers with an illusion while in reality doing something altogether different.
When he points to the way politicians like to demonize corporate executives as being greedy, and calls it "the opening salvo in the battle to take over their roles," I realize their sleight-of-hand may have contributed to the misgivings I express above. "Those who want more power have known for centuries that giving the people somebody to hate and fear is the key."
Thus, even if you're not enthusiastic about your politician, you can still be made into a useful supporter if convinced that somebody else is Evil Incarnate.
"One of the scariest aspects of our times is how easy it is for glib loudmouths to turn us against each other, weakening the whole fabric of society, on which we all depend."
Reform
“If everything that is wrong with the world becomes a reason to turn more power over to some political savior, then freedom is going to erode away, while we are mindlessly repeating the catchwords of the hour.”
"Rahm's Rule"—Never let a crisis go to waste—may well have become the dictum of this age. And if there is no real crisis, people who have the public's attention have learned the value of claiming otherwise. Thus we hear that something has got to be done, and done now! And the time for debating about it is over! Sowell observes that "almost by definition, everybody thinks their cause is just." But why does the perceived justness of your cause and your priority mean I have no voice in what happens?
Shouldn't you be required to convince me, through rational discussion, before forcing me to adapt to your ideas? But no. There is "a growing list of subjects where rational discussion has become impossible—and where you are considered a bad person even for wanting to discuss them rationally."
None of the essays addressing this topic are out of date, although in the decade since their publication the virulence with which would-be reformers attack our society's imperfections has grown more alarming. Sowell suggests that their goal is "the promised land, where the wise and noble few—like themselves—can take the rest of us poor dummies in hand and tell us how we had better change the way we live our lives." If only we were as impressed with them as as are with themselves.
Sure, I too regret things done through history by Americans and the US government, but that is no justification for trusting upstarts who condemn the country's very founding and innate nature while smearing their critics as bigots and fascists. "The beauty of doing nothing is that you can do it perfectly. Only when you do something is it almost impossible to do it without mistakes. Therefore people who are contributing nothing to society, except their constant criticisms, can feel both intellectually and morally superior." While themselves becoming fascists.
November 13, 2014
This book was torture, I could only handle small doses at a time. It was agonizing and infuriating to see the unfathomable depths our culture has progressively sunk into destructive delusions and sheer stupidity, it sometimes made me want to cry. Sowell truly is brilliant, Oh that he could have been America's first African American president.
February 24, 2011
Drivel and nonsense. Fox 5 News driven prouncements bordering on racism.
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