Thomas Sowell's Blog

Thomas Sowell on affirmative action

It is no coincidence that those who are going ballistic over the economic inequality between the top one or two percent and the rest of us are promoting a far more dangerous concentration of political power in Washington—where far less than one percent of the population increasingly tell 300 million Americans what they can and cannot do, on everything from their light bulbs and toilets to their medical care.

One of the great mysteries of our time is why so many people who are either born rich or who gain great wealth in the media are so hostile to the values of American society and Western civilization. The most plausible explanation I have heard is that this stance enables them to enjoy their wealth with a clearer conscience as friends of the “underdogs” and enemies of “the establishment”—even though in reality they are really friends of parasites and enemies of civilization.

It doesn't matter what rights you have under the Constitution of the United States, if the government can punish you for exercising those rights. And it doesn't matter what limits the Constitution puts on government officials' power, if they can exceed those limits without any adverse consequences.

In other words, the Constitution cannot protect you, if you don't protect the Constitution with your votes against anyone who violates it. Those government officials who want more power are not going...

Virtually no idea is too ridiculous to be accepted, even by very intelligent and highly educated people, if it provides a way for them to feel special and important.

Envy used to be just a human failing, but today it is a major industry. Politicians, journalists and academics are all part of that industry, which some call "social justice."

Virtually everybody is worse off than somebody else, if only in one dimension, so there are nearly unlimited opportunities to pander to people's sense of injustice, victimhood and entitlement

Regardless of what it is supposed to do, what the national debt-ceiling actually does is enable any administration to get all the political benefits of runaway spending for the benefit of their favorite constituencies – and then invite the opposition party to share the blame, by either raising the national debt ceiling, or by voting for unpopular cutbacks in spending or increases in taxes.

It is a painful irony that people who are promoting the make-believe equality of “inclusion” and “diversity” in schools are attacking charter schools that are producing the real equality of educational achievement.

There are few modest talents so richly rewarded — especially in politics and the media — as the ability to portray parasites as victims, and portray demands for preferential treatment as struggles for equal rights.

Racism is not dead. But it is on life-support, kept alive mainly by the people who use it for an excuse or to keep minority communities fearful or resentful enough to turn out as a voting bloc on election day.