Clearly, only very unequal intellectual and moral standing could justify having equality imposed, whether the people want it or not, as Dworkin suggests, and only very unequal power would make it possible.
THOMAS SOWELLAs history has also shown, especially in the twentieth century, one of the first things an ideologue will do after achieving absolute power is kill.
More Thomas Sowell Quotes
-
-
Life does not ask what we want. It presents us with options.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The problem isn’t that Johnny can’t read. The problem isn’t even that Johnny can’t think. The problem is that Johnny doesn’t know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Age gives you an excuse for not being very good at things that you were not very good at when you were young.
THOMAS SOWELL -
To believe in personal responsibility would be to destroy the whole special role of the anointed, whose vision casts them in the role of rescuers of people treated unfairly by society.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests.
THOMAS SOWELL -
We seem to be getting closer and closer to a situation where nobody is responsible for what they did but we are all responsible for what somebody else did.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Despite a voluminous and often fervent literature on “income distribution,” the cold fact is that most income is not distributed: It is earned.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Each new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The government is indeed an institution, but “the market” is nothing more than an option for each individual to chose among numerous existing institutions, or to fashion new arrangements suited to his own situation and taste.
THOMAS SOWELL -
If people in the media cannot decide whether they are in the business of reporting news or manufacturing propaganda, it is all the more important that the public understand that difference, and choose their news sources accordingly.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The most basic question is not what is best, but who shall decide what is best.
THOMAS SOWELL -
There are only two ways of telling the complete truth – anonymously and posthumously.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The welfare state is the oldest con game in the world. First you take people’s money away quietly and then you give some of it back to them flamboyantly.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Failure is part of the natural cycle of business. Companies are born, companies die, capitalism moves forward.
THOMAS SOWELL -
It’s amazing how much panic one honest man can spread among a multitude of hypocrites.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The history of which peoples, nations, or civilizations have conquered or enslaved which other peoples, nations, or civilizations has been largely a history of who has been in a position to do so.
THOMAS SOWELL -
For the anointed, traditions are likely to be seen as the dead hand of the past, relics of a less enlightened age, and not as the distilled experience of millions who faced similar human vicissitudes before.
THOMAS SOWELL -
The purpose of education is to give the student the intellectual tools to analyze, whether verbally or numerically, and to reach conclusions based on logic and evidence.
THOMAS SOWELL -
A society that puts equality – in the sense of equality of outcome – ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom.
THOMAS SOWELL -
If you have always believed that everyone should play by the same rules and be judged by the same standards, that would have gotten you labeled a radical 50 years ago, a liberal 25 years ago and a racist today.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Some of the biggest cases of mistaken identity are among intellectuals who have trouble remembering that they are not God.
THOMAS SOWELL -
Justice at all costs’ is not justice.
THOMAS SOWELL -
No government of the left has done as much for the poor as capitalism has. Even when it comes to the redistribution of income, the left talks the talk but the free market walks the walk.
THOMAS SOWELL -
As history has also shown, especially in the twentieth century, one of the first things an ideologue will do after achieving absolute power is kill.
THOMAS SOWELL