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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

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

Dead Enlight Experience Human Past Tradition
It is scary how easily so many people can be brainwashed by sheer repetition of a word.
THOMAS SOWELL

Brain Human Nature People Repetition Scary
It is amazing that people who think we cannot afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, and medication somehow think that we can afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, medication and a government bureaucracy to administer it.
THOMAS SOWELL

Afford Government Pay People Positive Thinking
People are all born ignorant but they are not born stupid.
THOMAS SOWELL

Born Ignorant People Stupidity
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

Education Evidence Intellectual Logic Student
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

Arrangement Economics Government Institution Market Situation
Bailing out people who made ill-advised mortgages makes no more sense that bailing out people who lost their life savings in Las Vegas casinos.
THOMAS SOWELL

Bail Economy Life Lost Mortage People
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

Achievement Century History Ideas Kill Power
It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.
THOMAS SOWELL

Consider Ignorance Knowledge Realize
It is usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.
THOMAS SOWELL

Enjoyment Ignorance Moral People Superior Try
The first lesson of economics is scarcity: There is never enough of anything to satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.
THOMAS SOWELL

Economics Enough Lesson Politics Satisfaction Scarcity
If politicians stopped meddling with things they don’t understand, there would be a more drastic reduction in the size of government than anyone in either party advocates.
THOMAS SOWELL

Advocate Government Party Politics Understand
When people get used to preferential treatment, equal treatment seems like discrimination.
THOMAS SOWELL

Discrimination People Politics Treatment
No one chooses which culture to be born into or can be blamed for how that culture evolved in past centuries.
THOMAS SOWELL

Blame Century Choose Culture Past
Life does not ask what we want. It presents us with options.
THOMAS SOWELL

Deep Healing Inspirational Life Option Want
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

Age Care Courtesy Excuse Goodness Humble Young

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.

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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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