black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

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

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
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
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

Confuse Feelings Problem Reading Thinking Trouble
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

Absence Born Civil Effect Generation Late
If you have been voting for politicians who promise to give you goodies at someone else’s expense, then you have no right to complain when they take your money and give it to someone else, including themselves.
THOMAS SOWELL

Complain Government Money Politics Promise Vote
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. Some confuse that feeling with idealism.
THOMAS SOWELL

Acceptance Education Ideas Intelligence People Virtue
What is called an educated person is often someone who has had a dangerously superficial exposure to a wide spectrum of subjects.
THOMAS SOWELL

DAngry Education Exposure Person Subject
The media are less a window on reality, than a stage on which officials and journalists perform self-scripted, self-serving fictions.
THOMAS SOWELL

Fiction Journalist Media Perform Reality Window
Rhetoric is no substitute for reality.
THOMAS SOWELL

Exploitation Reality Rhetoric Substitute
When people are presented with the alternatives of hating themselves for their failure or hating others for their success, they seldom choose to hate themselves.
THOMAS SOWELL

Alternative Choose Failure Hate People Success
The fact that the market is not doing what we wish it would do is no reason to automatically assume that the government would do better.
THOMAS SOWELL

Assume Automatic FAction Government Market Reason
No matter how much people on the left talk about compassion, they have no compassion for the taxpayers.
THOMAS SOWELL

Compassion Law People Tax
Freedom must be distinguished from democracy, with which it is often confused.
THOMAS SOWELL

Confuse Democracy Different Freedom
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
It doesn’t matter how smart you are unless you stop and think.
THOMAS SOWELL

Intelligance One Liner Philosophy Politics Smart Thinking
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

Capital Government Income Market Poor
It’s amazing how much panic one honest man can spread among a multitude of hypocrites.
THOMAS SOWELL

Honesty Human Nature Man Panic Spread
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 SOWELL

Economics Equality Justice People Politics Power
The next time some academics tell you how important diversity is, ask how many Republicans there are in their sociology department.
THOMAS SOWELL

Department Diversity Republic Social Time
We should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.
THOMAS SOWELL

Concentration Ideas Institution Surprise Survive Work
Ronald Reagan had a vision of America. Barack Obama has a vision of Barack Obama.
THOMAS SOWELL

Be Yourself Entrepreneur Intelligence Vision
Racism does not have a good track record. It’s been tried out for a long time and you’d think by now we’d want to put an end to it instead of putting it under new management.
THOMAS SOWELL

Character Management Racism Record Time
Much of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good.
THOMAS SOWELL

Decade Goodness History Past replace Social World
People who pride themselves on their “complexity” and deride others for being “simplistic” should realize that the truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth.
THOMAS SOWELL

Complex People Pride Realize Simplicity Truth
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
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 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

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Thomas Sowell Quotes