The most basic question is not what is best, but who shall decide what is best.
THOMAS SOWELLThe most basic question is not what is best, but who shall decide what is best.
THOMAS SOWELLTalkers are usually more articulate than doers, since talk is their specialty.
THOMAS SOWELLThe 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 SOWELLIt has nothing to say about philosophy or values, anymore than it has to say about music or literature.
THOMAS SOWELLOne of the consequences of such notions as ‘entitlements’ is that people who have contributed nothing to society feel that society owes them something, apparently just for being nice enough to grace us with their presence.
THOMAS SOWELLThe 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 SOWELLFor 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 SOWELLVirtually 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 SOWELLDespite a voluminous and often fervent literature on “income distribution,” the cold fact is that most income is not distributed: It is earned.
THOMAS SOWELLMuch of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good.
THOMAS SOWELLClearly, 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 SOWELLNo matter how much people on the left talk about compassion, they have no compassion for the taxpayers.
THOMAS SOWELLJustice at all costs’ is not justice.
THOMAS SOWELLIt is usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.
THOMAS SOWELLEach new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late.
THOMAS SOWELLExtrapolations are the last refuge of a groundless argument.
THOMAS SOWELL