Random Thoughts

by Dr. Thomas Sowell: Random thoughts on the passing scene:

• Stupid people can cause problems, but it usually takes brilliant people to create a real catastrophe.

• President Obama's "agreement" with Iran looks very much like "the emperor's new clothes." We are supposed to pretend that there is something there, when there is nothing there that will stop, or even slow down, Iran's development of a nuclear bomb.

• The endlessly repeated argument that most Americans are the descendants of immigrants ignores the fact that most Americans are NOT the descendants of ILLEGAL immigrants. Millions of immigrants from Europe had to stop at Ellis Island, and had to meet medical and other criteria before being allowed to go any further.

• Governor Bobby Jindal: "I realize that the best way to make news is to mention Donald Trump. ... So, I've decided to randomly put his name into my remarks at various points, thereby ensuring that the news media will cover what I have to say." Governor Jindal's outstanding record in Louisiana should have gotten him far more attention from the media than Trump's bombast.

• In her latest book, "Adios, America!" Ann Coulter says, "if Romney had won 71 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2012, instead of 27 percent, he still would have lost. On the other hand, had he won just 4 percent more of the white vote, he would have won."

• Despite an old saying that taxes are the price we pay for civilization, an absolute majority of the record-breaking tax money collected by the federal government today is simply transferred by politicians from people who are not likely to vote for them to people who are more likely to vote for them.

• Do the people who are always demanding that there be more "training" for police ever say that the hoodlums that the police have to deal with should have had more training by their parents, instead of being allowed to grow wild, like weeds?

• Europe is belatedly discovering how unbelievably stupid it was to import millions of people from cultures that despise Western values and which often promote hatred toward the people who have let them in.

• There are so many conservative Republican candidates for the party's presidential nomination that they may once again split the conservative vote so many ways as to guarantee that the nomination will go to some mushy moderate.

• Barack Obama wrote a book titled "The Audacity of Hope." His own career, however, might more accurately be titled "The Mendacity of Hype."

• With all its staggering horrors and insanities, World War II may yet turn out to have been just a dress rehearsal for the ultimate catastrophe of a nuclear-armed terrorist nation like Iran. We seem oblivious to the possibility that we may be leaving our children and grandchildren at the mercy of people who have demonstrated repeatedly that they have no mercy.

• No matter how many federal felony laws Hillary Clinton may have violated by using her own personal email account to do her work as Secretary of State, she is unlikely to face any legal consequences. President Obama can pardon her, as he can pardon Lois Lerner or the head of the Internal Revenue Service or others who may have violated federal laws during his administration.

• When Jeb Bush allowed hecklers shouting "Black lives matter" to drive him off the stage in Las Vegas, he may have given us a clue as to what kind of president he would be. We ignored too many clues about Barack Obama before putting him in the White House. There is no excuse for ignoring clues about another candidate now. Can you imagine Ronald Reagan letting hecklers drive him off the stage?

• Donald Trump has credited his political donations with getting Hillary Clinton to come to his wedding. What kind of man would want Hillary Clinton at his wedding, much less boast of having her there?

• A salute to Bill O'Reilly for being one of the very few people in the media to talk plain common sense about the disintegration of the black family, and the resulting social problems that followed.

• Ronald Reagan won two landslide victories with the help of "Reagan Democrats." These were voters who usually voted for Democrats but were now voting for Reagan. He got these voters by winning them over to his policy agenda — not by adjusting his policy agenda to them, as the Republican establishment today seems to think is the way to expand their constituency.
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Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social commentator, and author of dozens of books. He has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Chicago and degrees from Columbia University and Harvard University. He is a retired professor of Economic and presently is a Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University. Visit his website: tsowell.com and view a list of other articles.

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