Thomas Sowell

Many years ago, when I was a college student, I took a course from John Kenneth Galbraith. On the first day of class, Professor Galbraith gave a brilliant opening lecture, after which the students gave him a standing ovation. Galbraith kept on giving brilliant opening...

We have forgotten so much about the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that many people may not remember the deadly anthrax spores that were mailed to various prominent people in politics and in the media during that time. None of the...

If our era could have its own coat of arms, it would be a yak against a background of mush. This must be the golden age of endless and pointless talk. Every sports events seems to be preceded by all kinds of talk — whether by athletes repeating cliches that we...

Random thoughts on the passing scene: Government bailouts are like potato chips: You can’t stop with just one. Anyone who is honest with himself and with others knows that there is not a snow ball’s chance in hell to have an honest dialogue about race. I...

“New Ways to Diagnose Autism Earlier” read a recent headline in the Wall Street Journal. There is no question that you can diagnose anything as early as you want. The real question is whether the diagnosis will turn out to be correct. My own awareness of...

In an election campaign in which not only young liberals, but also some people who are neither young nor liberals, seem absolutely mesmerized by the skilled rhetoric of Barack Obama, facts have receded even further into the background than usual. As the hypnotic...

A number of friends of mine have commented on an odd phenomenon that they have observed– conservative Republicans they know who are saying that they are going to vote for Barack Obama. It seemed at first to be an isolated fluke, perhaps signifying only that my...

Some of the people who are most adamant against outsourcing economic activity from the United States to other countries often seem to think we should outsource our foreign policy to “world opinion” or act only in conjunction “with our NATO...

It must be a bitter disappointment to those in the media and in politics who have been dying to use the word “recession” that, for the second quarter in a row, there has been no downturn in the economy, though growth has been slow. Alarmists have been...

If anyone suggested that Tiger Woods should try to be more like other golfers, people would question the sanity of whoever made that suggestion. Why should Tiger Woods try to be more like Phil Mickelson? If Tiger turned around and tried to golf left-handed, like...

The obsession of many high school students and their parents about getting into a prestige college or university is part of the social scene of our time. So is the experience of parents going deep into hock to finance sending a son or daughter off to Ivy U. or the...

Only with Tim Russert’s sudden death at the age of 58 has his true stature as a landmark journalist become as widely recognized as it has long deserved to be. To ask who will replace him as host of “Meet the Press” is to confront the reality that...

Now that Senator Barack Obama has become the Democrats’ nominee for President of the United States, to the cheers of the media at home and abroad, he has written a letter to the Secretary of Defense, in a tone as if he is already President, addressing one of his...

It is amazing how seriously the media are taking Senator Barack Obama’s latest statement about the latest racist rant from the pulpit of the church he has attended for 20 years. But neither that statement nor the apology for his rant by Father Michael Pfleger...

Years ago, when Jack Greenberg left the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to become a professor at Columbia University, he announced that he was going to make it a point to hire a black secretary at Columbia. This would of course make whomever he hired be seen as a token...

“Killing an Unarmed Man.” That is how the front-page headline in the New York Times characterized an incident in which a man tried to run over a policeman with his car and was shot by three policemen on the scene, including his intended victim. An...

Random thoughts on the passing scene: Seeing the Pope driven around in a bullet-proof vehicle reminds me of how much times have changed over the years. I can remember when President Franklin D. Roosevelt rode through Harlem in an open car. A reader’s response to...

Some parents who are concerned about their children receiving a steady diet of liberal-left indoctrination in schools and colleges regard the summer vacation as a time to show these young people a different way of looking at things, with readings presenting viewpoints...

In one of those typical San Francisco decisions that makes San Francisco a poster child for the liberal left, the city’s Board of Supervisors is moving to block a paint store from renting a vacant building once used by a video rental shop. That paint store is...

Let’s face it. Supply and demand will never replace “need” and “greed” in political discussions of economic issues. Talking about the “need” for more affordable housing or more affordable medical care is what will get...

Some people think that the reason the public misunderstands so many issues is that these issues are too “complex” for most voters. But is that really so? With all the commotion in the media and in politics about the high price of gasoline, is there really...