Thomas Sowell, Sept 21^st

Thomas Sowell has now resorted to name calling, a strategy not uncommon for righteous right wingers talking about the President. (Referring to Sowell as a righteous right winger is hardly name calling.) Sowell writes, “…that after six years of repeated disasters, both domestically and internationally, under a glib egomaniac in the White House…;” then he claims Trump is just another egomaniac. Once again Sowell is half right; he’s certainly right about Trump as a glib egomaniac. He doesn’t stop to wonder why this glibster is running as a Republican; for some of us that is no surprise at all.

Now as to the President’s disasters, “both domestically and internationally,” Sowell doesn’t care to be specific. Perhaps this allergy to specifics has been picked up from Trump who has used it to great benefit in his various pronouncements.  The President’s domestic and international disasters include the following:  the bipartisan Trans Pacific Trade Agreement, passage of the Affordable Care Act, lowering the unemployment rate to 5.1 percent, doubling the value of the stock market, executing the man behind the 9/11 attacks, normalizing some relations with Cuba (after 50 years of failed policies) getting an agreement with Iran on nuclear proliferation… and producing his birth certificate… among many other achievements. What a litany of horrors this is for poor Thomas Sowell who is reduced to bundling them all together and calling them “failures.”

Then Sowell tell us that, “The media seem to think that participation in elections is a big deal.” It isn’t only the media who think participation in elections is a big deal. Sowell claims that, “…the purpose of elections is not participation but…to select people for offices…;” that is nonsense. We select people for office by means of elections; some countries do it by letting their military choose one of their own as national leader. Disputing the military’s choice could be very risky; just ask the mothers of the “Disappeared” in Argentina.

Elections can also provide widespread support for those elected. The franchise has been broadened over and over again. Women could not vote until 1920 when the 19^th amendment became law. In the early days of our country there were property ownership requirements to meet before you could vote. The result was that only about 10 percent of Americans could vote in early elections; in some areas the vote was limited to Christians. Now Sowell complains that some voters are “grossly uninformed, or misinformed,” and suggests the voting age be raised to 30! He claims that many people under that age “have never even had the responsibility of being self-supporting…” Incredible! Now, according to this right wing pundit, you can die for your country before you are responsible enough to vote against the fools who started the war.