Sowell Nov 25^th

Thomas Sowell, the right wing economist, maintains that the President, when saying that defeating ISIL will take a long time, really means that he will do “very little and do it very slowly.” He provides an example citing that of the thousands of sorties (air strikes) flown against ISIL most of the planes “have not fired a single shot or dropped a single bomb. Why? Because of the restrictive rules of engagement …”

These rules of engagement that Sowell so easily disparages keep us from killing non-ISIL people who are the majority population in the ISIL occupied territories. Quite apart from the ethics involved in these decisions, it is probably wise not to kill non-ISIL people whom we wish to help us eventually eliminate ISIL. Sowell would agree with that except he is so eager to present President Obama’s decisions in a negative light that he often makes poorly thought out comments…and that’s putting it as kindly as I can.

In the last few days our airstrikes have destroyed well over 250 tanker trucks used by ISIL to market their oil. These trucks will be difficult to replace as there are no tanker truck factories in northern Iraq. The rules of engagement that Sowell finds so unnecessary has resulted in our planes dropping leaflets warning the truck drivers to run away as fast as they can because the planes will soon return and destroy their trucks.

 Sowell then pivots in his column to discuss the plight of our black citizens: He is very unhappy with blaming their problems on “the legacy of slavery.” He is quite sure that the problems are due entirely to the increased social support system which he prefers to characterize as “our welfare state policies.” He wants to look at facts: He claims that by 1960 22 percent of black children were being raised in single parent families while thirty years later this had jumped to 67 percent. The increased murder rate is because “The welfare state vision was often part of a non-judgmental social vison that was lenient on criminals and hard on the police.”

What a simplistic series of comments!  Single parent households increased enormously in all segments of society because of no-fault divorce which was common by the early 1970’s. Divorce became cheaper, quicker and carried much less social stigma. Women regularly abused by their husbands could at last be rid of them and, of course, more women were working outside their homes. Sowell apparently doesn’t want to consider those changes in our society.

Then we have his “lenient on criminals and hard on police” remark. It is leniency on criminals that has increased our prison population to between three and four times the incarceration rate of any other western country? We have 700 people per hundred thousand in prison in this country compared with Britain at 148 per hundred thousand and Sowell claims we are “lenient on criminals.” Perhaps he would prefer Sharia law as in Saudi Arabia where they simply chop of various body parts or lash offenders.