Ruled by the Intellectuals

I would like to consider myself an intellectual if for no other reason than the self flattery aspect of it. (You can stop laughing now.) Actually, since I have no advanced degrees and haven't deemed to make myself an expert in any one area such a label would never stick. Regardless, I don't for one minute really believe that I have answers for all the troubles that exist in the areas that interest me. This is not necessarily true for all so-called intellectuals.

The problem for intellectuals is that so many have very little experience that would belie what their simple high-minded solutions would wrought out in the messy, chaotic real world.

The Hoover Institution's Thomas Sowell, an intellectual in his own right, having had some experience in the day to day corporate world see's his fellow intellectuals in a different light.

This is a paraphrased Sowell quote from an Uncommon Knowledge interview:
"For those who ascribe to the belief in free markets, judicial restraint, traditional values of what is called the tragic vision, there's no personal exaltation from those beliefs. But to be for social justice and saving the environment puts you on a higher moral plane."

So therefore everything, everyone on the "lower plane" can be readily dismissed by simple rationalization. The notion that they (the intellectuals) are better, wiser and more capable to know what's best than millions of boots on the ground everyday people is purely an exercise in self flattery and self pleading. This is because they rarely have any real experience (read: President Obama) making things work in the day to day world.

Again Thomas Sowell:
"Like so many things that intellectuals believe it is not subject to any kind of emperical test... For example between the two world wars, there were all these arms agreements and renunciations of war in the West (by the intellectual class) which only encouraged the Axis powers to believe they could win a war, because the West was too gullible to actually arm themselves and defend themselves."

Today with 29% of Americans now having a college degree, up from 9 % in the 1960's are we becoming a nation of intellectuals?

Sowell: "It's a chilling thought. We are becoming a nation of people who are propagandized from elementary school right on through graduate school with a certain vision of the world... There are a few for whatever reason, experience or insight (or skepticism I would add) leads them to say wait a minute! They are the ones we have to depend on"

These are the ones we have to depend on to apply the brakes to this train. As Sowell describes, we are putting the ultimate power of control for this nation into the hands of the "intellectuals" like President Obama and his advisers as well as those influencing the Congressional leadership is basically allowing those with 1% of the knowledge rule over those in the day to day world with 99% of the knowledge.


See the whole interview here:






CW