Way back when he was merely the mayor of Burlington, VT, Bernie Sanders voiced objection to private charity, because he believed it competed with and thereby undermined government charity.
You can't hate these people enough. They never wonder wonder where the Soros billions came from. Even Warren Buffett, who is arguably the world's greatest tax avoider, doesn't think the government does it better. My biggest concern is while they have made progress on the margin, spending cuts of 20-30% still seem like the best way to kill the beast. Starve it of funds. Harvard seems like a good case study. NPR too.
Being old enough to have lived during the time when racial discrimination was the norm, I think that we should not discount the existence of systemic racism and the role that government can play in addressing it. Now, if you want to be concerned that we have made a mistake in the opposite direction then that's a different question. One other thing regarding Carnegie. His philanthropy has mellowed his memory but still doesn't change the fact that he was known during that time as a "robber baron" who treated his workers badly while making the bucks to build the libraries. The Golden Rule wasn't followed by him or his contemporary titans of industry and represents a profound moral failure on his part regardless of how many libraries he built. And, who keeps those libraries in existence today? It's government.
We had that conversation about Carnegie already. I'm not excusing the man's bad acts, but I'm not fixating on them either, especially through the lens of modern morality.
More importantly, systemic racism *was* government. And, today, it continues to be government. Jim Crow laws were just that - laws - and they hindered the societal evolution that was eating away at prejudiced behavior. To the surprise of only the most naive, government's remedies to government-mandated racism were themselves deeply flawed, perpetuated racism in different forms, and did enormous damage to the communities they purported to help.
Why, then, should we expect government to fix things next time?
As for government and libraries - here's the question, asked by many. Do you think it is moral to point a gun at someone in order to fund a library?
Carnegie thought it was moral. Part of the agreement that he required for communities getting one of his libraries was that the local governments had to commit to fund them. Regarding the Jim Crow laws, those laws were there with the consent of the citizens in those states. It took a national effort by the national government to overturn these racist laws in the states.
Carnegie required the government to pay for the books and staff and ongoing upkeep of the libraries as part of the agreement when he would set up a library. I think that Carnegie would say he was in favor of government having sufficient force to collect taxes to keep the libraries open. Plus, this is the same person who cheered the use of soldiers to break the strike against his company. He should be no hero to libertarians. I suspect that minorities see the government as a lot less harmful to them than do others. If you are telling me that a libertarian would have opposed the Civil Rights Acts then we will have to agree to disagree.
You're missing the forest for one particular tree, and fixating on anecdote instead of big picture. This article isn't actually about Carnegie, and your insistence on commenting on him rather than the broader point may suggest you are being distracted.
As for the Civil Rights Act, I've blogged about that. The most liberty-oriented approach would have been to simply invalidate all discriminatory laws, but from a utilitarian standpoint it would have taken longer to produce good results. So, that's a point to discuss.
The broader libertarian objection to the CRA, long term, is the imposition of public accommodation rules to private businesses. And, it was an objection voiced even at that time by people with a principled fidelity to liberty, who knew from the get-go how corrosive it would turn out to be.
So, yes, the CRA should have invalidated all Jim Crow laws. You won't find many libertarians who disagree with that. The issue is the "beyond that." From a utilitarian, A-to-B perspective, I'd have been OK with a temporary public accommodation rule, but it should have sunsetted decades ago.
Your suspicion about minorities seeing government as a lot less harmful means... what, exactly? Money corrupts, and many who've lived their lives on the government gravy train don't have some sort of higher moral stance than those of us criticizing the government.
Meanwhile, you haven't answered my question about pointing a gun at someone to fund libraries. You mentioned that Carnegie favored government funding, but didn't you just tell me that Carnegie was a terrible person? You can't assert the latter while making an appeal-to-authority claim.
Governments have to be able to use force to enforce the laws and that includes things such as taxes for public libraries. Conservatives rightly warn of the harm which can come from too weak governments and libertarians rightly warn of the harm which can come from too strong of governments. It's a balancing act which depends upon the citizenry to keep the government honest. You brought up the government using a gun and so I just pointed out that Carnegie bought into the same idea and so he shouldn't be considered a libertarian hero. That's all. I suspect that you and I who have never experienced what minorities have on a daily basis may be far more sanguine than they are regarding what the law should have done.
The left hates success, provided it’s achieved by the wrong people. It’s just ducky when achieved by preferred demographics.
I don’t hear any cries to level the playing field in the NBA or the NFL. The underrepresentation of whites is clearly a disparate impact that could only have been achieved through systemic discrimination.
Jealousy over success and envy for the results of that success is the baseline of leftists. The question isn't why do progressives hate Jews and Asians, the question is why those two highly successful groups continue to reliably vote for those who would destroy them.
Habit, tribalism, past stereotypes, and in the case of the Jews, idealism.
All of which tells the Dems that they don't need to do anything for those votes.
Ditto for the blue collar vote - until the last couple elections. Now the Dems are wondering how they lost it and spending millions trying to figure out how to get it back... without changing their policies.
Most of the idjits waving the Palestinian banner aren't old enough to remember the PLO nightmares of the 60's. IMO, organizations created through terror as recently as 60 years ago cannot claim legitimacy.
I understand Dr. Sowell attributes anti-Semitism to that race primarily because they belong to the “merchant middleman” class of people. Either I misunderstand him or think he is only partially correct. I cannot believe all the virulent diatribes against Jews is because they have been successful for millennia at making markets more efficient. It feels like there is some hidden Nazi cabal trying to continue the Holocaust 😡
His take, from what I've seen, is not only that they are successful, but that they are successful in the face of oppression and antipathy. This is "in your face" to those who aren't as successful even though they started better off and didn't face bigotry, so they project their own failings into hatred for others.
One of your best pieces.
You can't hate these people enough. They never wonder wonder where the Soros billions came from. Even Warren Buffett, who is arguably the world's greatest tax avoider, doesn't think the government does it better. My biggest concern is while they have made progress on the margin, spending cuts of 20-30% still seem like the best way to kill the beast. Starve it of funds. Harvard seems like a good case study. NPR too.
Being old enough to have lived during the time when racial discrimination was the norm, I think that we should not discount the existence of systemic racism and the role that government can play in addressing it. Now, if you want to be concerned that we have made a mistake in the opposite direction then that's a different question. One other thing regarding Carnegie. His philanthropy has mellowed his memory but still doesn't change the fact that he was known during that time as a "robber baron" who treated his workers badly while making the bucks to build the libraries. The Golden Rule wasn't followed by him or his contemporary titans of industry and represents a profound moral failure on his part regardless of how many libraries he built. And, who keeps those libraries in existence today? It's government.
We had that conversation about Carnegie already. I'm not excusing the man's bad acts, but I'm not fixating on them either, especially through the lens of modern morality.
More importantly, systemic racism *was* government. And, today, it continues to be government. Jim Crow laws were just that - laws - and they hindered the societal evolution that was eating away at prejudiced behavior. To the surprise of only the most naive, government's remedies to government-mandated racism were themselves deeply flawed, perpetuated racism in different forms, and did enormous damage to the communities they purported to help.
Why, then, should we expect government to fix things next time?
As for government and libraries - here's the question, asked by many. Do you think it is moral to point a gun at someone in order to fund a library?
Carnegie thought it was moral. Part of the agreement that he required for communities getting one of his libraries was that the local governments had to commit to fund them. Regarding the Jim Crow laws, those laws were there with the consent of the citizens in those states. It took a national effort by the national government to overturn these racist laws in the states.
"Carnegie thought it was moral"
Did he?
As for Jim Crow - yes, the feds overrode the local laws, but the feds also did MASSIVE damage to the black community at the same time.
The harm done by government, time and again, far exceeds what any private actor has or can do.
Carnegie required the government to pay for the books and staff and ongoing upkeep of the libraries as part of the agreement when he would set up a library. I think that Carnegie would say he was in favor of government having sufficient force to collect taxes to keep the libraries open. Plus, this is the same person who cheered the use of soldiers to break the strike against his company. He should be no hero to libertarians. I suspect that minorities see the government as a lot less harmful to them than do others. If you are telling me that a libertarian would have opposed the Civil Rights Acts then we will have to agree to disagree.
You're missing the forest for one particular tree, and fixating on anecdote instead of big picture. This article isn't actually about Carnegie, and your insistence on commenting on him rather than the broader point may suggest you are being distracted.
As for the Civil Rights Act, I've blogged about that. The most liberty-oriented approach would have been to simply invalidate all discriminatory laws, but from a utilitarian standpoint it would have taken longer to produce good results. So, that's a point to discuss.
The broader libertarian objection to the CRA, long term, is the imposition of public accommodation rules to private businesses. And, it was an objection voiced even at that time by people with a principled fidelity to liberty, who knew from the get-go how corrosive it would turn out to be.
So, yes, the CRA should have invalidated all Jim Crow laws. You won't find many libertarians who disagree with that. The issue is the "beyond that." From a utilitarian, A-to-B perspective, I'd have been OK with a temporary public accommodation rule, but it should have sunsetted decades ago.
Your suspicion about minorities seeing government as a lot less harmful means... what, exactly? Money corrupts, and many who've lived their lives on the government gravy train don't have some sort of higher moral stance than those of us criticizing the government.
Meanwhile, you haven't answered my question about pointing a gun at someone to fund libraries. You mentioned that Carnegie favored government funding, but didn't you just tell me that Carnegie was a terrible person? You can't assert the latter while making an appeal-to-authority claim.
Governments have to be able to use force to enforce the laws and that includes things such as taxes for public libraries. Conservatives rightly warn of the harm which can come from too weak governments and libertarians rightly warn of the harm which can come from too strong of governments. It's a balancing act which depends upon the citizenry to keep the government honest. You brought up the government using a gun and so I just pointed out that Carnegie bought into the same idea and so he shouldn't be considered a libertarian hero. That's all. I suspect that you and I who have never experienced what minorities have on a daily basis may be far more sanguine than they are regarding what the law should have done.
The left hates success, provided it’s achieved by the wrong people. It’s just ducky when achieved by preferred demographics.
I don’t hear any cries to level the playing field in the NBA or the NFL. The underrepresentation of whites is clearly a disparate impact that could only have been achieved through systemic discrimination.
Jealousy over success and envy for the results of that success is the baseline of leftists. The question isn't why do progressives hate Jews and Asians, the question is why those two highly successful groups continue to reliably vote for those who would destroy them.
Habit, tribalism, past stereotypes, and in the case of the Jews, idealism.
All of which tells the Dems that they don't need to do anything for those votes.
Ditto for the blue collar vote - until the last couple elections. Now the Dems are wondering how they lost it and spending millions trying to figure out how to get it back... without changing their policies.
Most of the idjits waving the Palestinian banner aren't old enough to remember the PLO nightmares of the 60's. IMO, organizations created through terror as recently as 60 years ago cannot claim legitimacy.
I understand Dr. Sowell attributes anti-Semitism to that race primarily because they belong to the “merchant middleman” class of people. Either I misunderstand him or think he is only partially correct. I cannot believe all the virulent diatribes against Jews is because they have been successful for millennia at making markets more efficient. It feels like there is some hidden Nazi cabal trying to continue the Holocaust 😡
His take, from what I've seen, is not only that they are successful, but that they are successful in the face of oppression and antipathy. This is "in your face" to those who aren't as successful even though they started better off and didn't face bigotry, so they project their own failings into hatred for others.
One of the worst of human tendencies I would argue.