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.
Sowell, as a distinguished economist, is understandably offended by this proclivity of mature democracies. The man (the legend!) exposes some of Obama's worst statements about economic policy, including those regarding the capital-gains tax and minimum wage laws.
Several comments about facts. We live in a post-modern age in which truth is, to put it mildly, not what it once was. The mass of people are barely able anymore to see propositions, especially those regarding politics and religion, as true or false; rather, they are mean or not mean. They make us feel good, or they make us feel bad. Perhaps more precisely, they make us feel what we want to feel--bad when we want to feel guilty, and good when we want to feel good. Obama comes out on the advantageous side of this: he makes us feel the appropriate amount of guilt for our country's racial sins, but also makes us feel good that his election can absolve us. Rhetorically, his waffling and distortion are not so much due to his arrogance as to his insistence on simple pandering--he can do nothing but reflect everyone's passions, and so he comes out on every side of everything. The man is all sentimentality, and no substance.
He isn't a liar, like Bill Clinton; he simply values propositional truth at nothing. Feelings are everything. Because the basic tenet of rationalism--that man is ruled by reason--is false, this seems the inevitable end of democracy. Observe our current election, pitting a Third Way, know-nothing, feel-good charlatan against a Third Way, know-nothing, tough-guy charlatan. People don't want to believe that governance is about balancing goals; instead, they want to believe in easy, low-cost solutions to problems. Too often, the hidden costs of the actions thence undertaken are in the categories of property rights and individual liberties, non-sentimental concepts that do nothing more than provide the foundation for civilization.
We set ourselves a dangerous precedent. Hard truths are immovable objects, and civilization is not an unstoppable force.
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