Do Facts Matter More Than Rhetoric and Social Visions?

Thomas Sowell ponders the question in today’s title at the end of an essay published ar Real Clear Politics. His essay has to do with new facts that support old facts that contradict the rhetoric of the race baiters and the victimhood snake oil salesmen used to explain why minorities score so poorly in standardized school tests compared to white students. (A recent study in England finds that poor whites score much worse than poor minorities.)

I have no doubt that Dr. Sowell knows that the question he ponders coud apply to any issue the separates the Left from the Right in the political or the economical arena. Furthermore, I have no doubt that Sowell knows the answer to his question. Rhetoric and social visions trump logic, reason, and facts when it comes to political or economical policy making. I’m not sure there has ever been a time in history when that was not true. The one possible exception may have been the early days of the Great American Experiment.

The intellectual elite ideologues are more than capable of processing the facts, reason, and logic proffered by the Right; but they won’t. Their social visions of fairness or whatever are too important to them to be dissuaded by facts, reason, and logic. (The ends justify the means.)

Politicians on the Left (including most Republicans) love the power bestowed on them by the voters and their only interest is hanging on to that power. They will not be detered by facts, reason, or logic.

Crony capitalist certainly know better, but they don’t care. They are getting richer faster because illogical and unreasonable Leftist policies.

Union activists are only interested if feathering their own nest and they don’t care who gets hurt in the process.

Worst of all there are many millions of voters who have been conditioned for decades not to think for themselves. They may be third generation welfare moms or hard working highschool graduates or they may be professionals with college degrees. Critical thinking is a skill that evades them. Facts, logic, and reason are wasted on them.

What about the so-called all-important Independent voters? They are supposed be critical thinkers. Isn’t that what makes them “independents”? What do Independents stand for, anyway? I have no facts to back up my opinion. However, I do wonder just how independent these Independent voters really are? I suspect that if one could analyze their voting history, we would find that the largest fraction of Independents vote for the Democratic candidate 95% of the time and the other fraction votes for the Republican candidate 95% of the time. If I am close to being right, that means that five percent of the time issues or a particular candidate cause “independents” to cross over and vote for a candidate in the other party. But, that is nothing more than my opinion.

So, who is it that cares about facts, logic, and reason? That would be us: the conservative and libertarian voters. The same people who care about freedom, our God-given or natural rights, and the free market system. How many are there of us? We know that we are not 100% of those who vote Republican; 50 million plus or minus a few million. We know that some libertarians vote for libertarian candidates. So, I would guess we number 30 to 35 million voters at most. Is it any wonder then why we have such a hard time electing enough like-minded people to Washington to change the direction our nation is going?

Well, that’s what I’m thinking. What are your thoughts?