I think all liberals should read this book. Sowell does a good job laying out the argument that people on the left rely upon a lot of poor logic and condescending ideas. It's not enough for us on the left to simply believe we have the right ideas. We need to do a better job making our arguments that don't make it sound like we have the only right vision of how the world should be. I for sure didn't agree with Sowell's arguments on the courts and on criminal justice reform. But, I do think his arguments around how people on the left fail to fully think through their policy ideas lead to poor outcomes and we have a hard time facing up to that. One part I found really interesting was around the idea that activists and politicians can be well-intentioned but their poor grasp of statistics comes back to bite them in the butt. In the 1970s there was a book by an international organization named The Club of Rome. The book and club argued that economic growth was ending and countries needed to prepare for negative growth. Many experts and politicians thought this was going to happen and planned for it. Of course, this never happened but it doesn't mean anyone went back and changed their prior beliefs.

Prophetic. Written in 1995, this book reads like an introduction to the destruction caused today by the "Anointed," what commentators call "the elite" of government, higher education and policy influencers. It's ultimately a conflict of worldviews: the common man sees the world for what it is, a world of trade offs, causes and effects, and fallen human nature, but the Anointed see the world as They Can Remake It, a world of solutions, propaganda over fact, and a remade Humanity in its image. Of course, the common man is correct and the Anointed a fool, and we will continue to pay the price for giving them power.

Thomas Sowell is a brilliant thinker. This book clearly lays out the world view of the progressive left, and why they tenaciously hold to it in spite of overwhelming evidence that it just doesn't jive with the realities of the world we live in. Though it was written more than a decade ago, it is just as relevant today, if not more so, than when it was first published. Worth repeated readings.

Sowell's bias is obvious: in this book, Republicans never formulate bad policies, CEOs are never parasitic sociopaths, and, on the international scene, the US are the Good Guys. Nevertheless, this is an indispensable critique of elite thinking.

Sowell makes a heroic effort to codify the devices and doublethink our rulers employ as they impose their agenda on society, and he carefully examines the statistical evidence undermining their mythical successes in such areas as reducing poverty, eliminating racism, and the like. Although the book is more than twenty years old and was always flawed, it remains timely and unequalled for intellectual rigour, and persons at any point along the political spectrum will profit from reading it.