“IN A POSITION TO BE PERSUASIVE”

2 PARAGRAPHS 4 LIBERTY: #292

Okay, let’s face reality and understand that, as to various topics, some people are in a better position to be heard than others. For example, as a judge I am probably in a better position to be persuasive about the possible settlement of disputes than other people without my experience or position. Similarly, in today’s climate of racial frustration, many African-Americans are in a better position to be persuasive about how our country should best go forward about racial issues than someone like me, who is about as WASP as one can get. So that brings me to honor Economics Professor Dr. Walter E. Williams, because he was a true “Champion of Liberty” for us all, and we recently lost him at age 86. To his friends, students and admirers the fact that he was African-American was simply irrelevant, but he had more ability to be persuasive about racial issues than many of us because of that fact.

So what did Dr. Williams teach? That “anti-people laws” should be abolished because they reduce the positive impact of capitalism, which he defined as the “greatest means for liberating people from poverty ever known.” And what are some of those laws? Over-regulation by the government in such things as occupational and business licensing, zoning regulations and minimum wage laws. How so? Because, among other things, they reduce the ability of poor people to be able to become entrepreneurs. The way he explained it: “Prior to capitalism, the way people amassed great wealth was by looting, plundering and enslaving their fellow man. Capitalism made it possible to become wealthy by serving your fellow man.” Similarly, before his criminal sexual assault actions became known, Bill Cosby was in a far better position to argue that African Americans would almost certainly avoid poverty if they would adhere to three fundamental rules: 1) Get at least a high school education, 2) Do not have children out of wedlock, and 3) Get a job – any job! In other words, and as spoken by Henry Ford, “Anyone who feels they can thrive by relying upon the government should talk to the American Indian.” That reliance doesn’t work and instead is mostly a trap that keeps people down. So these observations are accurate and timeless, and the more we can feature them the better off everyone will be. And the more people from ethnic minorities that we can point to who are discussing those realities, the better off society will be. (One final thing, if interested in an insightful piece by another African-American, namely Condoleezza Rice writing about race relations, please see her attached article “What Will You Do?” taken from the Fall 2020 edition of the Hoover Digest.)

Quote for the week: “Thuggery: It doesn’t matter which form or which uniform it’s in!”.
Major General James Williams, United States Marine Corps (Another African-American)