Are facts obsolete?
Posted by 3Dsound at Tuesday, July 15, 2008 9:07 AM and is filed under Betsy Newmark,conservative politics,economic fundamentalism,Economics,Bookworm Room,Fundamentalism,Republican tax policy,Barack Obama 
Fundamentalism (updated and bumped up from 12-Apr-06)
Asserting a priori beliefs: Thomas Sowell (04-
Thomas Sowell argues that a vast number of policy positions (most of them centrist on the political spectrum and hence anathema to right-wing fundamentalists) remain unsupported by fact and therefore, Sowell implies, not possessing merit. Strangely though, Sowell supplies no evidence – such as facts – to support his argument, which makes his commentary only demagogic. Not that that prevented it from immediately receiving kudos from right-wing blogs far and wide (e.g., at Betsy's Page, Bookworm Room, Reasonable Nuts, A Rose By Any Other Name and Sister Toldjah).
Here's the first half of Sowell's commentary (with highlighting mine):
What is more frightening than any particular policy or ideology is the widespread habit of disregarding facts. Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey put it this way: "Demagoguery beats data."
People who urge us to rely on the United Nations, instead of acting "unilaterally," or who urge us to follow other countries in creating a government-run medical care system, often show not the slightest interest in getting facts about the actual track record of either the UN or government-run medical systems.
Those who believe in affirmative action likewise usually see no reason to find out what actually happens under such policies, as distinguished from what they wish, hope, or imagine happens.
The crusade for "a living wage" that will enable a worker to support a family proceeds without the slightest interest in finding out whether most people who are making low wages actually have any family to support – much less seeking out the facts about what actually happens after the government sets wages.
People who have made up their minds and don't want to be confused by the facts are a danger to the whole society. Since the votes of such people count just as much as the votes of people who know what they are talking about, politicians have every incentive to pass laws and create policies that pander to ignorant notions, if those notions are widespread.
Even institutions that are set up to pass on facts – the media, schools, academia – too often treat facts as expendable and use their strategic positions to filter out facts which go against their own preconceptions.
Crimes against homosexuals, blacks, or the homeless are big news to be dramatized, repeated, and denounced. Crimes committed by homosexuals, blacks, or the homeless are not – and are often passed over in silence by much of the media. The net result is that the public gets filtered facts, which can create an impression the direct opposite of the truth.
UPDATE, Wednesday, July 16, 2008: From time to time, Thomas Sowell recycles the titles of his previous commentaries, as we see with his latest, which was published yesterday but bears the title of a commentary that was popular among Sowell's audience back in April 2006, i.e., Are facts obsolete?
You can read, above, my un-persuaded reaction to Sowell's 2006 commentary. His present commentary posits an identical theme ("facts have receded even further into the background than usual") and focuses on Barack Obama. This time out, Sowell supports his position with rhetorical evidence such as, "Raising taxes, increasing government spending and demonizing business? That is straight out of the New Deal of the 1930s."
Did someone say 'Complete drivel'? Unpacking Sowell's deceits would require explaining the fundamentalist aversion to empirical evidence... And that, of course, is the irony of Sowell's theme – that no one relies on foregone conclusions and top-down thinking like a fundamentalist does (whether they be an economic fundamentalist or otherwise). Facts to a fundamentalist, like Sowell, are, in the enduring words of haloed St. Reagan, "stupid things." Especially when they counter fundamentalist writ.
For example, Sowell belittles Obama for disregarding the "well-documented fact that lower tax rates on capital gains [have] produced more actual revenue collected from that tax than the higher tax rates [have]." Except, the facts contradict that, as broadly indicated by our country's current economic woes. See the Center on Policy and Budget Priorities (Experts agree that capital gains tax cuts lose revenue [revised 09-May-08]) and Media Matters (Gibson's capital-gains tax assertion during debate disputed by economists by Jenny Hoffman [18-Apr-08]) for reviews of the facts and issues.
But Sowell's not finished disregarding facts. He oozily declares, "Since about half the people in the United States own stocks – either directly or because their pension funds buy stocks – socking it to people who earn capital gains is by no means socking it just to "the rich." But, again, that is one of the many facts that don't matter politically." (Of course... disagreeing with Sowell reflects politics, not facts.) Sowell raises a favorite Republican talking point, that supply-side tax policy benefits the middle class. It's a shibboleth possessing substantial political capital but not much factual basis, which I've pointed out before and which PolitiFact.com identifies as being "Barely True" (Obama's plan to raise the capital gains tax "hurts the middle class" [undated, circa May-08]).
I think you get the idea of how irrelevant facts are to Sowell's political commentary, which – naturally enough, by the requirements of fundamentalist demagoguery – concludes by comparing Obama's foreign policy to that of Neville Chamberlain.
Sowell's 'fact free' commentary doesn't seem to have been discussed as widely among right-wing bloggers as was its predecessor, but Betsy Newmark picked it up. And it provides her with an opportunity to repeat one of her favorite themes, "Once again, we're back to wishing that everyone understood basic economics better." Which is a sentiment nicely illustrating the rote acceptance of a favored view (in Betsy's case, economic fundamentalism – contravening evidence be damned!) that Sowell (hypothetically) rails against.
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