Just heard Sowell is going to retire
 

Bummer
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/G_sGn6PdmIo" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

He is a hero of mine...and I fully embrace and acknowledge the import of such a statement.

There has been no more lucid, finely-honed writer and economist in my lifetime.

http://tsowell.com/

I am not familiar with him so did a search.

Will have to read more about him but I loved this quote from WIKI.
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance"

I've called him the greatest mind of our time. I still think it's true.

Look through the list of his accomplishments. Then look at the year each accomplishment was done and the state of the country at the time of the accomplishment. He is truly a self made man. Sure, people have helped along the way, but nothing was freely given to him. He has earned his status.

No question.

The other writer I turn to often is Paul Johnson. He and Sowell were friends. Sowell had a big impact on Johnson and I am sure the reverse is true.

From Sowell's list of favorite quotes, also one of mine:

The study of history is a powerful antidote to contemporary arrogance. It is humbling to discover how many of our glib assumptions, which seem to us novel and plausible, have been tested before, not once but many times and in innumerable guises; and discovered to be, at great human cost, wholly false.

--Paul Johnson

Looking at my bookshelf,

Visions of the anointed
Conquests and cultures
The quest for cosmic justice.

The man is a genius. He looked at the tangled gibberish that is progressive thought and simplified it to a point where it could be understood and taken apart.

Agree. He's a very bright and insightful man. I love reading his stuff.

I always feel like he's put all the pieces together when I read him. I can often point out that something doesn't work, I can often point out some of the reasons why it doesn't work, but he gets to the root cause.

Hopefully he's retiring his column to get ready for his new job on the Supreme Court.