RLL Ep.38 Walter Williams Remembered

ThornCrown Network iconThornCrown Network

0 views

0 comments

00:24
Hi everybody, Steve Matthews here. Thanks for joining me for Ready It Looks Lucid episode 38.
00:30
The title of this episode is Walter Williams Remembered. Well there was some sad news this past week.
00:36
One of my personal heroes died on Monday December the 1st and I'm talking here about Dr.
00:43
Walter Williams. Dr. Williams was an economist and was a professor for many years at George Mason University in Virginia but he was not wasn't just an academic he was also somebody who is was very well known as a public intellectual and if if say you were someone who's in the liberty movement or a liberty minded person and maybe a libertarian or maybe you're a conservative or something along those lines the name
01:10
Walter Williams is probably one that you you recognize because he wrote a newspaper column for many years probably about 40 years or so and he was also pretty well known as one of Rush Limbaugh's regular guest hosts.
01:24
It always seemed like if I recall correctly that he would would fill in for Rush maybe the week Christmas between Christmas and New Year's was was typically one of the the times of year that that Walter Williams would sit behind the the
01:36
EIB microphone and and school people in in sound economics so and though it was it's it's sad to hear of his passing this past week
01:47
I didn't want to make this a sad show but really more as really to just honor someone that I think have thought very highly of for most of my life and into to give you a little bit of sense of the man and how he he actually mentored me now
02:06
I say I never I never knew him personally I never was a student of his I never sat in a classroom with him but yet he really did teach me and he taught me an awful lot about economics at a really a very important kind of impressionable time in my life it made a big difference to me and so that's why
02:24
I just wanted to I really think of this episode more is just a just a public public thank you to to dr.
02:32
Williams for for all of the the wonderful work that that he did and and how much his work has meant to me or over many years there's a a an article
02:45
I guess it was a yeah there's a write -up and if you call it an obituary maybe a write -up would be more like it in in the
02:50
New York Times that was done in fact it was just today December the 4th I'll read a little bit of that to you here so here we go quote
02:59
Walter E Williams 84 dies conservative economist on black issues skeptical of anti -poverty programs he was a scholar who reached a wide public through a newspaper column in books and as a fill -in for Rush Limbaugh now let me just read a little bit of this this is actually a pretty good write -up
03:16
I mean it's in the New York Times so I mean they're not the the kind of people who would necessarily be favorable to to Walter Williams's views if you are familiar with Walter Williams of course he was somebody who believed in and free market and laissez -faire economics capitalism and he was also somebody who believed in limited government so he had a a very biblical view of economics and politics and I don't know for sure
03:44
I I strongly suspect he was a Christian himself I know I I heard him make numerous references to to church and church related things over the years and I I very strongly suspect he was a
03:57
Christian and I I do I do know in terms of his writings in terms of his beliefs about economics and politics they certainly were or consistent with the scriptures before I get started here
04:09
I also wanted to say hi to everybody on live stream this is my second go at live stream you know it was funny
04:14
I did the the first one was on always on Thanksgiving and I was trying a new program actually
04:23
I had live streamed on Twitter a couple a few times before that but I got this new program it's called restream and it lets you stream across a number of different platforms all at once well
04:31
I got the thing all set up and I was I was going and I was having a pretty good time with the Thanksgiving episode
04:38
I got done and at the end of it I saw that somebody had sent me a message and he said something like dude your your audio is off so I was sitting here yammering on for about 45 minutes and it wasn't a sound fortunately
04:50
I did record it as a podcast so I did get I did get the audio on another device but that that was well yeah you know you know doing podcasting and and blogging and writing things like that it it has a tumbling moments and that was one for me so I think
05:08
I've got the audio on this week I learned how to how to check that so hopefully if you don't hear me and you're watching out there you be please be kind enough to drop me a chat and and let me know anyway so back to the article here this is the the
05:25
New York Times excuse me this is the New York Times write -up on on Walter Williams Walter E Williams a prominent conservative economist author and political commentator who expressed profoundly skeptical views of government efforts to aid his fellow
05:40
African Americans and other minority groups died on Tuesday on the campus of George Mason University in Virginia where he taught for 40 years he was 84 his daughter
05:51
Devin Williams said he died suddenly in his car after he had finished teaching a class she said he had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and hypertension as a public intellectual mr.
06:01
Williams moved easily between the classroom and public forums that gave him a wide reach he wrote a syndicated column lectured across the country and frequently appeared on the radio as a substitute host for the ardently conservative
06:12
Rush Limbaugh the author of about a dozen books including the state against blacks mr.
06:18
Williams was a subject of a 2014 PBS documentary suffer no fools in which he maintained that anti -poverty programs were subsidizing slovenly behavior the welfare state has done to black
06:30
Americans what slavery could not have done Jim Crow and the harshest racism could not have done namely to destroy the black family mr.
06:38
Williams declared and suffer no fools so that kind of gives you a little bit of a flavor of Walter Williams and one of the things that maybe just to tell you a little bit about him just from my own personal experience you know when
06:53
I was was growing up and this is back when I went to school I graduated high school in 1984 and when
06:59
I was going to school then growing up I went to public school you know I'm a product of public school okay and I went to public school my my whole life and going through public education you know you kind of got this sense
07:14
I mean and nobody stated this explicitly but you kind of got this sense that if you had any ambition say of being a scholar you know a serious scholar in in any field that that you really had to adopt a set of beliefs that were at odds with Christianity you know you had to be you had to be a
07:34
Darwinist in terms of of your your thinking about about the about mankind you had to to be a you know some kind of a collectivist in terms of your economics you had to be a big government guy in terms of of your politics now again nobody ever explicitly stated this it was more implicit in the kind of education we received because of course when you're talking about public education what you're doing is you're talking about government education so I mean of course you're going to get an education that favors what big government and I always got this sense that that when
08:12
I was was going to school that I wasn't really being taught straight that wasn't getting a straight scoop but I didn't know what the truth was and and I was was very confused and I was very frustrated and in fact
08:25
I was it was a pretty crummy student when when I was in high school and part of it was because I just I didn't trust the kinds of things that I was being taught it just didn't it didn't seem quite right to me but if you if you'd really pressed me on the issues
08:41
I would have had a hard time really articulating for you why why I thought that but but I tended not to have a whole lot of interest in in academics and I did very poorly when
08:52
I was in high school and I don't say that as a boast I'm not happy about it I wish that I had had handled things differently but but no
09:01
I didn't do well in part of the reason was was just because I found the the intellectual climate the the the atmosphere the the ideas that were put forth they didn't have a lot of appeal to me and I always wanted to believe
09:19
I don't know maybe this was this is the Lord's leading and in my life I wasn't a Christian at the time but I always believed in in I wanted to believe in Liberty I wanted to believe in in freedom in in economic freedom and political freedom but I just wasn't seeing that in in the the teaching that I was getting so anyway
09:37
I remember I first came across Walter Williams work I want to say about 1984 so it was about the same year that that I graduated high school and the local newspaper the
09:48
Cincinnati Enquirer carried his weekly syndicated column and I started reading his stuff and I was just just blown away by it you know as I the the general kind of intellectual atmosphere then as is as it is now as a sort of sort of big government type of socialism but but Walter Williams was just like it was like a bolt of lightning out of the blue he was so different from anybody else
10:17
I had ever read up to that point yeah he was somebody who would write very powerfully very clearly very in very logically and defend freedom and to friend limited government and defend you know economic liberty and and I was just absolutely amazed and blown away by it and in one of the things that really captured me the most of course is that Walter Williams was black and and yet he would write columns that would just he would just just flay the the received wisdom of the day you know there was always this idea oh well you know that that blacks aren't doing well in this or that area and it's all because of racism it's all because of white racism it's it's it's white racism that that is to blame for this and I'd read
11:08
Walter Williams he'd say no it's it's not white racism that's that's doing this it's socialism it's the welfare state and in fact let me go ahead
11:16
I'm gonna read that quote again this is from a quote from the New York Times and I know this must have been kind of painful for them to print this so I'm gonna read it again this is
11:25
Walter Williams quote the welfare state has done to black Americans what slavery could not have done Jim Crow and the harshest racism could not have done namely to destroy the black family end quote that was a quote from that PBS special suffer no fools by the way that that PBS specially talked about it's about an hour -long special on featuring
11:45
Walter Williams and it's actually it's available on Amazon so if you have Amazon if you've got
11:50
Amazon Prime it actually comes with your Amazon subscription so if if you have that go check it out
11:55
I'd strongly recommend it to you I always love hearing hearing Walter Williams talk about about economics it's if you've never heard him before you're in for a real treat
12:07
I just I've always loved his work so much but but I would read things like this and and it was just it was just shocking
12:15
I guess it was like a bolt of lightning out of the blue and it was like who is this guy and and where does he get these ideas and and I was was very keen to to learn and I say this was at a time in my life that you know as a senior in high school or was going into college and so it's a very intellectually formative years and you know for me reading his work really kind of reawakened or maybe awakened for the first time really the interest in in scholarly things from my standpoint because I had this idea growing up that if you had to be a scholar well you had to be some kind of you know socialist liberal you know what have you and I think there was a lot of truth in that actually there's certainly a lot of truth then and of course if you look at the way universities and and formal academics is today that really is true
13:09
I mean you have to have a you have to kind of accept the the worldview of the the secular liberals and that's something that that I was never comfortable with and but yeah here
13:22
I'm reading someone who's a PhD economist and a college professor and then I mean he's just just just flaying the received wisdom and it was just it was always so much fun to to read him and to read him to see him you know skewer the the received wisdom
13:38
I always enjoyed that but but in reading him and in the learning from him I say it for the first time in my life kind of began to awaken interest in in scholarship because I began to see that yeah you could be a scholar and not only could you defend liberty but but it was you could make a pretty compelling intellectual argument for that in fact you could make a much better argument for for liberty and freedom than you could for all the the big government social welfare programs that were out there so that that was one of the the big takeaways that I got from from Walter Williams and from his work over the years was just the fact that that good scholarship can really be used to support liberty now
14:26
I wasn't even a scripturalist at the time you know I talk about scripturalism I'm talking about the work of particularly of Gordon Clark and and John Robbins and this was years before I even read their stuff but it his work
14:38
Walter Williams work actually kind of helped me help prepare me for for reading some of the work of Gordon Clark and and John Robbins much later on it was probably about another 18 years or so it wasn't till about the year 2000 or so that I actually started to read read
14:56
Clark and Robbins but this was in you know say about 1984 or so when I started reading Walter Williams so anyway going through the this article a little bit let me read a little bit more of that here's a kind of give you a little more flavor of Walter Williams he argued that's he
15:13
Walter Williams argued that many well -intentioned government programs including the minimum wage in the law that in effect mandates union wages on federal construction projects hurt disadvantaged
15:22
Americans particularly black people in an influential essay minimum wage maximum folly published in 2007 he argued that a minimum wage it was five dollars and eighty -five cents at the time came with legally mandated fringe benefits such as employer payments for Social Security Medicare unemployment compensation and worker compensation programs at federal and state levels that run as high as 30 percent of the hourly wage and Williams goes on to say quote put oneself in the place of an employer and ask does it make sense for me to hire a worker who is so unfortunate as to have skills enabling him to produce four dollars worth of value per hour when he's going to cost me eight dollars an hour most employers would see doing so a losing economic proposition and not hire such a worker end quote well duh and it's it's it's amazing though that you know
16:20
Walter Williams he makes this point he makes it very powerful right I mean if you're say an employee maybe you've got limited skills for whatever reason maybe it's your first job for example and somebody hires you on and maybe you only produce four dollars an hour but they got to pay eight dollars an hour well who's gonna do that I mean you know that's that's you know you're gonna have a hard time getting a getting a job there like that you know in what minimum wage does is it it hurts low -skill employees because they can't find employment you know it hurts people who are and you know looking for an entry -level job because they can't find a job that will pay them at a at a rate that that their skills justify yeah and that's a pretty compelling pretty compelling argument and yet there's there are so many people and we're talking about PhD economists and some of the most prestigious universities in the
17:11
United States or around the world who argue that yeah I mean at minimum wage is is a great idea and what that is of course is that's that's government interference in the economy and of course one of the biggest sources of that interference and we've talked about that I think a little bit in in my podcast no
17:29
I've written quite a bit about it but one of the biggest sources of that interference is is the
17:34
Roman Catholic Church now you know Walter Williams didn't say that he don't he didn't that's not in the the
17:40
New York Times article and I don't know that he necessarily said that in his columns I'm saying that that's where that comes from a lot of that comes from the influence of a
17:48
Roman Catholic economic thought which is is very collectivist so let's continue on here with the New York Times article mr.
17:54
Williams contended that the civil rights legislation championed by President Lyndon B Johnson in the 1960s had actually worsened race relations by seeking an equality of result in terms of voting rights and bans on discrimination rather than equality of economic opportunity which you said might better have lifted more black
18:12
Americans out of poverty independence on public welfare programs oh my goodness
18:17
I mean that now this was something again that this is one of the things when early on when I began reading
18:23
Walter Williams work that I was just floored by it as I mentioned you know Walter Williams himself was black and you know
18:32
I mean I was used to the kind of the standard issue mainstream stuff that you'd see on on TV or reading newspapers right
18:39
I mean you know guys like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton I mean those are some prominent civil rights advocates at the time you know and and they were always into you know bigger government programs you know more laws compelling people to do this that and the other thing and I just I thought that that well you know
18:59
I guess that's what what black Americans really think that's what they want and Walter Williams comes along and he just blows that stuff out of the water and I thought
19:07
I've never seen anything like this and and again you know this this is very very good summary of Walter Williams argument you know that all of these you know so many of these civil rights laws that try to impose things like you know quotas and what -have -you on employers and on the workforce create a lot of a lot of ill will and not only do they create all does it create a lot of ill will it actually holds holds creates problems for black
19:37
Americans who are trying to advance it actually in a lot of ways hurts people that supposedly it's out there to help and it's interesting it goes on here it says that he again
19:52
Walter Williams had his critics on the liberal side in 1981 and a and a Q &A face -off with mr.
19:58
Williams and the opinion pages of the New York Times Benjamin Hooks then president of the NAACP at that time was unsparing in his assessment of black conservatives like mr.
20:07
Williams and he goes on in this Benjamin Hooks criticizes criticizes
20:14
Williams he says black conservatives are basically a carbon copy of white white conservatives they object to affirmative actions designed to overcome preferences long accorded to white males they object to busing as one effective remedy for rectifying a school system that has been deliberately historically segregated etc etc and he continues here well the the problem with so many of the with liberals is that they always think that somehow getting government involved in things and forcing people to do things that they wouldn't otherwise do is the way to go but Walter Williams had a consistent philosophy of Liberty he had a consistent philosophy of Liberty anything think about what
20:57
Jesus said you know Jesus said if the Son of Man shall make you free you shall be free indeed Liberty is that's something that we find in the scriptures we find economic
21:09
Liberty we find political Liberty now that quote that I gave you from Christ I mean of course he was talking there about spiritual
21:14
Liberty spiritual Liberty is the fountainhead of political and an economic Liberty now again
21:20
I'm I'm filling in some things here I don't know that that Walter Williams necessarily openly talked about that or not maybe he did
21:26
I haven't read everything that that he he wrote but but but Liberty is something that is it's
21:35
God -given it's a gift of God and Walter Williams understood the importance of political and economic
21:42
Liberty to help people to to help people to grow to help people to develop to help people to to learn and have an opportunity to apply their their
21:51
God -given gifts and their talents you don't get to to a place of success you don't have a
22:01
I guess what I'm trying to say here is is that nobody can give you prosperity
22:12
I mean we you try to give people stuff you try to give people free stuff what it ends up doing is destroying them and that that's one of the things that that Walter Williams argued quite a bit and you find it's just consistently in his columns you know that government anti -poverty programs the government affirmative action programs things like this even if they were well intentioned
22:35
I mean even assuming the best of intentions of the part of the people who who initiated them that they actually ended up hurting the very people that they were supposed to help and I remember and I don't have the the column here handy with me but I do recall reading in in one of one of Walter Williams columns he was talking about growing up and he grew up in the the housing projects in North Philadelphia and he was born in 1936 so he grew up he's pretty close to same age as my parents he grew up in the 1940s 1950s in that particular period of time and you know that was in the time those the pre -civil rights era so there was a lot of pretty overt discrimination that was going on it was taking place against blacks but one of the things it was interesting in listening to him talk about his experience growing up it was it was really quite remarkable because you know you think today of the you know housing projects and immediately conjures up you know images of you know drug addicts and shootings and prostitution and you know in all this kind of very depraved sorts of things but when you listen to him talk it sounded almost like a you know call almost like a like an all -american neighborhood yeah he talked about the fact that that you know with with he and all of his friends that he was the only one that didn't have both parents at home his father left his mother when he was was very young but all of his other friends their parents were married you know they they were intact families you know they would go out he and I remember reading him talking about how they'd go out and you know they'd camp out in the yard at night and and nobody would think anything of it and and they got a good quality education when he was was growing up as well and you know it sounded like it was pretty normal American neighborhood and this was in the the housing project you know in the 1940s and 1950s and of course you compare what he experienced growing up you know before all of the the
24:36
Great Society of Social Welfare programs came along in his 60s it was a very very different world than then the one that we live in today you know after all of those the social welfare programs you know came along and you know the the so -called
24:51
Great Society of Lyndon Johnson and and that was one of the the recurring themes of his work was how welfare had destroyed the black families and it wasn't just black families he'd talked about either welfare destroys any families you know there's no quicker way to destroy the moral fiber the industriousness of any people than to put them on the dole and put them on the government dole to say you deserve free stuff you you have entitlements yeah you could could sum up a pretty good chunk of Walter Williams work is you know that is sort of a lot a career making war on the word entitlement yeah he he had a view and this was a very biblical view of of the race relationship between work and money you know you think about what the
25:36
Apostle Paul wrote he said you know if a man will not work neither let him eat you know and of course you say that today and you know people tend to recoil at horror oh my gosh you can't be that cruel how can you be so terrible well
25:47
I mean that's what the Bible teaches you know and that that is also very sound economics and that's what that is is what
25:54
Walter Williams also taught in in his his public work and I'm sure he probably did in the classroom as well
26:02
I just I know him from the the work that he did publicly as as a writer as a columnist or as a author of books or as a radio talk show host
26:11
I know he always supported the idea that people had a responsibility to work you know and and if they wanted something that that you know it was if you wanted something your job you had to go out and you had to work for it you didn't have a right to sit and claim oh you know
26:28
I've been you know disadvantaged or discriminated against or something like this now you owe me free stuff because of course that's very much in vogue it was it was in vogue back in the 1980s when
26:38
I first started reading Walter Williams that was very much mainstream in the 1960s when
26:44
Lyndon Johnson was president and of course it's gone hyper nuclear in our own day
26:50
I mean that's you know if you don't think that let's say giving out reparations for example is a great idea well you're you're a really terrible person
26:58
I mean that's the very that's the very kind of thing that Walter Williams opposed throughout his career consistently in fact it even says here mr.
27:09
Williams also opposed affirmative action programs and proposals to pay reparations to black people for slavery the problems that black people face are not going to be solved by white people he said and that's true
27:20
I mean the only way the only way that you're ever gonna get anything is you have to go out and and you have to to apply yourself you're not going to you know nobody can give you a career nobody can give you skills those are things that you have to go out and you have to apply yourself and if you have the sense that you're how you're entitled and that somebody owes you something just because of who you are well you're gonna find you're not gonna get very far in your life and you're probably gonna be pretty bitter so and the article goes on to talk about how he became a in economist he actually got his
28:03
PhD from from UCLA out in out in Los Angeles and and it also goes on talk about he came he returned to to Philadelphia where he grew up he taught at Temple University for from 1973 and then in 1980 he moved on to George Mason University he was also an adjunct scholar at the the
28:25
Cato Institute that's a lip excuse me it's a libertarian think -tank and I'm gonna go ahead
28:32
I'm gonna put this article in the show notes I know the the New York Times I mean you do have to have a subscription to get to it but if you do have one you can go ahead and read the write -up it's actually like I say it's it's it's quite a good write -up you know it's it's better than I would expect from the
28:46
New York Times because of course philosophically Walter Williams is very different from the editorial staff of the New York Times and just to give you another flavor of the of Walter Williams work there's a a recent column this is maybe a oh
29:04
I don't know a couple it was back actually September 23rd so a little bit a little bit over two months ago it's a column that he wrote
29:13
I'm getting this from Town Hall and I'm gonna put this in the show notes as well but it's called language and thought and and here's
29:19
Williams writing he says 17th century poet and intellect John Milton predicted when language in common you use in any country becomes irregular and depraved it is followed by the ruin and degradation
29:30
Gore Vidal his 20th century intellectual successor elaborated saying in societies grow decadent the language grows decadent to words are used to disguise not to illuminate sloppy language permits people to get away with speaking and doing all manner of destructive nonsense without being challenged and he continues
29:51
Williams does let's look at the concept of white privilege the notion that white people have benefited in American history relative to and at the expense of people of color that's what white privilege is it appears to be utter nonsense to suggest that poor and destitute
30:05
Appalachian whites have white privilege how can one tell if a person has white privilege one imagines that the academic elite who coined the term refer to whites of a certain socio -economic status such as living in the suburbs with the privilege of high income amenities but here's the question did
30:22
Nigerians in the US have white privilege as reported by the New York Post this summer 17 % of all
30:28
Nigerians in this country hold master's degrees 4 % hold a doctorate and 37 % hold a bachelor's degree according to the
30:36
US Census Bureau's 2006 American Community Survey by contrast 19 % of whites have a bachelor's degree 8 % have a master's to have master's degrees and 1 % have doctorates what about slavery colleges teach our young people that the
30:53
US became rich on the backs of free black labor that is utter nonsense slavery does not have a very good record of producing wealth think about it slavery was all over the
31:04
South and outlawed in most of the north I doubt that anyone would claim that the antebellum South was rich and the slave starved north was poor the truth is just the opposite in fact the poorest states and regions of our country were places where slavery slavery flourished
31:18
Mississippi Alabama and Georgia while the richest states and regions where those were slavery was outlawed
31:24
Pennsylvania New York New Jersey and Massachusetts and again the the column continues it's really good stuff
31:31
I'm gonna go ahead and put that in in the show notes as well but it just goes to show you again that gives you a kind of a sense of the flavor of his argumentation and how he could could really refute so many of those arguments that that we hear
31:46
I mean you you watch the news you you hear hear people talk and you hear that that term white privilege
31:53
I mean that that's a very common almost a buzzword today and here he he really eviscerates idea by saying hey you know if you know how do you explain the fact that say
32:05
Nigerians and he's using Nigeria's example how is it that they Nigerians in the United States actually have stronger economic stronger educational backgrounds percentage -wise anyway then the average white
32:19
American or you know how is it possible that the South which held slaves which in the north which was relatively poor compared to the north which didn't have slaves you know we're constantly told that that America was built on the back of slaves and that you know slaves are responsible for for building the
32:35
United States and as he notes here slavery has a really crummy track record for building wealth you know you don't build wealth that way and of course that shouldn't surprise us as Christians right because I mean slavery is is not
32:48
Christian if you want to read a little bit more about slavery there's a wonderful little booklet by by John Robbins it's called
32:56
Christianity and Slavery and it's an exposition of the book of Philemon and if you read through Philemon I mean that's that's where you really get some explicit detail in the new in the
33:08
New Testament about you know abolishing slavery you really find that strongest arguments right there in in Philemon and John Robbins is a brilliant job explaining that I'm not going to go into that right now but you may want to check that out so it's a really great little book it's in print you can get it from the
33:23
Trinity Foundation so anyway I just wanted to give you a little bit of flavor of of Walter Williams and his argumentation and you might also find this interesting too if you're like me and say you you admire love the work of John Robbins I'm a huge admirer of John Robbins I mean
33:41
John Robbins is you know I talk about Walter Williams was an early influence in in my in shaping my thought well
33:47
John Robbins probably did more than anybody else to really kind of put all the pieces together and and shape my thinking
33:55
I mean I call myself a scripturalist today of course scripturalism was the name that that John Robbins gave to Gordon Clark's philosophy you know the idea that the
34:05
Bible has a systematic monopoly on truth but you might be interested to know you know if you're a if you're an admirer of John Robbins that he the
34:13
John Robbins was was well aware of Walter Williams work and actually admired him quite a bit and here's a piece and that was actually written by by John Robbins it's a review of of one of Walter Williams books this was written on the foundation for economic education
34:33
FEE and at the time John Robbins was it was written in 1996 and I believe
34:40
John Robbins was the editor -in -chief of the foundation for economic education at that time
34:46
John Robbins was very interested in economics and and I was always very interested in economics and of course part of that interest in economics a big chunk of that actually came from reading
34:54
Walter Williams and so I was so glad to come across a number of years later John Robbins work where he really ties in you know in shows how the the economics of freedom is is something that you can derive from the scriptures but writing in 1996
35:12
John Robbins is giving a review of of Walter Williams book and let me read a little bit of this this to you the title of its do the right thing that's the title of Walter Williams book keen insights from a sound economist so John Robbins calls
35:26
Walter Williams a sound economist now if you know John Robbins there's not a lot of people he would say that about I mean
35:34
John Robbins was a very discriminating and I mean that as a compliment very discriminating intellect is somebody who admired you know logic and precision of thought then those are things that are fairly unfortunately very rare qualities even among academics in our own day but he called called
35:51
Walter Williams a sound economist so let's read a little bit from John Robbins review of of Walter Williams here quote dr.
36:01
Walter Williams chairman of the Department of Economics at George Mason University in Virginia a syndicated columnist for the past 15 years has collected his best newspaper columns from 1990 to 1994 sorted them into seven categories and published them under the title do the right thing young Walter Williams grew up in North Philadelphia housing project in the 1930s and 40s he thanks his who having been abandoned hmm look at the sorry the words a little bit cut off here oh here we go let me stretch this out here young Walter Williams grew up in a
36:34
North Philadelphia housing project in the night in the 1930s and 40s he thanks his mother who having been abandoned by her husband raised two children by herself through difficult times she is the one who gave me a spirit of rebelliousness and taught me hard lessons about independence and discipline he later went on to earn his doctorate in economics from UCLA dr.
36:54
Williams also thanks Providence that enabled him to have teachers in high school and professors in college who didn't give a damn about what color
37:03
I was and held me accountable to high standards the title do the right thing reflects dr.
37:09
Williams political philosophy in two important respects it is not enough to think the right thing the all right action must start with right thinking is necessary to do to act faith without works is mere lip service second when one does act one must do the right thing the moral thing not the expedient thing or the politic thing dr.
37:30
Williams sees the source of American decline in the 20th century as moral rot in both our private lives and our public institutions in an age of philosophical moral relativism the
37:42
BOM fo G ubiquitous and false platitudes about unity in the brotherhood of man and fatherhood of God dr.
37:50
Williams honesty and analysis may be painful for some delicate souls regardless of whose sensibilities are offended he writes
37:57
I do not hesitate to call the things as I see them why because I care about our country and fear for its future as a free and prosperous nation more importantly dr.
38:07
Williams cares about the truth Williams is controversial but then anyone worth listening to is controversial long before William Sapphire thought the character thought of characterizing
38:17
Hillary Clinton as a congenital liar Williams recognized the political class especially Congress as charlatans either ignorant or contemptuous of the
38:25
Constitution Williams does not exaggerate as one who worked on Capitol Hill for several years
38:30
I can attest to the accuracy of his observation about the only thing sure to call forth more ridicule on the floor of Congress in a serious reference of the
38:38
Constitution is a serious reference of the Bible as the Word of God that means of course that many congressmen cannot do the right thing since they do not know or do not want to know what the right thing is and John John Robbins continues describes the book a little bit
38:59
I'll just just read you the the closing paragraph here as well maybe the closing two paragraphs one of dr.
39:06
Williams most important essays is one in which he defends the founders of America at the time of the Constitution against the charge that they were defenders of slavery
39:13
Williams quotes several including Thomas Jefferson James Otis John Adams Benjamin Franklin George Washington James Madison and Alexander Hamilton typical was the statement of Madison that slavery was quote a barbarous policy in quote dr.
39:29
Williams brings to his analysis of contemporary issues the keen insights of a sound economist he explains why businesses are in favor of regulations it's to keep down competition why the self -esteem movement is so pernicious it stifles effort and achievement why a balanced budget is not enough taxes and spending that today's levels are legalized theft there's hardly a significant and contemporary topic that Williams doesn't discuss in this book is well worth reading and dr.
39:56
Williams is well worth listening to so that was John Robbins 1996 review of Walter Williams book titled do the right thing and you know actually
40:06
I don't think I have that book I looked at it on Amazon I think I'm gonna have to they get a copy of that because I'm sure that that's got a lot of a lot of great stuff in it so anyway so that that about wraps things up for today
40:20
I wanted to just say thank you very much for listening I hope you enjoyed the discussion here of Walter Williams I I think
40:28
Walter Williams is was really just a wonderful exemplar of what of good academics you know he you know that he's a man who used his intellect used his
40:39
God -given talents to teach and to teach truth and and I know that he he touched a lot of lives and including a lot of people he never knew
40:49
I mean as I said I never knew him personally but I admired so much his work for many years and and I have benefited so much from the work that he did so I really wanted to use this as an opportunity just as I said as a sort of a way of publicly thanking saying thank you to him for for the work for the work that he did and I'm sure that his work will will live on for many years to come especially among all those those of us who who love and cherish liberty and truth so in closing
41:24
I just wanted to say again thanks very much for listening I really do appreciate that if you
41:30
I'm gonna go ahead I'm gonna post this this is I'm gonna post this as a as a podcast episode so I'm gonna post this out on my blog
41:36
I'm also gonna post it on Thorn Crown Ministries so if you get a chance come check out my blog it's it's a Luke Slucet that's
41:41
L -U -X -L -U -C -E -T dot M -E it's a it's a WordPress blog it's a
41:47
I've had it out there and goodness it's hard to believe now I guess it's almost going on 12 years my you know where's the time go so I'm gonna post it out there also
41:55
I'm gonna go ahead I'm gonna post it to my Twitter account so you can go ahead and follow me on Twitter check me out on Facebook also as I said
42:02
I'm gonna post this out on the Thorn Crown Ministry website Thorn Crown Ministries is a organization it was started by a couple of friends of mine
42:10
Tim Shaughnessy and Carlos Montillo and I'm gonna post that out there and if you get a chance go out and check out the
42:17
Thorn Crown Ministry as well they've got a lot of great stuff on there there's the the website itself hosts a number of different podcasts it also has a place where a number of us contributors put put blog articles as well so so go check that out there's a lot of great stuff on the
42:34
Thorn Crown Ministries website also too I just wanted to mention when I post this on my my my blog
42:40
I do have a donations box on there if you find that you enjoy this work and you get something out of it please consider making a donation as well to help to support me and the work that I do thanks again so much for listening
42:54
I really do appreciate that and appreciate your support and until next time may the spirit of truth guide you in all truth as you read and study