Thomas Sowell writes about the commencement address he would like to hear:
Commencement speakers express great reverence for “public service,” as distinguished from narrow private “greed.” There is usually not the slightest sign of embarrassment at this self-serving celebration of the kinds of careers they have chosen — over and above the careers of others who merely provide us with the food we eat, the homes we live in, the clothes we wear and the medical care that saves our health and our lives.
What I would like to see is someone with the guts to tell those students: Do you want to be of some use and service to your fellow human beings? Then let your fellow human beings tell you what they want — not with words, but by putting their money where their mouth is.
You want to see more people have better housing? Build it! Become a builder or developer– if you can stand the sneers and disdain of your classmates and professors who regard the very words as repulsive.
P.J. O’Rourke delivers it:
Don’t chain yourself to a redwood tree. Instead, be a corporate lawyer and make $500,000 a year. No matter how much you cheat the IRS, you’ll still end up paying $100,000 in property, sales and excise taxes. That’s $100,000 to schools, sewers, roads, firefighters and police. You’ll be doing good for society. Does chaining yourself to a redwood tree do society $100,000 worth of good?
Idealists are also bullies. The idealist says, “I care more about the redwood trees than you do. I care so much I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. It broke up my marriage. And because I care more than you do, I’m a better person. And because I’m the better person, I have the right to boss you around.”
Get a pair of bolt cutters and liberate that tree.
Who does more for the redwoods and society anyway — the guy chained to a tree or the guy who founds the “Green Travel Redwood Tree-Hug Tour Company” and makes a million by turning redwoods into a tourist destination, a valuable resource that people will pay just to go look at?
So make your contribution by getting rich. Don’t be an idealist.
Now, if we could just get this advice to be delivered on a college campus. . . .
June 2nd, 2008
Posted by
Fitzroy |
Education |
no comments
I enjoy reading thoughtful blogs written by retired Command Sergeant Majors. J.D. Pendry writes from the perspective of a veteran and as someone coping with ordinary life in rural West Virginia. I am currently learning (happily) to cope with rural life, and sometime back I had to learn (less happily) to cope with Command Sergeant Majors. Both efforts have been rewarding in their own way.
Pendry talks about faith in ordinary people and self-reliance, and he usually contrasts that with various government schemes to circumvent common sense. Yesterday, he took on the issue of rising oil prices.
I do not get the impression that anyone in Congress, or anyone who wants to be our President, is interested in what their inaction or the restrictions they impose inflict on the Average-American that has to go to a job every day. Or to the grocery store, or doctor’s office, or mow the lawn, or get on an airplane to visit an ailing parent or sibling or pay the higher prices for virtually every product under the sun that is delivered to us in a carbon fuel burning vehicle.
In the country, there is no public transportation. People drive greater distances out of necessity. They drive larger vehicles because you can’t load much hay into a Toyota Prius, and a Prius is completely useless in getting your livestock to market. In fact, many city-dwellers have similar issues, especially those with more than two children.
I’m all for developing alternative and renewable sources of energy, but those are not current solutions. Meanwhile, we leave the fuel supply that works now in the ground while we buy it from others at exorbitant prices. When we finally develop the next generation of energy technology, our vast supply of minerals may be worthless and the new technology may be mortgaged to the oil-producing states.
There is some high stakes gambling going on in Washington right now. It is the gamble that one political party or the other will be the one to convince Americans that it can save them from “big oil”. Unfortunately, for us, all of the hands being played now are losers. We need the hand that will save us from big politics. . . .
I have been out in the bunker working on a new drilling technique. On Tuesday, November 4, 2008, it should be operational. When activated, if it works properly, it will suck all of the gas out of Congress.
June 2nd, 2008
Posted by
Fitzroy |
Ammo, Politics |
no comments
