Good Things (Thomas Sowell)

Creators Syndicate ^ | July 19, 2011 | Thomas Sowell

[jazusamo]

Life has many good things. The problem is that most of these good things can be gotten only by sacrificing other good things. We all recognize this in our daily lives. It is only in politics that this simple, common sense fact is routinely ignored. In politics, there are not simply good things but some special Good Things — with a capital G and capital T — which are considered always better to have more of. Many of the things advocated by environmental extremists, for example, are things that most of us might think of as good things. But, in politics, they become Good Things whose repercussions and costs are brushed aside as unworthy considerations. Nobody wants to breathe dirty air or drink dirty water. But, if either becomes 98 percent pure, 99 percent pure or 99.9 percent pure, there is some point beyond which the costs skyrocket and the benefits become meager or non-existent. If the slightest trace of any impurity were fatal, the human race would have become extinct thousands of years ago. Not only does the body have defenses to neutralize small amounts of some impurities, some things that are dangerous, or even fatal, in substantial amounts can become harmless or even beneficial in extremely minute amounts, arsenic being one example. As an old adage put it: "It is the dose that makes the poison." In other words, removing arsenic from our drinking water should obviously be a very high priority — but not after we have gotten it down to some extremely minute trace. There is never going to be 100 percent clean water or air and, the closer we get to that, the more costly it is to remove extremely minute traces of anything. But none of this matters to those who see ever higher standards of "clean water" or "clean air" as a Good Thing. One of the things that have ruined our economy is the notion that both Democrats and Republicans in Washington pushed for years, that a higher rate of home ownership is a Good Thing. There is no question that there are benefits to home ownership. And there should be no question that there are costs as well. But costs get lost in the shuffle. Among the things that Washington politicians of both parties did for years was come up with more and more laws, rules and pressures on private lenders to lower the qualifications standards required for people to get a mortgage to buy a home. It was a full-court press from Congressional legislation to regulations and policies created by the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Federal Reserve, not to mention the buying of the resulting risky mortgages by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from the original lenders — and even threats of prosecution by the Department of Justice if the racial mixture of people who were approved for mortgages didn't match their expectations. The media chimed in with expressions of outrage when data showed that black applicants for mortgage loans were turned down more often than white applicants. Seldom was it even mentioned that white applicants were turned down more often than Asian American applicants. Nor was it mentioned that white applicants averaged higher credit ratings than black applicants, and Asian American applicants averaged higher credit ratings than white applicants — or that black applicants were turned down at least as often by black-owned banks as by white-owned banks. Such distracting details would have spoiled the story that racial discrimination was the reason why some people did not get the Good Thing of home ownership as often as others. Even after the risky mortgages that were made under government pressure led to huge bankruptcies and bailouts, as well as disasters for home owners in general and black home owners in particular, home ownership remains a Good Thing. The Justice Department is again threatening lenders who don't lower their standards to let more minority applicants get mortgage loans. Higher miles per gallon for cars is a Good Thing in politics, even if it leads to cars too lightly built to protect occupants when there is a crash. More students going to college is another Good Thing, even if lowering standards to get them admitted results in lower educational quality for others. Too much of a Good Thing is bad.

[jazusamo]

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[Jim Scott]

I love the fresh air of simple logic, i.e. common sense, that always comes from Dr. Sowell.

[jazusamo]

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[ctdonath2]

“Better is the enemy of good.”
- Russian proverb

[bvw]

That’s a proverb that sounds reasonable, eh?

How about this:

“Best is the enemy of better.”

Or, “Good is the enemy of the passable.”

Or, “Bad is the enemy of worse.”

Or, “Worse is the enemy of worst.”

Does it make any sense? No. But it sounds like, maybe you know, like, it does.

IOW, it’s meaningless pablum.

[mulligan]

And too much of a bad thing like too much government is truly a very bad thing.

[bvw]

With that kind of proverb as a cultural metric, Russians settle for crap or worse. Anyone seeking better is not good, eh? And then good gets defined down to passable. And passable gets defined down to “not really that bad”. Etc. etc.

Eventually folks are happy when things are getting worse, because as long as things can get worse, they are not the worst.

What a wonderful proverb. / not.

[Cyber Liberty]

“Perfect is the enemy of good.”
-Cyber Liberty

[jazusamo]

Amen to that!

[RoadTest]

Dr. Sowell brings up and analyzes good points that others have overlooked, or shows a new view of famous issues. Great thinker. Does his own thinking!

[fr_freak]

“Better is the enemy of good.” - Russian proverb

Does it make any sense? No. But it sounds like, maybe you know, like, it does.

IOW, it’s meaningless pablum.

Actually, it makes sense to me, if I'm interpreting it correctly. Too many people, when they have a good thing, can't simply enjoy the good thing and be thankful for it - they are always consumed with the idea that it could be better, and in their efforts to get the better thing, or to make something better, they ruin the good thing and end up with nothing.

Reminds me of an old joke:

A woman walks into a building where there is a dating service. A man comes out to greet her and says, "Hi there! Welcome! We are here to help the ladies find the love that they truly deserve. Would you like to try our service?"

The woman answers, "Sure! What do I have to do?"

The man replies, "It is very simple. Get into the elevator over there. As it goes up, it will stop at each floor, the doors will open, and you will see a single man there who is also looking for love, and, if you decide that he is the man for you, you need only get off the elevator and join him. However, once you pass a floor, you can't return."

The woman says, "Well, that sounds good, I guess." She enters the elevator and presses the button. The doors close and the elevator rises.

At the next floor, the doors open and the woman sees a slightly rough-looking man sitting in an armchair, a belly slightly bulging in his flannel shirt, and a hart hat on the table next to the chair. The woman thinks, "Well, he seems okay, but he's only the first one. There must be something better up higher." The woman then presses the button, the doors close, and the elevator rises.

At the next floor, the doors open and the woman sees a handsome man in a suit and tie, sipping a glass of wine and reading the Wall Street Journal. The woman thinks, "Well, this one is certainly better than the last one. He is quite attractive, and he looks like he does very well for himself. But I wonder what is on the next floor?" So she presses the button, the doors close, and the elevator rises.

The doors open again, and this time the woman's excited gaze falls on a chiseled Adonis who lounges seductively on a chaise-lounge strumming a guitar, his half-open shirt revealing well-defined pectorals. Next to him, on an ornate table, are an extensive array of fabulous chocolates and an exquisite arrangement of the most beautiful flowers from around the world. The woman almost faints with delight as she watches him ripple as he moves. She thinks, "My God, he is so wonderful! Each man just keeps getting better and better! I can't wait to see what is on the next floor!" With that, she presses the button, the doors close, and the elevator rises.

The doors open for the fourth time, and the woman sees a completely empty room except for a small sign, which reads, "There is no man here. This floor merely exists to show that women are just never satisfied."

[buffyt]

I can read his articles, but his books, they are on a higher level. His IQ is off the charts and his books are written in a way that shows that! He is so brilliant and RIGHT!

[bvw]

As a good story of a cultural wisdom that’s a good one. The trouble with uncommon short proverbs is that they are not longer enough.

I mean longer as in “longer is enemy of the long”. Maybe I’m being too zen.

Anyway, one day a traveling salesman visited a small but proud town in old Mother Russia. He was selling tape measures. Metric, of course, tvarish. Five meter tape measures.

He couldn’t make one sale. Why? Well, in that town they measured everything in shoe lengths. Everyone wore the same size shoe or went shoeless. They just were unable to think in meters. How many shoes is five meters? Too many! No building in town was that big. It was unimaginable what would be useful to measure that would require five meters.

Besides where would they carry the tape measure? That would mean they’d have to patch up their pockets. Why? Why bother.

It was a proud town. The salesman moved on. Longer was the enemy of the long.

[bfree]

Thanks for posting this.
I have always enjoyed reading his columns.

[StonyBurk]

seem to recall that whenever we attempt to protect something by removing all the bad stuff.We generally end up making it worse. Case in point when the bad germs are removed and the body no longer has a need —or eventually ability to build a defense—if say yellow fever would be reintroduced in America I don’t think our people could do well and given our Medical response to HIV — I think we would increase the duration rather than respond as one ought to communicable disease.
If the body—or a nation for the matter have no natural defense built up the result can be devastating.

[left that other site]

BRILLIANT!

[aruanan]

There is never going to be 100 percent clean water or air and, the closer we get to that, the more costly it is to remove extremely minute traces of anything.

And water that is 100 percent water tastes like crap, well, not like crap, but it doesn't taste good.

[668 - Neighbor of the Beast]

“Life has many good things. The problem is that most of these good things can be gotten only by sacrificing other good things.”

I think that’s in the minister’s speech for weddings.

[RipSawyer]

The way I first heard it is, “The PERFECT is the enemy of the good.” Once you realize what that means I think it makes a lot of sense. In almost anything you can name true perfection is actually unattainable so the pursuit of perfection simply wastes time and resources which could be used to attain “good”. The pursuit of perfection seems to be behind many if not most of the most absurd quests of the left. The drive for gun control, for instance, is based on the absurd notion that you can take all guns away from everyone (perfection in the mind of a liberal) when in reality you can only take guns away from those who strive to be law abiding citizens, the very people who are least likely to do harm with a gun and most likely to defend the innocent with a gun. I am tempted to say that the easiest way to identify a liberal barking moonbat is the inability to realize that there are no perfect solutions. They simply cannot conceive that while their gun control schemes might save someone’s life somewhere they will in certainty cost many more lives than they save.