Sowell Proves Yet Again that He is Either a Dishonest Man or Incapable of Understanding Human Nature.

Today, Thomas Sowell posted to RealClearPolitics an article called the "Invincible Lie."http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/07/11/the_invincible_lie_114757.html In it, he makes a number of swipes at the Obama administration and liberals - or anyone he considers a liberal, which is most everyone outside his small circle of RWNJs - though he does make a valid point that wealth is not the same as income. He, of course, loses any credibility for making this point when he implies that people earning over $250,000 a year are somehow simply like the great mass of middle class Americans. That is simply not true. $250,000 a year puts you in the top 2% of wealth and wage earners in this country. Not the top 2% of wage earners, but the top 2% of the wealthy. So Sowell, who is complaining about the so-called "lie" of taxing this group because they are wealthy, in effect lies about it to make his point.

But it doesn't stop there: He then goes on to state the the really big lie "is that those who oppose raising taxes on higher incomes simply want people with higher incomes to have more money, in hopes that some of their prosperity will "trickle down" to the rest of the people."

He goes so far as to state that he has called for anyone - ANYONE, mind you - to name one economist outside of a lunatic asylum that has made this statement. His argument being that since no economist has ever come out and called it that that must not be what is happening or its intent, ignoring the elephant in the room that all of the GOP Congress argue just that i.e. that if "job creators" can just hold onto more of their money, they will finally create jobs. If you're looking for an Invincible Lie, now there's one you can hang your hat on.

But what really finally throws this piece of idiotic excrement into the crapper is his final argument that people will avoid taxes when taxes are higher and will pay them when they are lower and do so without fuss or complaint. Just look at Mitt Romney: he only used his off-shore accounts when taxes were high.

Oh, wait...

And that's where Sowell really starts making stuff up. Not only does he use Romney as his example that the wealthy will look for tax havens when taxes are high, but it all really depends on the circumstances, don't you know. There's no reason to be a tax cheat when taxes are low. Right?

Except, of course, that taxes have been low, and Romney still did it. Now why would he do that if there's no reason to?

Because Romney behaved as human beings are wont to behave, and it appears Sowell has no idea how human beings behave. At some point, that lower tax rate becomes the norm. It's what its always been - at least to the person now looking at it - and everyone hates paying taxes, no matter how low the rate. And when it becomes the norm, those who are apt to try to avoid paying taxes will do so because TO THEM their taxes are too high. The rate doesn't matter.

If you don't believe this, go talk to a banker who complains about the Capital Gains rate being 15%, the lowest its ever been, because he thinks it should be zero. He believes he shouldn't be taxed for doing absolutely nothing but stealing other people's money.

So, to sum, up Thomas Sowell has either no idea how the world works or he simply believes the rest of us are too stupid to know how the world works. Either way, the real Invincible Lie is that Sowell has anything of import to say. Given how frequently and massively wrong he tends to be, he is a better bell-weather for what not to think since he does so very little of it.