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Daniel Melgar's avatar

The rich hate the very rich for the same reason the average man hates the above average man—envy.

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Daniel Melgar's avatar

Phil,

There are great writers and there are great thinkers. Sometimes they are one and the same person (e.g., Ayn Rand, FA Hayek, Thomas Paine). More often they are not.

Some of my favorites:

Fredric Bastiat

Henry Hazlitt

Thomas Jefferson

Benjamin Franklin

Thomas Sowell

Bryan Caplan

Walter Block

John McWhorter

Richard Dawkins

Carlo Rovelli

Jerry Coyne

Wilfred Reilly

Jason Riley

Will Durant

Philip O’Reilly

HL Mencken

What makes one a great writer, writing about someone else’s work, is their ability to breathe new life into an old idea and make it fresh and exciting—like it was just discovered yesterday.

For some readers it will actually be like a new discovery—Individual liberty and self-reliance (why didn’t I think of it!). That’s what happened to me when I came upon Thomas Sowell’s books.

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Philip O'Reilly's avatar

I was going through counting how many I'd read (7 or 8) and saw my name.

Thanks!

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Daniel Melgar's avatar

And I am being sincere.

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John Chittick's avatar

If you think their wedding is extravagant wait till you see their divorce settlement.

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Philip O'Reilly's avatar

What's the over/under? Five years?

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D Knigh's avatar

Greater writers steal and improve upon the idea. -- Me

Thanks for quoting Thomas Sowell in previous writings. I purchased The Thomas Sowell Reader the other day and as I've been reading it, I've thought, "Where has he been all my life?!"

I was delighted that he mentions Theodore Dalrymple's Race to the Bottom. If you haven't read it, you will now!

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Philip O'Reilly's avatar

I think I've had one of his books on my Amazon watch list for years. My list is way too long and I procrastinate too much.

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