The word 'racism' is like ketchup. It can be put on practically anything - and demanding evidence makes you a 'racist.'

Although much of the media have their antennae out to pick up anything that might be construed as racism against blacks, they resolutely ignore even the most blatant racism by blacks against others.

Much of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good. In area after area - crime, education, housing, race relations - the situation has gotten worse after the bright new theories were put into operation. The amazing thing is that this history of failure and disaster has neither discouraged the social engineers nor discredited them.

Balanced budget requirements seem more likely to produce accounting ingenuity than genuinely balanced budgets.

Welfare states on both sides of the Atlantic have discovered that largesse to losers does not reduce their hostility to society, but only increases it. Far from producing gratitude, generosity is seen as an admission of guilt, and the reparations as inadequate compensations for injustices - leading to worsening behavior by the recipients.

Too many policies, programs and institutions are judged by what they are supposed to do, rather than by what they actually do and the consequences of their actions.

Those government officials who want more power are not going to stop unless they get stopped.