talks about the campaign's but i am hoping this summer to get to the biography on jefferson which i have on my kyle and i have a new one on teddy roosevelt i am a big fan of theodore roosevelt. with his energy and style and one that deals mainly with his time in south america. that should be interesting

>> joining us on booktv is dr. thomas sowell from stanford university, your most recent book "intellectuals and race" how do you define an intellectual? >> someone whose work for end product or ideas whose validation is through consensus rather than any particular established procedure like a chemist but not be an intellectual because there are objective rules by which to judge or a mathematician or engineer but if you are the deconstruction as it is just of the others likely you are doing. >>host: it doesn't matter about popular opinion? >>guest: no. >>host: why not? >>guest: because the whole career and self-esteem comes

from their peers, so it doesn't matter they are out of step. >>host: are you an intellectual? >>guest: i suppose you would have to say that. since my work ends with ideas and people like them or don't like them, that is the way it is. >>host: you talk about intellectuals clustering together as a whole. what you mean? >> what somebody called the one-third of the independent mind they may change as a group and they were gung-ho after the first world war after they saw the carnage they all became a pacifist again as a heard. >> how intellectuals cluster when it comes to race?

>> in different ways. in the 20th century it was behind the belief that races were inferior or superior and that means john maynard keynes was one of the founders of the cambridge eugenic society. many distinguished leading intellectuals of that area were dogmatic and by the end of this century again as a group if anyone dared to disagree is a racist movement. >>host: where are intellectuals clustered today on race? >> still at the end all differences are between groups or to presumption mistreatment of others. they are impervious to

evidence the housing situation new york when they were turned down a higher rate for mortgage loans than whites that was discrimination against assist export asian-americans' undermines that completely. or when they were turned down at a rate nearly double of whites but then whites were turned down double of asian-americans but the black owned banks turned down blacks at a higher rate than the white banks so it is hard to reconcile for what they believe.

if they have the numbers that have the preconception they have no reason that undermines whole argument to talk about the factor of the motion had to get rid of that factor then they have to. >> it is to a practical matter a greater extent. one of the things i noticed people of different races get along together for decades and yet as the right demagogue comes along it can turn them against each other. it goes to nigeria, usher along the, it is very spontaneous there was one of

the less memorable songs of south pacific but intellectuals have taught people to hate those under better off than themselves. >>host: who are some of the demagogues? >>guest: heaven's. different in different countries. but sure long ago was held up as a model of a country of different races got along wonderfully the educated members of the two different groups of sri lanka live in the same neighborhoods even though they had different religions they have holiday's services of the house of worship and that was fine and tell he wanted to be prime minister and these people who never had a

race riot in the 20th century began to have of the riot that escalated as the civil war that went on for decades with unspeakable atrocities and more people killed in this little country than the entire that were lost during the vietnam war so at a given time things to look very good on the surface but when it comes along with the right circumstance people can be turned against each other with hate. >>host: in your view are their demagogues in america? >>guest: yes. that is one of the most lucrative occupations. somebody once asked me that from my view i said i am sure jesse jackson makes 10 times what i make how you convince them to reduce his income by 90%? >>host: what is the race

industry? >>guest: there's so many. naacp that already plays an important role but one of the problems with any institution with one goal is when they achieve that goal they don't say now we have a growing at a business ceremony they have to go on. the elsie is there to prevent discrimination but then they have to expand the definition sanofi it was to hire people they think that is discrimination. >>host: you right and "intellectuals and race" the kind of society to which with the recent history and the motion is one in which a newborn baby enters the world supplied with prepackage grievances against other babies born of the same time. >>guest: yes. yes. the idea you can redress history to have a specific

context it is around the world. one of the goals they had to was to redress the injustice is. so they try to take this out over the germans and so on and that even the germans were the worse off than they ever have been before. trying to undo what happens. >>host: do we have policies in this country that are formed the same way? >>guest: yes. affirmative-action. reparations and so on, if we

talk with this country something to the united states and slavery was one of the oldest they go back as far as recorded history and every single part of the world, pollinations for most of history for the simple reason he did not have the resources but late in history this is what happened in the united states and in the western hemisphere. much as be pathology one ottman with the breakdown of the family most black kids grew up in homes with two parents under slavery itself and for generations

thereafter and as late as the 1960's most black children grew up in two-parent homes. only when you start with the massive great society and other things that you see the family that has survived all of this now begin to disintegrate. >>host: from "intellectuals and race" dr. sowell there is other evidence that the black subculture has a negative effect on intellectual achievement, in other words, brighter black students do not perform as well when there are as many black students around them contrary to the theory what is needed in the educational institution is a larger critical mass. >>guest: yes. that study that i cited which would show that it is not just my opinion. one of the studies was said very outstanding academic

and over the years through 1954 i think 34 graduates of dunbar high school when to ann hurst there was never a critical mass and three-quarters of these kids graduated and of those more than one quarter were five basic appell. so clearly you don't need a critical mass they didn't have anything resembling that but a good educational background and the absence of people who would distract from the real purpose of the college. >>host: is there a relationship between race and mental capacity? >> me. >> if you mean potential, then who knows? you cannot measure potential

currently. and i suspect for the next 100 years or so but what you can recognize or measure is the capacity to develop one those sats and stuff like that the potential you cannot. >>host: when it comes to race how does that play into the measurements of jay? >>guest: what do you mean? >>host: is there a correlation between iq that we were able to measure today and race? >>host: sure. >>guest: there always has been that around the world. people in the island off scotland have the same iq as those in the united states probably because they are in the isolated culture and they tend to not have the same achievement for those

of a of a larger cultural universe so the data on what is likely to happen as a given time for the ultimate potential nobody has come close. >>host: where did this book come from? >> it came from a much larger study. >>guest: why did you break out? >> research assistant to urge me to bring this out to begin with. and then i realized because she was right to. [laughter] >>host: what about asian-american news that as a group seemed to perform better in school than other groups. why is that?

>>guest: i think the one four-letter word we cannot use his work. they just work. for us to go to the research library of a booker round almost everyone was asian-americans. i looked in vain for any black students and not many white students of the following week i find the asian-americans there is no real mystery. they work. >>host: day you teach here at stanford? >>guest: i have not. when first came here them with a sit-in on seminars. >>host: deal miss teaching? >>guest: yes and no. teaching as it is today, and no. teaching as it was when i started out with a little college in new jersey i really loved it.

when i taught my last class i was looking forward to to class the following monday but it changed drastically in one i get the offer from the hoover institution i said "this is it." there are many people out there who want to see the conditions of teaching at the university became such it was not worth the bother. >>host: what one turned you off? >> the attitude of students and faculty of the administration which does not leave much else. [laughter] the students begin to think if they showed up that of the grade was a constitutional right students would say i'm a

graduating senate -- senior into believing predestination? they thought it was my responsibility to see that they graduated. i never took that view. >>host: dr. sowell our guest here at stanford university's hoover institution talking about his most recent book "intellectuals and race." how many books have you written? >>guest: i have not counted them. >>host: i think it is 25. that is it. >>host: here at the public policy institution what you do? >>guest: i was asked that in a legal case as an expert witness and the opposing attorneys said you are a senior fellow just what does a senior fellow do? i said actually has no powers or no duties and the judge said would mind having a job like that.

>>host: used in the day thinking? >>guest: nothing but a brilliant ideas but that is exhausting. [laughter] >>host: when you talk about cosmic justice dr. sowell what you mean? >>guest: i guess social justice which is justice for groups and an initial opportunity to have the same life chances because no society is able to do that in any country. so what you are asking for is when you think of the differences it is impossible. some kids may be raised in families but one family has one said and the other will not.

and the one that does not have that attitude may be bright but does not have the same chance. no way he could. >> our goals like the economic quality or opportunity or racial equality are those good goals? >>. >> if you mean equality of opportunity, yes. if you mean any belief with the same end result the answer is no. what those do is tear society apart to make them worse off the would have been otherwise affirmative action and academia takes minority students to miss match them. when i was at cornell the average black student

enrolled score the 75 percentile on the s.a.t.. the average white student liberal arts at that time scored 99% half of the black students were on academic probation so kids would have been on the dean's list at most colleges but sent word they were virtually guaranteed not to make it. >>host: are there any affirmative action programs you think they're worthwhile? >>guest: no. the easiest question of all. >>host: dr. sowell i might have passed to this but are you working on another book right now? >>guest: one of the few times in my life i do not have another book under way at the moment. i am always updating the books i have previously written. i am always doing bad but if you mean am i on the new

venture of book writing, not for the moment. >>host: you mentioned at the beginning that intellectuals in your view should have peer approval. >>guest: no, no, no. not that they should have but that is what they go by. so if they get the same idea it is unstoppable. >>host: do you have to your approval? >>guest: i have never asked them if they approve. >>host: why not? the. >>guest: i don't care. [laughter] >>host: what would you like your legacy to be with what your work has created? >>guest: whenever it is i will be here to note it so that does not affect me that much. >>host: day like doing television interviews? >>guest: sometimes. i would not want to put a percentage on it.

>>host: how well did you know, milton friedman? >>guest: i was a student of his at one time. he was the reason i was brought to the hoover institution one of the fine human beings and i often say if you ask me to name someone who both had genius and common sense of what's in milton friedman then would have to struggle to find another example. >>host: we have been talking with dr. sowell here at the hoover institution stanford university. here is his most recent book , "intellectuals and race" this is the tv on c-span2.

of. >> and was curious what you think several of the ceo in and talking about capitalism to defend capitalism is.

do they have roll or a the role of government and how it works against business. the ceos have rolled to talk about and defend capitalism to explain it to people but is it something you do purely by example? >>guest: i think we do. one of the most disturbing statistics for me is for the longest period of time, understanding the history of the united states, we started out really pour. we were back water here in the united states. and really as we embrace capitalism in the united states, we had tens of millions of immigrants come over here to create a better life because they have freedom to enterprise and freedom to start businesses. for the law in this period of time well over 100 years the united states was the freest nation in the world

in the most capitalistic nation in the world without exception. and a shorter period of time and just the year 2000 united states still ranked number three on the economic freedom index behind hong kong and singapore. we're not number one but still number three against dynamic economies. but over the last 13 years we're now number 18. when people ask what is wrong with the economy and why we have high unemployment and on a per capita basis and why is that declining, the answer is right there. we're less economically free today than we were 13 years ago and as the economic freedom declines government regulations increase, taxes increase, the engine that is

the basis for our prosperity, which is business is lessened and our prosperity is declining as well. economic freedom goes down so does prosperity. if the capitalist is not willing to speak up for free enterprise capitalism can expect economic freedom to continue to lessen and american prosperity will lessen as well. we are far from being in a free system anymore we are moving toward the crony capitalist system where we have big government and big business colluding with each other. great example is the fiscal cliff bill that just passed and we look beneath the komodo and use the payoffs for politically well-connected organization such as hollywood hollywood, alternative energy are the to the standout for me. but there are other deals that are cut and we're

moving away from a system where people think it is fair and the system to get ahead through hard work and enterprise but people think the way to get ahead is to be politically well-connected. that is a problem.

. . of cooperation and compromise. the program is about an hour. >> we are here today to talk about fighting for common ground how we canf