“American Contempt for Liberty” a hefty, 417-page collection of columns by economist Walter E. Williams, would be an excellent choice. For many college graduates, this book would be virtually an education in itself, covering many issues and presenting many perspectives they have never encountered before.
How often will most college students have seen Social Security exposed as “The National Ponzi scheme,” as one of Professor Williams’ columns does in plain, hard-hitting English? Or see minimum wage laws examined in terms of their actual results, rather than their pious rhetoric?
Another book that would open the eyes of most of today’s graduates is “Life at the Bottom” by Theodore Dalrymple. It shows the actual effects of the welfare state on the way people live their lives. It is not a pretty picture, but young people need to become acquainted with realities, after years of hearing high-sounding theories.
The fact that “Life at the Bottom” is about low-income whites in England, living lives remarkably similar to the lives of blacks in American ghettos, means that it cannot be dismissed as racism.
Any of a number of blockbuster bestsellers by Ann Coulter can provide eye-opening revelations about the economic madness and moral dry rot originating on the political left. Her recently published book, “Adios, America!” is about the heedless rush to solve our immigration problems by simply declaring millions of illegal immigrants to be legal.
Like other Ann Coulter books, its cutting wit and take-no-prisoners style is backed up by thoroughly researched facts, including facts that most of the media refuse to report.
Books are not the only graduation gifts that could let young people, who are leaving the world of campus groupthink, know that there is another world called reality. Subscriptions to high quality publications with a different viewpoint are another possibility. The quarterly publications “City Journal” and “Hoover Digest” are gems of this genre.
My own favorite approach to controversial issues is to confront students with the strongest arguments available on opposite sides of these issues. The point is not to feed the students prepackaged conclusions, but to force them to seek facts and apply logic, in their own attempts to resolve complex controversies.
One of the best gifts to graduates — or to undergraduates still going through lockstep academia — would be a subscription to publications with opposite viewpoints.
My suggestion would be to give young people a subscription to both the “New York Times” and “Investor’s Business Daily.” Seeing how the editorial pages of these newspapers clash, day after day on issue after issue, should build up some mental muscles that students seldom get from being mental couch potatoes on politically correct campuses.
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