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I'm not a neo-nazi, I'm personally not even conservative. But Schmitt is probably one of the most influential conservatives of the 20th century. He's not only influenced conservative thought but people ranging from Arendt, to Habermas, Strauss even Derrida among others. His writing on the state of exception or the friend-foe distinction had wide reach from theory to policy-making.
Meanwhile in US Conservatism you have people ranting about taxation being theft, I mean if that's the intellectual elite I don't know what's going on exactly.
Sowell has published over thirty books, but I can find virtually no actual academic research. One of the last papers dates to the 60s, where he debates Marxism, but I think this is actually just a sort of philosophical treatise.
He's repeatedly rejected modelling, mathematics and virtually every other econonmic tool, so to call him an economist is kind of a misnomer.
And actually I do think I've portrayed his position fairly accurately. When you read his stuff it's often hard to tell if you're reading Sowell or Ann Coulter.
Btw I'm not opposed to conservative intellectual work in general. Chesterton is great, Carl Schmitt is probably one of the most intelligent writers of the last century. But Sowell isn't, and American Conservatism is in an intellectual crisis to put it mildly.