Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Ayn Rand Gets Some Pub


Ayn Rand the Prophet?
Our attention is brought to a curious article in The Wall Street Journal from Stephen Moore, formerly of the Cato Institute…
“Having read Rand's book (long ago),” Bob told us, “I agree that the United States government and its self-styled political saviors in Washington have by now surpassed the worst case scenario Rand spelled out in her best-selling book. The similarities of the plot to the present are uncanny – and disturbing.”
“As Stephen Moore notes, Obama's “...current economic strategy is right out of Atlas Shrugged: The more incompetent you are in business, the more handouts the politicians will bestow on you... With each successive bailout to 'calm the markets,' another trillion of national wealth is subsequently lost. Yet, as Atlas grimly foretold, we now treat the incompetent who wreck their companies as victims, while those resourceful business owners who manage to make a profit are portrayed as recipients of illegitimate 'windfalls.'”
“Ultimately, Atlas Shrugged is a celebration of the entrepreneur, the risk taker and the cultivator of wealth through human intellect. Critics dismissed the novel as simple-minded, and even some of Rand's political admirers complained that she lacked compassion. Yet one pertinent warning resounds throughout the book: When profits and wealth and creativity are denigrated in society, they start to disappear -- leaving everyone the poorer.”
“Based on current events, one might venture the opinion that an even greater threat to personal and collective liberty results from a deadly combination of the stupidity and greed of entrepreneurs with the incompetence and idiocy of Big Brother government and its slavish advocates.”

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