The Culture of Hatred

By Greg Perkins from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Objectivism Seminar is working through Dr. Leonard Peikoff's all-too-topical book, The Ominous Parallels. In it, he explores what gave rise to to the fascist, totalitarian regime of Nazi Germany -- and analyzes whether and how a fascist, totalitarian regime could emerge here in America.

An American Physician Reports From New Zealand

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Dr. Ross Stevens is an American radiologist currently working temporarily in New Zealand. He recently composed this detailed analysis of the NZ state-run medical system, which I received as an e-mail forward from a colleague.

Dr. Stevens has graciously given me permission to post the full text of his e-mail here. Any American who wants to know what his or her health care future will look like under "universal health care" should read this eye-opening piece:

I am currently on a sort of sabbatical and am working in New Zealand for a public government hospital. New Zealand has a purely socialist medical system although there is also private insurance that can be obtained as well. This is a single payer system from a government ministry that controls all care through District Health boards. Each District Health Board gets a lump sum of money each year to provide for their population.

Primary care physicians (general practitioners) are private contractors and are paid fee for service from the government plus a copay from the patient. Specialists (including radiologists as well as surgeons, pediatricians, internists, cardiology, gastroenterology, urology, etc) are paid a salary which is based only upon the number of years since board certification plus bonus for after hours call coverage.

All specialists are paid the same. The top salary band (15 years + after certification) is about NZ $200.000 which is about $150,000 US. Call coverage can add another 15-25% depending on how busy and how frequent. All New Zealand citizens and permanent residents are covered by the National Health Service.

General practitioners see one patient every 7 minutes and, I am told, can make up to NZ$600K - $800K with their fee for service.

Patients must go first to their GP for all initial care--adult and pediatric. Pediatricians are specialists and only see patients after referral from GPs. All routine obstetrics is handled by midwives who receive 2 years training post high school. To go to the ER you must have a referral from your GP unless it is emergent (trauma, etc).

How does this work? Well, my hospital is over budget for the year, so they are closing the hospital (the only one within a 3-4 hour driving radius) to all but emergent patients for 6 weeks in December and January!! No elective surgery or non emergent patients. I could give many stories about delays in diagnosis that would be unheard of in the US.

That said, patients are generally happy with their healthcare and are glad that it is "free". The mentality of patients here is different from the US. Patients are not as demanding. No one gives a second thought to waiting 4-6 weeks for a staging CT for their newly discovered lung cancer prior to treatment -- many don't accept treatment anyway. If they are told they have a cancer, they just go home to die. They are generally happy for what they have and don't worry (or know) what they don't.

For radiology, I am working in a small rural district, so our waiting times are good, but in many of the urban districts, the waiting times for a routine CT scan are up to 9 months. GP's cannot order CT or MRI -- only specialists. The radiology department runs 8:30 am - 5:00 pm and I read about half of what I would read in the US. If it is not done by 5:00, it doesn't get done until tomorrow. In some cases, it might be weeks until a routine film is read. Call back after hours are pretty much only for trauma or surgical emergencies. Everything else can wait until the next morning, or Monday.

Our department is over budget, because they forgot to include the $350,00 equipment maintenance contract in this years budget. They installed a PACS system but didn't buy the Physicians Hanging Protocol software or the RIS [Radiology Information System] -- they are using a 20 year old system that is no longer supported.

Physicians who live here are generally satisfied due to the light workload and the lifestyle. However, there is a huge brain drain from the country. Many New Zealand doctors emigrate to Australia, Canada, or the US where the pay is better.

The country is critically short of physicians, especially specialists such as radiologists. In my hospital, about 2/3 of the medical staff in not native New Zealander -- most from South Africa or Europe) and about 1/4 of the staff is made up of locum tenens like me -- people from outside of New Zealand who come here for 6-12 months for the experience.

It is an interesting system and I have had an interesting time here. They spend about 1/4 per capita compared to what we spend in the US for health care. The care is good but not great here. They have a hard time recruiting and keeping physicians and are critically in short supply. I do not think that the American public would accept the level of care that is provided here. We will see what our future brings!

Ross Stevens, MD

Dr. Stevens is absolutely correct. Americans would not accept the levels of restrictions on access and quality of care caused by New Zealand's government policies.

Long waits, outdated technology cost overruns, patients going home to die -- this is not change I can believe in.

Let's hope the US health system never gets to this point!

(Crossposted from the FIRM blog.)

Build Yourself a World Apart By Studying History and Art

By Scott Powell from Powell History Recommends,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Get Over Yourself!, Part II

By noreply@blogger.com (Dan Edge) from The Edge of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

or: Selfishness vs. Self-Centeredness in Maintaining Friendships



Way back in October of 2008, I wrote an article titled Get Over Yourself!, or Selfishness vs. Self-Centeredness in Meeting New People. In that article, I contrasted the approaches of the rationally selfish man vs. the self-centered man in meeting new people. The selfish man, I explained, treats each new person as a potential value to be explored; while the self-centered man sees new people primarily as a potential receptacle for information about himself. The selfish man endeavors to make new people comfortable and asks them questions about their lives and interests; the self-centered man looks for opportunities to soliloquy about his own life and interests. The selfish man tends to make friends, influence people, nail the interview, and get the girl; the self-centered man comes across as arrogant and annoying.

Since the conflation of selfishness and self-centeredness is relatively common among Objectivists, I had always intended to follow-up on my 2008 article to further explore this widely misunderstood issue. And over a year later, it’s high time to do so. This time, I will contrast the approaches of the selfish vs. the self-centered man in maintaining friendships. I will conclude the series (ideally before 2011!) with a discussion of these principles in relation to long term romantic love relationships.

Long term friendships are among the most significant values one can attain in his lifetime. Their survival value is crucial in many ways, including: emotional support, psychological visibility, specializations in different hobbies and areas of knowledge (allowing one more effectively to expand his horizons), and as deep wells of spiritual fuel. So critical a value warrants special study, specifically how to gain and keep it. In the last article of this series, I discussed some methods of gaining and earning this value. This article will focus on how to keep it. So: how does the rationally self-interested man maintain friendships?

First, the selfish man acknowledges that long term friendships are indeed values which require maintenance. A friendship is not a static entity automatically formed and sustained given the existence of shared values. It requires work to create, build, and sustain. The selfish man understands this and looks for ways to build and nurture his friendships. The self-centered man does not understand this. He believes, in effect, that friendships spring into existence, grow in depth, fade away, or collapse into enmity -- all without action on his part. He does not consider ways in which he can build a friendship or contribute to its growth. He is often not even aware of the state of his own relationships: Are they healthy and thriving or sick and dying? He does not know, nor does he think it in his self-interest to care.

The selfish man places value on the individuating characteristics of his long term friends. By individuating characteristics, I mean those legitimate optional values (hobbies, interests, career, etc.) that make each man unique. Just as the selfish man initiates relationships by showing sincere interest and asking questions, so he continues to show interest and ask questions about his friends’ values throughout the life of a friendship. He does this even if he does not share those particular values. Such questions go a long way in adding depth to the relationship, even with regard to a friend’s minor hobbies.

For instance, I have no particular interest in World of Warcraft (WoW), but I have a good friend, Nancy, who absolutely loves it. When I talk to her on the phone, or visit her apartment, I often ask how her Blood Elf is doing, what new weapons the Elf has acquired, if she’s created any new characters, if she’s gotten into any new similar games, etc. And believe me, she can spend many happy hours waxing philosophical about WoW! This is a good example, because knowledge of WoW does not otherwise improve my life -- I don’t learn any special life lessons from these conversations. But I do gain a value from taking the time to talk to her about WoW: I am learning more about what makes this woman unique. Nancy would not be Nancy if she wasn’t a fanatic RPG enthusiast.

But her love of RPGs is only a small part of Nancy’s personality. With a friend’s more significant values, like career or children, it’s much more important to keep tabs on these things. For instance, I have no particular interest in the World of Wall St. (I don’t even read the Business section of the Newspaper), but my good friend Sherry has dedicated her life to it. She is a superstar in her field, and I am very proud to be her friend. But I would never have known how passionate she is, how competent a businesswoman, how brilliant her business acumen, had I not taken the time to talk to her about her work life. I take pleasure in hearing about the World of Wall St. from Sherry’s perspective. I share her elation when she closes an important business deal, and I share her pain when a client pulls out at the last minute. Gaining knowledge about the business world and her role in it serves to strengthen our relationship.

In a good friendship, these kinds of efforts are reciprocal. My close friends also take stake in my interests, my career, my field of study, etc. Most of them don’t regularly attend Slam poetry performances, but they are always interested to hear any new poems I write. They will often read my essays and comment on them. They will spring to my defense if I am wrongfully arrested. These efforts do not go unnoticed. These are the kinds of friends who contribute the spiritual fuel to keep me going. They actively love, encourage, and inspire me.

The self-centered man, by contrast, does not expend much effort to maintain his friendships. To him, “selfishness” means that any friendships ought to focus on his own interests, his own life, his own career. He is very happy to tell friends about his values, but he usually doesn’t take the time to ask about theirs. He will tolerate friends telling him about their lives, but learning about them is not a primary objective to him. He doesn’t seek out friends whose interests differ from his own; he has no desire to broaden his horizons. Instead, he thinks that friendships ought to focus on “shared interests,” i.e., on interests he already has. He may ask Nancy about her Blood Elf in World of Warcraft, but only if he is already an RPG fan. And even then, his inquiry is usually only an excuse to pontificate on the virtues of his own Orc Beserker.

With regards to emotional support, again the rationally selfish man makes a point to contribute to the emotional health of his friends. He maintains an awareness of his friends’ emotional states, and can usually tell if they are proud or discouraged, joyous or depressed. Just as he relishes in sharing his friends’ triumphs, so he gladly shoulders their pain in difficult times.

For instance, I often talk to my friends about their romantic lives. I can often tell when a friend is unhappy with his current romantic relationship, even before the friend recognizes it himself. This is not at all uncommon. The outside perspective of a good friend can be invaluable in helping one understand relationship issues. But this kind of understanding does not come automatically. It is only because I take interest in my friends’ love lives that I am able to provide appropriate emotional support and friendly advice. I can share their hopeful excitement when love begins to bloom, and offer sympathy when a promising relationship disintegrates. I look for opportunities to be there for my friends, to hear their stories, to take part in their emotional lives.

But to the self-centered man, taking stake in his friends’ emotional lives seems sacrificial or altruistic. He acknowledges that sharing his own emotional pain with a friend can have a positive cathartic effect, and he may lean on them in difficult times. But when roles are reversed, he would rather not endure a friend’s tears over some heartache which he does not share. Why put a bummer on an otherwise pleasant day? The self-centered man may be happy to share in his friend’s triumphs at work, particularly if he shares an interest in his friend’s profession. But when sorrow strikes, he prefers to keep his distance. He is the classic fair-weather friend.

I don’t need to tell you which kind of person, the selfish man or the self-centered man, makes a better friend. Everyone has at some point been exposed to both types, and anyone could tell you that the rationally self-interested man makes the better business partner, the better lover, and overall the better person to have in one’s life. We seek out those who not only share our moral values, but who also take sincere interest in our individuating characteristics. Most of us tend to avoid those who take the self-centered approach, those who take interest only in those aspects of one’s personality that he already shares. We seek out friends who relish sharing in both our joys and pains, and we eschew those for whom emotional support is a one-way street. The selfish man is the kind of life-long friend who can become like a family member. The self-centered man usually doesn’t rise above the status of “temporary activity partner.”

Over time, long term friendships can grow into some of the highest values in one’s life. Whether one acknowledges it or not, we need deep friendships; they have a survival value which is difficult to quantify. In theory, it is easy to make the mistake that being independent means that one doesn’t need friends. In some respects, this is true. One ought not need anyone else to provide him with epistemological certainty, productive independence, or self-esteem. But friendships -- and to a greater degree romantic relationships -- so enrich our lives that they deserve a high degree of focus, consideration, and sustained effort.

In part III of this series, which I hope to publish with a few weeks, I will apply these same principles to romantic love relationships. How does the rationally self-interested man treat his lover at home, in the bedroom, with family, and in public? How does the self-centered man act in these situations? Which type of man makes a better lover, and why?

As always, thanks for reading, and I look forward to any comments!

--Dan Edge

The Dental Chair Confession

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

I've logged many an hour in the dental chair lately, but the time that stood out the most to me -- thanks to some pretty good drugs -- was a mostly pleasant conversation I was having recently with a hygienist who was cleaning my teeth.

Young and married, and with a couple of young kids, she was around the same stage in life as my wife and I. The conversation was very natural and enjoyable, moving smoothly from my account of the accident that screwed up my otherwise excellent teeth to other things, like what our spouses did for a living. I was impressed by how knowledgeable and enthusiastic about her work she was: She was obviously intelligent and seemed focused on filling her life with rational values. In short, she struck me as someone I could probably be friends with if I knew her better.

And then she started talking about the war. While I was in her chair, getting my recently-traumatized, but healing mouth cleaned. While I couldn't really speak my mind at any length. At a time that I would not rationally want to do so if it turned out that I disagreed with her on the subject and she was heavily invested in it. I've seen otherwise reasonable-seeming people turn into banshees about this topic before, and I didn't want to take any chances. I was mildly alarmed for a second or two.

Fortunately, since my political views look liberal to conservatives and conservative to liberals, I found myself on pretty familiar ground with this issue: I am neither a pacifist nor a fan of the extension of our welfare state into the Middle East that Bush passed off as a "war" in his term. The usual opportunity at intellectual activism this topic represented was instead, under the circumstances, an opportunity to stall and survive with an intact mouth, if I had to.

As it turned out, neither of us pushed too far, and it was to the extent that I am not terribly sure what her views on the war actually are, beyond, "We ought to be done by now." The conversation did not, as I thought it could at first, turn into a monologue on her part about how war is always evil no matter what. I was lucky to be dealing with a fundamentally decent person. I suspect that, probably, she was leftish, saw her opinion as what any decent person would think, and, as such, a fine topic for pleasant, casual conversation.

But the situation I was in was interesting in another respect, and it ties in to a story I remember hearing about some time ago. A guy was meeting a potential employer. He was unctuous with the possible new boss and friendly with his other potential new colleagues -- but rude to the waiter at lunch. He did not get the job because the boss saw how he treated the waiter, a person in a position of relative weakness, as opposed to how he treated everyone else, people in a position of strength who could do something for him. The boss rightly concluded, basically, that this potential employee was not a trader, and that he saw everything in terms of a zero-sum power struggle, and that he might not be someone he could count on when the chips were down.

What does that have to do with my situation and what did I learn here? I was puzzled by the hygienist bringing up the war until I recalled the above story and remembered that she did not take advantage of my situation to "enlighten" me or to extract a professed agreement with her views. I thus saw more evidence that she is probably a good person. I also saw evidence that my expectations about dealing with more leftish people may be skewed by my not having lived in a "Blue State" (and interacted with the natives very much) until now.

Context is everything in evaluating new knowledge. Twenty years ago, my reaction to the hygienist might have been far different, and much more unpleasant for both of us because I probably would have not fully considered the circumstances we were in and how each of us acted. (And I would have learned less from the encounter.) Specifically, at the time, I held in check my initial, "How rude of her to bring up the war out of the blue with a total stranger!" (And later, I remembered other facts about the conversation that were more relevant than they seemed at the time.) I think it's a fair guess on my part that to her mind, she was hardly being rude at all.

But what if I'd had the Anti-War Harpy from Hell instead? I might have had to go along with whatever she said just to protect my own health, but what would such "agreement" have told her? Nothing. But her lecture would have told me to find another dentist post haste. In that situation, I was the "waiter" and she was the job candidate.

Judging people is a very, very difficult and subtle art. To think you've got it down cold is only to fool yourself.

-- CAV

"No State" Tuition for All

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Writing for the Boston Globe, conservative columnist Jeff Jacoby makes what passes today as a strong argument against the brain-dead anti-immigration faction of the conservative movement:

A couple from Brazil, seeking a better life for themselves and their 2-month-old daughter, enter the United States unlawfully. They settle in Massachusetts, where 18 years later the girl graduates from a public high school, as assimilated and acculturated an American as her classmates in every respect - except that they are US citizens, and she, by virtue of a decision made when she was a baby, is not. Her classmates can attend the University of Massachusetts, paying $9,704 a year in tuition, the price tag for Massachusetts residents. She can attend only if she pays the out-of-state rate of $22,157; if that's more than she can afford, she's out of luck.

How is that a rational public policy? How is Massachusetts improved by making it impossible for an accomplished high-school graduate, a lifelong resident of the state, to gain a university degree? Who benefits when her education - along with the higher earning potential it would lead to - is cut short? She doesn't. You don't. Massachusetts taxpayers certainly don't. [links dropped, other minor format edits]

Jacoby notes that current Governor Deval Patrick's recent proposal to allow illegal immigrants residing in Massachusetts to pay in-state college tuition is driving conservative voters into the arms of Charlie "If you're illegally here, you're illegally here." Barker. He correctly notes that this xenophobia contradicts the idea that "what matters most about any of us ... is personal character and achievement."

Right he is, but his level of analysis is wrong, and that causes him not to raise the question he should. What, exactly should "improving" Massachusetts entail in the context of the proper function of the government? Put another way, since a proper government protects individual rights, "How is Massachusetts improved by forcing anyone to pay for anything that anybody else needs?"

I agree with Jacoby that our current immigration laws are largely preventing from coming here, "just the sort of newcomers Americans should embrace," but these aren't the only laws in need of reform. As I have argued before, the real problem is not that immigrants are sucking up social services like education, but that the government is providing these services in the first place rather than private enterprise.

As I put it before in a slightly different context, "I doubt anyone would complain if these [kids] were paying customers of American schools." I would also doubt that anyone would complain, if they needed help to attend, about them being recipients of voluntary charity, winners of academic scholarships, or participants in industrial work-study programs.

That fact that Massachusetts is running schools that it should not, and that those schools charge out-of-state tuition for some students to attend is not "making it impossible" for anyone to receive an education, but it is making it impossible for many people to benefit from the fruits of their own labor. It is probably also harming the economy of Massachusetts in myriad other unseen ways. Finally, Massachusetts, in the proper sense of its being a state founded to protect the rights of individuals, is inarguably placed in great peril by the fact that such systematic violations of our rights are happening at all, and all the more so that such violations are business as usual.

-- CAV

Gift Subscriptions to The Objective Standard

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Good holiday news from The Objective Standard:

Dear Subscribers and Friends of The Objective Standard,

Now through November 30, online-only subscriptions to TOS are 60% off the regular rate. An online subscription, which includes instant access to all current and past content, is only $19!

If you know anyone who might be interested in trying the journal, please let him know about this special offer. And if you've considered subscribing to TOS yourself but haven't yet done so, this is a great time to subscribe.

You can subscribe online or by calling 800-423-6151.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Sincerely,

Craig Biddle, Editor
The Objective Standard
www.theobjectivestandard.com

Paul and I have given quite a few gift subscriptions to The Objective Standard over the years to non-Objectivist friends interested in free markets, and they've always been super-impressed with the journal.

Jesus to Sinners: Love Me or Burn in Hell

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

I must admit, I'm often just a bit intrigued by religious spam. My favorite form is the attempt to turn me away from that pretender Jesus to the one true God, Allah. (If only the writer knew the depths of my evil!) The following gem appeared in my inbox a few months ago. As you'll see, it's fairly standard Christian proselytizing: you're a bad, bad sinner, but God will forgive all if you repent and accept Jesus.

If I were to seriously consider this attempt to convert me, I could only be offended. I'm not some lowly depraved sinner! Yet some people are deeply attracted to this kind of message. My question is... why?

Here's my supposition -- just one possible explanation. A person without clearly defined principles but some sense of the importance of morality is likely to feel vague pangs of guilt pretty routinely. Such a person might not want to consider what he's doing too closely, because that would require forsaking certain cherished desires. He might be caught in the crossfire of conflicting principles. He might often feel uncertain about whether he's acting rightly, yet not know how to determine the right course. He might not differentiate between his own honest errors and his willful evasions. He might indulge certain desires, knowing them to be wrong.

Over time, such actions would take their toll on the person's psyche. Periodic pangs of guilt would accumulate into a vague sense of being guilty as a person, but for not-too-clear reasons. That would be a deeply, deeply uncomfortable feeling. For such a person, the Christian claim that we're all guilty would be a comfort. Christianity tells him that he's not uniquely bad, that all people face the same problem of guilt, whether they acknowledge it or not. Then Christianity offers an easy way out: repent and accept the sacrifice of Jesus for your sins. Heck, if he sins again, he can just repent again... and again... and again. The flesh is weak, after all.

Does that seem right? What other reasons might a person have for embracing an image of himself as a depraved sinner?

Oh, and here's the e-mail:

Hello,

Thank you for not deleting this email right away. While you and I may not know each other, what I want to tell you is important enough for me to want to contact you. But don't worry, I obtained your email address off of the internet and will not contact you again unless you reply.

I assure you that this is not a solicitation or a scam of any kind. I do not want to sell you anything or sign you up for anything. My hope is that you will continue to read the email. My hope is that, in the end, you will see this letter as so much more than "spam."

The reason for the email is so that you can hear about the good news of the Gospel. Now, you might be saying to yourself, "I already know Jesus Christ and am sure of my salvation". I THOUGHT I WAS SURE TOO. It can't hurt to examine your faith and see where you stand. The cost of being wrong is too great.

The Bible says in Hebrews 9:27 that "it's appointed for every man once to die, and then judgment." What that means is that everyone dies once and is then judged before Almighty God. So, if you are standing before God on Judgment Day, are you going to heaven or hell? Have you been a good person? You might think so but, unfortunately though, we aren't going to be judged by any human standard of goodness. There is only one standard by which we can all be judged and that standard is God's Law, also known as the Ten Commandments. The Bible says in Romans 2:15 that God "has written the law upon the heart of every man in the form of our conscience" so that when we die and face him, we will have no excuse.

So let's go through them real quick. Have you ever broken the 9th commandment by lying? Of course you have. A person who does that is called a liar. Have you ever broken the 8th commandment and stolen anything (regardless of value)? A person who does that is called a thief. Let's look at the 7th commandment against adultery: Jesus says that whoever looks upon another person with lust has committed adultery in their heart. Have you ever looked with lust? Yes. What about the 6th commandment against murder? Jesus also says that whoever hates a person, without cause, has committed murder in his heart. Have you ever hated anyone? If you're like most people, at this point you are a lying, thieving, murdering adulterer at heart standing before a just and holy God.

At this point, you might be saying to yourself, I don't believe in God, Heaven, or Hell. I say that it doesn't matter what you believe. Let's say that someone held you up at gunpoint, would you laugh at him and say "I don't believe in guns!"? Of course not! That's because your disbelief doesn't negate reality and believe me, GOD IS REAL. Or are you willing to bet your eternal life on it?

Or, you might be saying to yourself, "I don't believe that God would judge us so harshly. My god is a god of love and forgiveness and would never send anyone to Hell". You are right. Your god would not send anyone to Hell because he doesn't exist! What you've just done is broken the 2nd commandment against idolatry. When you create a god in your mind to suit yourself, you are turning your back on the real God. Have you ever broken the 3rd commandment by using our Creator's name in vain as a four-letter cuss word? That's called blasphemy and is very serious in God's eyes.

So, if you are still reading this then you've probably said, "That's impossible! No one can live up to the standard of the Ten Commandments." You are right. No one can. Man is not perfect. We were born into sin and have a sinful nature. God is so holy and so perfect that his standard is unattainable to mortal men. You might say, but that's not fair! What about forgiveness? God is supposed to forgive us of our sins. What about all of the good things that I've done in my life?

Well, let's look at an example. What if you were in a courtroom standing before a judge and you had just been convicted of murder. You did it. You're guilty and all that's left is for the judge to render his sentence: $500,000 or death. You can't just say to the judge "Your honor. I just wanted to say that you are a good man and that I know you will forgive me of my crime. Besides, what about all the other good things I've done in my life?" What's the judge going to say? If he is a good judge then he's going to send you to the electric chair. He might want to be merciful, but he can't just set you free, the law demands a penalty. Since God is a good judge and because he is so good and so holy, he has no choice but to send you to Hell. The law demands a penalty and the Bible says in Romans 6:23 that "the wages of sin is DEATH".

But, here's where your story takes a turn for the good. You are about to be lead away in shackles when all of a sudden, someone comes into the courtroom and pays your $500,000 fine. The judge then sees that the requirement of the law has been fulfilled. And since you've met the requirements, you are now free to go! That's what Jesus Christ did for all of us when he died on the cross 2000 years ago. Jesus Christ came to earth, God in human form, born of a virgin, lived a perfect and blameless life, was crucified on the cross, and then rose from the dead three days later as a payment for our sins. All we have to do is accept the payment and we are free from eternal damnation!

How do we accept the payment? All that is required from us is to ask God for forgiveness, repent (turn away) from our sins, and then trust in the Lord Jesus Christ with all of our hearts (Romans 10:9). When we do that, Jesus Christ washes away all of our sins and we can now stand before God blameless on Judgment Day. Then read your Bible and obey it, join a local church and be baptized. God will make you into a new person with new wants and desires. He doesn't want to send you to Hell, He loves you. You've probably heard John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, will not perish but have eternal life."

Well, that's it. Thank you for reading all the way through. I thank you for your time and my prayer is that you will consider all that you've read and seek Jesus Christ for eternal life today. Don't wait for tomorrow because we never know when we will be taken from this earth and now that you've read this email you are without excuse when you stand before God.

To Him be the glory,
Mel Kizadeck

Oh dear. I've read the e-mail in full, so now I'm definitely going straight to hell when I die. That's okay... because I'll be dead.

Fork-Tongued in Washington

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

This is in the way of a correction to my “Fork-Tongued in Shanghai” (November 21), and of a footnote about our fork-tongued Senators as they sanction the groundwork of totalitarianism in this country.

This statement is corrected:

What Obama said about Sino-American relations in Shanghai is irrelevant here. China is the largest creditor of the U.S., holding about $800 billion in U.S. government securities, perhaps only three times what a health-care bill is estimated to cost over a decade.

I subsequently added a comment to the Shanghai post:

Last night (November 21) the Washington Post headlined: "Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) this evening secured the 60 votes needed to move an $848 billion health-care reform bill to the Senate floor for debate, clearing the way for amendment deliberations to begin after the Thanksgiving recess."

So, this criminally irresponsible and morally evil legislation actually tops the $800 billion in U.S. government securities held by the Chinese government. Of course, there's no way the $800 billion debt can be paid. Now it's going to be $1.6 trillion -- and counting.

And counting, indeed. My projection of the debt doubling to $1.6 trillion was literal and quite innocent. Americans for Limited Government's Bill Wilson issued the following statement today:

"On Saturday, the Senate voted 60-39 to proceed to the so-called ’public option’ legislation that will cost more than $2 trillion over ten years when fully implemented, ration health care away from seniors, raise the cost of premiums, drive the American people off of private health options, and bankrupt the Treasury.”

And counting, again. But, accepting my modest projection of only $1.6 trillion -- and this is exclusive of the billions in expenditure and cost to the economy incurred by whatever other socialist/fascist legislation is incubating in Congress’s collective mind, such as cap-and-trade, and exclusive of the costs of the looting, redistributionist “climate change” treaty President Obama is expected to sign next month in Copenhagen -- the logical question to ask is: How can the U.S. honor its debt to China, and also pay for socialist health care? Where is all this money supposed to come from? Is it the diminishing private, productive sector of the U.S. economy, which would become a mere servant to government debt service? For how long?

Captive, command economies and a fettered citizenry produce according to the law of diminishing returns, unless it can siphon off wealth from another economy and benefit from the blood transfusions made possible by semi-free nations. Is this, or is it not, a formula for catastrophic economic collapse? Yes. Will it be an open invitation for dictatorship to “take charge” of a crisis of the government’s making? Yes.

The question assumes a frozen, static debt figure, astronomical as it may be. Total U.S. government debt to foreign holders is nearly $3.5 trillion, with China followed by Japan, the United Kingdom and OPEC, in that order.

As for the scale of federal indebtedness in all categories, that figure also boggles the imagination. See these Federal Reserve calculations for 2005. These are Alan Greenspan figures and legacy.

Economies and human actions are not static. Economies either atrophy or grow. Men flee from atrophying economies -- when they can, when they and their wealth can remove to friendlier economic climes without being arrested and shaken down -- or they create new wealth that allows economies to grow, provided they are not barred from action by fiat law. The Emerson Electric Co. of Chicago is a case in point, cited by The Wire: Washington Insider’s Report. The ALG title for the report is “Atlas Shrugs.”

Finally, here is a breakdown of the 60-39 Senate vote on whether or not to “debate” the Senate’s version of the health care bill, also now known as the ReidCare bill, which incorporates all the expropriatory and extortionate provisions and language as the House Pelosi/ObamaCare bill. And then some. The names of the guilty are there for all to see.

The “debate” will not proceed on anything as honest as a principle, not even a statist, collectivist one. As happened in the House, it will be in the nature of horse-trading, arm-twisting and sugar-coated corruption instigated by malice-driven humanitarians.

Health Care Political Update

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

As several political observers have noted, the Senate Democrats scraped together just barely enough votes this weekend to start the health care debate.

At least 4 Senators who voted to begin the debate have stated that this should not be construed as support for the bill itself. Hence, the battle is not yet lost.

The actual debate in the Senate is expected to begin after Thanksgiving and will extend through December. The goal of the statists is to have a bill that Obama can sign by Christmas (or at the very latest by his State of the Union address in January 2010).

Our side has definitely suffered some setbacks lately, but we still have a chance to win:

1) Public opinion momentum has shifted slowly but steadily in our direction as more Americans start realizing that they will suffer under health care "reform".

2) The controversy over the proposed federal mammography restrictions has made the claims that "government care = rationing" very real for many ordinary Americans.

3) There have been a steady stream of articles and OpEds in high-profile outlets like Wall Street Journal, Investor's Business Daily, etc., making pretty good economic arguments (and sometimes good moral arguments) against universal health care.

4) The other side is still deeply concerned that their health care agenda will collapse at the final step. Numerous news stories discuss the Democrats' internal divisions on this issue and their fears about polling data against their proposal. (For example, "How health care reform could fall apart".)

Hence, if we keep up the pressure, we can still pull this out. So DON'T GIVE UP YET.

As a form of motivation and encouragement, I also encourage folks to read this fairly good analysis from the Washington Examiner written right after the crucial Senate vote:

"Why was it so hard for Dems even to start health care debate?"
Byron York, Washington Examiner, 11/21/2009

Opportunity

By David from Truth, Justice, and the American Way,cross-posted by MetaBlog

With doubt and dismay your are smitten
You think there’s no chance for you, son?
Why, the best books haven’t been written
The best race hasn’t been run,
The best score hasn’t been made yet,
The best song hasn’t been sung,
The best tune hasn’t been played yet,
Cheer up, for the world is young!

No chance? Why the world is just eager
For things that you ought to create.
Its store of true wealth is still meager
Its needs are incessant and great,
It yearns for more power and beauty
More laughter and love and romance,
More loyalty, labor and duty,
No chance–why there’s nothing but chance!

For the best verse hasn’t been rhymed yet,
The best house hasn’t been planned,
The highest peak hasn’t been climbed yet,
The mightiest rivers aren’t spanned,
Don’t worry and fret, faint hearted,
The chances have just begun,
For the Best jobs haven’t been started,
The Best work hasn’t been done.

-Berton Braley

Fork-Tongued in Shanghai

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

One might be tempted to pen a dark comedy about it. Don’t bother. President Barack Obama has just added this latest act to his own peculiar satire, authored by his speechwriters and scripted by professional censors.

In Shanghai, China to bolster relations between China and the U.S., he appeared in a “town hall” that was as thoroughly rigged as his press conferences and other “town hall” meetings in the U.S. He addressed a group of Chinese government-vetted students and answered eight pre-selected questions from the audience and over the Internet.

“You see, freedom of speech in America is not given to the people by the president but is something that the people use to supervise their government and president, to protect themselves.”

No, don’t take heart. Obama did not say it. It was said by a Chinese blogger and novelist, Yang Hengjun (on Twitter via a proxy server, because Twitter is blocked in China) in admiration for and agreement with Obama‘s assertion that Americans can criticize their political leaders without fear of reprisal. Hengjun understands what neither Obama nor his White House minions and departmental appointees do not: that a free press and free speech can oppose, criticize, and even check the depredations of government.

Hengjun understood that freedom of speech is a right that originates in individuals, and is not a privilege or right bestowed by a government on a nation’s citizens.

What Obama said about Sino-American relations in Shanghai is irrelevant here. China is the largest creditor of the U.S., holding about $800 billion in U.S. government securities, perhaps only three times what a health-care bill is estimated to cost over a decade. China is not going to sign any climate change treaty next month in Oslo that would oblige it to cut back on CO2 emissions, and so agree to economic suicide, no matter how much Obama “prods“ the super creditor. Nor is it going to cease censoring its press or the Internet, it is never going to cease suppressing freedom of speech. China is a totalitarian country. It hosted the visit of a nascent totalitarian, President Obama. It allowed him to visit to amuse him, and to take his measure, just as Europe and the Mideast allowed him to visit, to make his speeches, and to take his measure.

While Obama and his team indulged in wishful thinking, the Chinese government called all the shots.

The particulars of the town hall, including whether it could even be called one, were the subject of delicate negotiations between the White House and the Chinese up to the last minute. It remained unclear, for instance, whether - and how broadly - it would be broadcast on television and how much of a hand the central government had in choosing those allowed to question the U.S. president.

Obama deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said Obama would call at random on several of those in the audience, to be made up of hundreds of students hand-picked by the department heads of Shanghai-area universities, and would also answer questions solicited in advance by the White House from "various sources on the Internet."

What Obama said in China about freedom and speech and censorship, however, is far more relevant here, because it bodes ill for the future of freedom of speech in America. In answer to a question about the “Great Firewall of China” -- the Chinese government’s absolute control over what is said and seen on the Internet -- a question asked, incidentally, not by a Chinese student, but by the U.S. ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, he replied:

"I'm a big supporter of non-censorship," Obama said. "I recognize that different countries have different traditions. I can tell you that in the United States, the fact that we have free Internet — or unrestricted Internet access — is a source of strength, and I think should be encouraged."

Obama is a “big supporter of non-censorship”? What is “non-censorship”? Is it an awkward grasp of the concept of freedom of speech, or an inverted synonym? No. It cannot even have an antonym. If, to paraphrase the Oxford English Dictionary definition of censor, censorship is the “inspection of all books, journals, dramatic pieces, etc., before publication, to secure that they shall contain nothing immoral, heretical, or offensive to the government,” then non-censorship is an anti-concept. It is the “not censoring” of speech in any venue or form. That is, it is the staying of the government’s hand to censor it. It is the implicit acknowledgement that a government has the power and the will to censor, but chooses not to, for the moment. It is an Orwellian anti-concept possible only to a power-seeker at home with censoring and non-censoring.

Obama did not say that he is a “big supporter of freedom of speech” for two reasons: It would have been offensive to the Chinese totalitarian government -- and because he does not believe in it.

Obama stated that he recognized that “different countries have different traditions. I can tell you that in the United States, the fact that we have free Internet -- or unrestricted Internet access -- is a source of strength, and I think should be encouraged.

He avoided the term “freedom of speech” again, and likened it to “tradition,” or custom. Message to China’s communist/fascist rulers: You have a long tradition of censorship and suppression of speech. On the other hand, we in the United States have a long “tradition” of freedom of speech. So, it’s just a difference of tradition. I won’t make a distinction between our traditions and yours, nor judge your regime.

And for how long does Obama intend our free Internet to be a “source of strength”? Not for long.

Which brings us to his term “unrestricted Internet access,” a euphemism for one of Obama’s key goals, “net neutrality,” or, government control and censorship of the Internet. He promised to promote and enact such controls two years ago on MTV. Net neutrality, in a nutshell, is “the idea that broadband operators shouldn't be allowed to block or degrade Internet content and services--or charge content providers an extra fee for speedier delivery or more favorable placement.”

Suppose broadband operators want to block or degrade Internet content they do not wish to carry? Suppose customers do not mind paying extra for speedier delivery and more favorable placement? Well, that is beside the point, according to Obama. Like newspapers and other venues of speech and entertainment, broadband operators are regarded as “public servants” serving the public by providing it information and entertainment, and should not be permitted to discriminate against any comers. Moreover, no one should be permitted to discriminate in their favor, that is, exercise his freedom of choice. All must be “equal.”

To better concretize the issue: State-mandated smoking bans in restaurants, bars, businesses and other venues -- in some localities, even in one’s own residence or in a public park -- are enacted to favor an alleged majority of non-smokers for purported health reasons. This is the literal, partial seizure of private property for the benefit of one group. Call it the selective application of the power of eminent domain, in answer to the proclaimed “right” of non-smokers to drink or dine or work in a smoke-free, “un-degraded” environment, in defiance of the fact that they drink, dine or work in an environment that is someone else‘s property.

Business owners and proprietors nominally own their property or enterprises -- but only for as long as they submit to the ban. They are not allowed to discriminate between smokers and non-smokers -- call it “patron neutrality,” with a patron forbidden to light up lest he offend someone or “endanger” someone’s health -- and all customers must be reduced to the same state of being non-smokers.

Extrapolate that phenomenon to the Internet -- substitute bars, restaurants and businesses with broadband operators -- now call them providers, “neutral” bureaucratic jargon for anyone or any business that creates and offers a “service,” a term that has spread like a corrosive into virtually every realm of trade -- and it is easy to see what the consequences will be: a government policed Internet, just like the Chinese one. One will hear only what the government wishes one to hear, read, or watch.

Obama may have been hoping to set a personal example for China's leaders when he said he believes that free discussion, including criticism that may be annoying to him, [that] makes him "a better leader because it forces me to hear opinions that I don't want to hear."

Obama has made it eminently clear that he would rather not risk hearing opinions that conflict with his own. Recall his efforts to enlist Americans, at the height of the nationwide Tea Parties, to report “fishy” opinions about him and his administration directly to the White House. Remember that he wishes to compel radio and television stations to comply with a new “Fairness Doctrine” under the magic cloak of “diversity” and has chosen members of his Politburo to monitor and enforce that policy.

He appointed Mark Lloyd chief diversity officer of the Federal Communications Commission, who wishes to make private broadcasting companies pay licensing fees equal to their total operating costs to allow public broadcasting outlets to spend the same on their operations as the private companies do.

Obama appointed Julius Genachowski, his former Harvard Law School classmate and a busybody social worker, as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. Doubtless he will do Obama’s bidding, just for old times’ sake, and formulate a new speech policy that would regulate the Internet to ensure net neutrality.

Last week, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski proposed strengthening the agency’s current guidelines on net neutrality by formally adopting them as regulation. He also proposed two additional rules, including one aimed at preventing Internet companies from discriminating against any traffic to certain types of content or services. In other words, all traffic would have to be treated the same.

Net neutrality was a cornerstone of Obama’s technology priorities during his campaign. Genachowski, his top campaign tech adviser, was a key architect behind those plans.

Cass Sunstein, head of the White Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, can rule on virtually any brand of speech anywhere. Indeed, one blogger reported:

The recent Obama intended appointment of Cass Sunstein…is the next nail in the coffin of the First Amendment. In this position Sunstein will have powers that are unprecedented and very far reaching; not merely mind-boggling but with explicit ability to use the courts to stifle free speech if it opposes Obama policies. In particular, Sunstein thinks that the bloggers have been “rampaging out of control” and that “new laws need to be written” to contain them.

Doubtless this blogger, as well as countless others who disagree with Obama that the Constitution is “deeply flawed,” has been marked for gagging by administration snoops and FCC bloodhounds on the scent of “non-diversity.”

Of course, Mao admirer Anita Dunn, White House communications director and failed Fox-hunter who was a “victim” of opinions Obama would rather not hear, is gone, “but will remain as a consultant to the White House on the communications and strategic matters.” Her husband, attorney Robert Bauer and a long-time Obama devotee, has been appointed White House counsel to fend off more “frivolous” allegations and charges against Obama and members of his “team,” a political organization whose suffocating power is intended to extend from the White House rose garden to every nock and cranny of American life.

The satire is that in Shanghai, Obama was subjected to the same censorship that he wishes to impose on America. It was the professional totalitarians showing the ropes to an amateur.

Obama's Flawed Prescription for Health Care

By Jeff Scialabba from The Ayn Rand Institute Media Releases,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Obama’s Flawed Prescription for Health Care

By Jeff Scialabba

The House of Representatives has already passed its health-care bill and now the Senate is preparing to vote on its own. Should it pass, the largest new entitlement program since the New Deal will be a reconciliation process and a President’s signature away from being enacted. This is Congress and President Obama’s proposed cure for the ills of our health-care system. But are we sure they have properly diagnosed the disease? 

In his speech before Congress in early September, Obama noted that “more and more Americans worry that if you move, lose your job, or change your job, you'll lose your health insurance too,” and that “buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer.” The obvious implication is that government must do something.

But missing from the speech were answers to the following questions: Why is individual insurance so pricey? And why are so many Americans--over half the population, including more than 90 percent of the privately insured--chained to their employer for health insurance? 

The answers implicate government. Government policy has favored employer-based insurance through tax breaks dating back to WWII. Together with coercive labor laws arm-twisting companies into providing health benefits, these substantial tax breaks, which have never been extended to individuals purchasing insurance on their own, have distorted the health-insurance market. Employer-based plans now outnumber more limited and more expensive individual plans 10 to 1.  

Obama also decries “the problem of rising costs,” which is crippling businesses and pushing the federal deficit to stratospheric highs. But again, he fails to identify the real factors at work. 

Health insurance in America is typically comprehensive, intended to cover almost any medical expense, including routine care. This would be like using car insurance to pay for tune-ups and oil changes, and history has shown that this model increases (marginal) demand for medical services. But government interventions have favored the comprehensive model for decades, beginning in the 1930s with the granting of nonprofit status to Blue Cross and Blue Shield, which pioneered the model. Comprehensive coverage was further entrenched by Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s, as well as by the imposition of more than 2,100 federal and state mandates dictating who insurers must cover and what services they must pay for.  

As a result of these distortions, 95 percent of insured Americans--some 240 million of us--have comprehensive insurance paid for by a third party, either our employer or the government. As consumers of medical services we are cut off from their costs. When we go to the doctor, we don’t even see the price until it shows up on the invoice--with all but a small co-pay or deductible (relative to the total bill) paid by our insurance. When the cost to patients is low, we view any test or treatment as “necessary” no matter how minor the benefits. This apparent free lunch has led to the exploding spending we see today. 

Because Obama fails to grasp the cause of our problems, his proposed solutions will fare as badly as every previous “reform.”

Past attempts to limit the expenditures of Medicare and Medicaid by lowering reimbursements to physicians and hospitals, for instance, have left medical providers loath to take on new Medicare and Medicaid patients and forced them to make up the losses by raising prices on private consumers. These “cost-cutting” measures have also done little to stop the hemorrhagic spending--Medicare alone is expected to consume nearly 50 percent of all federal income tax revenue by 2040. 

Similarly, the use of mandates to increase coverage has had disastrous results. While state mandates have benefited special interest groups, they’ve raised the cost of basic coverage an estimated 20 to 50 percent. Moreover, in order to prevent the skirting of state mandates, federal law prohibits insurance companies from offering plans across state lines--effectively banning competition and prohibiting market forces from driving prices downward.  

No honest observer of our health-care system could deny it is in need of reform. But the basic question is: Have existing government interventions proved positive? Obama and his supporters on both the left and the right answer “yes”--but the facts say otherwise. Rather than trying to expand government control over health care--as Obama would do--we should be working to eliminate it.

# # #
 

Jeff Scialabba is a writer and researcher at the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights. 

Debate: There is a rational warrant for belief in God.

By David from Truth, Justice, and the American Way,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Here is the video and audio links from my debate..  They are both two hours 40 minutes long. You can also read my opening statement.

Quick Roundup 484

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Israeli Oath-Fakers

Pursuant to a recent post of mine on the so-called "Oath Keepers," who advocate mutiny by the military and the police as a means of "protecting" the Constitution, it is noteworthy that Israel is already suffering from the consequences of a similar direct assault on rule of law:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced concern on Tuesday over a mutiny by pro-settler soldiers that raised fears of more rebellion in the ranks in any future land-for-peace moves with the Palestinians.

The solution to bad laws and foolish policies is to promote better laws and pro-freedom policies, not eroding rule of law.

Paul Hsieh in RCP

I'm late to this party, but still very glad to see that a good, pro-freedom op-ed on the physician slavery debate was linked by RealClear Politics.

Republican Dark Horses

The good news, such as it is, is that there seem to be multiple viable alternatives to Sarah Palin in the GOP. The bad news is that none is terribly exciting, and David Brooks likes John Thune, the first listed.

He doesn't have radical plans to cut the federal leviathan. He just wants to restrain the growth of government to bring deficits down. He doesn't have ambitions to restructure the tax code. He just wants to lift burdens on small business.

Or: He just wants to have his cake and eat it, too.

Sigh.

Happy Birthday, Motown!

According to a blogger at Mental Floss, Motown Records recently turned fifty. The post has several embedded YouTube videos of its author's favorite Motown classics.

Real gentlemen don't scream, "Bitch!"

Nor do they feel the need to self-apply the label, "gentleman."

This magazine piece and this blog post can be thought of as snaggletoothed, inbred descendants at the end of the line of Whitaker Chambers' non-review of Atlas Shrugged at National Review. Even some of the sympathetic commenters at the blog post could see that these weren't really about Rand or the intellectual movement she started.

The high point of the blog posting comes when Barry Ritholtz easily gets backed into a corner by a commenter who hasn't even read Rand. Ritholtz does all he can do: dare him to call his bluff. "You should definitely read Atlas shrugged [sic] and than make up your own mind." Yes. Please do that, Kimble.

It's getting to where anyone who writes such tripe might as well spare himself some effort by appending a "Kick me!" sign to his posterior at the beginning of the day. (HT: Brad Harper)

Objectivist Roundups

Some time while I was under the knife or loopy from painkillers, Rational Jenn hosted last week's Objectivist Roundup. I believe C. August will host this week's edition.

As an interesting aside, this morning I googled "Polian Godboy" and saw that Rational Jenn had hit the 75,000 site vist mark. Congratulations to her!

Submarining is scary.

Hehhh-yep!

To Serve Man

Insert your favorite altruism-as-cannibalism joke here, tie it in to Barack Obama's desire to control the Census Bureau and his newfound concern with public debt, and then fill in your new census long-form questionnaire here. I scored seven.

Memo to Barack Obama: Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal" was a satire. This, my short version, is also a satire. I only mean the take home message, "Eat me!" figuratively.

-- CAV

NoodleCast #23: Explore Atlas Shrugged, Session 6

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

These discussion questions and podcast were prepared by Diana Hsieh for ExploreAtlasShrugged.com for people interested in creating their own Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups, as well as for anyone wishing to study the novel in more depth. They may be freely used for the study and discussion of Atlas Shrugged, provided that this paragraph remains intact in any reproduction.

Readings

Atlas Shrugged, Part 1, Chapter 10 (Part B) - Part 2, Chapter 1

• Part 1: Chapter 10: Wyatt's Torch (Sections 5-9)
  
• Part 2: Chapter 1: The Man Who Belonged on Earth

Or:

• Pages 309-378 in the larger Hardcover or Softcover
  
• Pages 294-358 in the smaller Mass Market Paperback

Podcast

Listen Now

56:08 minutes

Download This Episode

• Enhanced M4A File (26.5 MB)
  
• Standard MP3 File (25.8 MB)

Learn More

• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, also available in hardcover
  
• Essays on Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, edited by Robert Mayhew
  
• Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups of Front Range Objectivism
  
• AtlasShrugged.com, produced by by the Ayn Rand Institute

Discussion Questions

(Note: The listed page numbers are for the larger edition, softcover or hardback.)

Part 1: Chapter 10: Wyatt's Torch

Section Five: 309-13

• What do we discover about Eugene Lawson in the course of his conversation with Dagny Taggart? What did he seek and gain from the needy people to whom he granted loans, if not wealth? (309-13)

Section Six: 313-21

• How are Lee Hunsacker and Midas Mulligan different? How and why do they clash? Are the two men morally different? If so, how? (313-21)

Section Seven: 321-24

• What was the basic scheme for the Twentieth Century Motor Company implemented by the Starnes heirs? Why does Dagny think that it is pure evil? (323)
  
• What was Ivy Starnes' philosophy when she inherited the Twentieth Century Motor Company? What is it now? Why did she change as she did? (323)

Section Eight: 324-27

• How is Mrs. Hastings different from everyone else that Dagny has interviewed? Why is that important? (324-7)

Section Nine: 327-36

• What is so puzzling about Dr. Akston's meeting with Dagny? What conclusions can she draw from it, if any?
  
• What is the Fair Share Law? What is its basic premise? Why was it passed? (333) How will it kill Colorado?
  
• Why does Ellis Wyatt rebel against the Fair Share Law as he does? How has he fulfilled his earlier promise to Dagny? How does Wyatt's action affect Dagny? (333-6)

Whole Chapter

• What is the significance of the title of this chapter?

Whole Part

• What is the significance of the title of this part?

Part 2: Chapter 1: The Man Who Belonged on Earth

Section 1: 339-49

• How has the state of the world changed since the end of Part 1? How has it declined?
  
• Why does Dr. Stadler want to meet with Dr. Ferris? Why won't Stadler do anything about the book? How is this choice similar to and different from the choice Stadler made about Rearden Metal? (342-8)

Section 2: 349-60

• What was the effect of the elimination of Wyatt Oil from the market? (349-50) Are large producers a boon to small ones?
  
• What is the effect of the Fair Share Law on Taggart Transcontinental? Why is Taggart Transcontinental making more money than ever? What is Jim's response? (352)
  
• Why does Dagny feel greater revulsion at Dr. Stadler than Jim or Orren Boyle? (353) Is he worse than the others? Why or why not -- and how?
  
• What does Dr. Stadler want from Dagny? What does she give him? Is she right to do so? (354-60)
  
• Why does Dr. Stadler want to see the motor? How and why does he almost redeem himself? (358-9)

Section 3: 360-7

• Why does Rearden refuse to sell any Rearden Metal to the State Science Institute? What does he suggest they do instead? Why? (360, 365-6)
  
• How has the Fair Share law affected Rearden's business? Why? (361-2)
  
• What danger does Rearden feel on hearing the news of Wyatt's departure from the world? What is his response? Is that right or not? (363)
  
• What moral insight does Rearden's conversation with the representative of the State Science Institute reveal? What does he now understand? (366-7)

Section 4: 367-78

• How has Hank's view of his relationship with Dagny changed? How is that reflected in his actions toward her? (367-78) Why does Dagny think that she can help Hank win his deliverance from guilt, but that she cannot do so by words? (367)
  
• What does Hank discover about the looter's desire for sanction? How is it important? Why should they withhold that sanction? (377-8)

Whole Chapter

• What is the significance of the title of this chapter?

Nothing Less Than Victory

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Check out the endorsement John Lewis has gotten from Victor Davis Hanson for his soon-forthcoming book, Nothing Less than Victory:

John David Lewis has offered a superb appraisal of how ancient and modern wars start and finish. This chronicle of some 2,500 years of Western history is replete with a philosophical analysis of why nations fight, win--and lose. His insights and conclusions are original and fearless--as well as timely and welcome in the confused war-making of the present age."

-- Victor Davis Hanson, author of Carnage and Culture

If you haven't yet heard about the book, here's the description from John Lewis' web site:

The goal of a war is to defeat an enemy's will to fight. But how this can be accomplished is a thorny issue. Nothing Less than Victory provocatively shows that aggressive, strategic military offenses can win wars and establish lasting peace, while defensive maneuvers have often led to prolonged carnage, indecision, and stalemate. Taking an ambitious and sweeping look at six major wars, from antiquity to World War II, John David Lewis shows how victorious military commanders have achieved long-term peace by identifying the core of the enemy's ideological, political, and social support for a war, fiercely striking at this objective, and demanding that the enemy acknowledges its defeat.

Lewis examines the Greco-Persian and Theban wars, the Second Punic War, Aurelian's wars to reunify Rome, the American Civil War, and the Second World War. He considers successful examples of overwhelming force, such as the Greek mutilation of Xerxes' army and navy, the Theban-led invasion of the Spartan homeland, and Hannibal's attack against Italy--as well as failed tactics of defense, including Fabius's policy of delay, McClellan's retreat from Richmond, and Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler. Lewis shows that a war's endurance rests in each side's reasoning, moral purpose, and commitment to fight, and why an effectively aimed, well-planned, and quickly executed offense can end a conflict and create the conditions needed for long-term peace.

Recognizing the human motivations behind military conflicts, Nothing Less than Victory makes a powerful case for offensive actions in pursuit of peace.

John David Lewis is visiting associate professor of philosophy, politics, and economics at Duke University, and senior research scholar in history and classics at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center at Bowling Green State University. He is the author of Solon the Thinker: Political Thought in Archaic Athens and Early Greek Lawgivers.

The book is due out in March. On the advice of John Lewis, I recommend that you order the book from the Ayn Rand Bookstore. The publisher will take note of even a few dozen copies sold from that source.

"School phobia" is not irrational

By Roberto Brian Sarrionandia from Tito's Blog,cross-posted by MetaBlog

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8367283.stm

A school is being asked to apologise to the family of a boy it prosecuted for truancy. The boy was diagnosed as having "school phobia", but what exactly is that?<!-- E SF -->

Most adults can remember days when they vehemently didn't want to go to school.

There would be protestations of illness, and of the danger of passing on an unpleasant disease, before the eventual acceptance that the journey into school was inevitable.

So many might react with scepticism to the idea that there is such a thing as "school phobia".

No. We cannot use the word phobia to describe it, because for many people it is a perfectly rational fear.

Government schooling is effectively prison. It is totally unhuman for children to be ripped from their families every day, perhaps against the will of all parties, and dumped into what is going to be (at best) a hostile environment.

Government schools are like tribal societies in petri dishes. No real learning goes on, that learning which does occur is often completely useless to the child due to the anti-conceptual manner in which it is presented (See Dr Peikoff's: Why Johnny Can't Think). Children are forced into buildings and classrooms, they are bored for there is absolutely nothing of value there and they have no principles by which to operate in a civilised manner. It is a complete detachment from reality. Do x or receive punishment y. The good is that which is not punished. It is impossible to develop at any rate quicker than that of your peers.

The results are self evident. Crowds of people with nothing better to do than gang up and distress each other. Even people like myself, who went to a (relatively) docile rural school, can at best say it was the biggest waste of 10 years I will ever encounter, short of going into a coma. While my school was mild, it is still the most inhuman and alienating place I have ever been to. I'm quite sure parents would fret if their children were packed off to ride the subway in a big city alone all day, or to the center of a town with a bad reputation -- yet they happily put them on the bus to take them to what will be, for most western civilians, the most hostile location they will ever visit.

The whole system is simply awful, and it is terrible to think that not wanting to be locked inside a worthless, hostile environment 5 days a week is being thought of as an irrational phobia, a trait to be ironed out of the child.

Why They Trust

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Stephen Bourque makes some incisive commentary about a recent change in the government's recommendations on the timing and frequency of breast cancer screening. His post deserves a full read, but one paragraph in particular caught my eye:

It has always amazed me how much trust the general public puts in government recommendations of this sort. The group in this case, the United States Preventive Services Task Force, is characterized as an "independent panel of experts in prevention and private care appointed by the federal Department of Health and Human Services." But what exactly is this group independent of? The implication is that they are independent of individuals and corporations that have a vested interest in the guidelines. However, what the panel is entirely dependent upon for its existence is the federal government, an institution that has absolutely no incentive to meet consumer demands. The panel is independent of responsibility and accountability. [minor format edits]

I suspect that the amazement may be at least partially rhetorical, but it is worth noting where such blind trust originated and considering its full ramifications. The above paragraph reminded me of the following warning from an essay by Alan Greenspan in his better, younger days:

To paraphrase Gresham's Law: bad "protection" drives out good. The attempt to protect the consumer by force undercuts the protection he gets from incentive. First, it undercuts the value of reputation by placing the reputable company on the same basis as the unknown, the newcomer, or the fly-by-nighter. It declares, in effect, that all are equally suspect... Second it grants an automatic (though, in fact, unachievable) guarantee of safety to the products of any company that complies with its arbitrarily set minimum standards. The value of a reputation rested on the fact that it was necessary for the consumers to exercise judgment in the choice of the goods and services they purchased. ... [bold added] ("The Assault on Integrity" in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, pp. 119-120)

In other words, over the past few decades, people have become less and less accustomed to acting as their own "consumer watchdogs" even as the government slowly gobbled up larger and larger swaths of the medical and scientific sectors, slowly making the independent advice of scientists to the government less so. Consider this the informational equivalent of the illusory "access" to medical care the Democrats are promising us.

This affects everyone and even confounds the efforts of those of us who are inclined to distrust the government to establish our own opinions on medical matters. For example, at the site Quack Watch is a list of "Twenty-Five Ways to Spot Quacks and Vitamin Pushers." Reading through the list, I noticed that ten of the items on the list (1, 2, 9, 10, 16, 18, 21, 23, 24, and 25) included reliance on the government in some way: e.g., mentioning government nutritional guidelines, alluding to the role of the government in regulating the practice of medicine, or linking to a government web site.

Of course, since the government funds so much research and "educates" so many people about science, the truth is that every single item on the list is affected in some way by government interference in the economy: Both the information under consideration as well as the ability of an average person to evaluate it have often been undermined from the start.

The immediately possible debacle of a government takeover of the medical sector would be a bad enough pit for America to have to have to climb out of, but the truth is that we need only turn around for a moment to see that we are already in another.

-- CAV

Earth First Cries over Trees

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Wow, wow, wow:



These people should be huddling naked in a dank cave, not wearing fleece and gortex. Honestly though, I cannot take that crap seriously without wanting to pull out my hair. So here's a hysterical response from a hippie-hating tree:



Ha!

Paul Hsieh OpEd: Mafia-Style Health Insurance

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The November 16, 2009 Washington Examiner has just published my latest OpEd, "Mafia-style Health Insurance: An Offer You Can't Refuse".

Here is the opening:

Suppose the mafia came to your town and forced everyone to purchase all their meals at mob-approved restaurants. The mafia would also select the menu items.

If you liked broccoli but their vegetable choice was spinach, then tough luck. Everyone would also have to purchase dessert, whether they wanted it or not. And if some customers couldn't afford the high-priced meals, the mafia would force you to "contribute" to cover their bills.

Most Americans would be outraged at such violations of their basic rights. But this is precisely what the president and Congress want to do with health insurance...

(Read the full text of "Mafia-style Health Insurance: An Offer You Can't Refuse")

Update: Looks like it has been picked up at RealClearPolitics.com under the title, "Is Your Health Plan 'Acceptable'?"

My case against God

By David from Truth, Justice, and the American Way,cross-posted by MetaBlog

This is my opening for my debate on the existence of God at tomorrow’s philosophy meetup:

---

10 minutes is not much time to present an argument against a belief central to the philosophy of the majority of Americans. To show that God isn’t needed, I must not only offer an argument against his existence, but also *for* all the things that God means to people:

• *A guide to morality.
• *A justification for causality and the laws of nature.
• *An explanation for the variety of life on earth.
• *A validation of human knowledge.
• *And optimism for the future of humanity.

My opponent on the other hand, can simply say, “God says it is so, and thus so it is.” But as H.L. Menken said “There is always an easy solution to every human problem–neat, plausible, and wrong.”

The conclusions we reach about the existence or nonexistence of supernatural entities are not philosophical primaries. Rather, they are derivatives of our premises about the basic nature of the universe and our ability to know it.

To present an alternative to a theistic worldview, I am going to present two opposing positions on what I consider the fundamental question of philosophy. The side you take on this issue (which everyone does, whether they are aware of it or not) plays a critical choice your life.

What is this critically important issue? It is the nature of the relationship between consciousness and reality. The central question on this issue is whether consciousness is the agency of perceiving reality, or the agency of creating reality.

I believe that once you understand that consciousness has the power to perceive and identify, but *not* to create reality, a naturalistic worldview follows automatically. If however, you assume that consciousness is an entity that can create reality, then emotionalism becomes your epistemological method, and no further discussion or understanding of reality is possible.

Axioms

Why is the most fundamental issue in philosophy the relationship between consciousness and reality? It is because all knowledge of reality rests on certain premises. Such as: there is a reality to be known; that there is a distinction between consciousness and external reality, that reality has identity, that its identity has a specific nature, so that what you learn today is true tomorrow, that the mind is capable of acquiring knowledge of reality, and that the process is not automatic and infallible, but requires conscious and active direction on our part. Answers to these questions form the basic axioms of philosophy, on which all further human knowledge is built.

Although everyone implicitly assumes these premises from early childhood, very few people name them explicitly, and fewer still practice them consistently. As I will show, a belief in the supernatural violates all the basic axioms.

I will summarize the axioms in this sentence: “I am conscious of something.” Let me break that down:

Axiom 1: Existence exists

“I am *conscious*”: By simply looking at the world, we are immediately aware that there is a reality to be conscious of. In short: Existence exists.

Axiom 2: Consciousness is conscious:

“*I* am conscious”: The second thing we are aware of, is that we have an agency of perceiving reality: our mind. In short: Consciousness is conscious.

Axiom 3: Existence IS identity:

“I am conscious of *something*”: We are conscious of something specific, an entity which we perceive in a particular form, which can be differentiated from other entities by its attributes. Note that entities do not possess identity, as something tacked on to a non-entity. A ball does not posses roundness. A ball is a ball because it *is* round. In short: Existence is identity. Or: To be is to be something.

Putting that statement together again: consciousness is the agency of perceiving reality. Existence has primacy over consciousness, which means: reality is, and the function of the mind is to perceive and identify it. We are aware of reality through our senses, which perceive reality according to their particular nature and the nature of the entities we perceive. Existence exists, Consciousness is conscious, Existence is identity.

Observe that I did not prove that the axioms are valid. Proof is the process of logically deriving a conclusion from sensory data. This process presumes that there is something out there to be proved, that we have an agency of proof, and there is something specific to be proved. Existence, consciousness, identity. Any statement about reality presumes the validity of the axioms, including any attempt to deny them. We cannot prove the axioms – but we can validate that they *are* axioms by observing that they cannot be escaped in any statement about reality, that they are implicit in all knowledge, and that they must be accepted in any attempt to deny them.

Truth

The claim that reality exists, that the mind is a means of perceiving reality, and that entities in reality have attributes do not seem very controversial. Nonetheless, a belief in God contradicts all three axioms.

Before I explain why, I want to define one other concept: truth. If the mind is the agency of perceiving reality, then valid knowledge of reality is only possible by perceiving, identifying, and integrating sensory data into a correct mental model of reality. Truth therefore, is the product of the recognition of the facts of reality. To be certain that all our knowledge is true, we must be objective, which means: to volitionally adherence to reality by the use of logic. Logic is the non-contradictory identification of reality. The method by which we confirm that our abstract ideas correspond to reality is reduction to perception, which means: that ultimately, all our knowledge, from that which is directly observed, to that which is many levels abstracted, can be reduced to sensory evidence. Claims which are not based on sensory evidence are neither true nor false – they are arbitrary and have no bearing on reality.

Let’s apply the principles I have just introduced to the idea of God:

Did God create the universe?

How can a consciousness, which is a means of perception, take action? If the universe is the set of all entities that exist, is God not an entity? If he engages in causal interaction, then he must do so by some specific means according to his own identity. What is that identity? We know what it is not – it is not material or temporal, but what is it? All we are told is what God isn’t. Entities do not exist by the lack of attributes, but as the attributes that define them. To be is to be something.

Is God infinite?

But nothing can be infinite. Everything is something specific, in a specific form and quantity. Infinity is only a potentiality. In every sense, God exists in no specific form or measure. He is defined only in negatives. A non-specific age, size, power, perception and a non-specific means of perceiving him. But if existence is identity, he must exist as something specific, which means: not as something else.

Is God good?

For living things, the concept of good is possible because values are not automatic to them: they must act to stay in existence, and their actions must be in accordance with reality. But how can an immortal, indestructible being have values? What possible motive could it have for action? It has nothing to gain or lose – nothing can threaten its existence or cause it discomfort. What loss could be caused by choosing any activity over any other? And without values, what possible motive could it have for action? A being for which no value is possible has no basis for any action at all.

Is there any proof for God?

Evidence is derived from the interaction of an existent’s attributes with the sensory organs of a conscious being. What attributes of God are we aware of? If there are none, then claims about the supernatural are neither true nor false, but arbitrary emotionalism and must be thrown out of the realm of cognition.

Ayn Rand’s summarizes the supernatural thus:

“To exist is to possess identity. What identity are they able to give to their superior realm? They keep telling you what it is not, but never tell you what it is. All their identifications consist of negating: God is that which no human mind can know, they say—and proceed to demand that you consider it knowledge—God is non-man, heaven is non-earth, soul is non-body,.. A is non-A, perception is non-sensory, knowledge is non-reason. Their definitions are not acts of defining, but of wiping out.”

In short: God is existence without identity, consciousness without perception, action without a means, change without time, virtue without value. Every one of the attributes ascribed to God not only cannot be proven, but violates all of the axioms.

—

To conclude:

• *Axiomatic concepts form the foundation of cognition and delimit the field of awareness.
• *Existence is identity, consciousness is identification.
• *Truth is certainty reached by the use of reason and logic.
• *Reason man’s only means of knowing reality.
• *Knowledge must be validated by being reduced to sensory evidence.
• *Objectivity is volitional adherence to reality.
• *Ethics derive from the requirements of human life.

—

For Rebuttal:

I want to start by identifying the nature of emotions.

An emotion is an automatic response to an external or internal stimulus based upon your subconscious premises and values. It tells you something about the state of your consciousness, not about external reality. By examining the premises that led to a certain emotional evaluation, we can find the causes for our emotions. By changing our values, we can change our emotional responses to the same stimulus. Two people can have totally different responses to the same stimulus if their values are different. For example, to me a sports car driving by elicits feelings of appreciation and desire, to an environmentalist, a hated object of waste, to a caveman, of bewilderment and perhaps fear.

To me, a nature documentary inspires wonder and awe in the ability of simple rules to create amazingly complex creatures; to a creationist it is evidence of supernatural intervention. Our emotions differ because our subconscious mind has automatized premises and assumptions about the nature of the world.

If you never bother to check your premises, if you default on the task of consciously and honestly examining the world with ruthless rationality, honesty, and integrity, you will never know the origin of your ideas and values. Your subconscious mind will be a jumble of hopes and fears masquerading as evidence.

*Emotions are a subconscious response to values.

The Problem with Our Health-Care Debate

By Alex Epstein from The Ayn Rand Institute Media Releases,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Problem with Our Health-Care Debate

By Alex Epstein

Everyone seems to have a different take on how to solve America’s health-care problem. But notice that every solution offered involves some elaborate new system of government controls. Different proposals include a “public option,” mandatory insurance for individuals, government-supported health-care exchanges, government-sponsored “efficacy research,” government-supported co-ops, and as many other ways of dictating consumer and producer behavior as can fit in a 1,000-page bill.

More government controls, we are told, are necessary to solve problems such as skyrocketing health-insurance prices, lack of competition among insurance companies, the inability of workers to keep their insurance policy when switching jobs, etc.

Really?

Then why do giants of the computer industry like Google, Microsoft and Apple compete vigorously without a “public option”? Why do we have such plentiful, affordable food without a government “food insurance mandate”? Why does laser eye-surgery, which is not covered by Medicare or government insurance laws, get better and cheaper all the time, while the price of health services the government is most involved in, skyrockets?

The answer is that these other markets are (comparatively) left free--while health care has been manipulated by government “solutions” for decades. Thus, our health--care discussion should focus, not on how government controls can solve our problems, but on how government controls have caused our problems.

Take for instance the common complaint that individuals can’t keep their health insurance when switching from one job to another. The only reason so many individuals can’t keep their insurance in the first place is that they get it through their employer--a phenomenon that was institutionalized by the government post-WWII through tax laws that make individually purchased insurance far more expensive. We don’t face the same problem with car or home insurance when we change jobs because we don’t buy it through our employer.

Or consider the general phenomenon of skyrocketing prices for health insurance. The ways in which the government drives up prices are many and gory, but here are a few.

State insurance-mandates force companies and individuals to buy policies covering all sorts of expensive treatments they wouldn’t otherwise buy coverage for: chiropractic care, psychiatric care, prenatal care. Every such “benefit” means higher costs. Those who would prefer just to purchase insurance against medical catastrophe and pay for everything else out of pocket are prohibited from doing so.

More broadly, since the 1940s, on the idea that health care is a “right” that others must provide, the government has made Americans collectively responsible for each other’s health care, whether through collectivized employer plans or through Medicare; thus, on average, “every time an American spends a dollar on physicians' services,” explains health economist John Goodman, “only 10 cents is paid out of pocket; the remainder is paid by a third party.”

People consuming medical services on other people’s dime consume a lot more. Prices are further driven up by numerous restrictions on the supply of medical professionals, such as protectionist licensing laws that prevent doctor’s assistants, nurse practitioners, nurses, and paramedics from competing with doctors on services they are well qualified to perform (fixing minor bone breaks, diagnosing the flu, etc.).

When supply is artificially limited, and demand artificially increases, prices explode. (Any system promising “universal care” experiences this--the much-vaunted “affordable” European system just deals with it by severe rationing.)

This is just a fraction of the story of how government has mangled the market for health care--a story any honest discussion of health care needs to study and learn from.

Then we will start to hear proposals for a truly progressive idea: a market in health care where the individual is responsible for his own health, the medical profession is truly free to compete for his dollars, and the government has been removed from the equation--the private option.

 

# # #

 

 

Natural Allies Against Liberty

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Just as the Witch Doctor is impotent without Attila, so Attila is impotent without the Witch Doctor; neither can make his power last without the other.*

I am for freedom of religion and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendancy of one sect over another.**

In all ages, hypocrites, called priests, have put crowns upon the heads of thieves, called kings.***

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops lent its endorsement to the 2,000+ page health care bill passed by the House last week (H.R. 3962), when Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and her arm-twisting cohorts persuaded others to okay the Stupak-Pitts Amendment. The amendment would prohibit insurance companies from including coverage for federally-subsidized abortions in their health plans, or so restrict them that it would not encourage any insurance company to include it as a covered medical procedure.

The amendment, which passed by a vote of 240 to 194, would be included in the so-called “public option” of the legislation. The term “public option,” however, is a deceptive misnomer. There is nothing “public” about it. It would place a government bureaucrat in between an insurer and the insured. It should be called the “bureaucratic option.”

What has not been paid much attention is the fact that an organization of Catholic clergy has prevailed upon a nominally secular government to impose its religious dogma -- that fetuses are persons from the moment of conception -- on the rest of the country, in the face of opposition by several other religious groups, including one called Catholics for Choice. Of course, few in Congress, least of all Pelosi and her mandating munchkins and trolls, care to think of the First Amendment of the Constitution or even to give it serious credence, or perhaps devote two seconds of consideration of it in their power-obsessed minds. The words in that amendment are simple, clear and brief. It states that:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

The establishment clause prohibits Congress from creating a state religion, while the free exercise clause bars Congress from granting “most-favored religion” status to any religion at the expense of or over another (that is, while not literally creating a state religion).

Balance that against the mammoth health-care bill with its millions of words. The question, however, is: Can the endorsement of the anti-abortion provision by the bishops, together with the concession by Pelosi (also a Catholic) and her allies in response to the peevish machinations of Stupak and his allies, be construed as the establishment of a religion?

Actually, no. But it hovers close to it. In fact, the American Catholic Church is a major recipient of federal funds. Its collection basket overflows with taxpayer money. It should come as no surprise that the bishops could exert such extraordinary influence on a nominally secular Congress. Politico reports:

With well over half of their revenue coming from the government, it is safe to say that Catholic hospitals survive on government funding as well as contributions from private sources….Catholic Charities, the domestic direct service arm of the bishops, also depends on state and federal dollars. Sixty-seven percent of Catholic Charities’ income comes from government funding. That represents over $2.6 billion in 2008 — an amount that is more than three times as large as the next largest charitable recipient of federal funds, the YMCA. Just as Catholic hospitals do, Catholic Charities receives enormous quantities of government dollars while abiding by existing constitutional and statutory requirements that prevent government sponsorship of religion.

How the Stupak-Pitts Amendment to the health-care bill came to be an issue is completely consistent with the character of the bill itself. In a move that smacks of extortion of extortionists. Bart Stupak, a Michigan Democrat (and Catholic) who sponsored the amendment, together with Pennsylvania Republican representative Joseph Pitts (an evangelical Christian), promised that they and other Democrats and Republicans would block passage of the bill if it permitted the federal subsidy of abortions in conjunction with the bill’s insurance coverage. Joining them in that maneuver were Democratic Representatives Ike Skelton of Missouri, John Tanner and Lincoln Davis of Tennessee, and Dan Boren of Oklahoma.

They were apparently moved to initiate that maneuver by the first bishops’ letter, dated October 10, in which, among other things, the bishops demanded that the bill:

Exclude mandated coverage for abortion, and incorporate longstanding policies against abortion funding and in favor of conscience rights. No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential that the legislation clearly apply to this new program longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding and mandates, and protections for rights of conscience. No current bill meets this test.

Otherwise, the bishops warned:

If final legislation does not meet our principles, we will have no choice but to oppose the bill. We remain committed to working with the Administration, Congressional leadership, and our allies to produce final health reform legislation that will reflect our principles.

Once the amendment had passed, however, the bishops wrote the House:

We are very pleased that the House leadership has agreed to allow the essential Stupak-Pitts-Kaptur-Dahlkemper-Lipinski-Smith Amendment to be considered by the House. This amendment will add to the Affordable Health Care for America Act (H.R. 3962) crucial provisions that maintain the current protections against abortion funding and mandates. Specifically, it will achieve our objective of applying the provisions of the Hyde amendment to the public health plan and on the affordability credits in the exchanges called for in the legislation.

Passing this amendment allows the House to meet our criteria of preserving the existing protections against abortion funding in the new legislation. It also would fulfill President Obama’s commitment in this area. Most importantly, it will ensure that no government funds will be used for abortion or health plans which include abortion. It is a major step forward.

In the bishops’ first letter there is no reference to or mention of the premise that abortion is immoral, or that fetuses are “persons” with “rights.” Those are merely covered by the disingenuous phrases, “rights of conscience” and “our principles.” What “rights” and what “principles”? As Ayn Rand would retort: Blank-out. In the second, congratulatory letter, the bishops felt they no longer needed to mention “rights” or “principles.” They were only too happy to pat the Stupak syndicate on the back.

Catholics and their clergy are not the only religious groups that oppose abortion on moral grounds. There are secular opponents, as well. The question, then, is not whether there are any provable grounds to such a position, but whether or not such an idea, grounded on mere emotionalist assertions, has any business influencing any legislation.

In both of the bishops’ letters, the premise is not spoken, revealed, or even implied. It has been merely incorporated into the arid language of the bill concerning federal funding of abortions and insurance coverage.

In an apparent digression here, it would be apropos to quote Ayn Rand from her 1964 Playboy interview. Asked about her alleged remark about the cross being a symbol of torture, she replied:

To begin with, I never said that. It's not my style….What is correct is that I do regard the cross as the symbol of the sacrifice of the ideal to the nonideal. Isn't that what it does mean? Christ, in terms of the Christian philosophy, is the human ideal. He personifies that which men should strive to emulate. Yet, according to the Christian mythology, he died on the cross not for his own sins but for the sins of the nonideal people. In other words, a man of perfect virtue was sacrificed for men who are vicious and who are expected or supposed to accept that sacrifice. If I were a Christian, nothing could make me more indignant than that: the notion of sacrificing the ideal to the non-ideal, or virtue to vice. And it is in the name of that symbol that men are asked to sacrifice themselves for their inferiors. That is precisely how the symbolism is used. That is torture.

What is the bishops’ premise? What is their principle? Just as environmentalists expect man to sacrifice his well-being, standard of living, longevity, and happiness in the name of “preserving” the earth or the climate or polar bears or weeds, women are specifically expected to be virtuous by sacrificing their lives and happiness for the sake of a non-ideal, that is, for the sake of a fetus, or a non-person.

So it is logical that the bishops would endorse the entire, sacrifice-through-coercion health care legislation. It is doubtful that they actually believe in the nonsense that fetuses have “rights.” They know, in the dark, unexamined cores of their souls, that the bill is a prescription for slavery and sacrifice to all the “non-ideal” men and women in the country. They are the Witch Doctors working hand-in-hand with the Attilas. Virtue comes from the point of a gun. They pose as “pro-life,” when, in fact, they are anti-life.

Had the bishops not intervened and played politics with the House sponsors and advocates of the health-care bill, the provisions that cover insurance-covered abortions would probably have remained untouched. This is aside from the issue that the whole bill virtually appropriates Americans’ bodies and wealth for the sake of the poor, the uninsured, illegal immigrants -- and fetuses. The bishops are indifferent to the fact that the bill lays the groundwork for totalitarianism in this country. They are oblivious to the virtual enslavement of the medical profession. Their “rights of conscience” and “principles” trump those of all other Americans.

The bishops are not only anti-choice in the matter of abortion, but anti-choice in the most fundamental sense of individual rights. The Bill of Rights means as little to them as it does to most members of Congress. They are the natural allies of the totalitarians in the House and Senate.


*”For the New Intellectual,” in For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. New York: Signet, 1961, p. 23.

**Thomas Jefferson, letter to Elbridge Gerry, January 26, 1799. From Gorton Carruth and Eugene Ehrlich, eds., The Harper Book of American Quotations, New York: Harper & Row, 1988, p. 499.

***Robert G. Ingersoll, 1833-1899, Prose Poems and Selections, 1884. From Daniel B. Baker, ed., Political Quotations, Detroit: Gale Research, Inc., 1990, p. 190.

Two Hair-Pullers

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Via Glenn Reynolds is a Jennifer Rubin piece that asks the question, "[I]f [Barack Obama's] so smart and well-educated, should't he have come up with something better than the stimulus boondoggle?" She gets frustratingly close to the right answer, but ends up whiffing:

[F]inally, as Ronald Reagan said, "The trouble with our liberal friends isn't that they are ignorant; it is that they know so much that isn't so." In other words, they have a set of views at odds with the way the world operates (meekness will endear us to our enemies, terrorists will be impressed with American legal procedures), the American political scene (the public wanted a lurch to the Left), and basic economic realities (you can load mandates and taxes on employers without impacting employment). These views are a great impediment to a successful presidency.

True enough, but Rubin ends on the following note: "[H]e has time. Maybe with experience, he'll wise up." I'm not so sure about this, because Rubin overlooks the fact among the ideas one holds are the standards for what constitutes "success."

On the one hand, I applaud Rubin for seeing the importance of ideas in shaping the actions of the President, but on the other, I'm still unsatisfied with the level of analysis. What if Barack Obama's fundamental ideas are telling him that what he's doing is the best way to realize "equality" not only among all Americans, but among all people in the world? No pain, no gain -- and we haven't even gotten around to asking whether Obama sees suffering as a good thing, as many Christians do. Maybe he thinks the pain is the gain.

Conservatives who happen by here should not dismiss me for nit-picking. One need only open the digital pages of City Journal to see altruism/collectivism infecting even their own ranks. Luigi Zingales, attempting to argue for small government, seems to think that our government should be in the business of addressing income disparities, of all things!

Though American GDP has doubled in real terms over the last 25 years, median real income has grown by only 17 percent. While the richest 1 percent of the population has almost tripled its real income and the richest 0.01 percent has more than quintupled it, the bottom 10 percent has increased its income by only 12 percent.

So what? If the government didn't meddle with my personal choices and have its hands in my pockets all the time, I'd be thrilled to have any kind of income increase. Bill Gates hasn't picked my pocket or broken my leg if he is a trillionaire instead of a billionaire -- assuming, of course, he earned it rather than having been handed loot by the government.

Zingales goes on to praise "Republican" Theodore Roosevelt for creating the FDA and trust-busting. This he does on the way to counseling that, rather than, "give these poorer citizens entitlements disguised as rights," like the Democrats, the Republicans "should focus on providing" welfare state programs of their own disguised as "opportunities."

What's going on here? Rubin naively assumes that Obama has the same pro-prosperity goals she has, and Zingales seems to think that his goal of small government is compatible with egalitarianism. Why?

Because neither sees morality as having anything to do with life. Rubin's tack is that Obama will eventually see the "impracticality" of his idealism and back off on his destructive agenda. She underestimates the power of Obama's ideas to guide his actions. Zingales, on the other hand, fails to see the power of his own altruism (an apparently "compassionate" conservatism) to turn his enthusiasm for small government on its head and, in the process, transmogrify him into a "Democrat lite."

I strongly suspect that both hold an altruistic moral code and see morality as a matter of duty. On such a score, Ayn Rand made the following profound observation:

In order to make the choices required to achieve his goals, a man needs the constant, automatized awareness of the principle which the anti-concept "duty" has all but obliterated in his mind: the principle of causality--specifically, of Aristotelian final causation (which, in fact, applies only to a conscious being), i.e., the process by which an end determines the means, i.e., the process of choosing a goal and taking the actions necessary to achieve it. ("Causality Versus Duty," in Philosophy: Who Needs It, p. 98)

Conversely, a means causally incompatible with an end will fail to lead to that end. Altruism does not inform political choices (i.e., the selection of means) that lead to the protection of individual rights, whose purpose is to enable men to live for their own sake.

Thus, to the extent that one's goal is altruism or egalitarianism, that end (and not individual rights) will guide his actions and his thoughts, meaning it will obliterate his ability to make use of his intelligence for the means of furthering his own life. And further, to the extent that one's goal is freedom, that end will be frustrated by the means of achieving altruistic or collectivist goals.

In the political sphere, this means that one will regard individual freedom (and the economic prosperity that follows from it) only as means to that end (if that), and not as the proper end of government. The result will be that one will fail to see the danger of those more consistent than oneself, and that freedom will fall by the wayside when it frustrates egalitarianism.

This is why Jennifer Rubin underestimates Barack Obama's effective stupidity and Luigi Zingales fails to offer a real alternative to same.

-- CAV

What Obama Should Say to Iran

By Debi Ghate from The Ayn Rand Institute Media Releases,cross-posted by MetaBlog

What Obama Should Say to Iran

by Debi Ghate

Thirty years after the hostage crisis, Iranians are bravely challenging their government. Despite the theocracy’s attempt to crush these protests, Iranians have once again taken to the streets.

Imagine what might happen—the potential benefit to us and to Iran—if instead of declaring that we seek “a relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran based upon mutual interests and mutual respect,” President Obama had said the following on November 4^th, 2009.

“Thirty years ago today, the American Embassy in Tehran was seized. The 444 days that began on November 4, 1979 deeply affected the lives of courageous Americans who were unjustly held hostage. Rather than atone for this, Iran’s theocratic regime has clenched its iron fist to retain power. Once again, we have witnessed the beating and intimidation of Iranian protestors. I strongly condemn these unjust actions of the Iranian regime.

“My message tonight is to those Iranians voicing their opposition to the Ayatollah, making it clear his regime does not represent them.

“To those among you standing up in the face of threats; to those among you saying ‘We will continue to speak even if you, Supreme leader, forbid it’; to those among you deciding that it is time for freedom in Iran—we say: you have our encouragement and our respect.

“To those among you who are wholesale rejecting the oppression of theocratic rule—we offer you our moral sanction. You see, we share your goal of ending the Iranian theocracy and of eliminating the threat it poses to our own nation. We have had the moral right to end it for decades, as have you.

“To those in Iran desperately seeking liberty: rejecting theocratic rule is critical, but what are you fighting for? Seize this opportunity to fight for a nation founded on the radical principle of individual rights. As Americans once fought for their independence, so can you. Life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness: these are your inalienable rights. The time is now to fight to create a free nation upholding these ideals.

“Now I recognize that my statements may make some Americans anxious and uncertain. But I have no doubts.

“It is time for America to unequivocally state that she does not recognize the sovereignty of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Iran has not had a legitimate government worthy of our recognition for decades. The country has been ruled by a series of theocrats. Let us not mince words: they are murderous dictators.

“For decades, the Iranian regime has repeatedly declared itself our enemy, chanting ‘Death to America’ and openly attacking our citizens. We’ve known it since it took our embassy staff hostage in 1979. We’ve known it in the form of multiple Tehran-backed attacks on Americans since then: 1983 in Beirut, where explosives killed 241 people; 1985 onboard TWA 847, where Iranian-trained Hezbollah fighters killed a Navy diver; 1996 at the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, where bombs killed 19; and the list goes on. America will no longer evade that this regime has orchestrated and participated in three decades of deadly assaults upon her people.

“This is a regime that calls for jihad on the West; for the violent imposition of sharia law; for Islamic totalitarianism. It provides the leadership for the Islamist movement: educating, training, and financing a multitude of terrorist organizations, including those responsible for the September 11th attacks on our soil. We have nothing to say to the Iranian regime—except that we will no longer repeat the grave errors of our past. We know what you stand for, and what threat you pose.

“But we have much to say to you, the courageous protestors, because you too know what your government stands for, and you despise it.

“It will not be easy. Our thoughts are with you as you face imminent danger and uncertainty. It will take courage and conviction. But we are with you as you take your first important step towards real revolution. You have rejected the religious fist that smashes you down. You have spoken. Stand firm, and we will stand with you.”

Unfortunately we will not hear this speech. Only a President acting on a foreign policy that properly defends the rights of its own citizens—a foreign policy of principled self-interest and justice—would take this stand.

 

# # #

 

 

 

More Convergence Between Religion and Environmentalism

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The November 5, 2009 Economist highlights further convergence between environmentalism and religion in their article, "Religion and climate change: Sounding the trumpet".

Here's an excerpt:

...As environmentally minded clerics, and greens with a spiritual bent, confer in increasing numbers, in particular over climate change, acquaintances are being struck that transcend many ethnic, ideological and theological obstacles.

...[UN Secretary-General] Ban told an audience of gorgeously attired Bahais, Buddhists, Christians, Daoists, Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Shintos and Sikhs that "you are the leaders who can have the largest, widest and deepest reach" when warning people about climate change. Religions, he said, had established or helped to run half the schools in the world; they were among the world's biggest investors; and the global output of religious journalism was comparable at least to Europe's secular press.

The Economist article observes that this trend seems to be further advanced outside of the US. But the US is probably not far behind.

Although religion and environmentalism may seem to be fairly disparate, Onkar Ghate spoke about this coming convergence at the 2008 OCON conference in Lecture 2 of the 3-part series, "Cultural Movements: Creating Change".

Here is an excerpt from my notes of his lecture:

...Lately, the evangelicals have started to move away from a primary focus on issues such as abortion and sexual orientation/conduct, and towards a broader range of issues which includes "social justice" and environmentalism. Environmentalism and religion in particular have the potential to form a truly "unholy marriage", because in a crucial way they both need and complement the other.

The religionists have previously been concerned with issues in the spiritual realm, such as sex. Environmentalists have previously been concerned about issues in the material realm, such as industrial production. But a combination of the two gives each other strength, and feeds an ideology in which your very existence is a sin. This alliance grants a powerful moral foundation for environmentalist condemnations of mankind's physical activities and it also expands the domains by which religion can assert control over man's spirit through guilt.

The video of his lecture can be found on the "ARC: Culture" web page, middle column, under the heading "Cultural Movements: Creating Change". Use the scroll bar on the embedded video to select between the three separate lectures.

(BTW, I highly recommend listening to all three lectures).

Keith Lockitch on the Green Climate Crusade

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Dr. Keith Lockitch, Resident Fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, will be in Denver next this Wednesday to speak on environmentalism:

Come see Dr. Keith Lockitch of the Ayn Rand center give a speech on what the green climate crusade is really about.

What: Dr. Keith Lockitch on "The Real Goal of the Green Climate Crusade"

When: Wednesday November 18th 6:30-8:30pm

Where: Tivoli (Room 250) Turnhale on the Auraria Campus; 900 Auraria Parkway; Denver, Colorado

Environmentalists claim that our use of carbon-based energy is altering the climate, making us more vulnerable to climate disasters. Human survival, they insist, requires the immediate abandonment of fossil fuels in favor of carbon-free sources. So why do environmentalist groups vehemently oppose projects involving every alternative form of energy ever proposed to replace fossil fuels-- including wind farms and solar power plants? And why do they ignore the dramatic degree to which industrial development under capitalism has reduced the risk of harm from severe climate events? Before we rush headlong into drastic climate policies and energy rationing, a critical examination of these policies is urgently needed. Dr. Keith Lockitch will address these important issues and answer audience questions.

More details, including campus maps, can be found here. Paul and I will be there!

The Nazi Synthesis

By Greg Perkins from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Objectivism Seminar is working through Dr. Leonard Peikoff's all-too-topical book, The Ominous Parallels. In it, he explores what gave rise to to the fascist, totalitarian regime of Nazi Germany -- and analyzes whether and how a fascist, totalitarian regime could emerge here in America.

Censorship by Anti-Trust

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Yesterday, Ari Armstrong published a good op-ed against the push by the American Booksellers Association appeal for antitrust action against sellers of low-price books like Amazon and Wal-mart. As he observes:

When politicians control the physical conveyance of ideas, they can control the ideas themselves. As a villain in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged explains, "If you breathe the word 'censorship' now, they'll all scream bloody murder... But if you leave the spirit alone and make it a simple material issue -- not a matter of ideas, but just a matter of paper, ink and printing presses -- you accomplish your purpose much more smoothly."

That was certainly the method used in the Soviet Union: the Bolsheviks suppressed opposition by taking control over mere property, namely the printing presses.

I see another parallel to Atlas Shrugged in this call for government intervention, particularly from the section that we just read for our Atlas Shrugged Reading Group. Ari writes:

The letter [from the American Booksellers Association] argues that selling low-priced books to people who want to buy them constitutes "illegal predatory pricing that is damaging to the book industry and harmful to consumers."

You might think that "lower prices will encourage more reading and a greater sharing of ideas in the culture," but you would be wrong, the ABA claims. Low-priced books will drive out "many independent bookstores," put book buying "in very few hands," and eventually allow "mega booksellers to raise prices," the ABA asserts.

Ari's response to that is right:

Once a retailer purchases books from a willing publisher without pricing restrictions, the retailer properly has the right to sell the book for any amount it deems proper. If the retailer wants to sell books below cost as a loss leader, give them away, or pay people to take them, that's between them and their customers.

Yet notice that the ABA regards the most successful book sellers as eating up the whole market share, understood as a fixed pie, thereby taking business that would otherwise be given to the smaller bookseller. Yet that's a naive view of markets. As Ayn Rand observes, large producers often make the existence of smaller ones possible by keeping down costs. She makes this point in the course of describing the effects of Ellis Wyatt's quitting:

It had lasted less than six months after Ellis Wyatt had gone -- that period which a columnist had gleefully called "the field day of the little fellow." Every oil operator in the country, who owned three wells and whined that Ellis Wyatt left him no chance of livelihood, had rushed to fill the hole which Wyatt had left wide open. They formed leagues, cooperatives, associations; they pooled their resources and their letterheads. "The little fellow's day in the sun," the columnist had said. Their sun had been the flames that twisted through the derricks of Wyatt Oil. In its glare, they made the kind of fortunes they had dreamed about, fortunes requiring no competence or effort. Then their biggest customers, such as power companies, who drank oil by the trainful and would make no allowances for human frailty, began to convert to coal -- and the smaller customers, who were more tolerant, began to go out of business -- the boys in Washington imposed rationing on oil and an emergency tax on employers to support the unemployed oil field workers -- then a few of the big oil companies closed down -- then the little fellows in the sun discovered that a drilling bit which had cost a hundred dollars, now cost them five hundred, there being no market for oilfield equipment, and the suppliers having to earn on one drill what they had earned on five, or perish -- then the pipe lines began to close, there being no one able to pay for their upkeep -- then the railroads were granted permission to raise their freight rates, there being little oil to carry and the cost of running tank trains having crushed two small lines out of existence -- and when the sun went down, they saw that the operating costs, which had once permitted them to exist on their sixty-acre fields, had been made possible by the miles of Wyatt's hillside and had gone in the same coils of smoke. Not until their fortunes had vanished and their pumps had stopped, did the little fellows realize that no business in the country could afford to buy oil at the price it would now take them to produce it. Then the boys in Washington granted subsidies to the oil operators, but not all of the oil operators had friends in Washington, and there followed a situation which no one cared to examine too closely or to discuss.

Yes! Yes! Yes!

Five tips for improving your communications skills

By David from Truth, Justice, and the American Way,cross-posted by MetaBlog

How good are your communication skills? How often do you feel that misunderstandings get in the way of your personal relationships or your career? Do you ever avoid talking to people because you don’t know how to express what you feel, or because you are afraid that you will be misunderstood?

What if you could dramatically improve the effectiveness of your spoken and written communication? Would it increase your confidence when speaking to coworkers, friends, and romantic interests? Would you take more chances if you could speak directly to someone’s mind, almost as if you had a telepathic connection with your listener?

The problem with most people’s communication skills is that they think that it is an innate talent. They think that if you’re not a smart, good-looking extrovert with a good voice, you can never be a great communicator. It’s true that these things help. But just because you’re tall and have strong legs doesn’t mean that you can win a gold medal at the olympics. And even if you are short and weak by nature, doesn’t mean that you can’t double or triple your performance. Of course, no workout will make you two feet taller. But unlike your body, your brain is very flexible.

You might think that speaking is something we learn automatically, and don’t have much control over. It’s true that we learn how to talk automatically and subconsciously, just like we learned to run automatically. But, just as a trained athlete can run faster and longer than an amateur, so can a conscious effort to improve your skills vastly improve your performance.

I’m going to share some of the things I learned with you as a kind of test. If my ideas are any good, you will remember most of what I said. After you’re done watching, please leave a comment to let me know how I did.

The five tips are: less is more, use examples, no distractions, repeat, repeat repeat, and five or less.

One: Less is more.

Paying attention is hard. It takes an effort to follow what someone is saying. Don’t make that effort any harder than it absolutely has to be. Keep it simple. Keep it short. Keep it focused.

Long and unusual words take longer to recognize than smaller and more familiar words. Many people use a stilted academic tone when they have something important to say. Don’t do it. Don’t say comprehend, say understand, or follow, or just get. Don’t go on an harangue, tirade, or diatribe, go on a rant.

Same goes for sentence and paragraph size. Ditto for analogies and figures of speech. They need an extra mental cross-reference. Just say it. Don’t give me a piece of your mind. Just say it. And whatever you do, cut it out with the likes and the umms, and the you know. You need to take mental breaks when speaking, but just practice making them silent. Your perceived competency will immediately go up 50%. Yes, I just made that number up. Here’s another made up rule: if your finished work is not 30% shorter than your first draft, it’s too long.

Two: Use relevant visual examples.

Your brain is just a big network of triggers made up of images, sounds, tastes, and sensations. If you want me to remember what you said, you need to tie some of those triggers to what you just said. Use examples I know. If you want us to go out for sushi, remind me of the smoked salmon we ate last week. Yes, examples are not just for English class. See? That’s another one.

Good examples are about important things your audience is already familiar with. Don’t talk to young people about how you applied conflict resolution to your mother in law. Talk about your parents. Talk about shiny, fast, loud, dangerous, smelly things if you want to create strong mental triggers to your message.

Three: No distractions.

“Cue words” are concepts that can trigger emotional responses that block rational analysis. For example, democracy, Obama, guns, abortion. Just by saying those words, I’ve triggered a whole cascade of mental activity. Regardless of your political orientation, your mind is now busy trying to classify me into friend, enemy, or maybe just trying to think of something intelligent to say about them. Don’t distract me by mentioning things that trigger distracting emotional responses, or words with a whole host of irrelevant connotations. I’m not saying that you should not talk about controversial topics – just don’t distract the reader with them unnecessarily, even if you think he sides with you.

Four: Repeat, repeat, repeat.

Repetition is crucial to forming long-term memory. You’ve heard this before: say what you’re going to say, say it, then say what you said. Here’s an advanced trick: you can improve memorization by using spaced repetition. Make your point then repeat it with increasing intervals of time between each repetition.

Five: Five or less.

Most people can only keep a limited number of ideas in their immediate memory at once. Once they exceed that number, they are going to forget some of the things they learned. For most people, that number is five. So regardless of the topic, organize your presentation or argument so that you never list more than five items for any given category.

The five tips are: less is more, use relevant examples, no distractions, repeat, repeat repeat, and five points or less.

Forced Quarantine Versus Forced Vaccination

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

In late September, some folks on OActivists raised questions about the New York state government mandating the swine flu vaccine for its health care workers. One person wrote:

But what of the authority of the state to do this? I do think it's a valid question. ... I think there can only be justification for such coercive action by the state if it's proven that the flu will be more dangerous than usual and if this vaccine has been proven effective against this virus in an objective scientific manner. Is that the correct Objectivist response?

I replied:

No, I don't think that's right.

First, any government action for an epidemic must concern a seriously dangerous disease -- meaning one that risks mass death -- not merely a "more dangerous than usual" flu.  That danger must be demonstrated objectively by lots of actual deaths.  Moreover, people must be unable to take measures to protect themselves from the disease such as wearing masks, not shaking hands, etc.

Moreover, while quarantine of infected people (or perhaps, in severe cases, suspected infected people) might be justified, a proper state could never mandate vaccination.  Why not?  Vaccination primarily protects the person vaccinated.  It's not a violation of the rights of others to fail to be vaccinated.  You have every right to get sick and die!  The tort lies in knowingly or willingly spreading the disease to others.

So... when a person contracts a dangerous communicable disease and then exposes other people to it by ordinary social interactions, he violates their rights.  It's akin to driving a car while drunk.  That person is exposing other people to major threats to their life and limb without their consent.  That's what justifies government action to protect the healthy -- but only in the form of forced isolation of the sick.

I was reminded of this discussion while catching up on some of Leonard Peikoff's podcasts a few days ago. In Episode #82, Dr. Peikoff addressed this issue, briefly answering the questions: (1) "Is it justified to force sick patients into quarantine if the disease is serious enough?" and (2) "What about a vaccine to force citizens to take it?" Like me, he said that quarantine would be justified in certain cases, but that vaccinations could never be required by the state. Good!

Reason vs. Faith

By Mosley from Talk Objectivism,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of The Ayn Rand Institute, discusses how capitalism could develop from a culture that nominally upheld Christian ethics.

This kind of ties in to our show about Faith and Force with Don Watkins.

Download the MP3

(Non-)Buyer's Remorse

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

A friend from Houston emailed me a link to an article titled, "Capitalism's Fundamental Flaw," at Forbes. Its author, Sramana Mitra, grew up in pre-liberalization India, and once:

... embraced Ayn Rand as the one who best articulated a philosophy that rang true to my naturally entrepreneurial mind. Capitalism, meritocracy, individualism, self-correcting market economics, innovation, excellence, integrity, fairness, work-ethic, justice--many of the values that I worship are also those that Rand celebrates in her fiction through her unforgettable characters.

Fair enough: Ms. Mitra no longer "embraces" Ayn Rand. At least she admits what many libertarians and a self-proclaimed "Objectivist" here and there will not. I'll give her that much.

But I have an interesting question to ask. Did Mitra ever embrace Rand in the sense of fully grasping her philosophy on the inductive level? Based on her description of that philosophy and her reasons for rejecting it, I think the answer is: No.

In her next paragraph, Mitra complains that the "flaws" she now sees with her "deeper understanding of how capitalism works today" are unlikely to "correct themselves." Already, there are several flags. While it is true that capitalism is self-correcting (more on this shortly), this is an economic description of what happens under capitalism, and is neither fundamental to grasping the nature of capitalism nor even for making a case for it. (It is also worth noting here that there is no capitalist economy in the world today: Mixtures of free market elements and state controls are properly called, "mixed economies.")

Capitalism, as Ayn Rand herself put it, is, "a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights..." Its justification lies in the fact that for man, the rational animal, to survive and prosper, he needs to be able to profit from the use of his own mind and trade with others. The only system that gives him the opportunity to do so is capitalism. All other systems involve the forcible transfer of wealth, and so are ultimately not conducive to man's survival. Implicit in the recognition that one must be free from threats and harm from others is the acknowledgment that nobody else owes one a living.

It is this last fact that Mitra loses sight of as she builds her case for rejecting the philosophy of Ayn Rand and, with it, capitalism. She starts out talking about self-correction in the field of venture capital and even gives a succinct outline of how that market self-corrects: "Investors and limited partners come to realize that funds are not performing, and they pull the plug on them. Non-performing funds die, those that do well survive, new funds crop up..."

Mitra gets the problems with the auto industry partially right, although she should have mentioned the government's role in setting up GM's failure, from putting its muscle behind the labor unions to distorting the automobile market via such measures as fuel efficiency regulations. Nevertheless, she does at least refuse to stand behind the government bailout of GM. Whether GM fully "deserved" to go bankrupt (or would have even gotten to such a brink under actual capitalism) is an interesting question that Mitra leaves unasked.

It is when she discusses banks, however, that a fundamental flaw in Mitra's grasp of Objectivism becomes readily apparent. Mitra complains that the behavior of "looters" and the government's response to same has resulted in, shall we call it, a "cycle of economic violence."

The government has intervened to save many of them, and now, these bailed out banks want to hand out billions in bonuses to their non-performing employees. Capitalism gave way to welfare economics, and now the government has to intervene further to limit these looters from behaving badly by imposing taxes and regulations. A whole messy cycle that brings me to the core "bug" in the system that Rand once sold me on...

Mitra neglects the government's role in setting up the current economic mess, but that is actually not the fundamental point at which she goes wrong. Here is where she goes wrong:

[T]here is another less obvious bug in capitalism that I don't believe regulation can quite handle. It is the fundamental flaw that our celebrated system rewards speculators much more than creators. A relatively junior hedge-fund manager or a bond trader on Wall Street makes a great deal more money in his career than Charles Kao, who invented the basic physics making optical communication a reality. Dr. Kao, now 73, won the Nobel Prize this year, but his net worth would not compare favorably with that of George Soros.

Yet, who added the real value? Soros or Kao?

Mitra answers (b), apparently failing to notice that "(c) both" is an option, which blows my mind coming as it does from a entrepreneur, and one who has studied Ayn Rand to boot.

Implicit in the question of value, as Mitra may recall, is the question of a value-er. Kao identified facts of reality in physics, but these facts were and would remain value-less to large numbers of people were they left undiscovered, unpublicized, and unapplied. True, Kao discovered some things, many beyond the abilities or determination of most people to grasp.

But how would any inventor or scientist offer anything of value to the general public? He'd have to build a prototype, manufacture a product, and sell it. For all of these steps, the inventor has to convince others that his idea has enough merit that the man on the street will eventually be receptive enough to pay for it out of his own pocket. This is no trivial proposition! (I'm sure Orville and Wilbur Wright endured plenty of ridicule for tinkering around with airplanes in their time...)

All of the steps from discovering a theory to implementing it in marketable ways require information about things such as business, intellectual property law, and markets that few scientists are likely to have, and sums of money, which few scientists will have had time away from their studies to earn. The errors in his political thinking aside (and assuming, arguendo, that Soros's fortune comes only from sources actually possible under laissez-faire), individuals like George Soros are rare indeed: They combine financial resources with business knowledge (or the ability to locate needed business knowledge) and make it available where it might not otherwise be.

Nobody owes anyone else a living. That includes John Galt when he needs a means to market his famous motor and Midas Mulligan when he needs a productive way to invest capital he has sitting around doing nothing.

The fact that Soros is richer than Kao or (to use a better example) a Mulligan is usually richer than a Galt -- under capitalism -- is not a flaw, but a consequence of a virtue of capitalism: Division of labor, which is what allows someone good at finance to work in finance and someone good at theoretical physics to work at theoretical physics. The reason a financier will generally be wealthier than a great physicist is because, generally, a financier is better able to offer more value to more people at any given moment than a physicist. (For example, he can offer the same kind of help to a chemist, a biologist, and a tinkerer in a garage, while the physicist either has a marketable idea or he does not.)

Mitra's former idol, Ayn Rand, was famous for invoking the phrase, "Check your premises." It sounds like Mitra would do well to consider that advice before condemning her apparently unexamined purchase as defective.

-- CAV

BANNED IMAGES OF MUHAMMAD

By Martin Lindeskog from EGO,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Have you seen the "banned images" of Muhammad? For more information, read the following:

• Duke Professor Finishes Yale's Job, Prints Mohammed Images in New Book; FIRE Co-signs Statement of Principle by Adam Kissel.

• Muhammad: The "Banned" Images: by Eugene Volokh.

In 2008, under the glare of the controversy over the Danish cartoons, one of Flemming Rose’s few appearances on an American campus was sponsored by Dr. Gary Hull, director of the Program on Values and Ethics in the Marketplace at Duke University. Dr Hull has for five years taught and supervised the Power of Ideas, one of Duke’s most popular honors programs. In late 2001, he made national news when he posted an article calling for a strong military response to the 9/11 attacks. Duke pulled his website, but reinstated it after the action gained wide publicity. (About page - MuhammadImages.com)

"If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter." — George Washington

Related: My post, MUHAMMAD CARTOON CONTROVERSY: ONE YEAR LATER.

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• Greg Lukianoff: Duke Beats Yale: Censored Images of Muhammad Finally Printed in New Book (huffingtonpost.com)

In Congress, Ignorance is Strength

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

I open this commentary with the introduction to my previous commentary, “The Mainstream Smearing of Ayn Rand.” The disparity in subject is not so irrelevant as one might presume, but I won’t dwell on that matter.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi looked like a deer caught in the blinding headlight of an oncoming freight train, her expression frozen in either ignorance or fear. It has always been difficult to distinguish between the two in her. But the malice in her words was palpable.

CNSNews.com: “Madam Speaker, where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?”

Pelosi: “Are you serious? Are you serious?”

CNSNews.com: “Yes, yes, I am.”

Pelosi then shook her head before taking a question from another reporter. Her press spokesman, Nadeam Elshami, then told CNSNews.com that asking the speaker of the House where the Constitution authorized Congress to mandate that individual Americans buy health insurance was not a "serious question."

“You can put this on the record,” said Elshami. “That is not a serious question. That is not a serious question.”

His iterating mockery of the reporter is indeed on the record. Elshami, deputy communications director and senior adviser to Pelosi, later issued a press release stating that Congress was empowered by the commerce clause in the Constitution to mandate individual health insurance. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), however, differed from that dubious specificity, instead likening the power to compel all Americans to buy health insurance to federal authority to impose speed limits on interstate highways (???), adding that “nobody questions” Congress’s authority to impose controls of any kind. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland) linked the power to the general welfare clause.

Since that demonstration of Congressional arrogance, the House passed its health-care legislation by a vote of 220 to 215, squeaking through only because of the browbeating of Blue Dog Democrats by the Pelosi gang. Hardly a glittering victory. The bill has been sent to the Senate, which has its own versions of health care legislation to scuffle over. The House bill, remarked Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina remarked, soon after Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and her determined co-conspirators posed with smiles of triumph for photo ops, was “dead on arrival.” In the meantime, Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut issued his own warning:

If a government plan is part of the deal, “as a matter of conscience, I will not allow this bill to come to a final vote,” said Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent whose vote Democrats need to overcome GOP filibusters.

It seems that some Senators understand the original purpose of the Senate, which is to act as a check on the populist, “democratic,” majority-rule grounded legislation concocted by the House, to better preserve and protect the life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness of Americans. Unfortunately, only Graham, Lieberman, and a handful of other Senators appreciate that intention. Others have publicly articulated it -- but with reservations.

Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) says he is “not aware” of the Constitution giving Congress the authority to make individuals purchase health insurance, as the health care bills in both the House and Senate require.

No, he isn’t aware of the Constitution mandating Congress the power to force Americans to buy health insurance. And that unawareness won’t stop him from advocating such compulsion.

When asked if there was a specific part of the Constitution that gives Congress the authority to make people buy health insurance, Akaka said: “Not in particular with health insurance. It’s not covered in that respect. But in ways to help citizens in our country to live a good life, let me say it that way, is what we’re trying to do, and in this case, we’re trying to help them with their health.”

Both House and Senate health care bills mandate that people buy health insurance, facing a financial penalty if they do not. Akaka said this mandate should not be looked upon as a penalty…“It’s an idea of making it possible for people and this is what it’s all about,” he said. “I don’t look upon that as a penalty but as a way of getting help with health insurance.”

If Akaka had been sharp enough, he might have echoed House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland and claimed that “helping people” at the point of a gun to buy health insurance came under the (misunderstood) general welfare clause. But, he was not sharp enough, and that neglect simply added to his ignorance quotient.

Other politicians have been more specific in their opposition to any health care legislation. Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah remarked that if the government can force Americans to purchase health insurance, “then there is literally nothing the federal government can’t force us to do.”

Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island is in a dead heat with Senator Akaka in being unaware of any Constitutional mandate to compel Americans to buy health insurance. When asked by a reporter to identify that mandate in the Constitution, Reed answered:

“Let me see,” said Reed. “I would have to check the specific sections, so I’ll have to get back to you on the specific section. But it is not unusual that the Congress has required individuals to do things, like sign up for the draft and do many other things too, which I don’t think are explicitly contained [in the Constitution]. It gives Congress a right to raise an army, but it doesn’t say you can take people and draft them. But since that was something necessary for the functioning of the government over the past several years, the practice on the books, it’s been recognized, the authority to do that.”

The gentleman did not “get back” to the reporter who buttonholed him with that question. He likened the element of compulsion to forcing Americans to register for the military draft. That is okay with him. It is all about duty, and sacrifice, and “giving back” to society. Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska also displayed his ignorance as well as his manners:

“Specifically, where in the Constitution does Congress get its authority to mandate that individuals purchase health insurance?” CNSNews.com asked Nelson.

“Well, you know, I don’t know that I’m a constitutional scholar,” said Nelson. So, I, I’m not going to be able to answer that question.” The senator then turned away to answer another reporter’s question.

If he doesn’t know whether or not he’s a constitutional scholar, then he isn’t one. That answer invites the observation and question: One can expect members of the House of Representatives to be foggy on matters of constitutionality, although their four-year terms ought to allow them to become experts on the subject.

Should Senators come to their jobs as Solons prepared to repel any and all usurpations of the Constitution? Yes. Willing and able to uphold individual rights and the sanctity of private contract? Yes. It is in the nature of the title and the concomitant responsibility of the office. Most senators, however, do not come to the job with anything near a tenuous knowledge of their function. And many of them assume their seats in the Senate with a contempt for the Constitution that may as well be ignorance.

Most Senators complement their ignorance of the Constitution with an indifference to its clearly-worded stipulations, and in this state of mind emulate President Barack Obama, former pseudo-professor of Constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School. Obama is not so much ignorant of that document as hostile to it. It is “deeply flawed,” and a “charter of negative liberties,” which should be amended or rewritten to include the “positive“ liberties of welfare state entitlements and provisions for fiat executive powers. His demonstrated hostility for individual rights and private property is arguably more deep-seated than was FDR’s, whose grasp of the Constitutional limits placed on the executive and legislative branches of government was as blithely disjointed as is Obama’s.

The key to understanding the machinations of Obama, Pelosi, Reid and their allies in Congress is to grasp this: No one can express, as they have, such vehement ignorance without knowing full well what it is they are ignorant of.

It is time Americans called their bluff, as they may well do in the 2010 mid-term elections, or in manners reminiscent of the Tea Parties of 2009, or of the Minute Men of 1775.

A New Anti-Concept?

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Switching planes at Washington National Airport yesterday, I was surprised to find printed copies of Politico in a waiting area. Until then, I had thought it was strictly a web publication. Needless to say, I took a copy and thumbed through it during takeoff.

Within was an installment of a feature called "Arena Digest" titled, "Should GOP worry about tea parties?" I found the following comment by law professor Sherrilyn Ifill interesting:

Tea party conservatism is a help to the image of the Republican Party as an opposition party in a time of Democratic control of the White House and Congress. That's great for TV appearances. But tea party conservatism is a hazard for Republicans seeking a return to power because the kind of anger, vitriol and take-no-prisoners tactics of tea partyism is not a recipe for electoral success or for governing. A majority of Americans still want leaders who want to, and can, actually govern -- that means talking to people across the aisle, compromise, counting votes and advancing policies that bring positive results in the lives of constituents. Tea partyism is not a set of governing ideas. It's a nonstop protest against whatever is the status quo. Unless tea partyism can lose its fringe sensibilities and have as a central animating principle the idea of governance and not just protest, it will never return Republicans to power. To the contrary, it will continue to function as a barrier to "governance" Republican[s], who are the only hope and future of a party that has lost its way.

"Governance Republicans," eh? I've never heard big government Republicans called that before, but Ifill's comment did remind me that I have seen the term "governance" used by certain big-government conservatives here and there. (See David Brooks for a particularly sickening example.) Furthermore, I recall the usage always being in ways that seemed to mildly suggest that the government ought to be running our lives, while at the same time, not putting it quite so bluntlyl. The dictionary gives an ambiguous pair of definitions, and Wikipedia suggests I could be right to be suspicious of the term.

In any event, Ifill is half-right, half-wrong. She corrrectly identifies the Tea Party Movement as a somewhat blind rebellion in need of intellectual leadership, but speaks as if she is oblivious to the idea that laissez faire could be a viable political philosophy. Indeed, she even seems to equate it with anarchism up to and including imagining the same angry type of spirit that animates the anarchist running amok within that movement.

If I am correct that the term "governance" is (or is being used as) an anti-concept, then it would appear to serve mainly to obliterate the proper concept of a government that solely protects individual rights and replace it with statism. As the Tea Party movement evolves, so are its opponents, who are smearing capitalism even before the tea partiers themselves fully realize that that is their natural goal.

-- CAV

NoodleCast #22: Explore Atlas Shrugged, Session 5

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

These discussion questions and podcast were prepared by Diana Hsieh for ExploreAtlasShrugged.com for people interested in creating their own Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups, as well as for anyone wishing to study the novel in more depth. They may be freely used for the study and discussion of Atlas Shrugged, provided that this paragraph remains intact in any reproduction.

Readings

Atlas Shrugged, Part 1, Chapters 9 - 10 (Part A)

• Part 1: Chapter 9: The Sacred and the Profane
  
• Chapter 10: Wyatt's Torch (Sections 1-4)

Or:

• Pages 185-252 in the larger Hardcover or Softcover
  
• Pages 178-241 in the smaller Mass Market Paperback

Podcast

Listen Now

53:53 minutes

Download This Episode

• Enhanced M4A File (25.4 MB)
  
• Standard MP3 File (24.7 MB)

Learn More

• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, also available in hardcover
  
• Essays on Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, edited by Robert Mayhew
  
• Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups of Front Range Objectivism
  
• AtlasShrugged.com, produced by by the Ayn Rand Institute

Discussion Questions

(Note: The listed page numbers are for the larger edition, softcover or hardback.)

Chapter 9: The Sacred and the Profane

Section 1: 253-56

• Why does Hank say what he says to Dagny the morning after their first night together? Why does Dagny's reaction change as she listens to him? Why does she says what she says in response? (254-6)

Section 2: 256-67

• What kind of person is Cherryl Brooks? How and why does Cherryl misunderstand Jim Taggart's character? What does she think of what he says? Why doesn't she see the truth about him? (257-67)

Section 3: 267-9

• Why is Hank Rearden so tortured by the fact of Dagny's past lover? What does that tell her (and us) about him? Why won't she tell Rearden the identity of her prior lover? (268-9)

Section 4: 269-73

• What does Mr. Mowen reveal about his character in conversation with the worker (Owen Kellogg)? Are Mr. Mowen's views coherent or contradictory? How so? (270-3)

Section 5: 273-9

• Why does Hank presume that his invitation to speak at the National Council of Metal Industries is a peace offering? (275) How is he wrong? Why does Dagny think him (too) generous? (274-6)
  
• How and why is Hank optimistic about the future? Why does he think the Equalization of Opportunity Bill will not exist in three years? Is he right (at that time) to be so optimistic? (277)
  
• Why does Hank want Dagny to go on a vacation with him? Why does he want her to wear the bracelet of Rearden Metal? How has his attitude changed since their first night together? Why would anyone guessing their affair be worse for him than for her? (278-9)

Section 6: 279-91

• How is Starnesville in worse shape than other towns Hank and Dagny have seen? Why is it so alarming? (281, 283-6)
  
• Why is Dagny so excited to discover the motor? What disturbs Hank about the discovery? What is the importance of the creation of the motor and the significance of it being abandoned? (287-90)

Whole Chapter

• What is the significance of the title of this chapter?

Chapter 10: Wyatt's Torch

Section 1: 292-4

• How and why did the 20th Century Motors die such an ignoble death? (292-3)

Section 2: 294-8

• How and why does Dagny respond as she does to the claim by Mayor Bascom that she is not Hank's wife? How and why does Hank respond as he does? What is it about Mayor Bascom's explanation that resembles Hank's own views? (296-7)

Section 3: 298-301

• How has Dagny protected Jim from the consequences of his Anti-Dog-Eat-Dog Rule? Did she see that so clearly at the time? Why does she feel a chill on thinking that self-interest is not Jim's motive? What is the alternative? (300)

Section 4: 301-9

• What kinds of shady actions must Rearden take to save his mills? Are those actions moral, even though illegal? How and why do government controls make criminals of honest men? (302)
  
• What does Lillian reveal about herself and her values in her conversation with Rearden? How does Rearden give Lillian more credit than she deserves? What does she deserve? What are her motives? (304-9)
  
• Why does Lillian think that Rearden has an obligation to make her happy? Is that a reasonable expectation? Is it a common expectation? Should Hank oblige her? (307)

Response to Intellectual Smears

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Back in September, I received the following e-mail from some random guy "alan" in response to some promotion I was doing for the Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups:

Date: 11 September 2009 9:18:54 AM MDT
From: alan
To: Diana Hsieh
Subject: I know some about A.R., but have a question or 2

Hello Diana,

I have read that the fittest survive, that the best get the most, that those who deserve more get more (sports players, CEO, etc.), but is there not a place for compassion in her teaching?  Noblese Oblige (sp.?)  Take of the least of you?  You are your brother's keeper?  Moral obligation? And the like?  Is there not a sense of greater responsibility in the Rand teaching?  If not then is anyone responsible for the pressing (planetary, national, social) needs of the moment, or is it merely me, me, me?  I get that some have been given the ability to develop their intelligence ( & have a "big" brain), but how about a "big" heart.  Would that not be crucial in these day especially?  And if we are not "balanced" like that, ie. wise & prudent, then is there any chance of human or planetary survival?  Maybe humans have a death wish individually AND collectively.  And who would want to live in a world of no love anyway?  No compassion?  No openness to the sweetness of the connectedness/oneness of life?  That WOULD be delusional, & most sad.  You'd think there'd be a lesson there. 

Ya thank?
Sincerely, A.

Here's my reply:

Date: 11 September 2009 9:44:18 AM MDT
From: Diana Hsieh
To: alan
Subject: Re: I know some about A.R., but have a question or 2

[quoted text omitted]

Ayn Rand does not advocate the "survival of the fittest."  She advocates each person pursuing his own life and happiness by reason, with the voluntary, non-sacrificial cooperation of other rational people.

Compassion and kindness are part of AR's values, albeit not primary virtues.  You see them in her heros in Atlas Shrugged, and she practiced them in her own life.  In contrast -- and just as in real life -- the people who claim to be motivated by such feelings are often indifferent to the sufferings of innocent people.  Plus, kindness towards others is a very different matter than sacrificing yourself to them -- or thinking yourself obligated to "keep" them.

If you want to discuss these issues more, I'd definitely recommend that you join one of the Atlas Shrugged Reading Groups, if you can.  I think you'd find much of interest in AR's views -- as opposed to these common misconceptions about them.

-- DMH

Then the conversation went downhill:

Date: 14 September 2009 12:06:28 AM MDT
From: alan
To: Diana Hsieh
Subject: Re: I know some about A.R., but have a question or 2

Who are these people you mention that claim to be motivated by compassion & kindness & are indifferent to the suffering of innocent people.  Would they be religious fundamentalist conservative politicians who are all so keen to kill people all around the world & let them be killed & suffer in Africa?  Possibly like Hitler & the like who are elitists, which reminds me of libertarians.  The only reasonable thing to know is that very intelligent people are all so rational just like the Nazis in their zeal for a better more pure world free of racial "impurity".  And so it would be more rational to realize the folly of anything other than to follow the heart, or as I say mind your heart.  A common saying is that the mind is a terrible master, but an wonderful servant (of the heart).  The longest distance is between the head (mind) & the heart.  I ask questions to hear your response - that's all.  Many/some would follow their bliss, & advise to be in one's heart, in one's body, in the (holy) moment or present.  A common misconception is that we as people are our mind, & it is essentially worshiped.

AKG

My reply wasn't so friendly. (I decided to ignore the difference between libertarianism and Objectivism in this context, as I just didn't think it relevant.)

Date: 14 September 2009 7:49:09 AM MDT
From: Diana Hsieh
To: alan
Subject: Re: I know some about A.R., but have a question or 2

[quoted text omitted]

Wow, you just likened me to Hilter.  I suppose that's where "following your heart rather than your head" takes you.  Who cares about the lack of any actual connection?  Who cares about the fact that I'm explicitly opposed to every philosophical principle and action of the Third Reich?  Why bother with pesky things like facts?  You just feel that I'm mean -- and Hitler was mean too, right?

That's not just absurd; it's crazy-talk.  One cannot have a sensible conversation on that basis.  That's where your distain for reason takes you: you cannot muster the semblance of rational exchange.

In fact, Hitler was an ardent proponent of following the heart rather than the head.  Reason would never sanction his racism, nor his brutality, nor his totalitarian state, nor killing a single innocent person.  He did that by that preaching exactly what you preach: ignore facts, reason, and logic; indulge the emotions; the heart is superior to the head.  The result -- the inevitable result of that -- is killing fields.

I'm sure you won't worry about that very real connection between Hitler's views and your own.  After all, you're full of warm and fuzzy emotions -- not mean ones like Hitler!  That's why you likened me to a mass murderer in your second e-mail.  Yeah, that was very nice, very warm and fuzzy.  Not.

Civilization requires people to deal with each other as rational persons.  Since you reject that -- not just in the abstract but in your very method of spewing words without thought -- this conversation is over.

-- DMH

Looking back on it now, I'm not happy with that response. Sure, the guy deserved all that. He deserved plenty more. Yet I cannot imagine that my words did any good whatsoever. So I ask: Should I have responded differently? Or not responded at all? And why?

I try to avoid such exchanges as much as possible. Yet when I find myself in them, I often feel like I ought to say something. I hate to leave such awful and wrong claims about Ayn Rand's views unchallenged. Yet everything that I might say either seems too soft to be just -- or too harsh to be of any use.

What do you think?

Krening OpEd: Dissent and Nationalized Health Care

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The November 8, 2009 Denver Post has just published Hannah Krening's OpEd, "Dissent and Nationalization of Health Care".

Here's the opening:

I am a law-abiding citizen and breast cancer survivor, and I completely disagree with the current move to nationalize health care. Dissent is not new to me. As a teenager I worked to abolish the draft. Now, as then, my dissent is as a thinking American, not a member of an "un-American mob."

If government owns and pays for my health care, they own my body just as a farmer owns his cow. If government is paying, it will decide what kind of care I get and when I will get it. Under "free health care for all," access will diminish as lines lengthen, and my care may not be there when I really need it.

(Read the full text of "Dissent and Nationalization of Health Care".)

Although supporters of free-market health care reform lost a battle last night in the House vote, the war is not over -- it has merely shifted to the Senate.

Ed Morrissey of HotAir.com notes in "Is this the high-water mark for ObamaCare?":

The Democrats wheedled, cajoled, begged, and finally abandoned its defense of abortion -- truly a watershed moment -- in order to get their version of ObamaCare passed ...in the House of Representatives, where they enjoy a 75-seat majority. In the end, they could only muster a five-vote win on Nancy Pelosi's bill out of that strong majority. Until this week, most had assumed that any ObamaCare bill would pass the House easily, but that the fight would be in the Senate.

So what does this 220-215 vote tell us? Capitol Hill Democrats know that this bill is an albatross. It's true that Pelosi was able at the end to negotiate votes to allow a few at-risk Democrats that supported the bill to oppose it in the final vote, but even that tells a tale of fear and consciousness of unpopularity. The razor-thin vote, as well as a number of earlier, more sincere defections, show that this bill was a radical and expensive approach to fix a 13% problem -- and even most of the Democrats know it.

...We always thought the fight was in the Senate, so the only real surprise yesterday was how weak Pelosi actually was on ObamaCare.

Morrissey also discusses some of the other procedural hurdles before ObamaCare can become law.

The fight is far from over.

So thank you, Hannah, for speaking out and for mentioning FIRM and Front Range Objectivism in your OpEd byline!

The Emotionalist Republic

By Greg Perkins from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Objectivism Seminar is working through Dr. Leonard Peikoff's all-too-topical book, The Ominous Parallels. In it, he explores what gave rise to to the fascist, totalitarian regime of Nazi Germany -- and analyzes whether and how a fascist, totalitarian regime could emerge here in America.

Vegan Channels the Pope

By Diana Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Here's an unexpected demonstration of the power of philosophy, even amongst those completely oblivious to it. In this video, a rather ditzy vegan girl addresses the charge that vegans and vegetarians are guilty of killing tons of wild animals in the process of planting and harvesting crops. (It's true!)



As I observed in a comment on Free the Animal, she doesn't know it, but she's actually appealing to the Catholic doctrine of double effect.

The doctrine (or principle) of double effect is often invoked to explain the permissibility of an action that causes a serious harm, such as the death of a human being, as a side effect of promoting some good end. It is claimed that sometimes it is permissible to cause such a harm as a side effect (or "double effect") of bringing about a good result even though it would not be permissible to cause such a harm as a means to bringing about the same good end. This reasoning is summarized with the claim that sometimes it is permissible to bring about as a merely foreseen side effect a harmful event that it would be impermissible to bring about intentionally.

How does that apply here? According to ditzy-vegan-girl, it's morally okay to do something wrong (like killing animals) as an unintended side effect of pursuing a good end (like eating veggies) but not okay to do that same wrong thing (killing animals) as a direct means to your ends (like eating meat).

Of course, the doctrine of double effect doesn't actually help her answer the moral charge here. The doctrine is a handy tool of rationalization for people with ethics so disconnected from reality that they simply must violate them to live. It's not a real ethical principle.

Ditzy-vegan-girl surely hasn't ever heard of the doctrine of double effect, yet she's using it all the same. That's the power of philosophy.

Wages: Sticky on the downside

By SN from Software Nerd,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Economists speak of wages being "sticky" on the downside. What they mean is this: companies are usually slow to cut wages. New hiring freezes up very fast at signs of an economic downturn. Layoffs take place pretty soon too -- at least in the U.S. (not so in Europe, with its laws). For current-workers, wage freezes are common. However, wage cuts seem to be a last resort.

For most companies, this is poor economics. For most companies that are slow to cut wages, the main factor is a misguided ethics. Contrary to left-wing myth, managers usually feel good about paying their employees what they consider to be a fair wage, and managers often think of employees as being part of their team. Managers often feel it is their responsibility to try to keep their employees' wages steady. In addition to this, employees think the same way too. Therefore, they would often see a cut in wages as unfair to them.

This downward "stickiness" means that markets take longer to readjust, and to rebound.

Sometimes, companies will try "job sharing". This allows workers to work part time for less pay. It has the effect of keeping more employees on the payroll. However, if it does not reduce the actual wages-per-hour, it does not address the real issue: cutting costs. (It can be a good managerial strategy in some more limited slow-downs.) During the depression, Ford company had many workers working 3 days a week. Instead, if they'd been working all five days for what was previously 5-days pay, the company would have been able to make more goods for less. This would allow them to cut prices to customers. If there is insufficient demand even at those lower prices, then it is better for the extra workers to work in some other industry. This process of falling prices for labor and for goods would quickly work its way though the system and the end result would be a more efficient placement of capital and employees across industries.

Instead, politicians always try to slow the re-adjustment. This was Hoover's huge mistake post 1929. He called in businessmen and got their geniune committment to slow the process of readjustment; though he criticized the Smoot-Hawley law, he did not veto it increasing protectionism that slowed the process of re-adjustment; finally, instead of allowing commodity prices to adjust downward, he supported them (farmers wanted their prices to stay high). On top of all this, there were public works and cheap credit: two other ways governments stifle re-adjustment.

History surely rhymes.

Announcement: The new format and blog

By Mosley from Talk Objectivism,cross-posted by MetaBlog

If you listened to the last show then you knew this was coming. Arthur and I have decided to change the format of the show. Instead of having a weekly show we are going to move to a monthly format. That way we have more time to outline what we want to cover and find guests (experts) to be on the show.

Also, to keep the community active around the show I restarted the blog. Arthur and I will be posting stories and videos on the blog that tie in to what the topic will be during that month. We feel this will get people excited about what we are going to cover and hopefully then join us live when we record the show.

If you are wondering when the next show will be recorded, thats a good question. We will announce that once we book our guest. We feel that since we are no longer doing a weekly show we can be more flexible to accommodate out guest, since they will be a big part of the new format.

We are also looking for people to help us keep the blog updated. All you have to do is find interesting stories and headlines that objectivist would be interested and then post a link and summery about them. If you would like to do that just send me an email. Thanks!

Photo by lightmatter

Too Late!

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Over at Fresh Bilge, Alan Sullivan points to a rather lengthy story about one David Rubin, whose occupation in government finance has landed him in hot water for "conspiracy, wire fraud and obstructing federal tax authorities." Sullivan remarks, "The more money that government hands out, the more opportunities for corruption multiply." True enough, but this fire rates more than one alarm, and this shouldn't have been the first: The time to complain about corruption is whenever central planning of any kind is proposed or implemented.

I haven't finished the story and am not sure I will, but two things strike me as worth bringing up. First, the story is as long as it is in part because of the byzantine financial regulations it has to explain, and that make the David Rubins of the world possible -- both in terms of creating a need for people willing to navigate said regulations and in terms of these regulations representing a space at the public trough. I note further that many measures are already in place to prevent earning "too much" profit in these transactions, while at the same time it is absurd to expect municipal investments to grow without compensating the investors.

Second, I am unimpressed by the $6 billion estimate of the annual cost to taxpayers reported to be due to "public corruption, officials' mistakes and lack of disclosure." Every billion is only about three dollars per head in America. This is chump change compared to the enormous existing price tag for central planning at the federal, state, and local levels -- more commonly and variously known as "entitlement programs," "regulations," and "infrastructure." This "non-corrupt" tab is set to expand by trillions on Barack Obama's watch -- after George W. Bush got the ball rolling in 2008 with his financial "bailouts."

Certainly, I do not condone corruption, which would exist (albeit on a much more limited scale) even under capitalism. However, for the same reason I oppose the focus on reducing "earmarks" at the Congressional level, I find that concerns about corruption too frequently and easily distract from the real problem, which is that too many Americans regard theft as legitimate when performed by government officials in the name of central planning. The reason for this is the widespread acceptance of altruism, which excuses such theft on moral grounds.

Unsurprisingly, altruism -- being impossible to practice consistently by anyone interested in remaining alive -- demands its own version of corruption on the moral level: hypocrisy. Hypocrisy, too, is wrong, but too many people for too long have allowed that breach between words and deeds to distract them from asking whether altruism itself is a moral problem.

That would kill two birds with one stone.

-- CAV

Loser Takes All

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The "off-off-year" elections went about as well as one could expect: The American people essentially rejected both of last year's presidential candidates. Glenn Reynolds offers what I think is a pretty good overall integration of how voters probably weighed local concerns and discontent with a far-left Congress and Obama Administration:

All politics is local, they say, and Tuesday's off-off-year elections certainly had their local angles. Jon Corzine has been a terrible governor even by the undemanding standards of terribly governed New Jersey. Creigh Deeds, though he looked good to Democratic Party recruiters not long ago, turned out to be an undistinguished campaigner, more driven by the concerns of Washington Post editorialists than of Virginia voters. And NY-23 Republican nomineee Dede Scozzafava was a bizarre choice, bizarre enough to inspire a seemingly quixotic third-party run by Doug Hoffman.

Reynolds rightly notes later that, "[I]f [Obama] were the political marvel he was thought to be, these races wouldn't have been contests, but walkovers. So one consequence of this Election Day is the end of his special political magic." Reynolds sees Obama's problem as part-agenda and part-competence.

Maybe so, but I find myself both dubious and ambivalent about the latter. First, Obama's agenda, being demonstrably bad for America, will masquerade somewhat as incompetence to the extent that he can enact it. This will both magnify the problem he has with inexperience (that Reynolds notes) and make it too easy to excuse his actual policy failures: I shudder to imagine a future Democrat President reintroducing the Obama agenda and, thanks to this perception of ineptitude, getting away with an assertion like, "Obama was incompetent. Socialism will work this time." Second, to the extent that Obama really is incompetent, I find this mostly a relief since he spends much more time trying to re-shape America than doing his actual job, anyway.

Reynolds' short-term prognosis is that there isn't any longer any steam behind the locomotive of that train Obama keeps trying to herd us all onto: "It'll be politics as usual from now on, and we can thank Obama, at least, for making politics-as-usual seem not so bad after all ..." I hope he's right in the short term, but wrong in the long term. Politics-as-usual hasn't looked so good in a long time, but since "politics-as-usual" means a mixed economy, and mixed economies trend towards dictatorship, America is going to have to reject "politics-as-usual" sooner or later.

Fortunately, NY-23, where Bill Owens became the first Democrat to win in over a century yesterday, offers some hope that Americans are waking up to this idea. Recall that Newt Gingrich lost his argument that the Republicans should run as "Democrats Lite," to Sarah Palin when many Republicans started backing the Conservative Party candidate in that election.

It would appear, though, based on the huge Republican margin in that district reflected in the seven previous elections, that Sarah Palin also lost her (Reaganesque) argument -- that a little bit of theocracy is okay with the American voter -- last night. Doug Hoffman mixes a small government economic outlook -- which should have been a sure winner -- with a very socially-conservative one that I, for one, find completely unacceptable. Eric Scheie expresses similar "misgivings" on Hoffman and adds:

Perhaps the voters had had it with all the national hype, and finally decided they'd rather just vote for a Democrat who said he was a Democrat rather than be dragged against their will into a much-hyped "referendum" on a "bloody Republican civil war" they never asked to fight.

That kind of exhaustion, too, should tell the Republicans something: Just because Americans don't want the government's hands in their wallets doesn't mean they do want to let the government back into their bedrooms. Or, as one blogger memorably put it, "Your rights end where my pockets begin."

I think Scheie is premature to ask whether this was, as his post title put it, a possible "victory for laissez-faire," but that (or at least progress towards it) is what was missing from the ballot. It will be a long time before Americans have that option, but the time for "moral suasion" as our nation's first anti-slavery movement called it, does appear to be ripe for advocates of individual rights. (Ayn Rand called this "intellectual activism.")

Yes, it is good news that this election possibly represents a big loss of momentum for the Democrats, but that last is even better news. In terms of the ballot choices, there was no way for Americans to win politically last night. So we did the next best thing: we stalled for time instead.

-- CAV

Studying History: Why and How

By Scott Powell from Powell History Recommends,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Mainstream Smearing of Ayn Rand

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

More famous words from one of our wannabe Platonic guardians:

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi looked like a deer caught in the blinding headlight of an oncoming freight train, her expression frozen in either ignorance or fear. It has always been difficult to distinguish between the two in her. But the malice in her words was palpable.

CNSNews.com: “Madam Speaker, where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?”

Pelosi: “Are you serious? Are you serious?”

CNSNews.com: “Yes, yes, I am.”

Pelosi then shook her head before taking a question from another reporter. Her press spokesman, Nadeam Elshami, then told CNSNews.com that asking the speaker of the House where the Constitution authorized Congress to mandate that individual Americans buy health insurance was not a "serious question."

“You can put this on the record,” said Elshami. “That is not a serious question. That is not a serious question.”

His iterating mockery of the reporter is indeed on the record. Elshami, deputy communications director and senior adviser to Pelosi, later issued a press release stating that Congress was empowered by the commerce clause in the Constitution to mandate individual health insurance. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), however, differed from that dubious specificity, instead likening the power to compel all Americans to buy health insurance to federal authority to impose speed limits on interstate highways (???), adding that “nobody questions” Congress’s authority to impose controls of any kind. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland) linked the power to the general welfare clause.

All in all, nobody in Congress, it seems, treats questioning Congressional powers as a serious matter. Pelosi, Leahy, Hoyer, not to mention President Barack Obama, dismissively deflect any suggestion that particular members of Congress are violating their oaths to uphold and defend the Constitution. A handful of words that meant something entirely different to the authors of the Constitution -- in fact, the exact opposite of Congressional renditions -- is their sole sanction for expanding government powers. (And where is the Supreme Court on this issue? Absent from the bench, of course.)

Recounting this episode in crass contempt and learned ignorance is an overture to the subject of the mainstream critical establishment’s reception of the two biographies of Ayn Rand, Anne C. Heller’s Ayn Rand and the World She Made (Doubleday), and Jennifer Burns’ Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right (Oxford University Press). As most of our lawmakers consider raising the subject of the unlawfulness of their actions as beyond the bounds of polite or legitimate enquiry, the overwhelming consensus of contemporary critics is that Ayn Rand’s philosophy of reason and individual rights cannot -- should not -- be taken seriously and must be treated with similar contempt and ignorance. And, as with the libertarians (see my previous commentary), the mainstream press’s chief purpose in paying any attention to the Heller and Burns books is to attack Rand by cadging supporting statements from both biographies.

(I shall repeat here that I have not yet read the Heller and Burns biographies, but plan to. The subject here, again, is the reviewers, not the books or their authors.)

Late last year and early this year, when observers were reporting the uncanny similarities between current events and the events in Atlas Shrugged, there was nothing to do but report the phenomena. The parallels were undeniable and untouchable. But the appearance of these books now is propinquitous.

Her stalwart critics cannot refute her philosophy. The best of them, such as British philosopher Anthony Clifford Grayling (discussed below), can only dazzle the gullible with mental whirligigs. Some critics are so unread and illiterate that they can never grasp the philosophy, but only sense its danger to their intellectual and moral lethargy in an animalistic, feral manner. So they all adopt the policy of ad hominem, frequently interspersing their attacks on her person with generous ad captandum monologues. As I suggested in my previous commentary, imagine if it were reported that Aristotle beat his wife (as claimed, perhaps, by Roman biographer Suetonius in a newly discovered fragment), then that would constitute sufficient refutation of his work.

So it is with the mainstream media and literary treatment of Rand. In all instances, the fear, ignorance and malice in these reviews are palpable. For the present, their authors monopolize the podium of the culture.

TIME’s review of both biographies, “Ayn Rand: Extremist or Visionary?” (October 12) is perhaps the shortest. It does not so much review the books as borrow indiscriminately from them. After attempting to make Rand look comical in the first paragraph, the review goes on:

The bad economy has been good news for Rand's legacy. Her fierce denunciations of government regulation have sent sales of her two best-known novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, soaring. Yet her me-first brand of capitalism has been excoriated for fomenting the recent financial crisis. And her most famous former acolyte--onetime Fed chairman Alan Greenspan--has been blamed for inflating the housing bubble by refusing to intervene in the market.

Does the author of the review attempt to rebut the charges that Rand’s philosophy of laissez-faire capitalism was responsible for the financial crisis, and suggest instead that government intervention was and remains the culprit? No. If she had, she would not have insinuated that Alan Greenspan still believed in free markets, and that blame for the crisis could be pinned on them. An ounce of acuity in the author about Greenspan’s position would have led her to suspect that the former Federal Reserve chairman had abandoned laissez-faire in favor of intervention.

The TIME review goes on:

In the midst of the newly rekindled debate, two excellent biographies have just been published: Ayn Rand and the World She Made, by Anne C. Heller…is a comprehensive study, in novelistic detail, of Rand's personal life, and Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right, by Jennifer Burns…leans more heavily on Rand's theories and politics.

TIME’s reviewer, however, does not dwell on the theories and politics, but rather on Rand herself, quoting more often from Burns’ book than from Heller’s. Among other inaccuracies, it asserts that Rand’s horrible experience in Soviet Russia was the genesis of her “hatred of communism and any sort of collectivism,” which hatred “would guide her life” and somehow lead to the formulation of a philosophy. If the review’s author had bothered to investigate further (and perhaps read the biographies a little more closely), she would have seen that Rand abhorred collectivism before the Bolshevik coup and the imposition of communist rule in Russia. The reviewer does not attempt to answer whether Rand was an “extremist” or a “visionary.” She simply concludes that Rand’s emotions trumped reason and that, consequently, she was a pathetic person.

Janet Maslin in her New York Times review, “Twin Biographies of a Singular Woman, Ayn Rand” (October 22), emulating TIME’s review, opens with the same ridiculing reference to Rand’s appearance, stressing her gold dollar-sign pin, calling it a “Halloween-ready costume.” That more or less sets the tone of Maslin’s review.

Repeating the error that Rand’s antipathy for any kind of collectivism was the foundation of what would become her philosophy of Objectivism, Maslin writes:

Ms. Heller’s book is worth its $35 price, which is not the kind of detail that Rand herself would have been shy about trumpeting. When Russian Bolshevik soldiers commandeered and closed the St. Petersburg pharmacy run by Zinovy Rosenbaum [Rand‘s father], they made a lifelong capitalist of his 12-year-old daughter, Alissa [Rand], who would wind up fusing the subversive power of the Russian political novel with glittering Hollywood-fueled visions of the American dream.

Maslin, like Andrea Sachs of TIME and other reviewers, fairly gloats over Rand’s affair with Nathaniel Branden, her “foremost acolyte and officially anointed intellectual heir,” and predictably attaches more importance to it than to the body of Rand’s work.

Both books characterize Rand’s long relationship with Branden as the most important connection in her life. And both use it to illustrate how drastically Rand’s personal ties could rupture. The amphetamine-addicted, self-styled goddess in both books becomes so moody and volatile that her associates do not simply part ways with her. Some, like Branden and his wife, Barbara, wind up excommunicated.

Maslin concludes that Rand had “an hypnotic effect on those in her orbit,” implying that her ideas and logic were of less importance than her need to have “acolytes” and her “acolytes” needing her brand of religion. Referring to Rand’s first days in Hollywood -- a “fishy story” which Maslin writes was investigated by Heller -- Maslin concludes that Rand’s chief asset was her “charisma”:

Rand might have expressed disdain for that charisma, but it was enough to stop [Cecil B.] DeMille in his tracks. She would have been nowhere without it.

Sam Anderson’s New York Magazine review, “Mrs. Logic” (October 18), is arguably worse than either Maslin’s or Sachs’. Anderson, who confesses that he was once a student of Objectivism, reviews only Heller’s book, and mooches from it with scanty attribution and imposes his own evaluation on the information he gleans from it, so that rarely can one distinguish between his and Heller‘s evaluations. Beginning his review with a snide narration of what people could expect upon first meeting Rand, he writes:

….[S]he would open the conversation with a line that seems destined to go down as one of history’s all-time classic icebreakers: “Tell me your premises.” Once you’d managed to mumble something halfhearted about loving your family, say, or the Golden Rule, Rand would set about systematically exposing all of your logical contradictions, then steer you toward her own inviolable set of premises: that man is a heroic being, achievement is the aim of life, existence exists, A is A, and so forth—the whole Objectivist catechism. And once you conceded any part of that basic platform, the game was pretty much over. She’d start piecing together her rationalist Tinkertoys until the mighty Randian edifice towered over you: a rigidly logical Art Deco skyscraper, 30 or 40 feet tall, with little plastic industrialists peeking out the windows—a shining monument to the glories of individualism, the virtues of selfishness, and the deep morality of laissez-faire capitalism. Grant Ayn Rand a premise and you’d leave with a lifestyle.

Among Anderson’s numerous egregious and vicious statements about Rand, two stand out:

It’s easy to chuckle at Rand, smugly, from the safe distance of intervening decades or an opposed ideology, but in person—her big black eyes flashing deep into the night, fueled by nicotine, caffeine, and amphetamines—she was apparently an irresistible force, a machine of pure reason, a free-market Spock who converted doubters left, right, and center. Eyewitnesses say that she never lost an argument.

Thus the subtitle of Anderson’s review: “Ayn Rand never got into an argument she couldn’t win. Except, perhaps, with herself.” Harping again on the allegedly subjective, virtually neurotic origins and nature of Objectivism, he notes:

Anne Heller’s new biography…allows us to poke our heads, for the first time, into the Russian-American’s overheated philosophical subbasement. After reading the details of Rand’s early life, I find it hard to think of Objectivism as very objective at all—it looks more like a rational program retrofitted to a lifelong temperament, a fantasy world created to cancel the nightmare of a terrifying childhood….No one, according to Heller’s portrait, struggled with the unreality of Objectivism more than Rand herself. She wept, throughout her life, at the world’s refusal to conform to her ideal vision of it. Although she claimed that “one must never attempt to fake reality in any manner,” she repeatedly withheld or distorted facts to feed her own mythology.

This is the theme of Anderson’s whole review: Ayn Rand created her own “mythology”; ergo, she was as phony as her philosophy. He can’t take her seriously, nor should anyone else.

An unsigned review of the Heller and Burns biographies in The Economist, "Capitalism's martyred hero" (October 22), repeats but does not dwell on the “mythology” theme:

But her most important attribute was her talent for myth-making. Rand perfected her literary art as a screenwriter in Hollywood. And she dealt in Hollywood-style dichotomies between good and evil, between white-hatted capitalists and black-hatted collectivists. Greys don’t interest me, she once said. “Atlas Shrugged” conjured up a world in which all creative businessmen had gone on strike, retreating to Galt’s Gulch in Colorado, and culminated in a dramatic court scene in which Galt detailed the evils of collectivism.

The reviewer obviously had not read Atlas Shrugged to the end; John Galt does not appear in any courtroom scene. (Perhaps the reviewer had read The Fountainhead, but Galt and Howard Roark are emphatically not the same.) The swipes taken against Rand in this review are less offensive than those in the Anderson and Maslin reviews. The Economist reviewer at least concedes that Atlas Shrugged especially has permanent relevance and that Rand was right.

Jennifer Burns is better versed in conservative thought. Both are well worth reading, partly because Rand’s life was so extraordinary and partly because the questions that she raised about the proper power of government are just as urgent now as they ever were….Rand was the single most uncompromising critic of the collectivist tide that swept across the capitalist world in the wake of the Depression. For her, government was nothing more than licensed robbery and altruism just an excuse for power-grabbing. Intellectuals and bureaucrats might pose as champions of the people against the powerful. But in reality they were empire builders who were motivated by a noxious mixture of envy and greed.

The review concludes:

Yet Rand’s appeal has been undimmed by either the vituperation of her critics or the peculiarity of her admirers. Her insight in “Atlas Shrugged”—that society cannot thrive unless it is willing to give freedom to its entrepreneurs and innovators—has proved to be prescient.

Nick Gillespie, former editor-in-chief of Reason magazine and now editor of Reason.com and Reason.tv, in his Fall Wilson Quarterly review, “Ready for Her Close-Up,” asks:

Has any major postwar American author taken as much critical abuse as Ayn Rand? Her best-known novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, have sold more than 12 million copies in the United States alone and were ranked first and second in a 1998 Modern Library reader survey of the “greatest books” of the 20th century. Yet over the years, Rand’s writing has been routinely dismissed as juvenile and subliterate when it has been considered at all.

Later on, Gillespie notes:

Despite—or perhaps because of—such persistent mass appeal, critics have never been kind to Rand.

And:

Contempt has long been the standard literati response to Rand. Like Jack Kerouac, Rand is typically written off as a writer whose basic appeal is to maladjusted adolescents, a sort of vaguely embarrassing starter author who is quickly outgrown by those of us who develop more sophisticated aesthetic and ideological tastes. There’s more than a small degree of truth to such a characterization, but the extreme prejudice with which Rand is dismissed belies a body of work that continues to reach new audiences.

Of all the reviews discussed here, Gillespie’s is the fairest, not only to Rand, but to the Burns and Heller biographies. But the writer still feels compelled to take swings at Rand’s persona; it is the fairest review in terms of there being in it the least number of sneers and snorts directed at Rand. It is almost as though Gillespie were under some editorial obligation to include them (otherwise the review might not have passed muster in the Quarterly). He quotes Burns early in the article:

That Rand’s life story is in many ways more melodramatic, unbelievable, and conflicted than one of her own plots certainly helps to keep the reader’s attention. As Burns puts it, “The clash between her romantic and rational sides makes [her life] not a tale of triumph, but a tragedy of sorts.”

And, remarking on both biographies, ends it with:

Together, they provide a rounded portrait of a woman who, as Burns writes, “tried to nurture herself exclusively on ideas.” As Rand’s biography underscores, she failed miserably in that, even as she helped create an ideological framework that continues to energize debate in contemporary America.

By far the longest and most irrelevant review of the Heller and Burns biographies appeared September 14 in The New Republic, Jonathan Chait’s “Wealthcare.” It is a lengthy, bilious protest against the recent revolt of the “right” against an economically and politically carnivorous White House and Congress, a revolt which Chait blames almost exclusively on Rand. At the same time, it is the most honest of all the reviews, for Chait doesn’t hide behind cowardly chortles and guffaws to argue his position. However, lumping her together with conservative politicians, betrayed Obama supporters, and Tea Partiers, Chait writes of the uprising:

There is another way to describe this conservative idea. It is the ideology of Ayn Rand. Some, though not all, of the conservatives protesting against redistribution and conferring the highest moral prestige upon material success explicitly identify themselves as acolytes of Rand.

A few more clicks to the left and The New Republic’s masthead could very well read The Daily Worker. Chait, a senior editor of the publication, has apparently read Rand’s novels -- perhaps even some of her non-fiction essays on politics -- for he contrasts free market economics with socialist economics, and almost gets John Galt’s speech right. He handily explicates Rand’s ethics of productive work. For example:

It was Atlas Shrugged that Rand deemed the apogee of her life’s work and the definitive statement of her philosophy. She believed that the principle of trade governed all human relationships--that in a free market one earned money only by creating value for others. Hence, one’s value to society could be measured by his income. History largely consisted of "looters and moochers" stealing from society’s productive elements.

Chait quotes from Galt’s speech about the pyramid of ability -- not a pyramid of intellect, as Chait implies, for ability presupposes a mind or an intellect, while ability or competence or productive work is the observable, measurable consequence of such a mind in action, and can be measured as a value -- and calls it an “inverted Marxism.” And even though Chait demonstrates a more than superficial understanding of Rand’s ethics -- certainly more than any of the other reviewers discussed in this commentary -- he still sides with collectivism. Earlier in his review he remarked about the revolt against Obama and his socialist agenda, before discussing Rand‘s role in it:

In these disparate comments we can see the outlines of a coherent view of society. It expresses its opposition to redistribution not in practical terms--that taking from the rich harms the economy--but in moral absolutes, that taking from the rich is wrong. It likewise glorifies selfishness as a virtue. It denies any basis, other than raw force, for using government to reduce economic inequality. It holds people completely responsible for their own success or failure, and thus concludes that when government helps the disadvantaged, it consequently punishes virtue and rewards sloth. And it indulges the hopeful prospect that the rich will revolt against their ill treatment by going on strike, simultaneously punishing the inferiors who have exploited them while teaching them the folly of their ways.

Chait’s epistemological errors include thinking that “society” is an actual, independent, volitional entity, and that the term “rich” does not include the middle class, that part of “society” which also performs productive work. This is to be expected of a committed collectivist such as Chait, and when he coheres to Marxist criticism, his arguments begin to disintegrate. To wit:

Rand’s political philosophy remained amorphous in her early years. Aside from a revulsion at communism [sic], her primary influence was Nietzsche, whose exaltation of the superior individual spoke to her personally….In essence, Rand advocated an inverted Marxism. In the Marxist analysis, workers produce all value, and capitalists merely leech off their labor. Rand posited the opposite….Rand’s hotly pro-capitalist novels oddly mirrored the Socialist Realist style, with two-dimensional characters serving as ideological props….Like her old idol Nietzsche, she denounced a transvaluation of values according to which the strong had been made weak and the weak were praised as the strong….Rand called her doctrine "Objectivism," and it eventually expanded well beyond politics and economics to psychology, culture, science (she considered the entire field of physics "corrupt"), and sundry other fields. Objectivism was premised on the absolute centrality of logic to all human endeavors. Emotion and taste had no place….Ultimately the Objectivist movement failed for the same reason that communism failed: it tried to make its people live by the dictates of a totalizing ideology that failed to honor the realities of human existence. Rand’s movement devolved into a corrupt and cruel parody of itself.

Ultimately, Chait, while he accuses Rand (perhaps influenced by the Heller and Burns biographies) of shutting out the world in order to sustain her “world view,” is himself ideologically insulated against the observable phenomenon that Objectivism is “on a roll,” that it has hardly failed. The balance of his review is largely a disjointed and distracting critique of conservative/Republican economic policies and an endorsement of Obama’s, only tenuously connected to the biographies.

Lastly, A.C. Grayling, a British professor of philosophy at Birbeck College, University of London, and a frequent book reviewer for, all of things, Barnes & Noble, of all the reviewers discussed her, fails the most miserably when confronted with the task of reviewing the Burns and Heller biographies of Ayn Rand, but chiefly in his misapprehension of Rand’s philosophy. That misapprehension is rooted in a natural hostility to objectivity and logic, and may be taken as evidence of the state of contemporary, “mainstream” philosophy.

It is noteworthy that Grayling tackles only Heller’s biography, not Jennifer Burns’, for the latter apparently delves in more detail into the development of Rand’s philosophy and thinking than does Heller‘s. Other than a pair of irrelevant remarks about Rand by the late leftist/neo-conservative philosopher Sidney Hook, Grayling shies away from any philosophical rebuttal. He lets Hook do his talking.

Grayling’ review is particularly insipid, for it falls back on pleas for altruism to combat the purported heartlessness of Rand and her philosophy.

As the Branden affair shows, Rand's life was indeed exemplary of her thought. It was, in line with her avowed principles, an entirely selfish life, to which she sacrificed her family, her good-natured husband Frank O'Connor, her friends, and all but the last of her devoted followers, Leonard Peikoff. Whoever was not wholly with her was against her.

Au contraire, Rand did value her family, still prisoners in Soviet Russia, and was faced with the conflict of maintaining contact with them at the risk of jeopardizing their lives. She loved her husband, and as Letters of Ayn Rand amply reveals, concerned herself with the well-being of friends and relatives (on her husband’s side, her own distant relatives in Russia being beyond help). She could be generous, but not to a fault.

As for her philosophy, all Grayling can ascribe to it is cruelty and brutality.

What is wrong with Rand's views is what is wrong with Gordon Gekko. The unregulated market coupled with unbridled individual self-interest adds up to something far from heroic in the would-be Roark/Galt mode; instead it adds up to the strong trampling the weak, to the callousness of the jungle -- and eventually to a mightily ironic paradox, which is that the weak have to rescue the strong because the latter's unrestricted rampaging has consumed their own hunting-grounds.

Whatever that might mean. Again, Grayling writes, willing to forgive Rand but for her philosophy of egoism (which he never names):

She had enormous talents, great charisma, courage and dedication -- all as apparent in her work as in her life, and all acknowledged by Heller -- and not all of her ideas were wrong: her secularism merits applause, as does her opposition to the use of force in world affairs, and as does her championing of liberty -- or rather, this latter might merit applause if it were not in fact a coarse and callous libertarianism merely, which means liberty only for the few strong enough to trample on the heads of the rest.

And that represents Grayling’s summary view of the philosophical significance of Rand’s thinking, the hoary old collectivist chestnut, preached for decades from pulpits and in grade school “social studies” and in university classrooms, that unregulated freedom can only mean the oppression of the poor and “disadvantaged” and the average. No one but the “rich” and the “strong” could possibly profit from freedom -- a rather stultified and not very original position for a prominent philosopher to take.

Critics serve the function of cultural scouts, pointing out to the public what is significant, what is worth one’s attention, and what may be of value -- and also what is significantly not a value. Ayn Rand and her oeuvre are major contributors to Western culture, certainly the most significant in the last two hundred years, yet our culture has descended to such a state that its scouts are desperately and maliciously trying to persuade people that neither she nor her work should be taken seriously, for if they did, it would mean the end of the critics’ own importance.

Fortunately, few are heeding the advice of the critics, and countless individuals are discovering that there is an oasis over the horizon, and there, in Rand and her works, can be found life as it was meant and ought to be.

The Oblique Smearing of Ayn Rand

By noreply@blogger.com (Edward Cline) from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Two biographies of Ayn Rand have burst upon the literary scene, both written by non-Objectivists, Anne C. Heller’s Ayn Rand and the World She Made (Doubleday), and Jennifer Burns’ Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right (Oxford University Press). I have not read either book, but will in time. I have read the first chapter of the Burns book on Amazon Books. It is a literate account of Rand’s early life in Russia, and contains details of her life heretofore unknown to me, but that appraisal in no way can be extended to the rest of her biography, not until I have read it. Of the two books, however, going by their reception in the press and the literary establishment, the Heller book is the least significant, because it is less intellectual and more biographical. Moreover, both books provide Rand’s detractors with a limitless salad bar of details of Rand’s life. This is not the fault of the authors, of course, regardless of the merits or demerits of their books.

Burns, an assistant professor of history at the University of Virginia, focuses on Rand’s intellectual development from her years in Russia up to her death in 1982. Heller, a magazine writer and editor for Esquire and Redbook, apparently dwells on the “story” of Rand in terms of her social and personal life and political positions. It is the latter book from which “libertarian” reviewers have filled their plates from the salad bar. They have all proclaimed their fealty to Rand’s ideas, but at the same time have tried to diminish those ideas by deeming them as strictly “libertarian” and merely part of an evolutionary process of the development of libertarianism.

The most offensive instance of this kind of treatment of Rand -- praise so qualified that it ceases to be praise at all -- using Heller’s biography as a vehicle to not-so-subtly slander Rand, is Stephen Cox’s review of the book in the October issue of Liberty magazine. His review, “Ayn’s World,” can be taken as the apotheosis of all libertarian reviews, because it is long, commits the same offenses, and is as thorough a job of “debunking“ Rand short of a Whittaker Chambers/William F. Buckley Jr. effort.

The first offense, and there are many offenses in his article, is that he continually refers to Rand as a “libertarian” or a “radical libertarian.” Well, she was not a libertarian. She stated this so many times it would be almost pointless to repeat them here. Nevertheless, here is what she wrote:

For the record, I shall repeat what I have said many times before: I do not join or endorse any political group or movement. More specifically, I disapprove of, disagree with, and have no connection with, the latest aberration of some conservatives, the so-called “hippies of the right,” who attempt to snare the younger or more careless ones of my readers by claiming simultaneously to be followers of my philosophy and advocates of anarchism. Anyone offering such a combination confesses his inability to understand either. Anarchism is the most irrational, anti-intellectual notion ever spun by the concrete-bound, context-dropping, whim-worshiping fringe of the collectivist movement, where it properly belongs.

Moreover, she added,

Above all, do not join the wrong ideological groups or movements, in order to “do something.” By “ideological” (in this context), I mean groups or movements proclaiming some vaguely generalized, undefined (and, usually, contradictory) political goals. (e.g.,the Conservative Party, which subordinates reason to faith, and substitutes theocracy for capitalism; or the “libertarian” hippies, who subordinate reason to whims, and substitute anarchism for capitalism.) To join such groups means to reverse the philosophical hierarchy and to sell out fundamental principles for the sake of some superficial political action which is bound to fail. It means that you help the defeat of your ideas and the victory of your enemies.

Dr. Harry Binswanger seconds Rand’s position:

The “libertarians” . . . plagiarize Ayn Rand’s principle that no man may initiate the use of physical force, and treat it as a mystically revealed, out-of-context absolute . . . .

In the philosophical battle for a free society, the one crucial connection to be upheld is that between capitalism and reason. The religious conservatives are seeking to tie capitalism to mysticism; the “libertarians” are tying capitalism to the whim-worshipping subjectivism and chaos of anarchy. To cooperate with either group is to betray capitalism, reason, and one’s own future.

A “mystically revealed” absolute is a deserved opprobrium. To libertarians, that “absolute” is just floating out there in space, ready to be recognized and picked out of the air, and incorporated into an alleged political philosophy. How did it get there? Why is it there? What is its cause? No rational answers are forthcoming, or will be, for libertarians eschew a rational metaphysics. This is no better or defensible a means of validating the concept of political freedom than attributing freedom to God’s wishes or plan, as the religious conservatives do. From a political philosophy standpoint, it is equally appropriate that Rand links in substance libertarians with the religious conservatives. Libertarians -- “radical” or not -- do not subscribe to a philosophy of freedom, but instead to what one could call a cosmology absent an inexplicable “first cause.”

But Cox will have none of that. He states early on in the review, feigning a preemptive, parenthetical tiredness with the distinction Rand made between libertarians and herself (and, implicitly, between herself and himself):

(I know, she repudiated the name “libertarian,” but she did so for reasons that do her no credit for objective self-description. Instead of calling herself a libertarian, she said she was an individualist and a “radical for capitalism” — in short, a libertarian.)

Translation: Well, I don’t feel like making the distinction she made. She argued for freedom, ergo, she was a libertarian. That’s how I’m going to perceive her, mainly because it will allow me to take cheap shots at her and permit me to “humanize“ her. After all, she made a lot of mistakes, was not a nice person, and didn’t consistently live her philosophy. So, there.

It is difficult to decide which is the cheapest shot Cox takes against Rand. Bear in mind that while these shots are woven into his discussion of Heller’s biography, they are easy to detect. For example:

Rand often denied that she wrote propaganda, or even that she intended to teach her audience anything. (I believe the first claim was true; the second, transparently false.) She said that she wrote for her own pleasure, to create the kind of characters she would want to meet, in the kind of world that such characters would inhabit and deal with in their own way. Whatever her motivation, she did create a literary world in which radical libertarian ideas were embodied and found an interesting home — an intense and serious world, a world full of ideas and characters and exciting action, a world in which libertarians, self-proclaimed or only implicit, could feel that they too were at home.

It is an instance of gratuitous graciousness of Cox to concede that Rand did not write propaganda. But then he accuses her of lying, that she did indeed write to teach her audience. Again, Rand often stated that she did not write her novels to “teach” anyone anything, but for her own selfish pleasure of recreating a world in which she would want to live. (See her essay, “The Goal of My Writing” in The Romantic Manifesto.) If she had written from a motive of “service” -- to teach her audience -- her novels would have been markedly different and likely as bad as other novels written for a pedagogical purpose, such as two novels cited by Cox as literary precursors of Atlas Shrugged, Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward and Henry Hazlitt’s Time Will Run Back. (Cox could have cited novels that are better literarily, such as H.G. Wells’s 1933 Things to Come, or Jack London’s 1908 The Iron Heel. As dystopian novels, these would have better served as comparisons to Atlas Shrugged -- if one regards Rand‘s novel as a purely political/economic tract, which would be the libertarian way, and wrong.)

I shall skip over other remarks Cox makes about Rand, as they are of the same insouciant tone. His praise alternates with his back-stabbing. He does get around to discussing Heller’s book, and repeats some of her own estimates of Rand, touching, for example, on how he wished she had taken Albert Jay Nock, that wistful, ineffectual individualist of the 1930’s, more seriously. In fact, Cox repeats the libertarian mantra that Rand was not a true original thinker, but that she inherited and profited from the intellectual labors of her pro-freedom predecessors and contemporaries, but refused, in some narcissistic hubris, to acknowledge it. Cox missed a chance to quote Nock, who ends his essay, “Isaiah’s Job,“ with:

If, for example, you are a writer or a speaker or a preacher, you put forth an idea which lodges in the Unbewusstsein of a casual member of the Remnant and sticks fast there. For some time it is inert; then it begins to fret and fester until presently it invades the man's conscious mind and, as one might say, corrupts it. Meanwhile, he has quite forgotten how he came by the idea in the first instance, and even perhaps thinks he has invented it; and in those circumstances, the most interesting thing of all is that you never know what the pressure of that idea will make him do.

No, as is evident in Journals of Ayn Rand and Letters of Ayn Rand, and in her other writings, she never forgot how she came by any idea, nor why she agreed with or dismissed another’s idea. Cox asserts in his review that Rand acknowledged only Aristotle as the sole influence in her intellectual development. Wrong. She acknowledged John Locke, Thomas Aquinas, and other pro-reason thinkers from the past. She admired such contemporaries as H.L. Mencken. She was not interested, however, in addressing and consoling a “Remnant,” an idea she would have considered futile, self-defeating, and essentially malevolent because it surrendered one’s life and the world to the mindless.

After making some smarmy remarks on how long it took Rand to write and complete The Fountainhead, Cox makes this verbose crack about how and why she completed Atlas Shrugged:

After “The Fountainhead,” she started planning the novel that would be known as “Atlas Shrugged.” She supposed that she would finish it posthaste. It took her 14 years. For what reason? She put out the rumor that she spent the last few of those years getting the right tone for the endless speech about philosophy that she intrudes on the final movement of the book. The true reason, as it seems to me, is that she had come to regard “Atlas” as a philosophical Bible and was anxious to ensure that everything in the Speech would represent her ultimate, unassailable statement of reality. The result was a 60-page literary disaster — a ridiculously long prose essay, its tone arrogant, inappropriate, and repellent to the last degree, in which she repeated everything she had already made obvious in the rest of the novel. Years working on the “tone”? I don’t think so. Rand’s attitude toward this manifest literary failure is a mystery of the creative process. How could she have thought she was doing the right thing? (Italics mine)

So, not only does Cox imply again that Rand was a liar, but states that Galt’s speech in the novel was a “literary disaster.” That also was the consensus of most mainstream book reviewers of Atlas when it appeared. What Cox fails to appreciate is that Rand was a rule-breaker in literature, and that there was no rule anyway that governed the length of any speech, and that without that speech, there would have been no “libertarian” movement for him to abscond to after cherry-picking the philosophy explicated in that speech.

Cox continues later on in his review about Rand’s alleged intellectual ingratitude:

There have been important writers — Hemingway is a good example — who were not intellectuals, and who read fairly little. Rand is the only example I can identify of an important writer, and a brilliant intellectual to boot, who in her mature period retained practically no curiosity about current or classic works of literature, philosophy, or history. She had studied some kind of history at Leningrad University, but where are the accounts of her enjoying any work on the subject, outside of Paterson’s “The God of the Machine” (1943)? After that book, and some works by Ludwig von Mises, the great economic theorist, she appears to have ceased learning much from either theory or history. It was as if she were making good on her claim not to have been influenced by other people. It was as if individualism meant making everything up on one’s own.

Enough said. There is much, much more that is offensive in Cox’s review, which, as I wrote earlier, served as a vehicle through which to launch his not-so-subtly buried digs at Ayn Rand. One wonders what he would have written if, by some chance, a scholar had uncovered the complete life of Aristotle and published it as Heller has published it: when and where he was born, the professions of his parents, his foibles, loves, hates and hobbies, his relationships with Alexander the Great, his friends, students and enemies, and how he went off the deep end of rationality after publishing the Nichomachean Ethics and became a cave-dwelling recluse -- and devoting minimal attention to what Aristotle bequeathed to the world.

Someday, if Western civilization survives the double onslaught of statism and Islam, another book will appear with the same title, only it will describe the phoenix of reason and the world Ayn Rand helped to make possible. Libertarianism, as an ideology, will merit perhaps only a footnote.

On Peace

By Roberto Brian Sarrionandia from Tito's Blog,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Peace is a state of affairs where human beings need not worry about physical force being initiated against them. It can be said that the United States and the United Kingdom are at peace: nobody this side of a mental asylum expects the US Marines to storm London. Similarly, the French are not concerned about an attack from the British or the Germans. Indeed, the vast majority of the western world is at peace.

Free Market Rhetoric, Indeed!

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

During college, I had an elderly professor from Hungary who, it was rumored, still had fragments of a bullet in his back because he had the temerity to vote against Communist rule with his feet. That bullet came to mind yesterday when I ran across a pair of news stories about people avoiding confiscatory tax rates in America and what governments are starting to do about it.

First, New York is hemorrhaging productive citizens:

More than 1.5 million state residents left for other parts of the United States from 2000 to 2008, according to the report from the Empire Center for New York State Policy. It was the biggest out-of-state migration in the country.

The vast majority of the migrants, 1.1 million, were former residents of New York City -- meaning one out of seven city taxpayers moved out.

"The Empire State is being drained of an invaluable resource -- people," the report said.

Except for the story's emphasis on how much loot these people are taking with them, I agree with that last line. Were I a New Yorker, I'd be concerned that there were fewer opportunities to trade with those who left. Forget my taxes or the replacement of those who left with the less productive and parasites: These new people would mostly not be a problem but for the fact that the welfare state turns many of them into problems by chaining them to anyone who hasn't left yet.

Fortunately, New York can't prevent people from fleeing, but if you haven't left yet, your state might take a cue from Chicago and do what it can along these lines:

Chicago and Cook County residents aren't the only ones about to get shocking tax news; the city is debuting a "tax whistle-blower" plan that could turn neighbor against neighbor in Chicago's business community. [minor format edits]

The bullets haven't started flying yet, but on a national level, the gun is already cocked. Recall that there is already an emigration charge for people who renounce their American citizenship for tax purposes and that both parties collaborated on the law, which Bush signed. Interestingly, the bill includes a measure to confer benefits to soldiers, giving it a pro-American veneer that will mollify the unobservant.

That bone tossed towards the patriotic and the fact that a Republican President signed the exit tax into law remind me of something else: Glenn Reynolds points to a Libertarian's blog posting on a Robert Samuelson piece about the physician slavery debate in Congress. Specifically, Samuelson notes that Democrats are now using terms associated with the free market to re-brand socialized medicine.

Samuelson calls that "genius," and the Libertarians seem pretty impressed with that observation, but this is nothing new or rare at all. As another example look no further than the Chicago story above, where a tax official quoted about the new tax snitch program refers to the bounties as an "incentive."

More to the point, I've been on this scent for a very long time.

Has anyone ever heard of "cap-and-trade?" That government fuel rationing scheme sounds enough like capitalism for Arnold Schwarzenegger (who once fled socialism himself) to back it and tout it as a "free market" solution to global warming. Or "privatization" of infrastructure that merely replaces a socialist arrangement with a fascist one?

Republicans have been branding statism as capitalism for a very long time. There's no "genius" in the Democrats applying new labels to their various schemes. That's just monkey see, monkey do -- and by a monkey very slow on the uptake at that.

If you want to call a deception that will make America less free if people fall for it "genius," you will have to dig a little deeper. Anyone can see the veneer peeling from the wetted, dripping particle board in the above examples. Think of a freshly-varnished chair made of fine, but rotting wood and you'll get the idea of what "genius" is really like.

For "genius" of this kind, consider a group that makes lots of hay out of the similarity between our two big government political parties and the fact that their policies will lead to tyranny. Consider further that in the process of doing so, this group is constantly plagiarizing the conclusions of a brilliant political philosopher, even to the point of glomming on to the popularity of one of her most famous works -- while at the same time smearing its author as "intolerant" and "dogmatic" as a means of belittling the principles she used to reach the conclusions they're plagiarizing. Such a group will pose as an "alternative" to the main two parties, while selling the exact same product not just in a different bottle, but with different flavoring. That group is the Libertarian Party.

To start to comprehend this deception, one must ask: "What is the essential thing wrong with tyranny?" To appreciate the answer, "It violates individual rights," one must know what rights are, which means knowing what man is and why rights are important. (This is just where one has to begin.) One must also understand the nature of physical force and the moral difference between initiating it against another man and using it in retaliation in self-defense. Only after one has done this can he see why this question is important, consider how best to protect himself from others who will seek to harm him through physical force, and consider whether and how to delegate his retaliatory force to others in order to form a proper government.

The Libertarians pretend that no such careful thought is necessary, and that one can simply destroy all government to achieve freedom. They take the moral principle that Ayn Rand discovered that man should not initiate force against others out of context and misapply it to politics in order to pass off anarchism as capitalism. (The ones who do not actually advocate anarchy help those who do by pretending that this is a minor quibble.) To them, government as such is a bad thing. This is not true.

A hint of the rot comes when one tests the chair: Since Libertarians reject thinking in terms of principles, they frequently react to the fair question of how an individual will be protected from the initiation of force under anarchy any better than under a dictatorship with smears like that the one noted above and with insults. As Nick Provenzo once put it so well, "Want to enrage a Libertarian? It's easy. Just have standards." (Obviously, this is no refutation of Libertarianism, but it should cause one to wonder what exactly is going on.)

Caveat emptor. Just because someone can correctly point out the deficiencies in the products currently on the market does not mean that what he is selling is any good. Just because someone says that freedom is cheap doesn't mean it is. The struggle for freedom is difficult and will be lost without careful, principled thought on the part of pro-freedom intellectuals about fundamental issues, of which non-initiation of force is neither fundamental enough to serve as a starting point nor even meaningful outside such a context.

If a slave market is not capitalism, neither is anarchy freedom. Capitalism does not exist when rights are violated and rights are not protected without a proper government. And I don't care how good that might sound: Do not take my word for it. Do not take Ayn Rand's word for it, either. She can make your thinking easier, but obviously, she can't do it for you. Your agreement will mean nothing unless you understand what all of that means for yourself.

-- CAV

The Oath Fakers

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Pat Buchanan writes a sympathetic column about a rather disturbing phenomenon emergent in what he calls "the age of Obama."

In the brief age of Obama, we have had "truthers," "birthers," tea party activists and town-hall dissenters.

Comes now, the "Oath Keepers." And who might they be?

Writes Alan Maimon in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Oath Keepers, depending on where one stands, are "either strident defenders of liberty or dangerous peddlers of paranoia."

Formed in March, they are ex-military and police who repledge themselves to defend the Constitution, even if it means disobeying orders. If the U.S. government ordered law enforcement agencies to violate Second Amendment rights by disarming the people, Oath Keepers will not obey. [minor format edits]

Except for the truthers, the groups Buchanan lists here are all examples of rebellion , some more blind than others, to Barack Obama's nakedly collectivist, anti-American agenda of expansion of the role of the federal government into every area of our lives. (Buchanan is wrong to speak of an "Age of Obama:" The inappropriate use and explosive growth of government was going on thanks to both parties long before Obama showed up to cash in on it.)

I sympathize with the last three groups, but emphatically disagree with the way the birthers and the so-called oath keepers are trying to save America from dictatorship. Only the tea partiers are acting in a manner appropriate to the situation we face, although many of them are low on intellectual ammunition.

The birthers, who believe that there is a massive conspiracy to cover up the "fact" that Barack Obama is not actually an American citizen are clearly the blindest of the lot. At best, they're fishing around for a bombshell revelation that will serve as a real-life deus ex machina to deliver our country from this (particular) menace. In the meantime, they waste their effort deluding themselves to the effect that such a huge conspiracy is even possible, as well as time they could spend learning what they can do to slow or stop him (and other dangerous politicians) now.

But at least the birthers, universally dismissed as nuts and impotently spinning their own wheels, aren't really hurting the cause of liberty. The oath takers are another matter entirely. These people are preparing to take action, and their timing indicates that they do not really know what they are doing.

First, consider what they plan to do: They -- members of the executive branch of the government -- plan to disobey orders based on their own interpretation of the law and the Constitution. That is, they are planning to usurp the function of the judiciary branch on a case-by-case basis as they work, and to bypass the legislative branch as well as the electorate, rather than to persuade lawmakers and other voters of the proper course of action for their country. (Part of this work consists of learning for oneself the principles behind proper government.) And, oh yeah, they're setting a very, very dangerous precedent in doing so: They are weakening one of the few good things left in this country: rule of law.

It is not immoral for someone to disobey an order -- in a dictatorship or during an open rebellion against a tyrannical regime. But, as horrendous as Obama is, we do not live under a dictatorship. We still have freedom of speech, and many of our rights are protected enough that we can act to turn the tide of public opinion back towards the direction of increasing government protection of individual rights.

The so-called oath keepers clearly fail to understand this because they are acting as if this is not an option -- as if we are already in a dictatorship. In addition to their failure to appreciate the importance of rule of law, they -- unlike the Founding Fathers -- clearly fail to understand the value of rational persuasion and this is due to a failure to grasp the role of rational principles in guiding man's actions.

To see this, let's do a thought experiment. Sergeant Arnold, a born-again Christian who thinks gambling is sinful and an "oath-keeper," is a member of his state's national guard. Suppose further that his state has passed a law banning gambling, which had just been legalized in the United States. The bill was very controversial, and because the governor knows that a large number of casino owners are planning to defy this law, he has called up the National Guard to keep them closed. Conveniently for the governor, some religious fanatics have threatened to bomb any casinos that remain open, so the governor claims to be "protecting" them from terrorism.

The President federalizes the guard and orders them instead to stand watch over any casino that wishes to remain open. Hoping to provoke a test case, James McGillicuddy, a casino owner, weighs his risks and does just this. Someone calls a bomb threat in to him as soon as he gets wind of it. Unfortunately for him, his business is being guarded by Arnold's unit, which has been briefed about the threat and given instructions on how to head it off.

That night, Arnold, a sniper, relieves watch in a building behind the casino. Just as he was briefed might happen, a bearded man in camouflage carries something out of the woods behind the business. Because he thinks that states' rights (a part of the Constitution) override federal power (another part) in this circumstance, though, Sergeant Arnold has decided he will not guard the casino. He's entertaining himself with an iPhone instead.

So he never sees the man, never calls on anyone to stop him and see what he's doing, and never has him in his sights. Instead, he has decided that not guarding the casino is the best way to protect America from Barack Obama and "secular humanists" like McGillicuddy. Since he happened to be the only person who could have seen the bomber, the casino bursts into flames while he's surfing the Internet on his iPhone. McGillicuddy and twelve of his employees die in the blast. All he had wanted to do was make a living, and to have his day in court.

If that scenario seems contrived, replace the casino with an abortion clinic, and recall the use of the Arkansas National Guard during Little Rock's desegregation crisis. Consider further the fourth item on the list of orders the "oath keepers" will not obey. We are a lot closer to personal harm than we might care to imagine with self-appointed constitutional "experts" like this in charge of enforcing the law.

At least the tea partiers understand that America remains free enough that moral and political debate can preserve the freedom we have left and bring the government back around to its proper purpose of protecting individual rights. Many of them are wrong about particulars, but they at least appreciate the proper approach to political change in a nation founded on the principle -- apparently forgotten by the "oath-keepers" -- of consent of the governed, and in a nation of laws, and not men. The tea partiers offer their views for the consideration of others, and, from what I have heard, many are actively seeking the intellectual ammunition they need to better understand what went wrong with America and what they need to know to appeal to the best within their countrymen before the next election.

Someone who does not understand an oath can only mouth its words: He cannot be trusted to uphold such an "oath." These are not oath keepers, or even oath takers. They are oath fakers.

You cannot protect the Constitution in any meaningful way by subverting individual rights, consent of the governed, rule of law, or any other principle which must be generally accepted in order for it to be anything but words on paper. Mutiny on the part of the armed forces or law enforcement is not the way to protect the Constitution, but -- at best -- a concession that it is no longer in force.

To anyone who has mistakenly joined this movement, I ask that you reconsider: It might help to imagine someone patriotic that you completely disagree with on one issue as an "oath taker" -- and that person being in charge of protecting someone you care about, where that issue plays a role.

-- CAV

Updates

Today: Corrected some typos.

United They Fell

By Greg Perkins from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

The Objectivism Seminar is working through Dr. Leonard Peikoff's all-too-topical book, The Ominous Parallels. In it, he explores what gave rise to to the fascist, totalitarian regime of Nazi Germany -- and analyzes whether and how a fascist, totalitarian regime could emerge here in America.

Quick Roundup 479

By Gus Van Horn from Gus Van Horn,cross-posted by MetaBlog

Social Networking Bleg

Apparently, my last post both impressed and disappointed. On the one hand, I got backlinks (that I know about) from Rob and Trey. On the other, I was asked by commenters why I didn't make it easier to alert readers to the post with Twitter, FaceBook, or NetworkedBlogs. Blog template editing time is nigh. If you see your favorite social network missing, let me know.

Thanks in advance.

Precautionary Principle and Pascal's Wager

Via HBL I learned of a ridiculous video whose creator regards it as an unassailable argument in favor of global warming legislation. Binswanger called it an application of Pascal's Wager to environmentalism and notes its more common name: the precautionary principle, which Wikipedia describes as:

... a moral and political principle which states that if an action or policy might cause severe or irreversible harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of a scientific consensus that harm would not ensue, the burden of proof falls on those who would advocate taking the action. [links omitted]

I find several things interesting about the precautionary principle. First, it basically means that one has to have (or beg for) approval of anything he wants to do from government officials. Second, as it is being used by global warming alarmists, it is clear what the pecking order is between "the public or the environment" whenever there is a conflict. (Just see how little attention the clown in this video pays to the depression he admits these taxes and laws would bring, and note that he makes zero mention of political freedom at all.) Third, this principle is basically a way for people who take Pascal's Wager to force the rest of us to do the same by smuggling in arbitrary criteria of harm to excuse government action in situations where it is not warranted.

Objectivist Roundup

Head on over to 3 Ring Binder!

"GoodThing in Life" Carnival and Chat

Inspired in part by a recent post of mine on cooking as a hobby, Martin Lindeskog is attempting to bring back something along the lines of the old Carnival of the Recipes, but not limited to cooking. He's targeting Thanksgiving weekend as a start date.

Like a Kazoo at a Funeral

The glomming-on-with-cum-backstabbing-of Ayn Rand by Libertarians continues as Reason TV (of all hosts) plans to "celebrate" the enduring legacy of Ayn Rand by interviewing two of her most famous detractors, Nathaniel and Barbara Branden.

Maybe it was something she said...

Actually, it wasn't that, but her insistence that the fight for freedom begins with intellectual rigor that earned exposed their enmity.

-- CAV