Ayn Rand's Popular Again - And She's Still Just As Wrong

Ayn Rand :

"She's back!" screams the cover of Reason, the magazine "For Free Minds and Free Markets," featuring a photo of right-wing icon Ayn Rand looking suspiciously like the Bride of Frankenstein.

Read the whole story: Ayn Rand

Comments

[FreedomCorpse]

12:39 PM on 12/10/2009

Free markets are for people who don't believe greed mongers exist.

[TJCole]

12:14 PM on 12/10/2009

Ayn Rand was wrong because she denied human nature itself...an extremely limited flawed philosophy that cost America very possibly it's entire future...!

When you think of it she did a lot more harm to American financially than Osama bin-Laden, but only thanks to Alan Greenspan...her ever so easily influenced lap dog...

[fairplaystacy]

09:27 AM on 12/10/2009

Bernie Madoff read Ayn Rand, followed her philosophy too!

[fairplaystacy]

03:43 AM on 12/10/2009

How does Ayn Rand account for colonialism, which continues in in its various forms today providing an unfair advantage to American businesses and an unfair disadvantage to other countries businesses. Not quite a level playing field, just for starters.

Ayn Rand is an excellent intellectual exercise for H.S and college freshmen. It falls apart in the real world as soon as it comes face to face with human failings. It is not a manual for creating a panacea. Jesus certainly wouldn't be on board with it's lack of compassion.

Ayn Rand's philosophy, no matter how compelling is Disneyesque compared to more serious subject matter. Ayn Rand comes gestates her "philosophy" by weaving her hollywood screenplay skills with her new found appreciation for American capitalism and utter contempt for her native country's communist oppression. Great for a movie, but no way to run a society with real flesh and blood inhabitants.

Ayn Rand's heroes and heroines are caricatures of perfection. Is Dick Armee, Boehner, Greenspan, Bush ( choose one), Reagan, Cheney, Bernanke... (the list goes on) capable of emulating Dagny Taggart? Doesn't matter? Capitalism Communism, Socialism have all been blended where ever those systems are said to exist. They aren't mutually exclusive. Ironically however teabaggers and reason are mutually exclusive. Teabaggers and most righties are some ot the least objective people on earth and they are epistemologically bankrupt.

[AmericanFool]

01:18 AM on 12/10/2009

Rand didn't sell me. She overlooked too much that was frankly unalterable in human nature. She seems to have had no appreciation for how 'cooperative' and even 'socialist' successful pioneer communities are. They not only accept, they expect help from one another. There is a struggle in all individuals and societies between selfishness (which Rand likes to re-define as the true altruism, using different words) and altruism (which is 'selfish' from certain other perspectives) that is not well understood by science or philosophy.
The real problem with Fascism and Communism is that, like objectivism, both are attempts to create a throughly logical relationship between the individual and the state, based on thoroughly logical precepts governing our understanding of what 'man' is in relation to himself, when clearly the full dynamic of that relationship is far from understood (no Ari Seldons yet.) I borrow this opinion from Sir Bertand Russell, who also noted that the genius of America has been our ability to compromise. Nothing about this wonderful country is really logical. But it generally works. (Or as Churchill said of democracy, it's the worst form of government except for all the others.)

[DosGatos2]

12:50 AM on 12/10/2009

HuffPo ran a couple of editorials on AR during the summer and the dogmatists came out of the woodwork. I have read every single thing Rand wrote multiple times. Rand would have been appalled that her theories had been reduced to mysticism (something she despised) by her current followers, but I did not get to say that because the comments had been closed by that time.

Rand's theories are the moral equivalent of applying belief to chronic illness. The theory is always right and the fact that it does not reflect reality nor cure the disease is irrelevant to Rand's rabid followers. To them the earth will always be as flat as Ms. Rand tells them it is and free markets as wonderful as she said. Reality may not now nor will ever be allowed to intrude on her ideology.

[andycan]

10:29 PM on 12/09/2009

For Ayn Rand all government is bad, except the army and police that protect the haves.

[MajorKong]

09:57 PM on 12/09/2009

Atlas Shrugged Part 2

http://www.angryflower.com/atlass.gif

[GlenParked]

06:59 PM on 12/09/2009

Well worn copies of both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead are brazenly displayed on my bookshelves, in spite of an ideology that I find particularly distasteful. I've read Atlas Shrugged three times and The Fountainhead four, and there is a good reason for that. Layered within Rand's philosophy of objectivism, I find a truer message that speaks to me personally. That message is "never settle for being mediocre". There have been times in my adult life when I've felt tired and defeated, and reading either of those tomes never fails to snap me to attention and return to fight the good fight, to do and be the very best I am capable of. If Ms. Rand were alive today, she would no doubt be aghast that I failed to buy in to her philosophical nonsense, but I have no doubt that she would quietly give thanks that I understood the power of her subtext. And so I will unapologetically allow those to books to remain in full view, and look forward to my next debate with a fellow left-leaning buddy who challenges their presence in my home.

[totalliberal]

06:28 AM on 12/10/2009

So you need to be reminded to not be mediocre? Sad.

[DiogenesOfAlaska]

04:21 PM on 12/09/2009

Can anyone please explain to me why these books sell only in America?

But not in Singapur, not in New Zealand, not in the Netherlands, in the UK, in Germany, Switzerland or in Denmark?

Maybe it's a little similar to why the Persians didn't believe in the greek gods. Nor did the romans, really. They figured out that it's a different myth. But still just that: a myth.

[Gover]

09:42 PM on 12/09/2009

I don't read many books written by New Zealanders, Dutch, Germans or Swiss or Danish people either.

Or are you suggesting that American authors are so superior, that if they aren't read widely world-wide they can be consider failures?

[DiogenesOfAlaska]

10:26 AM on 12/14/2009

what I am saying is that Rand's books are myths. They are certainly not applications of any theory whatsoever, because whatever she thought is her theory is really a myth.

In still other words: her 'theories' are what physicists call 'not even wrong'.

When viewed as novels - without any claim to insight - they are whatever they are. Which means: I don't care. But it is important to realize that neither she herself nor her fans and readers view her novels as merely novels. And that's a huge problem. It's similar to the religious Right in the US: they claim to be covered by their rights to religious tolerance, but they are really subverting and abusing that same right. And that is, in a nutshell, why they are so dangerous. Because they are manifestly unaware of what it takes to maintain and renew the foundations of democracy.

[DanBest]

03:47 PM on 12/09/2009

First problem with Rand (and yes I’ve read the Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged) It’s fiction. Second problem. Rand’s family were Russian aristocrats. You would have to go back to pre-revolutionary France to find a more out of touch aristocracy. One that ignored every warning signal that its peasants were sick of their ruling class. Rand’s experience in communist Russia colored her world view. She transferred those experiences to her new home in America. Is it any wonder that she saw any type of proletarian behavior in America as an extension of her Russian experience? But Russia is not America, libertarians. She wrote compelling fiction and that’s all. Anyone who got to Galt’s 60 page speech had her worldview beaten over their head. It was the most propagandistic experience I’ve had since reading the end of the Jungle where the protagonist is saved by his entry into the socialist party.

[RightWingMarine]

03:41 PM on 12/09/2009

nothing beats a book review from someone that freely admits that not only did they not read this book but that children's books proved too daunting.

[Gover]

09:34 PM on 12/09/2009

You forgot how he literally judged another of her books by it's cover (title).

[Social Construct]

01:16 PM on 12/10/2009

I haven't read Mein Kampf and yet I'd readily offer an arguably valid review. Sometimes the hindsight of history, and an attention to it that is as objective as a subjective human is capable of, can adequately substitute for hands on experience. With proper critical thinking skills, of course.

[washlib]

12:28 PM on 12/09/2009

would the world have been a better place without Ayn Rand?

yes.

[Gover]

09:43 PM on 12/09/2009

Oh god ideas! They're so scary! Quick suppress the ones that are the scariest!

[DosGatos2]

12:56 AM on 12/10/2009

Ideas are fine. When one realizes that they do not conform to reality, those ideas should be amended or adapted. Rand's followers refuse to do this. They are doomed to repeat a cycle which fails because the theory does not properly model the real world.

It's like blindly worshiping the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Good luck with that.

[Desmo]

11:24 AM on 12/09/2009

Please if I can accomplish one thing on this board it is to dispell the myth that Alan Greenspan's actions at the FED were representative of Ayn Rand'd work. Greenspan was Rand's Judas. Greenspan as the FED chair promoted the most radical forms of government intervention into markets, leading to the current economic collapse.

[washlib]

12:26 PM on 12/09/2009

not sure how you could be more wrong. Obviously greenspan and the fed did not intervene ENOUGH, choosing to overlook the most egregious market manipulation in this history of this country and the world. This entire debacle was planned...

[Desmo]

12:50 PM on 12/09/2009

So what would you call holding the FED funds rate at 1% for an extended period of time following the .com bust? Was that not enough intervention for you? You clearly have no idea how market bubbles are formed.

[Desmo]

12:57 PM on 12/09/2009

I am still basking in the stupidty of your comments! Seriously how do you think the housing boom was created? Was it created becasuse greenspan didn't hold interest rates down enough? Greenspan oversaw the most active monetary policy since the creation of the FED and you think he didn't do enough? How stupid are you?

Wait don't answer that........

[MajorKong]

12:33 PM on 12/09/2009

Silly me, I forgot. Ayn Rand can never fail, she can only be failed. Therefore Greenspan was not a true disciple.

[Desmo]

12:52 PM on 12/09/2009

Is this your way of saying I was right? If you want to debate the boom and bust created by the FED I am game. If you just want to make snarky comments, I'll pass.

[fairplaystacy]

09:21 AM on 12/10/2009

Reagan was Rand's highest ranking adherent and he failed miserably. He came into office promising America her utopian idealism. I like how it paved the way for the S&L crisis, which was just a training exercise for Bush's Global Financial Crisis. How many times and how many ways do conservative ideals of "smaller" government have to be proven wrong?

European and other countries like Canada are just passing us by as we continue to be sophomoric about our politics.

[invest in jobs]

11:01 AM on 12/09/2009

it;s unfortunate Obama is taking advice from neoconservative, globalist economists like Bernanke, Geithner & Summers instead of being more receptive to Krugman & Volcker.

hat tip to: http://financeopinionss.blogspot.com

[Sam1234567]

11:05 AM on 12/09/2009

Yeah, cause there are so many liberal economists out there that are so great.

[Desmo]

11:32 AM on 12/09/2009

Krugman is a globalist!