May 12, 2011 | Philosophy, Politics
Writes Philosopher Onkar Ghate over at CSM:
How, people wondered, could Rand have foreseen all this? Was she a prophet? No, she answered. [Ayn Rand] had simply identified the basic cause of why the country was veering from crisis to new crisis.
Was the solution to “go Galt” and quit society? No, Rand again answered. The solution was simultaneously much easier and much harder. “So long as we have not yet reached the state of censorship of ideas,” she once said, “one does not have to leave a society in the way the characters did in Atlas Shrugged.... But you know what one does have to do? One has to break relationships with the culture.... [D]iscard all the ideas – the entire cultural philosophy which is dominant today.”
Now, if you’ve only seen the movie, the fact that "Atlas Shrugged" is not a political novel might surprise you. But the book’s point is that our plight is caused not by corrupt politicians (who are only a symptom) orsome alleged flaw in human nature. It’s caused by the philosophic ideas and moral ideals most of us embrace. ['Atlas Shrugged': With America on the brink, should you 'go Galt' and strike?]
For more on Rand's philosophy read Leonard Peikoff's Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.
May 11, 2011 | Politics
Writes Richard Salsman over at Forbes:
President Obama deserves a modicum of praise for finally allowing a
team of U.S. Navy Seals to kill mass-murderer and al Qaeda kingpin Osama
bin Laden last weekend, but only disdain for delaying the operation for
so long, and harsh condemnation for extolling “extraordinary sacrifice”
at his Ground Zero visit. Like his feckless predecessor, Mr. Obama
deserves the lowest grade for continuing to appease political-militant
Islam, as evidenced by the tender care and deep respect he bestowed on
bin Laden during the burial at sea.
“Shameful” is the only word fit to describe a U.S. foreign policy
that did nothing to bin Laden after 2005, when he first occupied his
conspicuous compound in Abbottabad, just 30 miles from Pakistan’s
capitol and close to the Pakistan Military Academy, which counted among
its notable visitors U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Admiral
Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Pakistan’s foreign
minister Salman Bashir told the BBC recently that in mid-2009 his
nation’s intelligence services (ISI) told the Obama regime about bin
Laden’s not-so-secret hide-out.
The CIA and Pentagon gave Mr. Obama a specific raid plan last August,
yet he dithered and remained reluctant to take military action. In time
it’ll likely be revealed that Mr. Obama gave the go-ahead only because
he feared leaks would reveal him to be weak and appeasing.
Of course, Barack Obama isn’t the only U.S. president who hoped to
give bin Laden a pass.
Read the rest.
May 7, 2011 | Education, Politics
Another brilliant op-ed over at Forbes by Yaron Brook and Don Watkins of the Ayn Rand Institute:
[...] The truth is that Ryan actually proposes increasing government spending in the coming years–just at a lower rate than current projections. So why are Ryan’s critics so up in arms?
Because Ryan’s plan dares to touch (albeit, merely to scratch) the
untouchable entitlement state. Ryan’s plan would, among other things,
trim and reorganize Medicare and Medicaid and reduce federal support for
education. To the plan’s critics, this amounts to “reverse-Robin Hood
redistribution,” as former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Blinder put it.
“[A]bout two-thirds of Mr. Ryan’s so-called courageous budget cuts
would come from programs serving low- and moderate-income Americans,
while the rich would gain from copious tax cuts.”
The “reverse-Robin Hood” line suggests that Ryan’s plan robs from
“the poor” and gives to “the rich.” But cutting entitlements is not
robbery–and cutting taxes isn’t a gift.
Entitlements are essentially government handouts: the government
takes money from some people in order to finance other people’s
retirements, doctor’s visits, and whatever else the government deems
worthy. They are unearned benefits. It is shameful that in a
civilized society we have to say this, but getting less loot is not the
same thing as being robbed.
A tax cut, meanwhile, is not a government handout–it is a reduction
of how much of your income the government takes. Whether you’re a
millionaire, billionaire, or an ambitious stock boy, a tax cut means you
get to keep more of what you earn.
In this context, consider president Obama’s recent budget speech,
in which he criticized Ryan’s plan for implying that “even though we
can’t afford to care for seniors and poor children, we can somehow
afford more than $1 trillion in new tax breaks for the wealthy.” When
Obama speaks of what “we” can afford, he is obviously smuggling in the
premise that all wealth rightfully belongs to society and that the
government–as society’s representative–will dole out that wealth as it
sees fit.
We reject that premise. On our view, you earned your wealth and it
belongs to you, and no politician has any business talking about how
much of your money he can “afford” to let you keep.
Read the rest of It’s Time To Kill The ‘Robin Hood’ Myth.
