Personally, though, I’m very disappointed to see Brad Pitt among their company. In his interviews he has always struck me as a kind of sectarian Buddhist–which I think is an excellent stance. I hope the magazine is reaching.

As an exercise in logicical argumentation, your points are useless to debate due to an a priori assumption that no market is ever free enough of “distortions” for your individualist utopia to emerge. No blood can possibly be on your hands, because, like other cultists, you reject any negotiation with that which fails to conform with your borrowed ideology. This is the realm of the fantasist, for whom I have no use beyond entertainment.

Now take a deep breath and read it again — you’re a seemingly bright enough lot to comprehend the mirror I hold before you.

You havent argued nor won a single point mate…like a pragmatic politician you’ve assumed you’re in safe water by rehashing tired disproven old crap from Rands enemies who have no valid refutation of her ideas other than slamming her on subjective grounds which cannot be proven nor disproven.

The same counts for your reliance on the collective for moral ammo that proclaims it as being OK and “progressive” to empower other “progressive” politicians to steal from the producers and redistribute the loot on behalf of the say so of the majority, i.e. looters (in exchange for your votes of course)

The reason Rand has so many enemies is that her ideas are making the producers aware of how they are being scammed, and that her ideas have some of them already going on strike against this notion of becoming Milch Cows to the majority..for no reason other than that they are the majority.

Ayn Rand fought for the smallest minority on earth..the individual. This battle should have been won with the collapse of socialism/communism wherever it was implemented, but unfortunately the envy of the looters in regard to those who are more industrious in a free economy were allowed to respawn and mobilise from behind the culturally inherited lie of “the greater public good” (as if the good of some take moral precedence over the good of others)

The revolution to dispose of mob induced slavery has begun, and even though it will take some time, the individual will win. (after all there are so many of you)

Until then as I said…enjoy the ride..it’s almost over.

That reminds me: C. Jeffery Small’s statement “like the heroes of Rand’s novels, I refuse to sanction you any right to any part of my life,” is actually awesome. Does he wear a cape?

“Like the heroes of the Dragonlance saga, I use my wizard skills to protect all the Noble races of Krynn from the Dragonarmies of Ansalon!”

That cracked me up to no end, C. Jeffery Small. I know, I know – hit me with a 2,000-word essay on what you meant by “the rule of law”, C. Jeffery Small. [Yaawwn.] While you’re at it, get yourself a new name to mentally masturbate by, because C. Jeffery Small ain’t makin’ you’re intellectual johnson any bigger.

“I counter that it is you who fails to comprehend that Rand was thinking and writing as a philosopher, not some sort of social scientist.”

By calling Rand a philosopher you’re being far to kind. She was a utopian, just like me. Rand repeatedly claimed that the goal of her writing was “the projection of an ideal man” and that her philosophy was merely “a necessary means to that end.”

Her actual grasp of philosophy seemed to start at Aristotle and skip everything in between up to Nietzsche. She spent a bit of energy dismissing Kant, while subsequently ripping him off. As mentioned on the excellent Objectivism-Criticism blog, Rand wrote the following:

“You know the best example I could give—perhaps this will help. If you brought a dog or a cat into this room, it would be aware of everything that we see here. It would also see the room, the objects, and the people. What it would never be able to grasp is, “I am conscious of this room,” although that fact is inherent in its perception.”

Then what is the difference between that idea and Kant’s idea of apperception? Kant:

“But all empirical consciousness has a necessary relation to a transcendental consciousness which precedes all special experience, namely, the consciousness of myself as original apperception. It is therefore absolutely necessary that in my knowledge all consciousness should belong to a single consciousness, that of myself.”

I enjoy how you folks always move to a defensive crouch by saying, “There is so much wrong with the essay above that it is difficult to know where to begin.” Then you simply regurgitate Randian talking points.

You’re right: Rand wasn’t a social scientist (nor was she a philosopher, but I don’t have time to keep flogging that sad, subjectivist horse). Had she been a social scientist, she may have had a grasp of the behavioral-motivational spectrum I mention above, which necessarily includes legion factors — historical, developmental, biological, environmental — that affect the organizational and hierarchical behavior of our species. She might have found as much “natural” evidence for collective action as she did for greed-based behavior. Or at least, she’d have begun to uncover the hidden biological/cultural hand shaping what she views as Bold and Noble action. Given the time at which she wrote, it’s not surprising that she’d have such a blind spot. But it doesn’t mean that you have to follow her off the cliff to irrelevance.

In regard to my statement that “the Objectivists’ nihilistic willingness to let entire global systems collapse, causing undue suffering in a quest for ever-purer markets, is hardly ‘noble’ or ‘morally sound’ — it’s evidence of the willful capital exploitation of human misery,” well, how about I excerpt a comment from one of your fellow Objectivists (the Godlike John Donahue) left here last week:

“We realize it is only the producers “holding on” that keeps you from seeing the hole down to hell.

So go ahead, finish the job. All the sooner the thing will collapse.”

This to me seems consistent at least, with “Atlas” — let the leeches destroy themselves and society, and hide like cowards in our Capitalist Fortress of Solitude until we can emerge as the Ubermensch who will rule through superior, greed-based productivity and “kinky” S&M. Go ahead, read the fucking book again and tell me that’s not the plot. I think Charlie Manson had a similar idea with “Helter Skelter.” At least you guys aren’t waiting for Hale-Bopp. Or are you?

My favorite part of your comment:

“Your idea of ‘progress’ appears to be one where you, in your superior wisdom, sit in judgment on how I, and others, are to be allowed to conduct our lives.”

Your God is dead. Might as well follow me, bub.

I’ll deal with the squirrelly Objectivists once I have some coffee.