theories.

It's all "Devil take the hindmost" wrapped up with a bow.

was a "superman" without the baggage of conscience. Sociopathic fits this morally bankrupt ideology perfectly.

Your eBook is off to a bad start, since your chosen theme is inherently self-contradictory. At the root of the Objectivist politics is an ethical mandate that one may not use force for any purpose other than to stop the use of force. Anyone intent on forcing something onto the world is ipso facto NOT obsessed with Objectivism. He would have to be some stripe of left-wing liberal or right-wing conservative.

That error then gives lie to your second contention that producers caring for their own success are harmful to others. Just the opposite is true. In an Objectivist society where force is forbidden, the only way to become wealthy is to satisfy the desires of the masses better than anyone else (the 99% have in aggregate more pennies to spend than the 1% do). Take Sam Walton, for instance. He died the wealthiest man in America after having raised the standard of living of America's poorest more than all the welfare/charity programs combined that existed throughout his lifetime. So much for the evils of rational selfishness. Your problem is that you take the crony capitalism of Obama and Bush et al to be the permanent status quo, and you are obviously unable to imagine anything else.

And if you had researched the Hickman subject before spouting your internet hearsay, you would have discovered that Rand's interest in him was not for his depraved acts, which she specifically condemned. You are obviously unaware of the literary convention of the "noble thief" or the "flawed hero" ... from the Wikipedia page on "Romantic Hero":

Literary critic Northrop Frye noted that the Romantic hero is often "placed outside the structure of civilization and therefore represents the force of physical nature, amoral or ruthless, yet with a sense of power, and often leadership, that society has impoverished itself by rejecting".

In principle, that literary device involves the heightened focus on certain good characteristics of a subject by their stark contrast with his bad characteristics. The greater the contrast the more effective the focus. None of the specifics of his horrible deeds inspired her to do anything. You owe an apology to your readers whom you have misled with that dishonesty.

Re Greenspan, long before he met Rand he was a Keynesian. He was also infatuated with Rand's fame and he toyed at the time he met Rand with Austrian economics and may still agree with some principles therein. She hoped he would follow through when he became Reagan's economic adviser, but his record at the Fed after she died clearly demonstrated that he was nothing more than a hanger-on in respect to Objectivism. None of his policies there bear any resemblance to the Objectivist preferred economics of Ludwig von Mises.

That economics is, by the way, NOT social-darwinism, and restoring liberty to the American worker is NOT a stranglehold by a long shot. If you will review your own comments, you will find that you are hurling characterizations throughout just like these, not one of which is or can be substantiated to actually apply. There is no evidence in such epithets that you are actually capable of dealing with Objectivism on the same level as its principles are defined and applied.

If opponents of Rand's steadily increasing infusion into the mainstream of American thought wish to slow or stop it, they will have to bite the bullet and attack her on the battlefield she has already staked out as her own: ideas. Just throwing rocks from afar won't cut it.

Well said, I must admit, but the problem is that when it comes to selfish people, the rules and guidelines are never going to be followed to a tee. My antagonist has no qualms of forcing his ideology a world that will never consider it.

Also, I never said helping oneself and others are mutually exclusive. I simply believe that serving oneself with complete disregard to the economy and people's lives leads to disaster. Who were the banks serving by selling toxic derivatives?

And I find nothing "noble" about a man who killed a little girl, stuffed her body and showed it to her father, only to die on the noose screaming. That, to me, is not a "flawed hero", but a despicable monster.

I appreciate you standing for your beliefs and welcome you to DU, but proceed with caution. Not everyone here is as inviting of opposition as I am.

You stating your conclusion to the likely process of pure objectionist view points of the world is not an error. You can perfectly understand Ayn Rand's philosophical and literary technique yet reach different conclusions as to what they will likely manifest in society.

I'm editing an e-book now along a similar frame. In no way do I think pure objectionist view point will work out in the world, yet I think parts of objectionism people do consider from time to time. Once again because your conclusions are different than Rand's doesn't mean your view point lacks ideas or more to the point understand Rand's philosophy (or semi-philosophical writing).

For instance Rand was an atheist yet many religious organizations incorporate parts of her thinking into their ideology. You can claim that isn't pure objectionism... yet who cares it is something that IS REALLY happening. Claiming people don't understand a philosophy because the abstract nature of it when manifested in the real world does thing not envisioned isn't a failure on your part as an author. It's how interesting idea develop.

One man's romantic hero is often another man's *hole.

If you need some tips on posting your eBook, ask me. I've posted two, so I know how to do it. Marketing it, however, is a different matter.

about 1 month away.

If nothing else, you managed to flush out a Randroid rhymes-with-"droll."

You are seriously claiming this?

This was a study complied specific to Georgia's PeachCare program (SCHIP)



That Walton legacy. What a model of generosity and free markets.

that WalMart put out of business. Yeah, the poor can buy cheap crap made in China, but there are less jobs for them here because of it, and with that less socio-economic upward mobility.

In sum, WalMart made life worse for the poor, not better.

under the belief that his employees should be able to afford his products.

for tens or hundreds of thousands of Americans, many of whom have little choice but to go to work for old Sam or his few big competitors in exchange for low wages and few benefits, knowing old Sam and the boys will keep pressuring those downward every chance they get.

Freedom my ass.

Each one is as an individual worth twenty million other people in terms of wealth.

And does anyone seriously imagine such dis-equilibriums of possession can be maintained save by threat and use of force?

. . . and proceded to make a giant polluting and unequal economy unto themselves FOR themselves, while their employees make just above poverty level wages and have to go on food stamps. Often times, their customers have nowhere else to shop, as WalMart moves in and sucks Mom and Pops out of cost contention.

But hey, keep defending the wealthmongers. Like magic, they'd probably rain manna down . . . if only they weren't taxed!!

Since the Ryan Randian budget eliminates all capital gains and corporate taxes - it is only a matter of time after implementation that this will trickle down from the Waltons to their employees and Utopia can begin.

USA! USA! USA!

Wal-Mart depends upon competitive asymmetries and very unfortunately, a lack of local/regional socio-economc reciprocity. No region let alone an entire nation has ever long endured an economy without inherent internal reciprocity between producers and consumers.

The current American economic 'adjustment' to the changing economic circumstance--loss of average buying power, loss of average wealth, and lowering of standards of living, forces many consumer/workers into doing business with retailers whose disconnect with local/regional economies sends profits out of the community and exacerbates local and regional problems. Walmart's success comes at the expense of community economic-overdraft.

In the end, the creative exploitation of asymmetries is less creative than exploitative. It has made a family fabulously wealthy at the expense of everyone they deal with. Yippee.

Just askin'...

The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch. For instance, in an age and in a country where royal power, aristocracy, and bourgeoisie are contending for mastery and where, therefore, mastery is shared, the doctrine of the separation of powers proves to be the dominant idea and is expressed as an “eternal law.”

I noticed it when I was studying (criminal psychology), the points listed on the psychopath checklist are much the same as the values Rand applauds.

Good luck with your book.