Gerson Vs. Rand

Michael Gerson's latest article takes on Ayn Rand and the recent movie (first part of a trilogy) of her Seminal Work "Atlas Shrugged." He is not a fan.

If Objectivism seems familiar, it is because most people know it under another name: adolescence. Many of us experienced a few unfortunate years of invincible self-involvement, testing moral boundaries and prone to stormy egotism and hero worship. Usually one grows out of it, eventually discovering that the quality of our lives is tied to the benefit of others

Gerson points out that she saw average Americans as looters and parasites and that she wasn't a fan of Christianity. He says that her philosophy, with it's laser like focus on freedom of the individual, doesn't work.

But both libertarians and Objectivists are moved by the mania of a single idea -- a freedom indistinguishable from selfishness. This unbalanced emphasis on one element of political theory -- at the expense of other public goals such as justice and equal opportunity -- is the evidence of a rigid ideology. Socialists take a similar path, embracing equality as an absolute value. Both ideologies have led good people into supporting policies with serious human costs.

Conservatives have been generally suspicious of all ideologies, preferring long practice and moral tradition to utopian schemes of left or right. And Rand is nothing if not utopian.

So a good take down. But, there are other points of view, such as those of Gerson's readers.

i am not sure why gerson does this hit piece. it may be that he is simply a pawn of the overlords who recognize that freedom for the individual is the greatest threat to their desire to be complete rulers of the masses. consequently, knowing the overlord's wishes, gerson seeks to discredit the movie before more and more people tune in to the socialism that is creeping surreptitiously into the american gestalt.

I just checked the list of pawns and Gerson's name isn't on it. Oh and there are no overlords. And I am certainly not an overlord.

Thank God for the movie. It was released just when we have the most totalitarian government ever in power in the USA. Ayn, we miss you. You would see instantly the parallels between the Obama Administration and Stalin's USSR. Your old nemesis is right here, right now, in Washington, D.C. And the clueless observers like Gerson don't even recognize it!

We live in the most totalitarian government in power? Why doesn't overlord Obama just get rid of those annoying Tea Partiers than? Send them off to Alaska (America's Siberia).

Gerson's writing is that of a disgusting blue-blood republican that may even be more dispicable than Obama. Gerson wants the rest of us to go back to the slimy days when Republicans cut deals with democrats to sell out the public in favor of the elite (to whom if you ever watched him or read him he considers himself one of). . . . Gerson you disgust me truly.

Funny that Ayn Rand, who was pretty elitist, is being held up as a champion of the little guy.

Trump! Trump! TRUMP!!!!

Several articles about Trump today. Cal Thomas wrote about how Trumps connection to Christianity may not be all that sincere.

He [Trump] did say he goes to church "as much as I can. Always on Christmas. Always on Easter. Always when there's a major occasion." Christians know a lot of people who attend church only on Christmas and Easter and special occasions. They are usually not serious about their faith. Not to judge, but if Trump intends to use faith to win votes from people of faith, then those people have a right to determine whether he is sincere or simply trying to manipulate them.

I pretty well agree with Thomas here; if he is playing to get Conservative Christian votes by pretending to be one of them, well, they have a right to ask how committed he actually is.

That said, Conservative Christians generally don't actually care about the faith of their candidates, so long as they vote the right way. Trouble is Trump has shown himself to be all over the map on that score.

Thomas does carefully exclude Trumps biggest selling point to the Right, i.e. his willingness to take Birtherism seriously. I suppose that makes sense, no sense bringing up embarrassing aspects about your base.

Larry Elder has no such compunction though, and dedicates his article to the proposition that Trump is asking questions that the media won't.

But are the "birther" folks wackier than the majority of Democrats who believe George W. Bush had prior knowledge of 9/11 or are unsure that he did?

Are the "birther" folks wackier than the majority of Democrats who believe that "Bush Lied, People Died" our way into the Iraq War or are unsure that he did?

Are they wackier than the majority of Democrats who, in 2008, held Bush responsible when gas prices hit $4 a gallon?

What's the point? When people are unhappy with a politician and/or his policies, they sometimes see the worst -- whether or not there is a factual basis. But the media do not even have a name for the Democratic equivalent of "birthers," despite these vicious, unsubstantiated and irresponsible accusations of Bush.

Poor Elder. Not a very strong section. But lets go through it.

First of all, 9/11 "Truthers" have never been taken seriously by any major Liberal pol. Liberal website Salon went out of their way to take the mickey out of the Truthers. In contrast there are several Republican pols who are taking this seriously, from state legislators putting up bills that require Presidential candidates to put up Birth Certificates to Presidential Candidates and Congresspeople giving a wink and a nod to Birthers.

Second and three are just said. People think that Bush lied us into Iraq because what he told us about Iraq turned out not to be true. We didn't find weapons of mass destruction. There is strong evidence that Bush and his advisors were determined to invade Iraq regardless of the evidence. Did they genuinely believe we needed to invade Iraq? Probably. Did they present all the evidence to the American people so they could make up their minds with all the facts? It does not seem so.

And of course our invasion of Iraq had something to do with Gas Prices going up.

Finally, yes, the media do have a name for people who think that Bush allowed or caused 9/11 to happen. It's Truthers as mentioned above.

Elder does more than wink at the Birthers, but makes it clear that he thinks they have some good points. Which is nice, since he's Black. This is helpful for Birthers, who are regularly accused of being racist for questioning whether or not President Obama is legally qualified to be President. This is because some of them are clearly racist, and others seem concerned that Obama isn't a real America like the rest of us. So Elder does provide a valuable service to the Birthers here.

Still, even with Elder, you can't get around some of the ugliness in their comments.

I am not so concerned about the so-called "birther issue as the "What are we going to do to Obama when his birth issue proves to be correct. I always have the image of his grandmother stating that "li'l Barry was born in Kenya," in front of me.

There has to be some kind of splendiferous punishment for the con - death by firing squad seems too little in view of the level of the fraud.

When you tell a 224 year old Christian nation that we are not a Christian nation any more and you are going to change the foundation that made us great, then people are going to have questions.

Barack Obama is a limp-wristed-panty-waist, who does not like getting his own hands dirty, instead he surrounds himself with those who are willing to do whatever criminal act or illegal operation Barack Obama has in his bag-of-community-organizing-tricks.

Interesting mix. The top one speaks for itself. The middle one plays off of the belief of many on the right that Liberals just aren't very good Americans. And the bottom one is homophobic crap, which I guess is slightly better than being racist.

Who Loves America?

Michael Medved's latest article takes on that old conundrum, why are liberals and conservatives so different. Turns out conservatives see America as a great place and liberals aren't as keen on it.

The right views America as exceptionally blessed and righteous — chosen by God (or fate, if you prefer) to inspire humanity with distinctive ideals of liberty, self rule and free markets. The left, on the other hand, expresses an intensifying tendency to see the U.S. as exceptionally guilty (for slavery, "genocide" against Native Americans and arrogant imperialism) and exceptionally backward when it comes to "social justice." Progressives never tire of reminding us that the United States lacks the welfare state guarantees that characterize other wealthy nations, and that it tolerates a vast gap between rich and poor.

Or to put it another way, Progressives want an America that works for all Americans, not just the wealthy.

Medved is pretty transperant here; this is the simplistic way Conservatives beleive that Liberals look at America. We don't like it, and want it to be more like Europe. Conservatives love America and are content having a small powerless Government with a strong military, because they believe in the American people.

Putting Troops First

Mike Needham's latest article is intended to put pressure on Congressional Democrats to cave and pass the Republican Budget.

President Obama and Senator Harry Reid have an obligation to explain to our military why they have refused to come to the table and either pass H.R. 1 through the Senate or pass an alternative.

Needham does let on that he'd be satisfied if they just passed the military section of the resolution; and I'm more or less with him on that. We are fighting a couple of wars, no reason to stop paying our troops. That said, this is a pretty big bargaining chip for either side to play around with.

Of course Needham doesn't mention some of the controversial riders attached by Republicans, such as defunding Planned Parenthood and NPR, limiting the EPA and defunding the Consumer Protection Complaints database. It is possible that the American people would see some of those as Republicans settling scores on the backs of our troops.

Not many comments, but one notable one.

These pathetic, excremental democrats will hold out paying our troops in order to blame Republicans.

Die democrats, die!

Nice.