Coldhearted Crackpot

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." — Kung Fu Monkey.

Despite the massive push by the Heritage Foundation and Freedom Works, the film adaptation of Atlas Shrugged is seeing dismal ticket sales. Perhaps all the Teabaggers who worship at the altar of the selfish, coldhearted crackpot, Ayn Rand, really went Galt this time? Or couldn't part with their gold coins for a movie ticket maybe? Or the movie simply sucks?

The far-right's love affair with Ayn Rand is odd in some ways and quite fitting in others. On the one hand, she was an atheist and believed in abortion rights. According to Rand, "One method of destroying a concept is by diluting its meaning. Observe that by ascribing rights to the unborn, i.e., the nonliving, the anti-abortionists obliterate the rights of the living." The capitalist Randians try to keep this quote hidden from the Christian Randians.

But Rand's philosophic justification of greed is quite fitting to the Republicans. Altruism is immoral. Social goals are for suckers. Self-interest is the only acceptable motivation in society. Life and love are earned through productivity.

(YouTube video.)

In other words, most of us are blood-sucking parasites. This Randian definition would, of course, encompass the soccer moms, Joe the plumbers, and every teabagger out there... but don't tell them that. Their great delusions keep them believing that they are the "better class" that Rand speaks of.

And as self-proclaimed members of this "better class," they can believe any pseudo-intellectual justifications for the growing inequality of wealth in this country.

Economists long ago tried to justify the vast inequalities that seemed so troubling in the mid-19th century—inequalities that are but a pale shadow of what we are seeing in America today. The justification they came up with was called “marginal-productivity theory.” In a nutshell, this theory associated higher incomes with higher productivity and a greater contribution to society. It is a theory that has always been cherished by the rich. Evidence for its validity, however, remains thin. The corporate executives who helped bring on the recession of the past three years—whose contribution to our society, and to their own companies, has been massively negative—went on to receive large bonuses. In some cases, companies were so embarrassed about calling such rewards “performance bonuses” that they felt compelled to change the name to “retention bonuses” (even if the only thing being retained was bad performance). Those who have contributed great positive innovations to our society, from the pioneers of genetic understanding to the pioneers of the Information Age, have received a pittance compared with those responsible for the financial innovations that brought our global economy to the brink of ruin.

This greed-is-good mentality, disdain for humanity and economic disparity are all related. No man (or woman) is an island -- not even a selfish, coldhearted crackpot.

Boom to Bushville

Behold the Internet version of the angry mob in this flickr album's comment section! Over on YouTube the crowd is slightly less frightening, but it's amazing anybody has the stamina to view the 10 minute dull prattle of an oppressed wealthy man and still post incensed yet witty comments. See if you can pass the endurance test:



I really only gathered a few things from the above video. TigerHawk sees himself as a member of the Better Class, looks down on people who make less money, and thinks small businesses create "lame jobs." Bizarre threats of Going John Galt are beyond belief because if these presumably educated tycoons were so bloody smart they would understand how our tax system works. All of your income is not taxed at the same rate. The TigerHawks of the country will only pay another 3 cents on the dollar for the income they earn over $250K! To shut down your business or even turn away customers is absurd.

You want to know who I feel sorry for? The families living in Bushvilles. These are the new shanty towns -- named after George W. Bush just like Hoovervilles were named after President Herbert Hoover. Hey, if we're going to relive history, let's make sure we understand it. There's a lot of bull going around that somehow FDR prolonged or even created the Great Depression. Writer Jonathan Chait tackles this new chapter of revisionist history:

Moreover, the classic right-wing critique fails to explain how the economy recovered at all. In one of his columns touting Shlaes, George Will observed that "the war, not the New Deal, defeated the Depression." Why, though, did the war defeat the Depression? Because it entailed a massive expansion of government spending. The Republicans who have been endlessly making the anti-stimulus case seem not to realize that, if you believe that the war ended the Depression, then you are a Keynesian.

I don't know what the Republicans will do when the public figures out that the Democrats' policies have been historically good for economic growth and all these Republican obstructionist battles over President Barack Obama's budget are a blatant sham.