Ayn Rand "I am against God"
Category Archives: Politics
Atlas Shrugged or Lord of the Rings????
The Choice: Ayn Rand's nightmare world or J.R.R.Tolkein
Posted by in Politics
Oh…..the Horror……
Professor Leiter comments on Paul Ryan’s selection. I am in total agreement. Ayn Rand’s selfish ideas of a cold, icy, mean, heartless society are horrifying. Her teachings are the exact opposite of the teachings of Jesus.
http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2012/08/romney-chooses-randroid-paul-ryan-as-vp-candidate.html
Romney Chooses Randroid Paul Ryan as VP Candidate…
…the horror, the horror. In some ways, this is even worse than McCain’s choice of the narcissistic moron Sarah Palin in 2008. First, Ryan has a clear ideology, and it’s a mixture of the vicious and the insane. Second, Ryan does not seem to be as inept and self-destructive as Palin, so he may really be the future even if Romney loses this year. In other words, the Republican Party is now officially the party committed to destroying Medicare and destroying Social Security. Unless they are crushed in the election, this battle is going to continue for a generation or more.
Consider, in perspective, what’s happened: an ideology (partly inspired by Rand–remember dopey Alan Greenspan?) of deregulation and unbridled capitalism brought the world to the brink of economic collapse in 2008. Four years later, the Republican Party has now openly embraced a full-throated Randian ideology. This country has learned nothing. If Obama does not rise to this occasion, and launch a full-throttled attack on this ideology, he will go down in history as the most craven coward in American politics.
Meanwhile, the decision of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy to host a puff piece on Ayn Rand that gives no sense of the overwhelmingly critical and dismissive reception of her work by the vast majority of philosophers worldwide now begins to look inexcusable.
UPDATE: It’s a good sign that the Obama campaign already has a fairly strong attack up.
ANOTHER: This should make Randroid heads explode.
AND ANOTHER: Roger Albin writes:
Rand’s selection as VP candidate is probably a sign of weakness. The most likely explanation is that the Romney campaign is worried about turnout of hard right Republican voters. Given the Obama campaign’s lead in electoral college votes, Romney has to do very well in swing states and he has no chance in many of those states without a good Republican turnout. Picking Ryan is probably aimed at placating the hard right and carries with it the considerable risk of conceding a significant fraction of so-called independent voters to Obama. In one respect, Ryan is a curious choice. Ryan is a nominal Catholic (being a commited Randite and a commited Catholic is incompatible, something the hierarchy will never point out) and while the Evangelical prejudice against Catholics has moderated considerably in the last couple of decades, many continue to be very suspicious of Mormons. Its unlikely the Evangelicals will have the same enthusiasm for a Mormon-Catholic ticket as one involving a Protestant.
Of course, Ryan’s prominence is yet another sign of the complete intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the Republican Party.
See also this analysis, which takes a similar view.
ONE MORE: For your amusement (or despair), here’s how things look when you fall through the looking glass.
STILL MORE: From Nate Silver, echoing, in effect, Albin and the Salon piece linked, above.
Posted by Brian Leiter on August 11, 2012 at 07:45 AM in “The less they know, the less they know it”, Of Cultural Interest | Permalink
Posted by in Politics
Really! Viagra for middle aged men but no birth control for young women???
What!!! Employer-based insurance companies often provide Viagra for middle-aged men, but it is still difficult for young, child-bearing age women to get access to birth control through the insurance provided by their employees. This steady attack on women’s reproductive rights, now degenerating into “I will take away your birth control.” is WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.
In a free society, women have the right to control their own bodies.
Senator Ted Kennedy—memories of five decades of Liberalism
Watching…..for the last time…..the beginning of final rites for a Kennedy brother.
So very glad this one died a natural death and lived into the fullness of age.
I was glued to the TV for days for the rites for President John Kennedy and for
Senator Robert Kennedy. For the President: Robert, Jackie and Teddy leading
the march of distinguished mourners, the riderless horse with boots reversed,
the beat of the drum as the procession passed along, the silent crowds lining
the streets, John and Caroline standing with their mother, John saluting his
father, the scene at the burial with Jackie lost and confused.
Then Robert and the wild scene in the hotel kitchen where he was gunned down.
The funeral in St. Patrick’s and Teddy’s moving eulogy, the funeral train and the
crowds lining the tracks.
The Kennedys and their ideals and escapades have been a huge part of my life
from age 16. Wild and reckless though they were, I find them and their ideals
more powerful than Regan, McCain, Bush, and the conservatives.
Max drove my mother and me out to almost the end of Cape Cod, on a lovely
sunny day like today, along the route the Kennedy cortege is taking. Then,
we drove back to Boston in storms and tornadoes—we could not see the road
in the pouring rain; the wind almost blew us off the road.
Today I say—- I am glad I was able to follow the Kennedys and their lives. Hooray
for Liberals!! Hooray for humans who reach out to help the weak, the poor, the
uneducated, the young, the powerless!!! One can be conservative without being
mean, petty, hateful, spiteful, or cruel. I reject with my whole heart the mean-spirited
and hateful right-wingers of today. I am proud to be a liberal.
From the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
Liberal
adj.
1.
1. Not limited to or by established, traditional, orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas; free from bigotry.
2. Favoring proposals for reform, open to new ideas for progress, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; broad-minded.
3. Of, relating to, or characteristic of liberalism.
4. Liberal Of, designating, or characteristic of a political party founded on or associated with principles of social and political liberalism, especially in Great Britain, Canada, and the United States.
2.
1. Tending to give freely; generous: a liberal benefactor.
2. Generous in amount; ample: a liberal serving of potatoes.
3. Not strict or literal; loose or approximate: a liberal translation.
4. Of, relating to, or based on the traditional arts and sciences of a college or university curriculum: a liberal education.
5.
1. Archaic. Permissible or appropriate for a person of free birth; befitting a lady or gentleman.
2. Obsolete. Morally unrestrained; licentious.
n.
1. A person with liberal ideas or opinions.
2. Liberal A member of a Liberal political party.
[Middle English, generous, from Old French, from Latin līberālis, from līber, free.]
liberally lib’er·al·ly adv.
liberalness lib’er·al·ness n.
SYNONYMS liberal, bounteous, bountiful, freehanded, generous, handsome, munificent, openhanded. These adjectives mean willing or marked by a willingness to give unstintingly: a liberal backer of the arts; a bounteous feast; bountiful compliments; a freehanded host; a generous donation; a handsome offer; a munificent gift; fond and openhanded grandparents. See also synonyms at broad-minded.
ANTONYM stingy
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