Nicky

You have not proved anything.  Ayn Rand  concluded with: "How could I advocate restricting immigration when I wouldn’t be alive today if our borders had been closed?"  But she was alive that day, so the borders weren't closed to her, so the immigration controls active when she immigrated did not amount to closed borders.
I skipped a step.  Having a functional border requires immigration control of some degree. 
An "economic migrant"  is an anti-concept.  What comes across the border are whole human beings, not interchangeable labor units.   Once someone has immigrated they have the freedom to be as economically active or inactive as anyone else.   "Economic migrant" tries to distract us away from considering the politics of the immigrant, but immigration policy is crafted with an eye to importing more voters for particular political parties.  "Economic migrant" and "criminal" are not mutually exclusive categories, as most criminals commit crimes to obtain money, i.e. economic motivation.  
If you buy the notion that the U.S. is a nation of ideas,  then the chief qualification for immigration is that the immigrant accept those same ideas.

You are deliberately equivocating on the term "invasion", to misrepresent Ayn Rand's views on the proper role of government.
You're welcome to be a nationalist and a racist. But, please, don't lie about Ayn Rand agreeing with you. Here's Rand's position on the issue, as stated in a 1973 Q&A:
She was asked: “What is your attitude toward immigration? Doesn’t open immigration have a negative effect on a country’s standard of living?” This is her answer:
You don’t know my conception of self-interest. No one has the right to pursue his self-interest by law or by force, which is what you’re suggesting. You want to forbid immigration on the grounds that it lowers your standard of living — which isn’t true, though if it were true, you’d still have no right to close the borders. You’re not entitled to any “self-interest” that injures others, especially when you can’t prove that open immigration affects your self-interest. You can’t claim that anything others may do — for example, simply through competition — is against your self-interest. But above all, aren’t you dropping a personal context? How could I advocate restricting immigration when I wouldn’t be alive today if our borders had been closed?

As far as I know, reservation laws on the vast majority of reservations are very similar to regular local laws.
The problem is that federal law prevents non tribe members from owning land on the reservation. So while you can transfer ownership, you can only transfer it within the confines of small tribes (the biggest are the Navajo, at 300,000, but after that it's 20,000 or less), you can't transfer it to outsiders.
Which has all kinds of consequences:
1. property values are low
2. real estate can't be used as collateral in loans or mortgages (since the bank can't own it).
3. reservations can't attract investment the way other jurisdictions can (there are lots of countries that restrict land ownership by foreigners, and they end up having the same problem).
So young tribe members wishing to build a life, who have trouble raising the money to buy a home (or start a business) react in two different ways: they either decide to depend on local government for help, or they leave the reservation. It's easy to guess which type of person does which, and what the effect is on the overall prosperity levels on reservations.
This problem could be solved without any intrusive measures, land confiscations, or any further interference with the sovereignty of reservation governments. There's no need to cause any protests, or any violent reaction, by mandating anything.
All that's needed is to remove the race restriction on the federal level. Leave the decision up to the reservation's government. If they want to open up to the world, and invite non-natives to buy land and join their community, fine. If they don't, that's fine as well. Let them be racist. It's their loss, and, eventually, their population would leave, and that would be that.

For those who might read the thread later, I'm posting this thread shortly after the Vegas mass shooting in October, 2017. Every media analyst in the western world is searching for the shooter's "motives", and looking for them everywhere, except on their own news channels, and the front page of their own news sites or papers. That's your motive: the world's attention is focused on this dull, unimportant idiot who could've never commanded attention any other way except through the most unimaginative, copycat act of murder in the history of crime.
Sorry to the victims, it's a tragedy for them and their friends and families, but, as far as everyone else is concerned, nothing notable happened in Vegas. Some people were killed by some moron. No special achievement, no special misfortune in the overall scheme of things. Just some personal tragedies. They happen. To everybody, eventually.
And covering it as if it's the most important event in the world, for the next week, will benefit no one. Especially not the victims, or the victims of future copycats. If it was at least interesting, like Ted Bundy going on a seduction/torture/murder/necrophilia spree, or Charlie Manson and his exploits, then there would be some reason for the coverage. It would still be despicably exploitative, but it would be a reason: it would be telling the audience something they've never heard of before.
There's no reason for covering these mass shootings to this extent. They're not interesting, they're not even frightening (at least not to anyone with an ability to evaluate the danger rationally), it's just the same coverage, every single time some loser does the same exact thing (knowing that that's what it takes to get into the headlines).

Yes, except for the "person without rights" part. There's no such thing, in Objectivism. Every human being has rights.

The part of your question that throws a curve into these otherwise obvious answers (obviously, initiating force against a fellow human is always a crime, but self harm or the harm of an animal you own is not a crime per se) is the "you see" part.
While animals don't have rights, that doesn't mean that a moral, civilized society should tolerate public acts of barbarism, anymore than it should tolerate public sex, people relieving themselves in public, etc.
While a person doesn't have the right to prevent another person from harming himself, or an animal he owns, he does have the right not to be subjected to witnessing those disturbing acts. If a person is hurting an animal or himself on his lawn, in plain view of the neighborhood, that absolutely violates the neighbors' rights, and the government should act to stop him. In fact, the neighbors themselves have the right to use force to stop the person immediately, and even rescue the animal (and never give it back...much like how property damage entitles the victim to monetary compensation, emotional damage entitles them to the emotional satisfaction rescuing the animal brings).
What the neighbors and the government don't have the right to, however, is to dictate how he behaves in his own sound proof basement, where the only way you would even know what he's doing is by violating his privacy.

Intelligent people aren't always rational. But I've never been dismissed like that by any rational person. Also, I wasn't born an Objectivist. I became one. I didn't dismiss Objectivism before learning about it. It's just something I wouldn't do, no matter how many people decide to insult it or attack it with fallacious arguments. Why assume that other rational people would?
 
P.S. In general, I really don't think that is how groups necessarily function. I think it takes a specific kind of, very damaged, culture in which most people will react like that to a point of view just because it's tarnished by shallow attacks.
 
I think that in a relatively rational culture people are able to differentiate between substantive criticism and slander, and if they see a point of view being savaged, if anything, they become curious about what it is that upset all the irrational savages. They wouldn't just take the irrational attacks as cause for dismissing their target belief system.
 
I think the guy gives way too much credit to those types of attacks. I'm sure it works with the kind of fringe groups I mentioned above ( the far left and religious fundamentalists), but the main reason why Objectivism is unpopular with normal, reasonable people is because of what it is, not because of any of the lies obsessed bloggers spread about Ayn Rand. Objectivism is radical philosophy that contradicts pretty much everything most people believe about morality and politics. It's a tough sell, with or without the idiots calling Ayn Rand names.
 
Let's put it this way: it wasn't Ayn Rand's slanderers who went on o'Reilly and said that according to Objectivism nuking Tehran should be a tactical option available to the military (or whatever was said exactly). It was Leonard Peikoff. And, in my opinion at least, it was a pretty accurate representation of Objectivism. It was a mistake to say it, because it's not something most Americans are ready to hear, but it's not like it's not true. And I bet that single TV appearance turned off more people to Objectivism than all the slanderous articles put together.

Communism is a much more dangerous ideology than anything "Unite the Right" has to say. Partly because they have been far more destructive throughout history, but mainly because, unlike the far right, they are well represented, and tolerated, among cultural, academic and political elites.
So they, along with the entire far left they work side by side with, should absolutely be the main concern.

Communism is a much more dangerous ideology than anything "Unite the Right" has to say. Partly because they have been far more destructive throughout history, but mainly because, unlike the far right, they are well represented, and tolerated, among cultural, academic and political elites.
So they, along with the entire far left they work side by side with, should absolutely be the main concern.

There's a meta aspect to this White Supremacist vs. BLM argument, which one sees repeatedly in similar fights across time and geography: Protestant vs. Catholic in Ireland, Hindu vs. Muslim along the Indo-Pakistan border, and many other such conflicts. The aspect is this: the more extreme elements are a small minority around which there is a larger set of people who identify with them to some extent. 
If one considers the larger group, people on both sides have different ideas, but would likely move closer toward each other's position if they would talk, would probably be willing to talk, and would likely be able to find a workable solution even while disagreeing. However, the extremes are the loudest voices, and this keeps the (larger) group around them polarized, rather than listening and attempting to understand the situation rationally. 
Often, there will be some specific issue that the larger groups disagree on: it could be confederacy statues in this case, it could be cows and pigs in another case, it could be religious affirmative action in another. The more extreme elements will take an all-or-nothing position, and that's the loudest position. If members of the larger group around them say anything else, they're branded as traitors to the cause.
On top of this, the extreme elements on both sides will try to provoke physical violations: perhaps using police to enforce what they want, perhaps using private thugs, or perhaps using violence against members of the "enemy" group. This is further polarizing. Once the battle reaches a certain point where people think dialog isn't going to get them anywhere -- because the opposition will use violence in response -- then they do the "rational thing" by cheering on when their own side uses violence.
From one perspective, white supremacists almost do not exist; from another, millions of white supremacists are out there. If we're speaking of people who want to get rid of blacks, they're a tiny minority. If we threw them all in jail, we'd still have disproportionately more black folk in jails. However, if we expand the definition to include people who think there's probably something biological/genetic about black people that makes them inferior, we now have a slightly bigger set. If we expand this further to include people who think there's probably something cultural about many black people that makes them inferior (in effect, even if not inevitably), then we have a pretty big set: many millions across all states.
Similarly, the set of people who think these statues should stay up is far larger than the racist hard-core. If nobody addresses their views and their arguments with words, it is no surprise they will give a secret, guilty thumbs up to the thugs enforcing their wishes with force. It is also no surprise that they will point to the thugs on the other side as their primary argument. 

I won't waste my time challenging this statement. It should be clear to every Objectivist why it's monstrous in its dogmatic dismissal of rationality and individual moral responsibility.

On a separate note, it also strikes me as extremely stupid to drive dangerous ideologies underground. That's when they turn from obnoxious loudmouths into violent insurgents. And this bunch might just prove better equipped for mass killing than the Islamists. So I really wouldn't poke the bear. The guy who drove his car into the lefty agitators was just some idiot who flunked basic training. Someone who didn't would go about mass murder a lot more efficiently.
Just leave them alone, let them protest and march, expose and shame politicians like Trump who show any sympathy for their cause, and that will be that.

A good relationship with China is far more important than anything we could possibly hope to gain by threatening them. And the only way we can maintain what is currently a good relationship is by leaving the balance of power that has been established in Asia alone. This is not Russia. They're not invading their neighbors, they're not going around grabbing back territories they agreed to give up, they're not even interfering in western elections. They're not perfect, but they're trying to get along with us.
We already help Taiwan a lot more than they're helping North Korea. China didn't arm North Korea with nukes (Pakistan did). We DO arm Taiwan with sophisticated weaponry. So, if I were in the US government, I'd stay as far away from the subject of Taiwan as I can through all this. Treat it as an entirely separate issue, and be thankful that the Chinese are willing to do that too.
We should stick with economic pressure. And even that, lightly. China is powerful and confident, and we're lucky they're trying to be somewhat nice.
For what purpose? Who would Taiwan use them on? Invading Chinese troops, on Taiwanese soil? Or Chinese cities? The Taiwanese and Chinese are the same ethnic group. They're not trying to annihilate each other, they're having a political disagreement.
Imo, the main thing that move would achieve is that, after the PLA strolls in (in a war that would be both a given and very brief), China would have some US nukes in its arsenal. And the US would have an adversarial China to deal with, for the next few decades.

I haven't seen any evidence that North Korea has the ability to deliver nuclear warheads with any accuracy.
There are also several missile defense systems in the area, that further reduce the success rate of NK missiles. The US is in the process of deploying THAAD missile defense to South Korea, Japan has the ship and air based AEGIS missile defense system, and I'm guessing US bases in the region are protected by both. 
So, to me at least, North Korea's ability to inflict massive casualties on either SK or Japan is being exaggerated in the media. If they attack with conventional weapons, they would have a few days at most before their offensive capabilities are fully destroyed. If they try to attack with nukes, I'm guessing they would have one try, before the US responds with tactical nukes against their launch sites.
That's one of the few good things about Trump: he is unlikely to hold back the US military from using appropriate force.
And that's IF Un even has the power to start a suicidal war. Seems like a tall order for an unpopular, unproven leader to get his military to march into certain death...no matter how ruthless and scary he is.

Just to further elaborate on the options North Koreans have: in case of any conflict or instability, they have the option to surrender to China, rather than the US. That would be something the US side would not just accept, but welcome, because it would solve almost everybody's problems without bloodshed: China would keep its buffer, the US, Japan and SK would no longer have to worry about a rogue regime in the area, and the transition to a more open NK society wouldn't be the US' problem.
So the North Korean elites wouldn't just be choosing between surrender/reunification (which would mean being held responsible for their crimes) and war. They have a path towards keeping their status/wealth while at the same time getting rid of the frightened, paranoid manchild who's terrorizing them. That is a very strong incentive to avoid a war, as the US (to me at least, seems like consciously, and as part of a well thought out plan) is ratcheting up tensions.

I haven't seen any evidence that North Korea has the ability to deliver nuclear warheads with any accuracy.
There are also several missile defense systems in the area, that further reduce the success rate of NK missiles. The US is in the process of deploying THAAD missile defense to South Korea, Japan has the ship and air based AEGIS missile defense system, and I'm guessing US bases in the region are protected by both. 
So, to me at least, North Korea's ability to inflict massive casualties on either SK or Japan is being exaggerated in the media. If they attack with conventional weapons, they would have a few days at most before their offensive capabilities are fully destroyed. If they try to attack with nukes, I'm guessing they would have one try, before the US responds with tactical nukes against their launch sites.
That's one of the few good things about Trump: he is unlikely to hold back the US military from using appropriate force.
And that's IF Un even has the power to start a suicidal war. Seems like a tall order for an unpopular, unproven leader to get his military to march into certain death...no matter how ruthless and scary he is.

I haven't seen any evidence that North Korea has the ability to deliver nuclear warheads with any accuracy.
There are also several missile defense systems in the area, that further reduce the success rate of NK missiles. The US is in the process of deploying THAAD missile defense to South Korea, Japan has the ship and air based AEGIS missile defense system, and I'm guessing US bases in the region are protected by both. 
So, to me at least, North Korea's ability to inflict massive casualties on either SK or Japan is being exaggerated in the media. If they attack with conventional weapons, they would have a few days at most before their offensive capabilities are fully destroyed. If they try to attack with nukes, I'm guessing they would have one try, before the US responds with tactical nukes against their launch sites.
That's one of the few good things about Trump: he is unlikely to hold back the US military from using appropriate force.
And that's IF Un even has the power to start a suicidal war. Seems like a tall order for an unpopular, unproven leader to get his military to march into certain death...no matter how ruthless and scary he is.

Supposedly, software engineers are predominantly male. Let's assume that's true, for the sake of this thread.  A lot of people want this rectified by having companies to make a special effort to recruit women. 
Similarly, many people claim that women are paid less than men for the same job. This may be unfounded, but let's assume it is true -- for the moment. The solution, we're told, is to pay women more.
So, here's a thought: a company (say Google) announces that it will pay a bonus to all women and to anyone identifying as a woman. Tell HR that you're a woman, and you can get the bonus. Google can keep raising the bonus until they have enough "women", and until they're being paid the same. [For a million in Google stock I might go as "Softer-wareNerdie", but name-changes should not be necessary... since all these things are supposed to be conventions, just in the mind.]
What would be the objection to this, from supporters of women's equality?
Would it be that the men are lying about thinking they're women, merely to get the bonus? Would it be okay with the egalitarians if the men genuinely identified as women? 

Ok, here it is: NONE.
There. It's summarized. There's NOTHING mystics have to say that I don't understand. Now it's your turn to contradict that by naming something.

It ignores "the reality of human psychology" because it's a hypothetical. It's not reality, it's a wild fantasy.
That's the premise here: the idea of an immortal human ignores human nature in general, including psychology, and replaces it with something else. What that something else is, is the question:
What would an immortal entity's psychology be like? Psychology is a consequence of our circumstances. Fundamentally different circumstances would lead to a fundamentally different psychology. An immortal human (I mean really immortal: indestructible, not just someone who doesn't age or get sick) would be nothing like a regular human. It wouldn't even be alive (or dead... it would be a third category).
Okay, now we left the hypothetical, and we're back in reality. You're talking about yourself...and you're ignoring the reality of human psychology. Our psychology can't escape our nature. Our psychology is a consequence of our nature. And we are mortal. That's the essential attribute of not just humans, but living entities in general.
So, like it or not, enjoying yourself enables you to survive. You don't enjoy yourself just to enjoy yourself, your enjoyment has an ultimate purpose, and that ultimate purpose, just like the ultimate purpose of everything else living entities do, is to survive.

I had picked up the DVD when it came out. It had been marked on my calender almost from when the release date had been announced. After zeroing in on the hype of the language and the interpretation thereof, I probably created an expectation in my own mind that did not get fulfilled, hence the disappointment. I will put it back in the queue and give it another go, sans expectation.

Well the main thing I would point out is that the movie is centered around a personality. That's the point of it: it's not the sci fi plot, it's the sadness of a great intellect, that is portrayed masterfully, and with everything around Amy Adams carefully structured for one and only one purpose: to support her tragic screen presence.
The incredible originality of both the plot and the structure of the movie (with the clever lie by omission at the start) are the cherry on top. But what really matters is how Adams' performance makes you feel. How strong and real the admiration and sadness feels as you're watching.
Take Jeremy Renner's inconspicuous, almost expressionless acting, for instance: a conscious choice (on the director's part), along with many, many other similar, brilliant choices, to allow Amy Adams to keep the viewer's undivided attention for the full length of the movie...and it was a compelling performance, that made me grateful that I was able to enjoy her soulful presence without distractions. It felt like she was in the room, next to me.
P.S. I wasn't an Amy Adams fan, before I saw the movie. Looking through her IMDB, the two movies she's been in that I've seen are Charlie Wilson's War and Catch Me if You Can, but I don't remember her in either. So this isn't fanboy talk, I went into it without any bias.
When I went to see Interstellar, I was expecting McConaughey to deliver (and did he ever). With this, I wasn't expecting anything, but what I got was just as great.

Well the main thing I would point out is that the movie is centered around a personality. That's the point of it: it's not the sci fi plot, it's the sadness of a great intellect, that is portrayed masterfully, and with everything around Amy Adams carefully structured for one and only one purpose: to support her tragic screen presence.
The incredible originality of both the plot and the structure of the movie (with the clever lie by omission at the start) are the cherry on top. But what really matters is how Adams' performance makes you feel. How strong and real the admiration and sadness feels as you're watching.
Take Jeremy Renner's inconspicuous, almost expressionless acting, for instance: a conscious choice (on the director's part), along with many, many other similar, brilliant choices, to allow Amy Adams to keep the viewer's undivided attention for the full length of the movie...and it was a compelling performance, that made me grateful that I was able to enjoy her soulful presence without distractions. It felt like she was in the room, next to me.
P.S. I wasn't an Amy Adams fan, before I saw the movie. Looking through her IMDB, the two movies she's been in that I've seen are Charlie Wilson's War and Catch Me if You Can, but I don't remember her in either. So this isn't fanboy talk, I went into it without any bias.
When I went to see Interstellar, I was expecting McConaughey to deliver (and did he ever). With this, I wasn't expecting anything, but what I got was just as great.

I agree, her decision wasn't self sacrificial at all. I would've still loved the movie if there was some altruism in it, but there wasn't, the movie wasn't trying to push any kind of ideology.

The best serious Hollywood actors consistently refer to current television as where to find the highest quality acting work. They say TV and movies have kind of swapped places, where movies are now frothy events. Sometimes I like event movies, but I happily embrace 8 to 12 hour serious character and narrative TV in place of 2 hour serious movies - especially when viewed from the comfort of home.