Dormin111

Bill requires all Idaho kids to read ‘Atlas Shrugged’ BOISE – Coeur d’Alene Sen. John Goedde, chairman of the Idaho Senate’s Education Committee, introduced legislation Tuesday to require every Idaho high school student to read Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” and pass a test on it to graduate from high school. When Sen. Bob Nonini, R-Coeur d’Alene, asked Goedde why he chose that particular book, Goedde said to laughter, “That book made my son a Republican.” Goedde said he doesn’t plan to press forward with the bill, but it was formally introduced in his committee Tuesday on a voice vote. He said he was sending a message to the State Board of Education, because he’s unhappy with its recent move to repeal a rule requiring two online courses to graduate from high school, and with its decision to back off on another planned rule regarding principal evaluations. “It was a shot over their bow just to let them know that there’s another way to adopt high school graduation requirements,” Goedde said after the meeting. “I don’t intend to schedule a hearing on it.” The 1957 novel has been embraced by libertarians and the tea party movement, in part for its opposition to “statism” and embrace of capitalism, as Rand expressed her philosophy of “objectivism,” focusing on “the morality of rational self-interest.” In recent years, the novel has been touted by conservative commentators including Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. “When I read Atlas Shrugged, and it’s been probably 30 years since I read it, but it certainly gives one a sense of personal responsibility,” Goedde said. Sen. Cherie Buckner-Webb, D-Boise, questioned the choice of the book for a graduation requirement. “We have a wide variety of children who will be trying to graduate and reading and grasping some of these things, and their cultural context may be different,” she said. Goedde responded, “I don’t plan on moving this forward – it was a statement.” Nevertheless, as a formally introduced bill, the measure will be read across the desk in the Senate Wednesday morning and will receive a bill number; it will be among the bills posted on the Legislature’s website for the session and preserved in its records. Before voting to introduce the measure, other Senate Education Committee members joked that they’d like to put forth their own favorite books for consideration. The bill’s introduction marks a contrast, as Idaho Senate committees have sometimes refused to introduce serious legislation because they felt it wouldn’t pass. An example is last year’s bill to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation; despite a statewide outpouring of support for the measure, the Senate State Affairs Committee voted along party lines against introducing it. The State Board of Education repealed the online-class graduation requirement Nov. 19 on a 7-1 vote; state schools Superintendent Tom Luna made the motion, saying, “Proposition 3 was overturned by the voters.” Proposition 3 called for a laptop computer for every high school student and a new focus on online learning, among other changes. Goedde was the lead Senate sponsor of that legislation, which implemented a major portion of Luna’s “Students Come First” school reform laws. Those laws, which also included rolling back collective bargaining rights for teachers and imposing a new merit pay system, all were overturned by Idaho voters in November. Asked about his comment that the Ayn Rand book made his son a Republican, Goedde said after the meeting, “Well, he’s not a practicing Republican. But it certainly made him a conservative.” Looks like a publicity stunt from a clueless Republican. We'll probably get some good publicity at least.

I agree with Dennis and Johnathan. A great example of this "forget the details, look at the big picture approach" can be seen in the movie Gattaca where the protagnoist constantly commits fraud to demonstrate his tremendous abilitities and virtue.

Reading his wikipedia page, he seems pretty good for a modern Republican: quite strong on the fiscal side, awful on the social side. But I can predict now that for the rest of this guy's career, he will forver be labeled as a "Rand fanatic" who "adamently followed her philosophy in Congress."

This is rationalization to avoid my assertions. When I said, "in this case" I meant to qualify the meaning of the word "underlie," not the concept it represents. It is no different than saying "in this case, a mouse is an electronic device which attaches to my computer, and not a small fury rodent." "Underlie" in another context could refer to the physical state of one itee two concepts, they are not identical. Perhaps my qualifier was unnecesary, but it was also not what you claimed it to be.

The OP's question was not, "does libertarianism have a SINGLE philosophy?" Libertarianism has A philosophy because it has many philosophies.

To "underlie" in this case, refers to a philosophy which forms the basis for the understanding of another philosophy. Political philosophy refers to the use of collectivized force, and is therefore necesarily dependent upon ethics, which refers to how an individual lives his life. As I illustrated, multiple forms of ethics, even contradictory ones, can underlie a common political principle. On the other hand, one can build an ethical system without relation to a political system, because politics is not a requirement for ethics. The two should be integrated, but one comes before the other. As Ayn Rand expressed, her herierarchy goes as follows - metaphysics to epistemology to ethics to politics That was clumsily worded by me. I only meant a moral principle which denotes an action. For instance, "the state should not bail out bankrupt companies."

Thank you for pointing out Frederick II. I had never read antying on him but his wiki page is facinating: "Frederick II was a religious skeptic. He is said to have denounced Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad as all being frauds and deceivers of mankind. He delighted in uttering blasphemies and making mocking remarks directed toward Christian sacraments and beliefs. Frederick's religious skepticism was unusual for the era in which he lived, and to his contemporaries, highly shocking and scandalous, and his papal enemies used it against him at every turn."

Someone covered this previously in regards to vegitarianism. While all philisophical categories are properly integrated, they can also be heierarchical. Libertarianism is a political philosophy and therefore deals with the philosophy of the use of collective force. While libertarians and Objectivists can believe in a specific principle, they don't have to agree with the justification for said principle. For instance, it is a libertarian principle that it is wrong for the state to give financial bailouts to failing private companies. Amongst libertarian scholars, a number of different rationales with vary degrees of importance can be used to justify this principle. An Objectivist would say that such a bailout would be an improper use of the state, which given its role as a legitimate monopoly on force, is tasked with the protection of individual rights. Pressing further, and Objectivst would qualify why such right exist and where they come from. An "utilitarian" libertarian would probably start and stop with the suggestion that bailouts are counterproductive to the economy and therefore make everyone poorer. An Objectivist would agree with this assertion, but not its importance as a primary argument. Meanwhile, someone over at Bleeding Heart Libertarians (http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/) would oppose bailouts on the grounds that they are anti-egalitarian and lead to a society with more social injustice. While these libertarians hold the same premises as progressives, they come to the same action principle conclusions as Objectivists.

My answer to the topic is that libertarianism has numerous underlying philosophies stretching from classical liberalism, to Objectivism, and even to egalitarianism.

I define a "libertarian philosopher" as an individual who holds the political philosophy of libertarianism, and then attempts to justify it by fleshing out its foundations (ie. ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, deontology, etc.) regardless of the order of discovery. By this standard, Rand is a libertarian philosopher. As are Mises, Nozick, Hayek, Rothbard, and others to varying degrees. I agree that there is no single libertarian philosophy, like there is a single Objectivist philosophy. Rather, libertarian philosophy is a field of study. For instance, John Locke is probably the first libertarian philosopher (depending on how loosely you define, "libertarian"). He first theorized the case for homestead based private property. From there, other enlightenment philosophers like Thomas Jefferson to modern philosophers like Rand refined his view point. This is a progression of libertarian philosophy. Johnathan's main point is that Objectivsts often dismiss libertarianism as shallow and baseless while ignoring the long hisotry of foundational development for the political philosophy.

I don't know how you constructed that syllogism. I said the underlying metaphysics/epistemology/ethics between Rothbard and Rand were nearly identical. The major separation between the two started with the leap from ethics to politics. The Lockean basis for libertarianism refers almost entirely to politcs with only a bit of ethical justification. Both Rothbard and Rand certainly took a few key principles from Locke, but they are by no means identical to Locke.

I would go as far as to say Rothbard has a nearly identical metaphysical/epistemological/ethical basis as Rand, although it was far less developed given his primary role as an economist rather than a philosopher. EDIT: I throw my lot in with Johnathan and 2046. Libertarianism is a political philosophy with a long history of underlying philosophical justifications going back to Locke. We can certainly critisize those varied justifications, but to claim they do not exist is ignorant.

Check out Marsha Enright's "Why Man Needs Approval." http://mol.redbarn.org/objectivism/Writing/MarshaEnright/WhyManNeedsApproval.html

2046, I am interested to here more about your theories, but I always see them in response format. Would you be willing to start a new thread where you lay out a synopsis of your political theory?

I didn't consider Whitaker since his article is at least a review, and not an article written long after Rand's death for the sole purpose of attacking her. My number one pick is George Monibot's article, "How Ayn Rand became the New Right's version of Marx" in the Guardian. Link - http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/mar/05/new-right-ayn-rand-marx There was a thread on it a while back when it came out - http://forum.objecti...showtopic=23191

On the flip side, would it be immoral to for the federal government to repudiate its debt? What if it was doing so to become a legitimate government funded by voluntary means?

http://www.salon.com/2013/01/19/ayn_rand_is_for_children/ "With this week’s news that Glenn Beck and others are preparing to build libertarian communes and “Going Galt,” I figure now is the time to finally refine my theory about those who claim to be Ayn Rand acolytes or who brag that their favorite book is “Fountainhead Shrugged” (they are the same book written twice in order to double Rand’s profit, so for brevity, let’s just use one name). Since I first met Objectivists (read: libertarians) in college, my Unified Theory of Rand Groupies posited that they all probably fit into at least one of three groups: those who 1) never grew out of the usual “the world is persecuting me and doesn’t see my true genius” phase that momentarily afflicts the typical high schooler 2) think saying “Ayn Rand” in any context makes them sound intelligent, even though they’ve never actually read her work or 3) have read Rand’s work, don’t genuinely believe in her ideology as evidenced by their lifestyle/politics, but still say they love her because it serves to make them feel good about their own avarice. Out of these three groups, the third is probably the most prominent in this, the era defined by the politics of “makers versus takers.” After all, these folks purport to adore the free-market triumphalism of “The Fountainhead” and “Atlas Shrugged,” haughtily imagine themselves as rugged up-from-the-bootstraps individualists like Howard Roark and John Galt, tell themselves that their greed is patriotic, and thus demonize government and taxation. Yet, most of these same people tend to live their lives in ways that belie their personal mythology. Typically, they are more than happy to (among other things) drive on taxpayer funded roads; to have their assets defended by government agents (aka police and firefighters); to have their property rights protected by a law enforcement collective known as the judiciary; and to pocket their share of handouts. Some alleged Randian individualists are even willing to decry the social safety net for others but not for themselves, and still others are happy to to vote in Congress for the epitome of what Randianism stands against. That said, after reading the following nugget from this terrific New York Times writeup of literary giant George Saunders, I discovered a critical hole in my theory (emphasis added): After he graduated from the School of Mines, Saunders went to work for an oil-exploration company in the jungles of Sumatra…They worked four weeks on and two weeks off and in the down time would be shuttled in helicopters to the nearest city, 40 minutes away, and then from there fly to Singapore. “I’d been kind of an Ayn Rand guy before that,” he said. “And then you go to Asia and you see people who are genuinely poor and genuinely suffering and hadn’t gotten there by whining.” While on a break in Singapore, walking back to his hotel in the middle of the night, he stopped by an excavation site and “saw these shadows scuttling around in the hole. And then I realized the shadows were old women, working the night shift. Oh, I thought, Ayn Rand doesn’t quite account for this.” As Saunders’ personal story suggests, my theory about Randists fails in not accounting for the fourth and arguably biggest subgroup of all: those who have never visited the developing world. And when I say “developing world” I’m not talking Tom Friedman-ese by referring to walled off resorts in banana republics or big, wealthy cosmopolitan cities isolated from their otherwise dirt poor nations. I’m referring to the actual dirt poor places outside those resorts and cities where the Tom Friedmans and Rand groupies probably never visit. Now its true: I’ve never been much of a Rand fan myself (beyond, of course, the normal momentary dalliance with “Fountainhead Shrugged” during my obligatory 11th grade descent into immature self-pity). Nonetheless, after my three-week voyage to the poorest province in China in 2009 (which you can read about here), I can say with confidence that if you have been to the non-Tom-Friedman developing world – aka the actual developing world – you don’t need Saunders’ MacArthur Genius-worthy intellect to arrive at his very same conclusion. My particular trip felt like a journey to a place much like what I imagine 19th century America had been – a place that at once confirmed the worst consequences of a real-world Galt’s Gulch (no obvious environmental, public health or workplace safety laws) and proved the idiocy of Rand’s overarching ideology (the preternaturally industrious poor in China hardly seemed like blameworthy “takers”). I’m guessing it was the same for Saunders in Singapore, just as I’m guessing it is for Americans who deign to visit the developing world. Simply put, once you actually see laissez faire capitalism and greed-is-good extremism at work, it doesn’t look as nice as it sounds in Rand’s works. On the contrary, as Saunders implies, it makes “Fountainhead Shrugged” look less like serious treatise than bad young adult fiction, with all the corresponding misguided parables and oversimplified conclusions. The problem is, for various reasons – some having to do with economics, some having to do with cultural arrogance – relatively few Americans make the kind of trip Saunders made. According to government data, only 30 percent of Americans even possess a passport (which is a very low rate compared to citizens in other industrialized English-speaking countries). Additionally, of those who do, only a fraction use their travel papers to visit parts of the developing world that perfectly spotlight the failures of the Rand vision. To be sure, a strict Objectivist would probably argue that many developing-world nations don’t represent Rand’s vision because they are ruled by corrupt governments. But that’s not really relevant because many of those places are now defined by Authoritarian Capitalism whereby political freedoms are limited, but Randian free-market extremism most certainly is not. Indeed, as some American CEOs will http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C48fqHdMaVc, if you want to see a more purely Randian version of a socially darwinist free market than exists in America, head straight across the Pacific Ocean to China. Put all this together, and I’m officially amending my theory. To be a Rand groupie is to flaunt your immaturity, your ignorance, your desperation to justify greed or your lack of international travel. It is, in other words, to admit your blindness to how so much of the world already lives, and to ignore what America would look like if “Fountainhead Shrugged” was seen as a public policy manual rather than what it really is: a dangerous farce." I rank this as the second worst Rand hit piece I've ever read.

Evolution is a scientific systems process, not an ethical code. Ethics only refers to the entity which is capable of having choice, which is the individual. Evolution is an emergent process which occurs when many individual entities interact with each other. It has no "purpose" or "goal," it is just the result of automatic biological action. When an individual acts, he does so by the standard of his life, not reproduction. The individual human is only concerned with the evolutionary advance of his species to the degree which it enhances his own existence (which is to say, generally not at all).

In a proper state, what are the valid restrictions on voting? I think the topic is generally considered archaic today in the West with such wide suffrage, but perhaps voting restrictions hold the key to staving off potential "public choice" problems. Off the top of my head, a few potential criteria include: - Age - Mental Health - Criminal or ex-criminal status - Wealth - Education - Knowlege (ie. civic tests) - Citizenship/residency - Civic participation (taxes or membership in state functions) I honestly have not thought too deeply about the topic, but I have a few ideas. There should be a minimum age requirement and residency for a certain time period. Criminals of a certain degree should be prohibited from voting (would have to think more about specifics). I would like to see some for of simple civics test. I might also consider voting power being tied to wealth in some capacity.

That's interesting that you call Branden charasmatic. I have seen and heard mixed things. In recent videos he looks and sounds like a zombie who barely knows where he is. From someone who knew him back in the day, he was describes as a "game show host" with a lot of flash and suface charm, but a lack of substance and willingness to engage in intellectual rigor. On the other hand, I have also heard from other people who agree with your assessment. Can you elaborate on what Branden was like back then and how he complimented Rand?

Do you agree that the potential for hyperinflation (or just high inflation) still exists? What if the banks unleash the hordes of cash they are sitting on or the government prints excessive money to cover debts?

Yep, your typical pile of Rand-bashing strawmen and nonsense. Sing it with me: - Paul Ryan is a hardocre objectivist - Rand's books only appeal to wimpy adolecents - One of Rand's biggest platforms was "tax cuts for the rich" - Rand was an elitist who wanted smart people to run the world - The moderate Republican establishment (including Romney) "channels" Rand - Rand was a massive hypocryte because she took social security and Medicare - Rand championed a serial killer

Oooooo, we've all been burned.

Completely agree but I would add that the social contract is itself a floating abstraction, and is never valid.

I don't see any explanation as to why Objectivism doesn't count as a philosophy (by your definitions of ideology and philosophy). Rand would say that Objectivism is a scientific, metaphysical fact just like chemistry or physicals. Its status as an "ism" is purely semantics. Modern science could be described as "rationalism" and in the past it was. These days trust in the scientific method is so ubiquitous that almost all people accept it as fact and therefore don't assign it the label of "ideology" which generally implies subjective bias. The philosophy of Objectivism is still extremely marginal and therefore is not treated as the same category as modern science.