It Wuz Ayn

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for May 3, 2012

            It could only have been her. Who else in the world could have talked a whole country into collectively committing suicide?  Turn it into a heedless fiddle-playing grasshopper who had no responsibility for its future because winter would never come?  Who could make a whole nation believe that it was so exceptional, so special, so wonderful, so King-of-the-Worldish that it didn’t need to undertake those annoying chores like taking out the garbage, washing the windows, mowing the lawn and paying the mortgage, all of which are part of the adult responsibility required to maintain a civil society?  Who could feed the adolescent ego to such a degree that a whole generation of boomers would grow up to become right-wing Randian Republicans, all convinced that they were John Galt and it was time to shrug?          

            Ayn Rand, that’s who. And why not?  Hers was the irresistible siren song for every 18 year-old brooding in his room in the basement, picking at pimples and daydreaming about the cool, blond Dagny Taggart, while Mom keeps hollering down the stairs that he needs to do his homework, clean up his room, take a shower and come take the garbage out. Terrible. Take the garbage out. That’s for mooks, for losers, for leeches and takers, not for job-creating Masters of the Universe!

            And so John Galt was secretly born in the hearts of millions of average Americans – the belief that the benefits they received by living in a civil society, the schools they attended, the roads they drove on, the public health measures that helped keep them healthy, the regulations and subsidies that kept their food safe and affordable, everything in the social compact that surrounded them, all paid for by taxes by their hard-working fellow citizens  – all of that should be eliminated, de-regulated, privatized, profitized and paid for by The Other Guy, while they alone would be exempt, would be the special ones, answerable only to themselves.  Not for them the taking out of garbage.  Or paying the taxes that kept the schools and roads open so others could also benefit.  No.  Once he’s gotten his, John Galt doesn’t do The Commons for anybody else. That is for the moochers, the leeches.

            Did I say “siren song?”  Crack cocaine is more like it.  It was irresistible to the self-centered sociopathic 18-year old mind.  Fortunately, most people were able to outgrow Randian sociopathy when they grew up, got a job, had a family.  That’s when a world-wiser adult realizes that paying for a civil society actually brings benefits, secures a better future for their kids, and offers vital protections against the brutal way capitalism often operates in the real world.

            But a few people never grew out of that mind set. Alan Greenspan, the former Chairman of the Fed, was one of those life-long fanboys of Ayn.  He was also one of the most powerful financial advisers to all the Masters of the Universe for years, which gave his Randian world view extraordinary legitimacy. The Koch  Brothers are fanboy beneficiaries extraordinare, as is Congressman Paul Ryan.  He’s a Super Fanboy who requires that his staffers read her interminable Atlas Shrugged.  His proposed federal budget is Ayn at her chilling best.

            Which is all well and good.  In a capitalist, consumer society, sociopathy has its special charms and pay-offs for a certain few.  But here was the most amazing part of  Ayn’s mind-trick:  Her few fanboys managed to convince a huge majority of normal adults --who knew better-- that they should repeatedly vote for Master of the Universe policies that would benefit a handful of real John Galts, while hurting all those useless, contemptible moochers and leeches  -- themselves. 

             It was a brilliant piece of political ju-jitsu, all blind self-destructive noses, scissors, and fearful, misdirected spite on the part of the voters.  While the manipulative, sociopathic Randers smiled. Ayn would have been so proud.   

            So, how did it all work out?  Look around you at what happens when Atlas shrugs: For the moochers, an underwater mortgage, a looted national treasury, record unemployment, outsourced jobs, busted unions, voter suppression, a crumbling, bankrupt Commons, a failing health system, a failing school system.  In short, a system in collapse, a country without a future.

            And for the Masters of the Universe? The happy continued massive transfer of the nation’s wealth upline, with the booming Wall Street casino once again open for business-as-usual.   

            And why not?  Johnny Galt needs a new pair of shoes.

Ayn's Fanboys Rule!

Calhoun's Can(n)ons for April 29, 2001


True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.  Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt had no idea. The Cult of Ayn Rand is now in full flower in Washington in a gaggle of powerful players. And they’re writing and trying to pass laws that don’t just affect your Senior Prom, they’re now writing laws that will affect your life.

A wag once noted, “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.”

Alas, Representative Paul Ryan, Chairman of the House Budget Committee, was one of those 14-year olds, but he didn’t get the joke. Instead, he’s an Ayn Rand Fanboy who requires his staffers to read her massive screed, “Atlas Shrugged,” which is a risky thing to do since it will plunk him into the Bin of the Shameless Hypocrites when they learn that Ryan’s father died when Ryan was 16 and thereafter Ryan received Survivor’s Benefits from that anathema to all Randians: Social Security. Which, ironically, puts Ryan in the class of people Ayn Rand most despised: parasites and moochers. (“Bootstraps, young Ryan. That’s all you need: Bootstraps!”) And may explain why Ryan now wants to “transform” and “privatize” Social Security as we know it right out of existence. (“A bootstrapped safety net for me, zip for you. Ayn wouldn’t approve, you know.”)

Ryan is being touted as the courageous savior du jour with his budget proposal that basically gives more tax cuts for the rich and the shaft to everybody else. Which is quintessential Rand. Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the Fed was also a Fanboy of Rand, even wrote her a fan letter, although he couldn’t have read her novels very carefully. On his watch, after the Randian Masters of the Universe on Wall Street blew up the financial world and nearly brought this country down, he expressed surprise and confessed that it never occurred to him that any Master of the Universe would be so irresponsible and reckless as to destroy his own company.

Obviously, Greenspan never bothered to read the ending of “The Fountainhead.” Some fan.

And now the Cult of Rand has churned out Part I of “Atlas Shrugged,” a loving-hands-at-home movie filled with earnest reverence and bad writing, while offering full employment for second-string character actors. It’s now playing at your local Cineplex, though if you want to see it, I’d recommend you hurry since Part II has been canceled and Part I won’t be there long.

A Romantic Rand Renaissance in the era of Facebook (We’re all one big interconnected Tahrir Square, now.) seems strangely anachronistic, like watching Republican Congressmen suddenly morphing into Civil War reenactors on the floor of Congress and yelling about the South Rising Again! But I suppose it’s to be expected.

In hard times, when the world has suddenly turns upside down and flies totally out of control, a good number of people apparently find comfort in turning back into teenagers. And there is nothing more powerfully attractive than RandWorld’s ego-stroking, romantic world view, which is basically the normal 14 year-old’s sociopathically delusional belief that his individual needs alone stand athwart the world -- “ I AM JOHN GALT!”-- while Mom is hollering down the basement stairs that he needs to stop picking at his pimples and get his homework done.

Most of us grow out of that phase. But a few don’t. Safely wrapped up in RandWorld, the Paul Ryans of this world grow up believing that society is made up of Prime Movers (them) and everybody else (moochers). They forget that Dagney Taggart didn’t build her railroad with those soft white manicured hands: Moochers did, one spike at a time; Commie Bums and Socialist Moochers and Union Parasites who knew what the real world is like and demanded whiney Dagney pay a living wage and pony up her fair share of taxes to help build and pay for a safety net because building railroads is hard, dangerous work and those builders needed a safety net for when times got tough.

That’s who built Dagney’s railroad. Without them and their steel-bending hands, Dagney Taggart would just be another rich second-rate dreamer sitting in a bar buying drinks for anybody who would listen to her while she drew her useless plans to build a railroad and make it run, all scribbled out on the back of damp cocktail napkins.

Buddy, can you spare a dime?