Ozymandias Shrugged
Posted on January 11th, 2009 by Gavin M.
Shorter Stephen “Senior Economics Writer of the Wall Street Journal” Moore:
Above: Allusive composition
- Our rightness is evident, for as we can see, the incorruptible titans of business are now being parasitized by the inferior masses and their regulations.
‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.™
Stephen Moore, former president of the Club for Cancerous Growth!
is he growing another head? or is that supposed to be the angel on his shoulder bowing her head in shame?
head club for men?
I always thought this guy was the “the government will give you free money” guy dressed in that Riddler-like outfit from the tele till I saw his wankery in action on Bill Maher’s show. I am still suspicious, come to think of it.
Seems like a lot of these types certainly have Atlas Shrugged as going from fiction to wank fantasy, but this is the first time I’ve seen one claim the book had any basis in reality, in the headline no less.
Say what you will about libertarians and their inability to realize (or their ability to not care about) the inevitable outcome of their ideal world, but most I’ve run into are aware that things are not, in fact, the way they would like them to be, now, right here, in the present.
Are we sure this guy wasn’t on LSD or something?
I wouldn’t think it was possible for my opinion of the Cato Institute to drop even further, but there it is.
Now see, I have two problems with this statement:
1) It’s extremely broad. And extremely false. Counter-examples abound.
2) Classic? Classic novel? You really want to stick Rand’s capitalism porn in the same category as, say, Dickens?
For the uninitiated, the moral of the story is simply this: Politicians invariably respond to crises — that in most cases they themselves created — by spawning new government programs, laws and regulations. These, in turn, generate more havoc and poverty, which inspires the politicians to create more programs . . . and the downward spiral repeats itself until the productive sectors of the economy collapse under the collective weight of taxes and other burdens imposed in the name of fairness, equality and do-goodism.
America-hating at its finest.
Abolishing the income tax. Now that really would be a genuine economic stimulus.
This, after whinging about the deficit?
These fukcers have lost their minds.
Hey!
What could go wrong?
mikey
I nominate Stephen Moore for the Stupidest Douchebag Alive award
or is that supposed to be the angel on his shoulder bowing her head in shame?
what we should be seeing is the little devil on the other shoulder, also bowing its head in shame…
Politicians invariably respond to crises — that in most cases they themselves created — by spawning new government programs, laws and regulations.
Clearly the catastrophe is the fault of onerous regulations restricting how much leverage you could put on crappy mortgages.
Stephen Moore was interviewed by the Daily Show’s Rob Riggle about the construction of affordable housing near Walt Disney World.
anybody have this clip?
Moore sees Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as the hope and future of the Republican Party … He is a strong supporter of controversial radio host Rush Limbaugh, calling him a good spokesman for Republicanism.
has anyone here seen the two-page cartoon Life of Ayn Rand, from Edward Sorel’s Literary Lives? I would link to it, but it appears to be firmly ensconced within the protection of the copyrighted book. It is hilarious, sums up the entire ugly wacko Rand life, and we even get Greenspan as a bonus.
Um. Did he really put the word fact within 20 yards of Atlas Shrugged?
Someone go check and see if the universe has collapsed.
bibliography
# Bullish On Bush: How George Bush’s Ownership Society Will Make America Stronger
# Privatization: A Strategy for Taming the Deficit (The Heritage Foundation, 1988)
these worked out beautifully.
another solution that paid in spades
“Put Government on a Diet: Pass the Bush Tax Cut”
He’s up there with Bill Kristol for being wrong 100% of the time about everything.
I remember back in the late 1990s, my grandfather had a book on his shelf that was called “The Roaring 2000s”.
There is no short supply of crappy books telling people what they want to hear.
When reality finally crushes your libertarian fantasy, the only way out is to tell yourself that your libertarian fantasy has finally crushed reality.
The world is waiting.
mingo—is that that comic that details the next 15 minutes after the end of Atlas Shrugs? That’s one I saw referenced somewhere but could never find anywhere.
simba – nope, it is a biography of Rand, done in a two-page cartoon. The thing you mentioned sounds interesting, but I have never heard of it. Much of my adolescent memory of AS is mercifully erased, so I can’t remember exactly what happened right at the end. I kept expecting Galt and Dagny to have hot libertarian sex (ew), in fact, I think that’s why I kept reading. Can’t remember if they did or not. I was not able to complete the JG manifesto.
and my apologies for being uncivil, but Stephen Moore is a festering rectal polyp.
A conversation reported to me regarding the PC/console game Bioshock, which is set in an the ruined underwater city of a Randesque figure:
A: I don’t know if I want to buy Bioshock. I don’t know if I’d like it.
B: For most of the game, you get to shoot objectivists in the face.
A: I’m IN.
Simba- You’re thinking of a one-shot of Bob the Angry Flower
David Kelley, the president of the Atlas Society, which is dedicated to promoting Rand’s ideas [and Kelley’s awesome hair], explains that “the older the book gets, the more timely its message.”
To shoot any jackass who even sits down at a computer to sketch out a screenplay.
is that that comic that details the next 15 minutes after the end of Atlas Shrugs? That’s one I saw referenced somewhere but could never find anywhere.
Bob the Angry Flower’s Atlas Shrugged 2
Brad DeLong on the mendaciousness of Stephen Moore.
I assume you all heard about this:
http://www.observer.com/term/50672
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/deutsche-project-executive-is-charged-with-larceny/?apage=1
??
…there are plans to make “Atlas Shrugged” into a major motion picture…
Angelina and Brad! Together again on the big screen!
Anyone who reads Atlas Wanks or holds that libertarianism is a serious philosophy past the age of twenty (that is being generous, normally I would say 16) has forever forfeited the right to ever be taken seriously for the rest of their life.
is that that comic that details the next 15 minutes after the end of Atlas Shrugs?
You may be thinking of this one.
I wish, fervently and deeply, that everyone who takes that goddamn book seriously would just fuck off into the wilderness in emulation of their heroes. Then we could slap a fence around Galt’s Gulch, call it a federally-protected Ignorance Reserve, set up some cameras, and start popping popcorn.
Beaten! Damn you, Xec…th…wha? You! Damn you! And damn my slowness.
Of course, neither Ayn Ran nor Stephen Moore ever come remotely close to running a business, so what the hell would they no more about it?
These people clearly have some idealized fantasy about business ownership and entrepreneurship in the abstract and they have wrapped their ideology around that.
Damn you! And damn my slowness.
You paused to write some interesting commentary. That always kills you when you’re up against a speed-posting geek.
I agree with your comment, btw.
The nut grafs:
In one chapter of the book, an entrepreneur invents a new miracle metal — stronger but lighter than steel. The government immediately appropriates the invention in “the public good.” The politicians demand that the metal inventor come to Washington and sign over ownership of his invention or lose everything.
The scene is eerily similar to an event late last year when six bank presidents were summoned by Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson to Washington, and then shuttled into a conference room and told, in effect, that they could not leave until they collectively signed a document handing over percentages of their future profits to the government. The Treasury folks insisted that this shakedown, too, was all in “the public interest.”
The distinction being that in Ms Rand’s turgid book, the invention is an alloy of some kind. In real life, the inventions are massive ponzi schemes and markets in expanding debt. Congratulations to Stephen Moore for being more unrealistic than Ayn Rand.
Well, what the fuck are you waiting for Stephen?! If Atlas Shrugged really has become reality, it time for you to fucking go John Galt, isn’t it? Get the fuck out of here already! What are you waiting for?
Anyone who reads Atlas Wanks or holds that libertarianism is a serious philosophy past the age of twenty (that is being generous, normally I would say 16) has forever forfeited the right to ever be taken seriously for the rest of their life.
Well, I held it until I was about 30. Then I got married, bought a house and became a father of two. Oh, and I lived under two terms of the Bush Administration. That pretty much cured me of libertarianism for life.
I should add though that even in my libertarian phase, I was never really into Ayn Rand. I read The Fountainhead, but I never read Atlas Shrugged.
When I used to get libertarian book catalogs in the mail, 5 or 6 pages would be devoted to the writings of Ayn Rand or the writings of others about her. I was like, “who the fuck is Ayn Rand that I should care about her opinion on art or anything else?”
Libertarianism is totally counter factual lunacy. None us does, or could, live on our own. Humans are social animals who rely society for our survival and well being. Markets cannot exist in the absence of a strong, comprehensive regulatory framework (which does not naturally emerge from the workings of the market itself). It is this regulation which provides the trust which is necessary for markets to function. Without government intervention, you inevitably get Bushian economics.
The best condensation of Atlas Shrugged EVAH:
http://www.spudworks.com/article/66/2/
A sample:
“Yes Dagny, you silly silly woman, I may seem a slacker to you, but after ten pages of explanation you will know that it is you who slack and it is I who serve a higher cause which will not be explained for another seven hundred pages. Remember, I am a d’Anconia which goes without saying that I know what I am doing,” he mocked. He was so perfect at mocking. No man mocked like Francisco.
—
Two of the “heroes” of Atlas Shrugged are a South American copper baron, a member of one of the most viciously rapacious classes in the history of predatory capitalism, and a guy who goes around blowing up ships carrying foreign aid. That, combined with the paeans to cigarettes, should tell any rational person everything they need to know about Rand’s moral compass.
Oedipus farted…
oh.. oh, but… DrDick, libertarians stand tall and stare fearlessly at adversity with a little sneer playing about their well-crafted lips. When confronted with a contemptible gummit-type opponent, they toss off a little speech, the masterfulness of which utterly abashes the opponent, who slinks off in shame. Didn’t you know that???
Dammit.
Can’t you fuckers see I’m busy here?
who slinks off in shame
Falls about, rolling on the floor laughing their ass off at their total ignorance and stupidity, more likely.
The Fountainhead did wind up as an awesomely watchable movie, at least until the courtroom speech. It was inadvertently hilarious, but there you go.
Oedipus farted…
Jesus wept.
Best blog post title ever. I mean ever. I stand in awe.
Ozomatli sang.
Or else, libertarians teach us stuff. Like about water, and such as.
My mother, who read widely, had both AS and The Fountainhead on her bookshelves. When I asked her what they were and if I should read them, she replied without looking up from her crossword puzzle, “Nah. Just a mean woman writing about something called ‘the virtue of selfishness.’ Read To Kill a Mockingbird instead.” I was about twelve, and I credit my mother with probably saving me a lot of wasted time, as I was quite impressionable and might have fallen under the Randian sway if I’d gone ahead and read those books.
A former boss of mine recommended this book, and from his brief description (“This one guy’s speech lasts for like 100 pages!”) I could tell that it was something I’d never want to read.
”This one guy’s speech lasts for like 100 pages!”
It’s like Fidel Castro’s evil doppelgänger!
That post from 2003 mentions that back then Stephen Moore was recommending that the chief economist at Bear Stearns be named Chairman of Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers. I guess Bernard Madoff wasn’t available.
If Obama can require all Randroids to go Galt somewhere out of the way for at least four years, he’ll go down in history as the greatest president ever.
Of course, the eight who survive past the four-year mark will all be shot…
That’s a real fucking “shake down” when the shaken down walk out of the conference room w/ the United Snakes Treasury tucked in their suits.
This has to be the worst Ayn Rand-inspired blog ever.
That’s a real fucking “shake down” when the shaken down walk out of the conference room w/ the United Snakes Treasury tucked in their suits.
Tucked in their barrels. Barrels with suspenders.
Oh, Brian Wesbury is quite a winner as well…
This has to be the worst Ayn Rand-inspired blog ever.
Best blog post title ever. I mean ever.
I have to agree, it’s a corker.
That’s pretty bad, David.
But I have to say it’s the shrieking harpy.
I’m picturing Mr. Moore trying to grab the conch when all those magnificent Day Traders who have fled with their laptops to the desert island go all Lord of the Flies on each other.
Wesbury was another of Stephen Moore’s recommendations for chief economic adviser. From the linked article (an interview done last February):
Q: Is there a problem that is being overhyped by the mainstream general news media…?
(Wesbury answers): …The biggest one is this whole subprime lending issue. At its worst, and this is using the worst assumptions that I can make, it’ll be about a $250 billion problem. I don’t even think that we’ll get to that level; that’s the worst I can make it… It’s just too small of a problem to take the economy down. So I think we are blowing it out of proportion today and it is causing more fear than it should.
Priceless.
I’m reading A.S. as we speak. Fun fact: Howard Korder, who wrote The Passion of Ayn Rand (a movie w/ a typically fantastic Helen Mirren, and worth watching), tells me even HE couldn’t read it. He skipped to Galt’s almost-60-page speech near the end.
The human brain, which is what I’m working with, cannot truly describe how horrible it is. The fact that Moore reveres it is the final proof (as if any
were needed) that he and his type really are, in some basic way, deeply deeply nutz.
You’re doing it anyway of course, but check Roy out:
Pammy is a thing that shrieks.
Funny. I’ve always found Moore to be a transparent dork when he’s been on Maher or any other show…like some goofy adolescent. Now that I know he considers Ayn Rand to be the pinnacle of intellectualism, I understand why. He IS a goofy, transparently dorky adolescent.
Roy actually attributed that to Crittenden in error. It’s from Ed Driscoll — and the tragedy apropos Driscoll is that Derbyshire’s piece on Mencken is really pretty good. I mean, once you sift out the crackpot political stuff, and correct for its influence.
I originally intended that “Atlas Shrugged” be a pop-up book for children, but I got a little carried away.
I think the Irony Of The Century is the name of the construction company that was indicted in NYC last month for shoddy workmanship leading to 2 (or more?) deaths.
The John Galt Company.
And it’s ironic on so many levels!
You can’t imagine how much I detest repigs, their hatred for America, their unending cowardice, and their ignorance.
I’m adding Moore to my long and ever-growing list of wingnuts into whose eyes I would like to look deeply and ask, “What the fuck is wrong with you, exactly? I really, really want to know.” This desire is not damped by the fact that I know I will never get an answer to my question.
Atlas Shrugged is to economics as Sgt. Fury is to military science.
Without the torn shirts and FOOMPH! graphics.
Atlas Shrugged is to economics as Rex Morgan, MD is to medical science.
Atlas Shrugged is to economics as Mark Trail is to wildlife studies.
Atlas Shrugged is to economics as Archie is to education.
Go, Comics Curmugeon!
I know (or rather knew) a guy that was reading Atlas Shrugged in his late 20’s. What was creepy was how emotionally involved he was getting in the story.
“I just can’t believe what those moochers are doing!”
“I bet Dagny is super hot”
In one chapter of the book, an entrepreneur invents a new miracle metal — stronger but lighter than steel. The government immediately appropriates the invention in “the public good.” The politicians demand that the metal inventor come to Washington and sign over ownership of his invention or lose everything.
Yeah! It’s just like when Clinton sent the blue-helmeted brownshirts in the black helicopters to sieze those electric motors from GM.
Telemachus Sneezed.
FYI, Angelina Jolie is now developing the movie and will be Dagny Taggart. This, at least, is appropriate. There is mention of Russell Crowe as Hank Rearden. (I love the heroes’ names. So two-fisted. So can-do.) Although it is inconceivable that a decent film be made of this ludicrous monstrosity.
Telemachus Sneezed.
Yeah, baby!
Funny, when I read Illuminatus! it’d been years since I read The Odyssey so I never picked up on this,
I don’t know what the fuss is. The FBI makes all new recruits read Encyclopedia Brown. That’s why they have a constant wiretap running on the Tigers.
the perfect body and wardrobe for right wing heads.
From the article: Some years ago when I worked at the libertarian Cato Institute, we used to label any new hire who had not yet read “Atlas Shrugged” a “virgin.”
Funny, that’s a label that in my experience tends to go well with people who have read Atlas Shrugged.
Just you wait, the glibertarians will go John Galt on us as soon as someone develops a motor that runs on Ron Paul’s spittle.
Wasn’t that what that blimp ran on?
No, that blimp ran on fumes from Mitt Romney’s hairspray.
From the Be John Galt blog linked above:
Objectivists?
Hey I’m playing Bioshock right now! And yes, I can presently imagine nothing in the universe more satisfying than bashing in objectivist skulls with a heavy wrench.
Harry? Yeah, Harry, I just… g*d*mmit, Harry.. I just read the g*dd*mned script. What the hell were you… Jesus, Harry! Railroads? A three hour speech? And who in the… who the f**k names their lead character, what’s her name… Dagnabby Triscuit?
Listen, Harry, here’s what’s gonna happen. Lovable dog, Harry. Have you seen the numbers from “Marley and Me”? Dagnabby’s got a little dog now. Woof woof. She, like, talks to it and everything. Maybe the dog talks, Christ, I don’t know… what? Objectivism? What the f**k is that? Look, Harry, I don’t give a sh*t if the dog talks about urinary tract infections, just get a dog in there somewhere. And vampires. They’re hot, too. Maybe it’s a vampire dog. But cute.
And, Geez, this John Galt a**hole, the one who can’t shut up? Two words, Harry: “Wizard School.” Next time I see this thing, Galt better run some sort of wizard school, long beard, magic wands, all that shit. Maybe he flies around on a flying carpet. All I have to say, Harry… g*dd*mmit, Harry! All I have to say, Harry is, you bring me a script like this again and I don’t care if it’s attached to Angelina Jolie’s left t*t, you bring me a script like this and you’re fired, Harry. Fired!
The editorial staff of the WallSt.Urinal are the most reeking pack of unreconstructed Hookers east of a Posey Co. Indianastan Whorehouse.
Stephen Moore was much funnier in The Hitch Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.
Anus Rained books used to sell very well on e-bay for hard cover editions in good nick. One felt good about relieving those people of their money and since they were already diseased, it wasn’t spreading it. Turgid is the way to describe her “prose”.
I’m surprised no-one has yet mentioned the ultimate Ayn Rand takedown, Mary Gaitskill’s <a href=”http://www.amazon.com/Two-Girls-Thin-Mary-Gaitskill/dp/0684843129/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231667786&sr=8-1″Two Girls Fat and Thin. Dorothy Never, the (guess which) girl is a dead ringer for K-Lo.
Yeah, fuck you wordpress for screwing up my link.
Should have been
Here’s a neato article/opinion piece I found on Rand’s seriously fucked up life.
http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:kgOjXNKKdzkJ:www.incharacter.org/article.php%3Farticle%3D93+%22Life+of+Ayn+Rand%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=12&gl=us&lr=lang_en&client=safari
(could only read it through google cache)
Re: “The Fountainhead”
“More than fifteen years later, all I can remember of the book is a red-headed architect, an image of a woman with slender wrists and large bracelets; a confusing scene involving a housing project, and a deeply disturbing sex scene.”
Re: Rand’s personal life:
“To Rand, for whom sexual love was a direct result of intellectual respect, this was heresy. “If you have an ounce of morality left in you, an ounce of psychological health – you’ll be impotent for the next twenty years!” she screamed at her former lover, in front of his wife, her husband, and Allan Blumenthal, a psychiatrist who had been asked to come down to mediate the situation. “And if you achieve any potency, you’ll know it’s a sign of still worse moral degradation!””
Shrieking Harpy indeed.
“Harry? Yeah, Harry, I just… g*d*mmit, Harry.. I just read the g*dd*mned script. What the hell were you… Jesus, Harry! Railroads? A three hour speech? And who in the… who the f**k names their lead character, what’s her name… Dagnabby Triscuit?”
Maeby Funke? Is that you?
Yet, as “Atlas” grimly foretold, we now treat the incompetent who wreck their companies as victims, while those resourceful business owners who manage to make a profit are portrayed as recipients of illegitimate “windfalls.”
What the fuck? Aren’t they the same dickwads?
What I don’t understand is why someone hasn’t started an Ayn Rand RPG or re-enactment festival, like D&D or one of those “Medieval Faires”. Mad money in that for an enterprising free market “Libertarian” like Moore. You don’t even need costumes–everybody just gets to stand around with hands on hips, “as if” they had capes blowing behind them…and then they get to play ‘scale the skyscraper’ to save Dagny from Ellsworth Toohey. Oh, the possibilities!
Maybe we should call them “Victwads”.
Harry? Yeah, Harry, I just… g*d*mmit, Harry.. I just read the g*dd*mned script. What the hell were you… Jesus, Harry! Railroads? A three hour speech? And who in the… who the f**k names their lead character, what’s her name… Dagnabby Triscuit?
All I ever needed to know about Hollywood executives, I learned from watching The Majestic.
So, I fully expect these speeches to come with John Galt being blind, with a seeing eye dog with no back legs and a disease.
Also see R. Crumb’s tribute to this epic reductivist bore on a back cover of Weirdo: “Nuts to you, ya witch!”
That’ll be the problem when they make the movie: John Galt goes full retard.
“Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ayn Rand”–Gary Marker.
This mammoth bolus of amphetamine-addled prose is the textbook example of how easy writing makes hard reading. The big chip on this speed-ravaged harpy’s shoulder was the Russian revolution. I’ve been reading Nabokov’s Speak, Memory instead: weird how an aristocratic victim of the revolution could either turn out to be a beguiling, butterfly-loving, arch-humanist….or else a cranky little troll whose gibberings are taking as gospel by this Fellowship of the Wrong.
There are people who are playing hardball for the absolute right, without consequence, to screw anyone, anywhere, and at any time. One method of accomplishing this is to turn government into toilet paper that businesses can wipe their asses with and flush so that the people have no means of recourse, no chance for retribution, and finally the ability to ignore their grievances entirely, because we all know that a humans worth need only be measured by his or her ability to consume recklessly without filing for bankruptcy. Cheney knowingly referred to such people as fodder units. One fodder unit equals one person.
Speaking of, forget everything you have ever thought or heard about Mr. Cheney, because he is a humble man who is doing what he knows is best for Americans. He never advised Bush to do anything. He cut no deals with Halliburton. He had no input about the Iraq War. He only sat in on Senate meetings to hang with the white guys who control some things and did not do so to intimidate errant republicans who might vote the wrong way, (not the Cheney way.) He has nothing in common with a mafia don and was only in the bunker during nine eleven to learn from the competent people that he admires. He did not put two intelligence community people on his staff to make people think twice about disagreeing with him, but are there to provide napkins and fresh glasses of fear that he uses like a hammer. Forget that he could arrange one’s suicide with only a hint, but never a direct order. Forget about Papa Bush’s hundred thousand acre ranch. Do not believe for a minute that KBR will take care of Cheney very nicely when he retires from his role as Constitution destroyer. When Cheney orders torture it is not torture. When unarmed civilians, including their children, are killed, one must remember that Muslims are different from normal people. They are vicious killing machines who only respond to Israeli methods of engagement.
It is also important to remember that the more financially successful a person is the better person they are, and at any given time, the best person in the room is the richest one. Money is god and anyone who believes differently is the enemy. Competition toward selfish ends is the best motivation. People who believe in community or act in a self-sacrificing ways are communists. Government regulations exist only for stupid people and corrupt politicians. Do not forget that the most virtuous person is the one with the most power or wealth. Wealthy people are American heroes regardless of the fact that many of them would sell our country out in a split second if there were enough profit in it.
Ayn Rand knew as much about capitalism as she did about lovemaking, absolutely nothing. She understood that the real enemies were the masses and they must face severe punishment for their mistakes, and under no circumstances must anyone think he is his brother’s keeper. It is a human eats human world and human dignity does not exist. The masses are a hindrance to having it all. Just because this attitude makes war inevitable one must not hate war, but must embrace it as the foundation of a strong economy. Do not worry about all the dead people, because there are too damn many people anyway and most of them are broke dicks who would not know how to rub two sticks together to make a fire let alone tie their own shoes.
The bailout is the largest tax increase in U.S. history and no one had a hand in causing the collapse, because the professionals did not have a clue that 40:1 risk ratios were unacceptable and they actually believed in infinitely expanding markets, (the first sin of capitalism is believing one’s own bullshit.)
Capitalism is not a ponzi or pyramid scheme and the only necessity now is to invent another scheme that will create the belief that our captains of industry and financial experts actually know what they are doing so everyone can start lending us money again, because of the principle of OPM. Simply because there is not enough collateral to justify the amount of debt that has been amassed and the fact that our country is now known in the trade as a deadbeat where credit is concerned is no reason to panic, because geniuses are working on it. The fact that the world is aware that they same criminals who caused this mess are the ones who are trying to invent another criminal scheme to get us out of it goes quite far in restoring faith in our nation’s financial stability. The morons are refusing to lend the U.S. money at the rate it was borrowing it, because they learned that our fearless leaders have based the entire economy on OPM and bullshit.
Foreign and institutional investors have to shake off their naive’ superstition that conservative money management combined with a respected and free people is utter nonsense; they should join our wizards and gurus in creating the next grand illusion so everyone can get on with the game the way it is supposed to be played. Ask Ayn Rand; after all, you can trust someone who never knew how to have sex. Philosophically she is the virgin Mary with a grudge, because very few realized that her famous works were fictions capable of making grown men and women believe in a person who rose from the dead and liaise’ faire economics.
There is no reason to concern oneself with the reality that the U.S. is becoming a totalitarian police state, because special interests are terrified that “the people” will rebel against the illusion when they are fed up with their wise men treating them like suckers and mooches.
Atlas shrugged and got two black eyes.
On a totally different topic, my new dog has the WORST gas! Holy not quite shit!
Note that according to Moore, the loan to Chrysler and GM cost the U.S. of A. “another trillion dollars.” Just a detail, but the actual world is made up of details.
Jeez, I really hate Ayn Rand. I knew more people in college who worshiped her and never really figured out why other than their love of “selfishness” as some sort of “virtue”. Egads. Big no thanks on the movie.
Moore :
Moore, in the next paragraph:
Simple-minded and lacking compassion? Oh, no!
Naturally, Moore then quips that abolishing the income tax would be a real stimulus package, nyuk nyuk. That’s just what Randroid douchebags do.
I hope for some Libertarian business criminal assholes to put $800 million into a bloated, ideologically pure four and a half hour movie version of Atlas Shrugs that includes every word of John Galt’s speech from the book. I hope many right-wing Hollywood dumbfucks with more money than brains who think that having to pay income tax is the worst injustice that could possibly exist sign onto this movie.
I want to see careers destroyed.
George Romero might shoot it thus
“Send more ayn rands”
What is John Guilt?
Jrod, they should get the same pack of losers that backed this stinker.
Alternative Shorter Stephen Moore:
LEAVE BERNIE MADOFF ALOOOOONE!
As mikey noted the other day, there is a Randian paradise right now on planet Earth. It’s called Somalia.
How ’bout a 15 minute movie where Ronald Reagan farts in various enclosed spaces that other people can’t leave while he’s talking about the power of the American entrepreneur?
From Stephen Moore’s WSJ piece:
From Stephen Moore’s fantasies:
fap fap fap fap
Sure, why not.
All of Mr. Moore’s theories have now been detonated.
Why not drag out Ayn Rand?
Her corpse is more decayed than Reagan’s.
The IMDB, that most trusted of sources, says Randall Wallace (Braveheart, Pearl Harbor, Richard Marx lyrics) is doing the Atlas Shrugged screenplay. Wallace likes manly man, muy macho manly heroes a lot. A lot.
That’s right. Because there’s nothing as manly as speechifying for hours on end, which we men are also hardwired to do. As I noted above, see Fidel.
Or see this exchange between Gavin and Pere Ubu on Rand and Marx and Staliln and headstands.
StalilnStalinCitizens enjoying the arsenic tang in their drinking water in Tennessee.
Here’s to unfettered capitalism.
Randall Wallace:
More to the point, our society as a whole is uncomfortable with shitty screenplays.
Applying the sort of overblown dreck he wrote for Pearl Harbor to Ayn Rand’s overblown dreck of a novel in order to dramatize her ultra-overblown dreck of a philosophy could lead to a cosmic dreck overload capable of ripping apart the very fabric of the universe. I fear for our future.
Mr. Wonderful and Snorghagen: You two don’t think the movie might turn out to be one of those so bad it’s amusing things? Maybe I’m just being optimistic.
I hope they have a one hour speech in it. That’ll guarantee success!
J—, I think these asshats take themselves too seriously to produce anything of Ed Wood, Jr. quality.
…could lead to a cosmic dreck overload capable of ripping apart the very fabric of the universe. I fear for our future.
I wouldn’t worry too much. It’ll probably just overblow.
Mr. Moor is a friend of mine and yesterday when a disgruntled investor told me he stinks, I stood up for Moor and said, “Like shit he does.”
It may very well end up being a bombastic laugh-riot. I hope so. Or it may just be mind-numbingly crappy.
One way or the other, I assume it’s going to a stinker. I’ve been trying to imagine someone making a good film from an Ayn Rand novel and I just can’t do it. Righteous Bubba mentioned the old Fountainhead movie. He called it ‘inadvertently hilarious’; I’d go for ‘heavy-handed and grotesque’.
Critics dismissed the novel as simple-minded, and even some of Rand’s political admirers complained that she lacked compassion.
She didn’t just lack compassion – she was actively evil. There’s a nasty bit of Nazi-esque eugenics in the Fountainhead.
Atlas Shugs the Movie = Battlefield Earth without Aliens
I think a pathologic devotion to a whacky ideology has created great movies!
Like Battlefield Earth.
Hmm – I smell some serious franchise potential here!
Sisyphus Chillaxed.
Loki Went Into Therapy.
Dionysus Joined AA.
Poseidon Got Rabies.
Nemesis Took Zoloft.
Buddha Got Hooked On “World Of Warcraft.”
Argus Napped.
Aphrodite Got A Zit.
J–
It’s possible. In fact it seems impossible that any movie remotely faithful to even the spirit of the book be anything but.
I never saw The Fountainhead, but according to my ex, a Yale architecture grad, few experiences are more rewarding and laff-inducing than watching that movie in an audience of architecture students.
My question about A.S. is: it’s so obviously overblown crap, and it’s so LONG and TEDIOUS, what do its fans think they’re getting from it? Agreeing with its (repellent) “philosophy” is one thing. But this is a million-word nightmare of turgidity and soap opera. What’s to “like”?
When I started architecture school, all the incoming students had to watch The Fountainhead on the first week of class. I don’t know whose idea it was, but most of the professors there seemed pretty apologetic about putting us all through it.
From a slightly older entry in that Be John Galt blog:
I am effectively rendered speechless.
But it’s a nightmare of turgid soap opera that supports them in their demented world view. No suffering is too great.
The Bob The Angry Flower strip is great, and I also recommend this, which I think someone here linked before, for shits and giggles.
And equating a fictional government’s fictional appropriation of a fictional invention with the actual “here’s $700 billion with few strings attached, maybe please pay some of it back if you can” government bail-out is hilarious. Like a comedy root canal.
>>He tells me that there are plans to make “Atlas Shrugged” into a major motion picture
The phrase “major motion picture” has always made me laugh. Has anyone ever announced plans to make a minor motion picture?
equating a fictional government’s fictional appropriation of a fictional invention with the actual “here’s $700 billion with few strings attached, maybe please pay some of it back if you can” government bail-out is hilarious. Like a comedy root canal.
It is, unless you (like Moore) find it intolerable that the event might have been perceived as inconveniencing the titans of industry or even having the possibility of defying their iron will, whether that was truly possible or not.
I am always aghast to realize that not only are there people out there who think like this, but apparently there are quite a few of them. Even some who are willing to write signed letters flat out calling for genocide.
From today’s local rag, a letter to the editor:
I’ve been kind of blue lately, and I found this letter unutterably depressing. Ordinarily it would make me very angry, but all I can feel is sorrow. What a world.
Ouroboros gagged.
FYI, y’all – Rooski pr0n link w/ what look to be popunders in “MymnBilieli’s” comment @ 15:35
Fenris slavered.
More conservomorphism from the wingnuts. But in reverse.
“Fire all your government employees.”
Yah, let’s start with the police.
And when we’re done with them, let’s sack the sewage workers, so John Galt can swim in the shite he’s talking.
I’ve mentioned this before, but may I point out again that, out here in the real world, most normal people stop getting their philosophy from novels around the age of 15.
What always strikes me as funny is that not only do they not seem to understand that 24 is not a documentary and that Jack Bauer is not a real guy, but they don’t seem to know that the actor who portrays Bauer is a liberal.
Wingnuts: We just don’t do reality. Reality hurts us.
godamnit, wrong thread.
I support the creation of a hundred or so clones from the DNA of Ayn Rand so that Moore and other fucktards who were too young to boink Ayn Rand in her prime can experience unsatisfactory congress with the genetic duplicates of their idol.
At a pinch, Rand fembots will do.
I support building an undersea city for Moore and all the other libertarians to John Galt away to.
I honestly don’t even care to make the thing a revenge-laden death trap. Let the city be completely self-sustaining so they can do whatever it is they think they’ll do down there without a genuine proletariat to exploit. They just can’t come back up after they go.
Well, okay, putting that many assholes in a cramped, claustrophobic undersea complex might be a little revenge-laden, but only because I fully expect them to turn on each other the minute the bathysphere heads back to the surface and one of them declares himself “king”.
I fully expect them to turn on each other the minute the bathysphere heads back to the surface and one of them declares himself “king”.
I think they might asphyxiate in Cheeto fart gas even before that.
If you’re libertarian you have a finely honed philosophic and economic rationale to hate teh darkies.
Atlas Shrugged: the induction into or graduation from adolescence, depending on how seriously you take the “ideas” contained within.
Hank Rearend?
Green indestructible metal?
Atlas Shrugged is what the bible was in 50 AD. In the year 4009, O’Reilly’s descendants will be whining about the “War On Randmas”. Luckily by then, 98% of the world’s population will be Pastafarians, and they won’t be listening.
I still like reading the Fountainhead from time to time. It appeals to teenagers and college students for the same reason it is not a very good novel — the characters are unreal ideals and anti-ideals. It’s a parallel universe.
But Atlas Shrugged just grinds you down and makes you want to be illiterate.
Wait a minute – Rand has a chapter in which a metal alloy stronger and lighter than steel was siezed by the government for the public good?
Was Rand aware that titainum alloys have been commerically available since 1946?
I, also, most vividly recall Moore from a Bill Maher appearance – specifically, when he couldn’t manage to get through the phrase ‘a rising tide raises all ships’ without laughing. Shameful.
We see how well the Randian principles worked on Wall Street. Randtards are a bane to civilization. The only relevant question is: what would be a more venal crime… forced reading of Atlas, or forced watching of Fountainhead?
he couldn’t manage to get through the phrase ‘a rising tide raises all ships’ without laughing.
I can usually get through that part with a straight face. I lose it when I try to explain that the way to make the tide rise is to dredge the dirt from the sea floor and dump it on the mountaintops.
So, I walk into a bar, order a drink (club soda with a twist of lime, because Crime Never Has A Happy Hour), and look around, and I notice this guy who looks kind of like the dumbest fucking guy on the planet, only he has this small blonde woman’s head sticking out of one shoulder. He takes a sip of his martini, then offers it to the head on his shoulder, she takes a little sip. He catches me staring at him and snaps, “What the fuck are you looking at? You’re dressed like a goddamn bat.”
I shrug and say, “Hey, nothing personal, just figured that there had to be some sort of story there.”
He relaxes a little, introduces himself as Stephen “Senior Economics Writer of the Wall Street Journal” Moore, and tells me his story. “I was stranded on this desert island, and I’m there for a month, trying to live on coconuts and whatever fish I can catch, and then one day a bottle washes up on the shore, and when I open it, a gorgeous female genie–think Barbara Eden in her prime–comes out.
“So, immediately, I ask her if she can get me off this fucking island, and she tells me that a rescue chopper is on its way. Then I tell her that my life’s ambition is to become Senior Economics Writer of the Wall Street Journal, and she tells me that the job’s mine. I’m thinking of what else I want, and you know, she’s not wearing a lot and I’ve been pretty damn lonely, so I ask her if we can do it while I’m waiting for the helicopter. ‘Sorry’, she chirps, ‘but genies have to be celibate.'”
“I think it over. ‘Okay’, I say, ‘how about a little head?'”
Thankew, thankew, I’ll be here all week.
Ah, memories.
I picked up a paperback of The Fountainhead in the library at about age thirteen. From the cover, I thought it might be science fiction. Read through the first dozen pages quickly, and realized:
first, this book is going to be all about Howard Roark.
second. Howard Roark is a screaming a@@hole.
Conclusion: I do not want to read this book.
Being a brainy, highly opinionated and socially awkward teenager, I could have become a screaming a@@hole MYSELF, had I read it. Narrow escape, for which I’m grateful. Years later, as a reasonably well-adjusted adult (early 40s) I read Atlas Shrugged cover to cover, including the hundred page ‘your stupid, stupid minds!’ speech. It did things to my mind, strange, terrible things that it took weeks to recover from. It’s the Necronomicon of insane politico-economic thought.
Moore-on: The scene is eerily similar to an event late last year when six bank presidents were summoned by Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson to Washington, and then shuttled into a conference room and told, in effect, that they could not leave until they collectively signed a document handing over percentages of their future profits to the government. The Treasury folks insisted that this shakedown, too, was all in “the public interest.”
You know, the very same thing happened to me. Or something very similar, anyway. What with this and that, I had gone and spent my last dime on crack and hookers – hey now, don’t hassle me, all that’s in the past, and we should look to the future instead! – so I went to the local savings-n-loan with my palm outstretched to get financially bailed-out. Well, after a certain amount of begging and pleading I got them to the point where they were willing to make me a loan, but do you know what those evil jackbooted thugs had the nerve to demand of me? That I pay them back!
Tyranny! Oppression! Never, never, never! To Hell with society, I’m gonna go live in the woods, and let’s see just how well those arrogant bastards do in my absence!
Move over, Battlefield Earth.
somalia is a modern libertarian paradise. they should move.
an article worth reading would be idiocracy: from fiction to fact in almost no time at all
Around 1976, about half the apa I was in at the time seemed to be talking about Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged. From what they said, I judged it might be of interest to a roommate of mine and mentioned it to him. He read it right away, and it seemed to have a powerful effect on him, at least he said so. So I read it too. It was kind of compelling in its way, but I couldn’t overlook the telltale insane bits. When I got to the 60-page monologue, I decided Rand had no faith in her audience getting it in the previous hundreds of pages. That more or less cured me.
I still found Rand interesting enough to read. I couldn’t hack her nonfiction for more than about a page (after which I would typically realize that though my eyes were moving through the text, it wasn’t reaching my brain), but I read her fiction. I re-read Atlas two or three times (skipping the monologue one time, forcing myself to read the stupid thing at least once), and The Fountainhead twice, and the others once.
In my opinion, the real goldmine of stupidity, wrapped in nonsense and deep-fried in liquid pretension, is Anthem. It’s the shortest thing she wrote, and the only one I am quite certain I will never ever attempt to read again. It’s the DUCK AMUCK of Objectimalism.
Incidentally, I heard her speak on the radio once — the Fishwife, I mean — and she had an accent you could scoop with a shovel. I understand some people can learn how to speak English without an accent, but Superwoman couldn’t be bothered.
Very nice site!