Ayn Rand. Sociopath.

Now that we have a real live Ayn Rand worshiper running for vice president of the United States, I'm excising this short Rand reading list from the Teaparty entry elsewhere on this blog, in anticipation of more Rand gems to add in the coming months.

What a sad, broken and destructive woman. Our curse that she has infected our political id so inextricably.

for an a good primer on Rand herself and a great listen--play the AUDIO ONLY youtube clip--it's just audio, press play and browse in another window while you listen.

The woman, her life/story and philosophy

• I, me, mine: the unholy trinity to ayn rand « Tomfoolery - (1/23/2011) http://bit.ly/PddnGb
• Slate Book Review: "The Perverse Allure of a Damaged Woman"(Nov 2009
• " thrilling psychological portraits of a horribly damaged woman who deserves the one thing she spent her life raging against: compassion."
• Stranded in New Mexico - AYN RAND: SOCIOPATH, ATHEIST, PHILOSOPHER OF SELFISHNESS (7/1/2012)  http://bit.ly/MRC9t8
• Ayn Rand was fascinated w/ a gruesome serial killer (AlterNet, 1/2011)

Libertarian Paradise

• "So what is this Republican Eden, this Utopia? Why, it’s Pakistan." Our Fantasy Nation? - N. Kristof -  NYTimes.com  (Jun 4, 2011)
• Stateless in Somalia, and Loving It - Yumi Kim - Mises Daily (2/21/2006)   (Ludwig von Mises Institute)
• Ayn Rand, 99%er | Addicting Info (8/11/2012) http://bit.ly/ScZ3Oc
• Of the 10 richest people of this nation, only two of them, Bill Gates and Larry Ellison, actually produced something to earn their wealth. The rest instead made their wealth either through margin, operating as middlemen for financial transactions, or in an idle manner, earning profits from other people’s labor through capital ownership. Half of them are inheritance wealthy, without any real generation of wealth on their own. And the system is slanted for the middlemen, the economy’s transmission system, to gain the largest of benefits.
• The largest pool of wealthy in this nation do not produce anything, instead effectively robbing from those who do produce goods and services. The top 1% are primarily filled with these middlemen, with the financial transactions, the hedge fund managers, with the idle rich, unable and unwilling to produce neither goods nor services. The removal of regulations allowed for them to slant the system in their favor. Being the middlemen, they could game the system, and turn it into a heads I win, tails you lose, con game.
• Is this what Ayn wanted? Absolutely not....She believed in productivity, that those who made or serve should be in the drivers seats.

Welfare

• Wealthcare (book review, Jonathan Chait, thoughts on Rand; The New Republic 1/2011)
• Ayn Rand sucked off the gov't teat--under assumed name (1/2011)

Selfishness

• On Judge John Roll's heroism: either Ayn Rand was wrong or he was a fool (on empathy, rand, Tucson) (1/2011)
• The terror of knowing what this world is about - (Jan 2011) http://bit.ly/Nl9bb2