Atlas Shrugged is My Favorite Book©
Posted: Wednesday, October 12, 2011
by Arlene Wright-Correll
http://www.learn-america.com
Many years ago I saw a movie called the Fountainhead which was from a book of the same name by Ayn Rand and this lead me to hunt out the novel and read it. I also lead me to research some more about the author and eventually I discovered a novel of hers titled, “Atlas Shrugged”. It has just about become a pre-requisite reading material for our family and many of us re-read it every couple of years.
As this current administration continues with its relentless wealth redistribution programs I see how close we come to Rand’s book references to “the looters and their laws”.
How close is Charlie Rangel’s promises of “soaking the rich bill” to Rand’s “Anti-Greed Act” or the cry of giving other people a chance by preventing people from starting more than one business reminds me of the “Equalization of Opportunity Act” in Atlas Shrugged. As we restrict cut-throat competition between firms and as we see an ever increasing wave of business bankruptcies I am reminded of the Atlas Shrugged “Anti Dog-Eat Dog Act”.
Each time I re-read this book I notice that some of these fictional acts are becoming realities such as the $700 billion "Emergency Economic Stabilization Act" and the "Auto Industry Financing and Restructuring Act" and lo and behold we are being served up the “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act”.
The story line of Atlas Shrugged was the main character, Dagney Taggart’s fight to keep her railroad alive while being taxed, regulated, ruled, cajoled and badgered into a state of bankruptcy always under the guise of public interest and one might think this is such fiction it can never happen here and just when I opened the Wall Street Journal to read “Rail Shippers Ask Congress to Regulate Freight Prices.”
Hank Readon, another entrepenuer in Atlas Shrugged invents a miracle metal which is lighter and stronger and cheaper than steel. This metal is eventually appropriated by the government under the guise of “the public good” and they demand Readon come to Washington to sign a statement turning over the formula or lose everything.Again you might say fiction like that cannot happen here but only last year six bank presidents were summoned Washington by Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and upon being put into a conference room they 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 folks at the Treasury insisted that this shakedown, too, was all in "the public interest i.e. “the public good”.
For more years than I can remember we have had a license plate on the front of our automobiles that says “Who is John Galt $” and the dollar sign is in gold. Our stock answer is John Galt is the man who stopped the motors of the world by removing all the entrepenurial brains of businessmen to Galt Gulch.
As the economy in Atlas Shrugged grinds down to a halt, as progress stops, as the public is unable to get food, goods or whatever else the capitalists of the world moved towards them and as the public just sorts of give up, the politicians in Atlas Shrugged come to Galt and beg him to help get the economy back on track.
They offer him everything and the following is a direct quote from Atlas Shrugged.
Galt: "You want me to be Economic Dictator?"
Mr. Thompson: "Yes!"
"And you'll obey any order I give?"
"Implicitly!"
"Then start by abolishing all income taxes."
"Oh no!" screamed Mr. Thompson, leaping to his feet. "We couldn't do that . . . How would we pay government employees?"
"Fire your government employees."
"Oh, no!"
Abolishing the income tax. Now that really would be a genuine economic stimulus. But Mr. Obama who promised to reduce taxes and have no new taxes and the Democrats in Washington want to do the opposite: to raise the income tax "for purposes of fairness" as Barack Obama puts it without removing the thousands of tax loopholes for the corporations and the very rich and leave only the dwindling middle class Americans and their grandchildren to hold the bag of ever increasing National debt that is crushing this country.
Yes, Atlas Shrugged should be required reading for everyone and the reason why it is my favorite book is it makes your think while it gives you a very good, but long, read.
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Top-level comments on this article: (3 total)Great analogy. Well written, good arguments.
Arlene, your review and analysis makes me want to download the book and start reading. Thanks for sharing your fave with us.It is a good read...
Too much truth packed in one book. It is something that the "great unwashed" would not even be able to absorb. Alas, not even read. So glad you and Ayn were "friends".How true. They just made the first of this book into a trilogy and I did not even bother to go because I knew it would be made for the masses or should I say them asses!
Alas!
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