It has been a not so subtle change that has overtaken us conservatives and evangelicals over the past five years....demonstrated in many ways but evidenced in our reaction to a pandemic. There has not been a single solitary day go by.....in my observation anyway.....on talk radio....where a caller did not ridicule masks or vaccinations...."miniscule"....as one caller described the number of deaths in America...."not even a million!" The following post is from January of 2020.....before the pandemic began to hit in full force:
This is an odd Lord's Day post. I'm somewhat surprised that I had never read Atlas Shrugged back in college in the 70s....for Ayn Rand was a charismatic cult figure on campuses back then.....and because I would read similar complex but popular books such as Gravity's Rainbow and The World According To Garp and The Greening Of America....and Future Shock....but I did....when I was very young....probably about twelve at the time....see Gary Cooper in The Fountainhead....the final scene of which eerily stayed with me over the years....where Howard Roark's new wife rises in the open elevator to the top of the soon to be greatest skyscraper in the world....while Roark waits godlike....arms on in hips.....at the top.
In retrospect....opinion here of course....Ayn Rand's capitalism as connected to her philosophy of Objectivism is the worst capitalism of all....and it has reared its ugly head today through America first....which is really America Only....which is why we can threaten and browbeat and throw tariffs at will on anyone from whom we can get a few dollars more.
Philosophers have rejected Ayn Rand's system but from time to time over the decades during and after her life she would again become very popular in certain sectors of American life....at one time conservatives and at another time Libertarians and at other times college students and protesters....and again at other times intellectuals....as Alan Greenspan was more than an admirer of hers....evidenced as he invited her to the White House when he was named President Ford's chair of his Council of Economic Advisers...(a photo exists of Rand and Greenspan and President Ford that is available through a quick Google search)
This philosophy....this system of hers....effects man in many areas of life and government but essentially it is using an inductive logic from the reality that our senses perceive where as Wikipedia puts it...."the moral purpose of one's life is to pursue one's own happiness." So for example...altruism in any form is a waste of time. It's really as bad as it sounds. Compare this to the Westminster Shorter Catechism answer to the question "What is the chief end of man?"...."Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever."
As a child during the early days of the Soviet Union Ayn Rand's family was persecuted. She escaped....it took a while but she became famous for her writing. She was an atheist who could not tolerate anything to do with God....and she despised William F. Buckley....as the feeling was returned.
In many ways Donald Trump could have been one of her heroic characters.... he could have been Howard Roark at the top of his Trump Tower....but in some other ways she would have despised him. Trump said during the campaign that he read The Fountainhead....and listed it as one of his favorite books....but more likely he...as I....saw the film.
"Lord open our eyes to this man"....it's not a prayer that I utter while purposely taking time for prayer.....but rather uttered at different times throughout any day when I hear some new news about President Trump...."Lord....open our eyes to this man....open my own eyes to myself....have mercy upon your children if not all of America....that at least we might look once again only to you....having learned a lesson on how easily it is to be taken in by the philosophies of this world."
