Comments on: Reports on Ryan and Rand are Rong

By: Leftie Lefterson

Leftie Lefterson — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 00:48:27 +0000

Rep. Ryan lists “Mere Christianity” and “Atlas Shrugged” on his facebook page as two of his favourite books (oil and water!). Even if his staffers might not be asked to read it, the toxic, anti-Christian ideology is still there.

By: Bret Lythgoe

Bret Lythgoe — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 06:41:02 +0000

I thought that Whittiker Chambers, in the pages of National Review, effectively dispatched Ayn Rand’s “philosophy” (to use the term loosely), to borrow a phrase from Ronald Reagan’s description of Chamber’s former fling, communism, to the intellectual “ashheap”?

Sadly, Rand’s nonsense, even though Chambers, and, I might add, william F.Buckley, effectively refuted it, light years ago, seems to, like a bad virus, that’s almost immune to eradication, rear its ugly head in the form of Paul Ryan’s political philosophy.

An excellent article, regarding Rand’s influence, on Paul Ryan, in NEWSWEEK, by Johnathon Chait, is rather illuminating, as is Chait’s article, in THE NEW REPUBLIC that, effectively refutes Ryan’s plans to fix the deficit.

Just as the Democratic Party, must fully purge itself, of any vestige of Marxism, the Republican Party, must purge itself, of the noxious nonsense, of Ayn Rand.

By: pentamom

pentamom — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 03:21:27 +0000

Dan, keep thinking — there are better logical opposites for “collectivist” than “selfish.”

By: Dan

Dan — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 23:39:58 +0000

The collectivist left? Vs. What? The selfish right? Should that be the adjective?

I will always use such a label in the future.

By: Liam

Liam — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 19:52:12 +0000

Stuart

Sadly, no. Her work is locked-tight cultic ideology, not open-ended freeware. There is nothing useful there that is not better found elsewhere in freer form. To the extent Rep Paul wants to market himself as a Faithful Catholic(TM), he would be well advised to shelve Atlas Shrugged as anything other than a piece of fiction.

By: Greg Forster

Greg Forster — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 19:21:04 +0000

But why bother with Rand when you can learn all the same things from far superior sources? To the extent that Rand offers insight on the evils and dangers of collectivism, others have made the same case far better, and without hobbling it all at one leg to naive moral and metaphysical reductionism. There’s no comparative advantage to getting this stuff from Rand.

By: Stuart Koehl

Stuart Koehl — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 19:17:08 +0000

This would seem to be one of those “What hath Athens to do with Jerusalem?” moments, but whereas Tertullian felt that Hellenism had nothing in common with, and thus nothing to offer Christiantianity, a century or so later the great Cappodocians, Basil the Great, Greogry Nanzianzen and Gregory of Nyssa, where using Greek philosophical terminology and constructs to better define the nature of the Holy Trinity. While Ayn Rand is no Aristotle or Plato, there are aspects of her work which can be applied by Catholics, regardless of whether she herself would have approved. The USCCB and other modern Catholic theologians of course think nothing of mining through Marx and neo-Marxian scholars for ideas to support their theology–and with a lot less success, too, one might add.

By: Liam

Liam — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 18:20:47 +0000

Catholics can read Rand, they just can’t pretend to square Rand with Catholic teaching (and Rand herself would have been rather aggressively the first to agree).

By: Stuart Koehl

Stuart Koehl — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 17:21:49 +0000

Yah, well, some of us get tired of the Church’s fatuous brand of collectivism, too.

By: Bob G

Bob G — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 17:06:54 +0000

It’s odd that Ryan, a Catholic as I understand, has any use for Rand. But even Cal Thomas thinks we should all rush off to see the new Rand movie, Atlas Shrugged. It seems that Randian individualism is a good club to beat the collectivist left. Tthe Church as as opposed to her fatuous brand of individualism and materialism as is any leftist.