A Comment on Rational Egoism

Rational egoism refers to an entire ethical system originated by Ayn Rand. The system rests on the recognition that man's means of survival is his mind. It identifies the ruling values a man should hold and the virtues his life requires.

In essence, rational egoism recognizes that in order to support his life, man must think. He must figure out what he needs (his values) in order to live, and how to gain them (his virtues). The rational egoist is the individual who recognizes that he must exert intellectual and physical effort in order to survive and that it is good and right for him to keep and dispose of the result of his efforts as he chooses.

An essential aspect of Ayn Rand's ethics is the nature and meaning of the self. Miss Rand's view of the self is revolutionary. For millennium all religions and all ethical systems, have viewed the self as born sinful, evil by nature and pre-determined. The self, it was asserted, must be whipped and controlled by the state or religious authorities in order to curb, if not crush, vicious thoughts and demonic actions. Such a view of the self is in essence the Nietzschean brute, the only difference being that Nietzsche said such a creature is good, while other ethical systems said such a creature is bad. In all cases, the self was commanded to live for others in order to be moral. And if one did not choose to live for others, the state and/or the church saw to it that one was forced to do so. The initiation of force, inherent in any advocacy that man must live for others, was thus made into a moral good.

Miss Rand, in contrast, showed that the self is that aspect of the individual that thinks and judges and chooses and acts, and that the self is formed by one's own choices and actions. One's choices and actions reflect the thinking one has done, or has not.

Concern with one's choices and actions is concern with one's own interests, which means one cares about one's life and its quality. To be concerned with one's own interest on a fundamental level is to be concerned with one's own estimate of the moral stature of one's self, which is egoism. To evade such concern is to be guided by other's say-so, which is anti-egoism, or as Miss Rand's coined description: the second hander.

A fascinating dramatization of the essential qualities of the rational self is Howard Roark in The Fountainhead. The abstract meaning of the self is neatly summed by Gayle Wynand, in the same novel, during the battle over Cortland Homes.

"A republic if you can keep it."

At a recent activist training session an 18-year old said, "I'm here because I want to do something about the antipathy among my own age group."

A work-at-home mom said, "Forty-five times I've written to my Congressman asking questions. He will not answer."

To a Tea Party worker, the manager of a car dealership said, "Congress is out of control. We have to stop them."

Volunteering to help raise money for protest rallies, an insurance office worker said, "I've never demonstrated before against my government. But now I must."

A preacher said, "Today I received the thirty-seventh form letter from my Representative."

Most congressional members continue to ignore their constituents. Although Americans have loudly and persistently registered their opposition to health care, the latest Pelosi/Obama 1,990 page monstrosity is now in the Senate under consideration as if Americans' opposition to it is irrelevant.

Congress evidently believes we have no say in the matter. We have sent them letters, e-mails, faxes and telephones messages. They turn off their phones, shred the incoming faxes and emails and ignore our letters. On their web sites, their idea of responding to our opposition to government health care is to send long, boring canned letters that have nothing to do with anything except their own plans.

They do not answer our queries. They do not answer our complaints. They do not address our concerns. They do not vote the way we want them to vote on the dozens of bills they write aimed at taxing us more and listening to us less. They do not admit that they are violating our rights, that their countless regulations are onerous, the taxes they impose burdensome, their corruption outrageous. They evade the fact that we pay their salaries in return for which they do little more than posture.

Much of that posturing revolves around repeated announcements that they create jobs. They do not. Businesses create jobs. Businesspeople have an idea, figure out a way to make and sell it, hire others to help them. That is job creation. It increases employment and general productivity. Job creation necessarily leads to product improvement---one cannot remain static in any business. Product improvement leads to improved sales, which expands business, which raises salaries and results ultimately in raising the standard of living.

Every businessperson is aware of the process---from small to large businesses, from the manufacture of common nails to complex computers, from the making of cheese to the design of satellite sensors. We know who creates jobs. It ain't the government.

One does not create jobs by taking money from one person and giving it to another. One does not create jobs by commanding company bids for infrastructure work, ordering that helicopters be built for politicians, or agreeing to pay $200 for a toilet seat. One does not create jobs by regulating established enterprises, taking them over, making deals with unions, or ordering banks to lower their mortgage and credit card rates.

Such actions depend on the goods being there in the first place, and are violations of individual rights. But individual rights are the foundation of our culture and the basic meaning of a republic. Congressmen who ignore their constituents do not sustain a republic. They reveal a preference for a different type of government organization: statism, which is collectivism, which means ultimately totalitarianism.

What's to be done to stop Congress' stampede toward statism? What's to be done to counter this massive infringement of our individual rights? What's to be done to end this flagrant invasion of our lives and property? How can we terminate congressional dismissal of our opposition to government health care, to energy controls that guarantee shrinkage of agriculture, mining and fossil fuel production, to business and professional regulations that are suffocating our economy, to strangling taxes?

Must we move to Washington, stand on the Capitol steps and grab each Congressman by the arms and shake them to register our disagreement with what they're doing? Would that help?

What can one person do? You can organize. You can vote.

The Tea Party is one type of organization that has brought together hundreds of thousands of grassroots Americans. Many such organizations have been formed across the nation. Most of them have a plan. And most of the plans are identical: vote out of office every single representative coming up for re-election in 2010.

The plan is already in operation. The mayoral and a city councilman race in Albuquerque, New Mexico started the drive. Virginia and New Jersey followed suit. New York gave it a shot. More races are taking place in 2010.

But there is more to the plan than voting out of office every current incumbent that has ignored our choices. The grassroots is no longer sitting on the couch and cursing. They've jumped to their feet and are taking part in politics. They are finding ways to enter primaries. How great a part they are taking is being revealed as more Americans realize that Ben Franklin was right.

If we want a Republic, we have to work to keep it. Now, more than ever, more Americans realize the truth of this and are taking action. We will succeed. As one Albuquerque Tea Party member recently said, "I will never give up. Never. We will take back our country." Yes, we will. It's up to us to restore and keep our republic.

Ideas and Politics

It is not unusual to hear politicians express contempt for philosophical ideas while simultaneously claiming they are Progressives and Pragmatist---as if those words did not give title to volumes of philosophical ideas---each resting upon the most lethal premise in man’s history.

While many Republicans---conservative and liberal alike---steep themselves in social issues of highly charged emotionality, such as abortion, they evade or ignore fundamental ideas. Some fail to distinguish between concretes and fundamentals completely, thus disarming themselves for a battle that requires intellectual clarity and moral certitude.

Fundamental ideas give rise to, make possible and color every concrete with which an individual deals. To evade or ignore them is to invite disaster. That’s what has happened to the Republican Party. They have for too long mouthed the same Democrat pap that we’ve heard scores of times. If the Democrats, for instance, say they want to provide universal health care, the Republicans do not denounce such a flagrant attack on individual rights. Instead they say, “Yes, we do too, but not your way.” On this issue as on every other, the Republicans are on the same page with the Democrats, singing the same tune, using the same chords, merely in a different key.

Some politicians claim that voters are not interested in ideas. This is patently false. The grassroots assuredly are interested in ideas, as witness the avalanche of interest in Ayn Rand’s books---which deal exclusively with the dramatization of ideas. American voters are not indifferent to ideas as the lines at libraries, the sales in bookstores and the explosion of blogs attests. At present they are looking for ideas more eagerly than ever before.

The Republican Party has said that it wants to figure out how to re-invigorate the GOP. They can do it if they throw out collectivist ideas. This will disassociate the party from past mistakes. In lieu of discarded collectivism, the GOP should rally Americans to the restoration of individual rights, the only effective way to counteract the Obama government's collectivist assault on the American people. The restoration of our individual rights protects our freedoms, makes possible limited government, and leads to capitalism.

The grassroots recognizes the validity and importance of the right to life, property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They understand the connection between their individual rights and their choice of work, keeping what they earn, disposing of their income as they see fit, choosing their own doctor and paying their own way. They are fully aware that when one takes from the producer/earner to give to the non-earner, one is depleting savings. They know that reducing savings reduces investment in productive enterprises, which chokes growth, which reduces the standard of living.

Collectivism holds that the individual exists for the state. For decades Democrats have advocated taking from the earner and giving to the non-earner. They have advocated enforced unionization, enforced medical care, enforced social security, enforced public education, enforced business regulation. Obama’s Administration has crystallized this practice.

The grassroots has been clearly shown the irresponsible spending that blasts through the stratosphere, the disastrous regulations and take-overs of companies, the harassment and intimidation of businessmen, the support of corrupt union leaders against the membership, the appeasement of our enemies and the snubbing of our allies, the attempts at “fishy” censorship, and now, recently, the attempt to shut down free expression on the net. They have been told the topsy-turvy collectivist line that a rich nation is a bad nation, that producers/earners are demonical threats to society, that those who create jobs are exploitative, that dissent is unpatriotic (now, but wasn't during the 1960s), that supporting countries that deserve it is intolerant but kissing thugs and bowing to savage rulers is sensitive diplomacy.

The preceding are all concrete expressions of a fundamental idea: statism. Statism is the culmination of collectivism, the rule of brute force, in which the state is supreme, the individual subservient to the ruler in all respects and instances. Statism is the complete destruction of the individual and his rights.

To stop the Obama Administration’s giddy plunge toward statism, the Republican Party would be foolish---and self-destructive---not to join the grassroots and commit itself to the restoration of individual rights. The GOP could seek no greater re-generation than to re-establish the abstract ideas this country was founded on: individual rights, limited government and capitalism, and their concrete social expression, our constitutional freedoms: freedom of speech, of press, of assembly, of worship, and to keep and bear arms.

Collectivists say might makes right. But it does not. Rights make right. If the Republican Party wants to be a viable political party, they must self-righteously proclaim the practical virtue of individual rights, a moral principle that assures peace and prosperity. Nothing more than this is needed. Nothing short of this will win.

The Nobel Peace Prize & Mr. Obama's Intentions

Americans are well aware that these are troubling times. Things have been turned upside down. We are told that obeying government edicts constitutes "freedom." We are told that government health and insurance plans are "competition." We are offered movies dramatizing the view that a free-market economy---which made this country the richest nation in the world---is barbaric and exploitative.

One sometimes feels that the entire world has gone insane. A case in point is awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Mr. Obama for his intentions.

Certainly, Mr. Obama has shown us his intentions.
1. He intends to force every American into government health care and insurance plans whether they want it or not, and to force us to pay a penalty if we refuse.
2. He intends to enact censorship. His "fishy" expedition was merely a trial balloon. He has now gone a step farther. He wants the FBI to monitor the net and fine and/or jail those who dare to dissent from his views.
3. He intends to disarm every American, thereby violating our right to keep and bear arms.
4. He intends to violate our right to peaceably assemble. Police are instructed to arrest those who form a group of more than ten. Others are arrested without cause.

These are only some of Mr. Obama's intentions. Are any of them good? Do they take cognizance of our freedoms stated in the Constitution? Do they acknowledge our individual rights to life, property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? They do not. Every one of Mr. Obma's intentions promises to generate hostility, anger and violence, if not outright rebellion. Should such intentions be awarded a peace prize? They should not.

It is not surprising that Norwegian officials would consider Mr. Obama's intention to crush Americans' individual rights as meriting an award. Like most European countries, individuals there regard themselves as subjects---not citizens---and have no idea what a right is. The Nobel Committee would be composed of such individuals. They would be pre-disposed to award the intention to destroy the characteristic unique to Americans, i.e., the recognition that each individual is a sovereign and autonomous intellect. That is the essential meaning of individualism. It is what Mr. Obama intends to destroy. From his actions, there is no other conclusion to reach.

The result of Mr. Obama's acts and intentions is that he and his administration have driven an angry and bitter wedge between Americans and their government. Franklin D. Roosevelt was widely disliked and referred to disdainfully as "that man in the White House." But Americans--- thanks to enterprising businessmen---got on with their lives, found jobs, moved to less-congested areas and discovered ways to pick up the pieces left by government interference in the economy. McCarthy and Nixon were tarred and feathered by the media, but generally Americans were split on their assessment of both men's effectiveness. Johnson was distrusted for his back-room politicking, but Americans were more concerned about Civil Rights. Government shortcomings did not create a hostile gulf between our representatives and us.

Mr. Obama has changed things. As promised. Never has there been such deep alienation between Americans and government officials as presently exists in this country. As his acts took form and his intentions unfolded, many Americans for the first time in their lives began to fear the government. Then, as violations of our rights followed more such violations, fear turned into outrage and Americans started to fight back. Their fight is paying off. Those in government are now starting to fear Americans.

That's understandable. Most government officials are no longer Americans. As a nationality, Americans are identified around the world and in their own minds as champions of individual rights, limited government and free markets. But the majority of government personnel---elected, appointed and hired---no longer hold such values. They retain the nationality but that is all. They have betrayed their loyalty to fundamental American values for "pull," for private jets and fine houses, for special medical and insurance plans and salaries that exceed most middle class incomes, all of which the American producer/earner pays for.

The decline of our representative republic toward statism has been gradual and is at present incomplete. Mr. Obama is seeking to complete it. Most government officials and their supporters are rushing to help him.

His Organizing for America, for instance, brazenly performed a skit in which collectivism destroyed individualism. OFA members laughed raucously and loudly applauded. Knowing full well that decades of Soviet collectivism murdered millions on farms and in cities, in frozen Siberian gulags, in the dungeons of the Soviet "police," in countless, unrecorded suicides, Mr. Obama's OFA cheers for collectivism. Knowing full well the terror and agony in which people existed under communism, and refusing to consider the strangled ambitions, the corruption and repeated "Five Year Plans" promising utopia in the future but requiring that wheat be imported from the USA, Mr. Obama's OFA members chanted "Go Communism!"

No matter whether one calls their efforts progressivism, socialism, communism or fascism, it is all the same and it's all collectivism. And collectivism is what Mr. Obama intends for the United States of America.

I hope Americans will embrace their values and not let go of them. I hope they will vote into public office those who will advocate the restoration of our individual rights. We must not allow Mr. Obama to get away with his intentions. 2010 is not that far away. It is time to start working to replace all those who support Mr. Obama and his intentions.

Water and Health Care: A Parallel

From the time I arrived on Albuquerque, New Mexico's West Side some 14 years ago, I was impressed with New Mexico Utilities, the private enterprise that supplied our water. They did a superior job of keeping our water clean, fresh tasting and odor-free. They sent out periodic questionnaires to discover our concerns and/or grievances. One of their employees went from house to house to check on customer satisfaction. Their personnel were courteous and helpful. Because of my water-conserving methods, my bill was lowered.

About a year ago, the Albuquerque Water Authority unilaterally decided to take over New Mexico Utilities. Westsiders were dismayed. We had not been consulted. The West Side Coalition held a town hall in order to find out what we thought. Both New Mexico Utilities and the city were invited to present its case. The meeting hall was quite full. At least 200 residents attended. We listened to arguments and looked at charts and graphs for about 2 hours.

Afterwards a vote was taken whether to keep New Mexico Utilities or to switch to government management of water. Ninety-eight percent of the citizens expressed their satisfaction with New Mexico Utilities and voted to keep them.

The Water Authority ignored us. They forced New Mexico Utilities out of business. The result was a lowering in the quality of our water and a raising of rates that increased every month. Now and then the water has an unpleasant odor. It's expected to get worse.

Although I had not changed the amount of water I used and continued to use the same water-conserving methods, the Water Authority increased my bill by $8. I called the Water Authority to ask why. They claimed I was using more water. They were not helpful. They were rude and snippy.

There is nothing I can do. They are in complete control of our water. They are a monopoly. They are competing with no one for customer satisfaction.

There’s a parallel here that most readers will grasp. When government forces out private enterprise, the quality of product and/or service goes down, the price goes up. You can bet that the same thing will happen should we allow government to take over the health care industry.

The Undisclosed Danger of Government Health Care

Government health care is not concerned with patients. Politicians' interest is primarily focused on the productive---in the U.S., about one-third the population. Government has no income other than what it confiscates from the productive. So, promises of "affordable health care" depend on the able while devouring life from them. In other words, parasitism.

Some people seem oblivious to this. A man wrote on Twitter, "I'm a socialist and proud of it." Whatever he may feel about being a socialist, pride is not a virtue possible to a looter and a parasite. Blood lust is.

State planning demands obedience. For example, Organizing for America held a meeting in Belen, New Mexico on government health care. OFA would not allow any expression of opposition. They told dissenters to "Sit down!"-meaning: "and shut up!" They became angry when questioned. They spoke to one of the dissenters using coarse language. They put obscene notes in other dissenters' vehicles and ignored those who complained about such conduct.

Such creatures abound in government health care. It is common knowledge, for instance, that those in state-run sanitariums, asylums, and senior care centers are sickeningly abused. Little is done about it. The government is in charge.

Interfering with impunity in other people's lives and property is characteristic of those who advocate government health care. Some time ago, Wal-Mart announced its support of socialized medicine. It wrote, "[T]he best way to lower costs is by managing the supply chain [meaning the medical professions] and encouraging efficiencies of scale [meaning medical rationing]."

"Managing" those who aren't employed by you is a euphemism for violating others' individual rights. Those who took over Sam Walton's extraordinary achievement are helping to destroy what made it possible. They are evading the importance of individual rights, which protects private property and promotes innovative thinking.

They're not the only ones evading facts. The AARP declares "need is a right," while seeking to deny rights to those they plan to force to fill those needs. But need is not a right. No one has a right to other peoples' work and effort wrested from them by force-legalized or not. Yet the AARP says force is a proper means of dealing with individuals. They say might makes right.

So does Mr. Obama. He declared that he will set doctors' fees based not on how many patients the doctor treats, not on his specialty, not on how many hours he works, but on the patient's improvement. Mr. Obama evidently does not grasp that medical problems characteristically are replete with numerous variables and that results of medical treatment are not as predictable as sunrises. Should we trust such stupefying ignorance?

Mr. Obama has no understanding of the free market. In a free-market, the patient judges a doctor's performance, not a politician. If the patient is dissatisfied with the doctor's performance, he can sue for malpractice. He can seek out another doctor. He can persuade others to boycott the doctor and drive him out of business. He can write to newspapers describing the doctor's performance. He can complain to whatever associations the doctor is a member of.

Government health care offers no alternatives. The state dictates. The doctor must obey. And so must the patient. Like the doctor, the patient under government health care is frozen into a system that is riddled with irrational requirements dreamed up by politicians and their lackeys. The dream revolves around control of the able.

Whether doctor, businessman, blue or white-collar worker, it is the able that make life worth living. It is the able that stand with the facts of reality against fallacies and falsehoods. It is the able that earn the money that pay politicians salaries. It is the able that politicians seek to control.

Government officials seek to force their edicts between doctor and patient, declaring that their force is superior to your choice. They seek to insert ignorance and suspicion between knowledge and trust, declaring that their say-so is superior to a physician's knowledge and judgment honed by medical experience, and to a patient's evaluation and decision.

But the mind cannot be ruled by force. Those that can, are incapable of creating anything. They can only destroy. Such minds are those of thugs and goons, the lowest ranks of society.

Thought does not function efficaciously under threats. Minds that are able, shut down under force or the threat of force. In medicine, force discourages interest in a medical career. The number of doctors declines; the quality of medicine follows suit. Research and development becomes sluggish, eventually ceasing altogether. This is the undisclosed danger of government health care.

Destroying another's rights does not guarantee health care. A right yoked to a bureaucrat's whim is not a right. "A right is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man's freedom of action in a social context." (Ayn Rand, "Man's Rights.") To destroy one man's rights is to destroy all men's rights. To destroy the rights of doctors and patients is to turn a nation into warring camps and those needing medical attention into numbers on a waiting list.

Either doctors are free to work unfettered by government edict or they are not. Either we are free to choose our doctor or we are not. Either each of us is free to earn our own way, keep what we earn and decide how to dispose of it, or we relinquish that freedom to government officials---which means, we relinquish our individual rights of life, property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Capitalism vs the Welfare State: The Next Vote

Let's sort out some things.

As a political and economic system, socialism is government ownership and management of the means of production and distribution of goods, the control of money, and the abolition of profit and private property. These ideas also describe communism and progressivism.

Socialism originated at the end of the 18th century in several "social studies." The studies evaded the Enlightenment's giant strides in providing jobs and raising the standard of living of hundreds of thousands who had been far worse off before the advent of the Industrial Revolution.

In the 1840s, the term communism was coined to describe a militant form of socialism. Marx and Engels used the word in the title of their work, The Communist Manifesto, published in 1848. Later both Marx and Engels referred to themselves as socialists, and Marx's work remains the basis of socialist thought.

In 1878, a schism split communists from socialists. The socialists advocated "gradualism," the idea that capitalist society could be changed by reform from within. The communists advocated the violent overthrow of government. It was only a matter of methodology. They remained glued together by their fundamental ideas.

Progressivism started sometime after the Civil War as an attempt to help poor people through self-help programs operated by private charities. Progressives usurped the effort. They, too, evaded the advances achieved by the Industrial Revolution.

As early as the 1890s, progressives elected politicians who promised to take over utilities, improve city services and tenement housing codes. Other states joined in. By 1903 a wide range of progressive political and economic ideas were adopted to regulate railroads and utilities. They pressured government to raise corporate taxes. They advocated workmen's compensation---paid for by businesses---and child labor laws, which denied income to the very poor.

In 1906 progressives passed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act. In 1913 progressives established the Federal Reserve. In 1914, they established the Federal Trade Commission and the Anti-Trust Act, extending government regulation of business. In 1916, they again raised corporate taxes, organized a railroad commission to set rates and established a conservation commission.

World War I interrupted the progressive's juggernaut lumbering toward total government control of the economy. However, it was resumed with the administration of Franklin Roosevelt, although now referred to as the welfare state. Another name, the same ideas.

The sameness of these doctrines, which many people believe represent different points of view, arises from a single source.

There are only two ways to regard man's relationship to society: either he has the right to live for his own sake, or he must live for others. Whichever principle you espouse places you in one or the other of opposing camps.

If you accept the principle that man has the right to live for his own sake, you are an individualist. If you believe that man must live for others, you are a collectivist.

If man has the right to live for his own sake, then that right must be protected and so, the initiation of physical force must be outlawed. In such a society no one's rights may be violated with impunity; so, government has only one job: to protect individual rights domestically by means of the courts and the police, and by means of the military in matters of foreign aggression. Individualism limits government.

In a society in which rights are protected and from which the initiation of physical force is banned, men are free to trade value for value as they choose, working at what they choose, disposing of their earnings and property as they see fit, enjoying their life as they like. This is capitalism, the economic system in which all property is privately owned.

Our constitution explicitly states the individual's right to life, property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Enumerated, too, are freedoms that follow from individual rights---such as, for example, the freedom to peaceably assemble, the freedom to petition the government to redress wrongs, the freedom to keep and bear arms, and so forth.

If you believe that man must live for others, government becomes your ruler. There is no alternative. A large group seeking to plan and execute some plan requires by its nature a leader, or leadership. In a nation of people who believe man should live for others, the government becomes that leader simply by claiming that it represents everyone in the group.

But the government is a group of men. If you believe you must live for others, it is that group of men that will tell you what to do, how to do it and when to do it. It is that group of men that will regulate and control every aspect of your life, from hopscotch to hospital.

Progressivism, socialism, communism are all expressions of collectivism. But collectivism as repeatedly shown in countless examples throughout history cannot work. So, necessarily, the collectivist seeks an accommodation. He is willing to allow vestiges of capitalism, not too much but enough to keep the leaders in shoes and jets to fly to their vacation spots. All else is controlled and regulated by government, which is what we have today: A "mixed economy."

No matter how you describe him politically, Mr. Obama is a collectivist. It doesn't matter whether you say he's a socialist, a progressive or a communist. It all adds up to collectivism. It all adds up to---like it or not, accept it or not---everyone being forced to live for others.

The question is: why should men live for others when they can better live their own life? They "should," according to collectivists, because it gives collectivists power over men's actions, which is what all forms of collectivism are about.

So, if you wonder about those who seek power over other men, it's instructive to recognize that all collectivist doctrines depend on the values that the able create.

Consider, for instance, the slogans of both socialism and communism. Socialists declare, "From each according to his ability; to each according to work performed." Communists declare, "From each according to his ability; to each according to his need."

Notice "from each." Who are they? They are the men of ability. If you're one, you might want to think about whether you want to be an individualist or a collectivist when you cast your next vote.

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Suggested Reading:
Leonard Peikoff, The Ominous Parallels