PAUL RYAN BUDGET LINKED TO AYN RAND:
According to thinkprogress (see Source, below) Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) architect of the GOP's 2012 budget plan, is a devotee of Ayn Rand and especially of her Atlas Shrugged.
Although Conservative columnist Ross Douthat has dismissed the connection the Ryan-Rand connection, thinkprogress points out:
- Ryan was a speaker at the Ayn Rand Centenary Conference in 2005, where he described Social Security as a "collectivist system" and cited Rand as his public service inspiration.
- He has at least two videos on his Facebook page in which he heaps praise on the author. "Ayn Rand, more than anyone else, did a fantastic job of explaining the morality of capitalism, the morality of individualism"
- Ryan's budget plan comports with Ayn Rand's world view.
Examples:
- He guts Medicare, Medicaid, and a whole host of housing,food, and educational support programs.
- Then he uses approximately half of the money freed by those cuts to reduce taxes on the most wealthy Americans.
Ayn Rand, Ryan has written, explained the morality of Capitalism" to him (see above)
Ayn Rand thought of altruism as "evil" and wrote that highly successful individuals are morally superior to others.
No surprise that the Ryan-Rand budget plan seems a logical plan to Paul Ryan and the GOP.
SOURCE: http://pr.thinkprogress.org/
