With the exception of crony capitalists, freeloaders, and union bosses, if there were anyone who has benefited from the Obama presidency, the three years of wealth redistribution vis-à-vis a $5 trillion increase in the national debt, along with a heaping on of new federal regulations enough to choke the country into a second visit of the great recession, it would be the publisher of Ayn Rand’s mid 20th century classic philosophical novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. As of late, since the innauguration of the 44th president, both novels have seen resurgence of interest, and the latter, her magnum opus of fiction, has been embraced by many who feel the personal assault of Obama collectivism fervor, as well as his administration of mandated rule via left wing, know-it-all committees of ivy league intellectuals.
In the 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged Rand had explored an American Dystopian society, a United States shackled by repressive controls and enforced by politicians who "know better than the rest," and fooled the population with mandates disguised under a Utopian veil. As the government increased its coercive controls over society, the true producers, the innovators and backbone of society, led by a mysterious John Gault decided that they have had enough.
The “John Gaults” of today are the very same as those of 1957. They are the innovators, the businessmen and women that create the wealth necessary to run the society, a capitalist society being systematically strangled by an inept president, driven by his vastly inflated ego, and policed by self-serving socialistic handlers. Let’s explore the parallels of Rand’s novel as they apply to the United States in 2011.
The theme of Atlas Shrugged is a question: what would happen to the world if the prime movers quit? What would be the result if the great innovators had their spirit ripped from them until they couldn’t take it anymore, and simply gave up – went away? Independence, integrity, pride, and ingenuity, the prime movers most important characteristics, those necessary for the advancement of society, have been thwarted by a head of state that imposes Marxist exploitation of the prime movers.
What would happen in the United States of 2011 if a president acted independently of Congress and instead through mandated executive order imposed new regulatory restrictions that stifled productivity? What would happen if those new federal regulations came at time when the country was struggling in a recession, with unemployment at its worst continuous level since the Great Depression? Perhaps things would get worse. Perhaps the economy would backslide into an even more dire situation, accelerating toward an eventual collapse. On the other hand, what would happen if there were a president, and a congress that operated under the principles of laissez-faire, a capitalistic society free from over regulation, burdensome state controls and intervention? Perhaps this nation would be free of its dependence on foreign oil, and employment surge in the Gulf States where drilling for oil would be continuing. Just maybe then we wouldn’t be subjected to getting rides in space by the Russians, a country no longer grounded as a space power, no longer incapable of launching a manned mission beyond the surly bounds of terra firma, a current malady mandated by an oppressive whim.
The protagonists in Rand’s novel are besieged time and time again by “parasites,” "looters," and “moochers,” awful antagonists that consistently refuse the work and toil that’s needed to achieve success, but instead call for the benefits from those that do succeed, demanding that the innovators “pay their fair share.” Parasites are of course are overpaid government workers. The “looters” tend to use government policy for example, to forcibly take the goods of one properly run state and give it to another state that was improperly managed. The “moochers” take the “unneeded earnings” from those that have made "too much" and give it to those unable or unwilling to earn it on their own. Both the “looters” and “moochers” continually criticize the producers for their success, making them feel guilty for their talent. The producers simply shrug and give up. So how does this relate to the current administration? That’s a rhetorical question of course, but nonetheless let us explore the notion further.
Just why would Atlas shrug today, now at this hour in the third year of Barack Obama 's presidency? What could possibly be the catalyst? The answer is obvious for sure. This president, more so than any president before him, has attempted to monkey wrench at every corner, at every turn, the primary gear that drives the wealth of our nation – self-interest. That’s right, the apparently not so virtuous vice, as Obama would have the mindless masses believe, yet the primary impetus that makes a society exceptionally great. For it is through self-interest that inventions are created, disease is cured, and a good society is promoted. Self-interest in a free market, as Adam Smith so astutely pointed out centuries ago, drives a free economy to seek and maintain equilibrium, so long as government doesn’t interfere.
But Obama has employed socialist tactics that batter self-interest, and therefore undermine the pride and determination necessary to compete effectively in a fair and open marketplace, a marketplace that Obama’s economic illiterates can’t comprehend, but can’t keep their hands off of. When there is success, Obama wants to take the rewards and distribute those rewards to those of his choosing, those that fail, and in some cases, as the case with Solyndra, distribute future success to those companies known to be doomed to fail. In that particular case, because the start up company had major investors that include campaign bundlers for Obama, the self-interest was for those chosen by Obama to be his capitalist cronies.
Could Atlas shrug in a society wherein he is told what car to buy, what food to eat, what school to send his children, what news to watch, what doctor to see, and what amount of his earnings he should be “allowed to keep?” This is the very debt gorged society that the Obama administration would want to foster in remaking the United States of America in the dystopian, bankrupt model.
To imagine that this administration would propose to incorporate in their debt plan the abolishing of interest free municipal bonds for those making over $200,000 per year in inconceivable, yet a fact. In Obamanomics, the very people who buy municipal bonds, so that municipalities can improve roads, and build new schools, and other infrastructure repairs desperately needed, would be stripped of the primary monetary benefit for making such an investment. Would they perhaps shrug, therefore preventing infrastructure projects from going forward, undermining the employment of so many now out of work? And even if the sale of muni bonds were successful, the spread would have to be greatly narrowed for the municipality, thus limiting the amount of dollars raised, again stifling employment. Would Atlas shrug I ask again?
How about the so called “Buffet Rule,” that millionaires should pay “their fair share.” Don’t millionaires already pay their fair share, as those making over $1 million in cash income paid an average federal tax rate (excluding excise taxes) of 29.1 percent while those with cash income between $50,000 and $75,000 paid an average federal tax rate of 15 percent. In fact, the “Buffet Rule” has already been invoked in California, where the left wing liberals have imposed a “Buffet Rule Plus,” lobbing on an extra tax bracket — at 10.3% — for income exceeding $1 million. If Buffet want to live by his own rule, he should sell his home in Omaha and move to California, where many are shrugging, as they are in New York and New Jersey, moving away from those highly taxed states. That fact of the matter is that the top 1% of US taxpayers is responsible for 20% of the nation’s income and pay 40% of taxes. Higher taxes on small business and entrepreneurs would slow growth and reduce tax revenue as well as encourage greater efforts to avoid tax altogether, by simply moving or quitting – a massive shrug by Atlas, if there ever would be one.
Today Rand’s novel has found a new home on Kindles and iPads everywhere, carried by tea-partiers, independents, conservatives, libertarians, and most free thinkers. As John Gault argued in the novel, “a free mind and a free market are corollaries,” so too is the corollary that as long as Obama is in office, book sales of the half century old novel will continue to rise, exponentially.
