PAUL RYAN = AYN RAND.

[Segami]

Now apparently it’s a “slam” to say Paul Ryan likes Ayn Rand

The right's favorite congressman declares backsies on admiration for notorious author

" Here’s something kinda nutty. One guy said all of the following things:


“The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand.”


“You know you’ve arrived in politics when you have an urban legend about you, and this one is mine,” chuckles Representative Paul Ryan, the Budget Committee chairman, as we discuss his purported obsession with author and philosopher Ayn Rand.”


“I give out ‘Atlas Shrugged’ as Christmas presents, and I make all my interns read it. Well… I try to make my interns read it.”


“Ayn Rand, more than anybody else, did a fantastic job explaining the morality of capitalism, the morality of individualism, and that, to me, is what matters most.”


Now this:


“I reject her philosophy…. It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview. “

That one guy is U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, who used to love Ayn Rand so much that he hosted a birthday party for her in Washington, but who now apparently doesn’t like her anymore, because of God. (And because her extremist philosophy is liable to turn off “swing voters” and “people who aren’t 18-year-old boys with delusional fantasies of superiority.”)



It looks like — after some obvious excitement among conservatives and Republicans that it was suddenly OK to openly admit to being enough of a stunted adolescent asshole that Ayn Rand seemed like visionary instead of a bad pulp author and even worse philosopher — Rand is back to being an embarrassment. Which is fine with me! It’s not all that shocking that Ryan would want to back off from openly admiring a stringent atheist radical right-winger around the time that his party is trying to paint the president as anti-religion.


cont'


http://www.salon.com/2012/04/26/now_apparently_its_a_slam_to_say_paul_ryan_likes_ayn_rand/


.

[longship]

1. Rand Paul == Ayn Rand

He was fucking named after her!

[Speck Tater]

2. Close: Paul Ryan = Ayn Raplu nt

[Canuckistanian]

3. That's right

Ryan professed his undying love for her already.

His name will always be inextricably linked with hers.

[TlalocW]

4. Oh, he might reject her atheism

But he's still going to work as hard as possible to destroy the middle class and try to elevate the rich to some sort of demi-godhood like she did in her novels.

TlalocW

[calimary]

5. The patron saint of all those small-minded people searching for some justification

for sheer brazen unbridled selfishness. She validated it, made it cool, acceptable. Indeed, even a virtue. About as un-Christian as it gets.

[Zambero]

6. How Christians rationalize their economic policies

I think I've figured it out. Christ said that we must help the poor. Republican policies that transfer wealth to the wealthiest assure that there are lots of poor people that need help. Therefore, without Republicans and the massive poverty that follows in their wake, we would be unable to follow Christ's teachings.

[Fearless]

7. Two people who should be blasted into the sun.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

8. So has Ryan just found God?

He can't claim that he didn't know about Ayn Rand's sociopathic philosophy of selfishness as he was an ardent admirer along with most of the Republican party. So is greed no longer good?

[chknltl]

9. hmm... i before e except after c,....carry the two....

.....yep, it just might work! According to my calculations: Ms. Rosenbaum, (ayn rand), is listed as a Russian Jew. Born in 1905, died well after WWII and currently still deceased.... I am thinkin someone needs to alert the baptism department of the Mormon Church!

[aquart]

11. Ayn Rand was Jewish?

ARE WE TO BE SPARED NOTHING?

[Segami]

12. HAHAHA...Nice! n/t

[aquart]

10. Worshipping Ayn Rand will not keep Paul Ryan from burning in Hell.

Paul Ryan intends to kill American women and children so the rich can have elevators for their cars.

[lame54]

13. He's angling for V.P....

He's showing how Romney he can be

[FSogol]

17. Exactly. n/t

[Bake]

14. Most voters don't know who the hell Ayn Rand was, unless they work crossword puzzles.

24 Across: Author Rand. Three-letter word.

Bake

[hifiguy]

15. Two quotes sum up the Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver:

“Two novels can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.”

Kung Fu Monkey

"The modern day conservative is engaged in one of the oldest projects in philosophy, the attempt to find a superior justification for base selfishness."

John Kenneth Galbraith

[alterfurz]

16. keep spinning, Paul...

The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. -- John Kenneth Galbraith