Category: Celebrity Rand Fans

Ted Nicholas is perhaps the most famous direct mail and direct sales marketer in the world. During his career, working in 47 different industries, he has sold over 7 billion dollars worth of products and services.
Someone just forwarded me the latest issue of his e-newsletter, The Success Margin. Here is how it begins:

A warm hello from Cyprus, my favorite island in
the world. The sun is setting on my veranda at this
moment as I pen these words.
Ever think about this?
The average small business owner barely makes a
living let alone ever becomes wealthy.
Many entrepreneurs work extremely long hours.
But hard work alone is definitely not the answer to
achieving massive success.
By contrast, nearly every wealthy super achiever
I’ve known and worked with are not workaholics.
(To be fair, I also know a few workaholics that are
rich. But they are unhappy and unhealthy in every
instance.)
While the super successful are productive, they are
also multifaceted in how they spend their time. And
their lives are a lot more fun too.
I believe it is this “well roundedness” factor alone
that makes all the difference. And multiplies their
margin of success.
I thought I’d share today lots of personal things
about facets of my own life that you may find of
interest.
These insights may give you food for thought. And
also encourage you to add some factors to your
existence.
Besides my work, here is a brief look at how I
spend the most valuable asset I have – my time.
** Reading **
I read 2-3 hours a day and have for many years.
This includes solid “How To” books, written by
those who really walk the talk.
But I also enjoy fiction. Favorite fiction writers
include Ayn Rand, John McDonald, Rex Stout,
Elmore Leonard. My very favorite author is the late
Miss Rand.

Daniel Hannan, famous for taking Gordon Brown out to the woodshed in front of the EU Parliament while defending free market principles, confirmed today what many of us might have suspected: He’s a fellow fan of Ayn Rand’s writings.
Good to have you among our ranks, sir.

How did Stagliano become a supporter of free markets? He read Ayn Rand in high school. Today he’s being prosecuted for “obscenity” and could (if convicted) spend the rest of his life in prison.

We’ve noted before that Penn Jillette (of Penn & Teller fame) is a fan of Ayn Rand’s ideas.
Now Ed Hudgins confirms that the same is true of Teller:

[The Atlas Society] had a display table at the “I, Skeptic” meeting in Las Vegas, put on by the James Randi Educational Foundation, June 19-22. Penn and Teller were on the program. Teller stopped by the Atlas Society table, said he was a Rand fan and took a copy of my new book, An Objectivist Secular Reader. In the Q&A session with P&T, Penn was asked whether, as a critical thinker, there were blind spots he had to watch out for in himself. He said that he is a strong libertarian and mentioned Atlas Shrugged and Ayn Rand and that tries to keep a critical perspective on his ideas or words to that effect.

And check out the amusing shirt Penn wore when Hudgins met him.
Thanks to Atlasphere member Stuart Hayashi for the tip.

New York Times writer Rachel Donadio explores the “It’s not you, it’s your books” problem in romantic love — a problem very familiar to many admirers of Ayn Rand’s novels.
From her perspective, though, it’s the like (rather than dislike) for Rand’s novels that indicates middlebrow tastes:

Pity the would-be Romeo who earnestly confesses middlebrow tastes: sometimes, itâ??s the Howard Roark problem as much as the Pushkin one. â??I did have to break up with one guy because he was very keen on Ayn Rand,â? said Laura Miller, a book critic for Salon. â??He was sweet and incredibly decent despite all the grandiosely heartless â??philosophyâ?? he espoused, but it wasnâ??t even the ideology that did it. I just thought Rand was a hilariously bad writer, and past a certain point I couldnâ??t hide my amusement.â? (Members of theatlasphere.com, a dating and fan site for devotees of â??Atlas Shruggedâ? and â??The Fountainhead,â? might disagree.)

Indeed.
Sounds like they both dodged a bullet. Two cheers for being unable to hide your own literary tastes!
And I’ll second Donadio’s suggestion to fall in love with someone who shares your taste in art. It makes a lot of other things go more smoothly.

From Atlasphere member Stuart Hayashi:

Lately the famous humorous magician Penn Jillette, from “Penn & Teller,” has been lauding Ayn Rand quite a bit. He positively alluded to Atlas Shrugged on his Showtime series Bullshit!, for instance. The allusion was humorous, but still sounded sincere.
But most impressive, he says at the end of his interview with Glenn Beck that he thinks he believes in Objectivism.
His remarks begin at the 01:28 mark. He says, “You can go into that Ayn Rand stuff, that Objectivist stuff, and believe in it completely, and I think I do…”

Thanks for the heads-up!