The current newsletter of the National Association of Scholars includes an upbeat article about the Institute for the Study of Capitalism at Clemson University. The Institute was launched last year with a grant from BB&T Charitable Foundation and is headed by C. Bradley Thompson.
According to the article, the Institute is unique in studying the moral foundation of a free society. Prof. Thompson is quoted as saying that “the Clemson Institute is the first and only university-related program in the U.S. that takes as its core mission the defense of Capitalism as the moral and just social system.”
The National Association of Scholars is committed to rational discourse as the foundation of academic life in a free and democratic society and promotes an informed understanding of the Western intellectual heritage. The article concludes with the note that “Professor Thompson would be happy to speak with NAS members and supporters who might be interested in adapting or replicating the Clemson program on other university campuses.”
The BB&T Charitable Foundation is sponsoring several academic programs on Capitalism, as pointed out on this meta-blog here, here, and here.
Category: Culture
Fat Cup of Trouble for Starbucks
From a new op-ed by Ed Hudgins published in the Washington Times:
Critics charge many Starbucks products are high in calories and high in fat, especially those tasty trans-fats that are really bad for us. So what? Starbucks offers everyone a choice. If you don’t like the venti vanilla caramel Macchiato with extra whip, don’t order it. In any case, Starbucks lists on its Web site and brochures in its stores the nutritional information about its products.
But that’s not enough for the self-appointed health police. They’re trying to shame Starbucks into putting all of that information on menu boards in their cafes which, aside from being redundant, would make those menus, crowded with numbers, look to most people as confusing as the big board at the stock exchange. In any case, come on people, we all know whipped cream and cakes are fattening. Starbucks’ upscale clientele is certainly educated enough to figure that out.
Critics also want Starbucks to “voluntarily” cut down on the fat stuff in their fare. Normally, boring biddies can natter at us all they want and we’re free to take their advice or tell them to take a hike. But that’s not what the Center for Science in the Public Interest wants. They and their kind are bent on stopping us from being unhealthy — by their definition — no matter what.
Buffett Gives Largest Philanthropic Gift in History
Warren Buffett — not known as a particularly principled supporter of capitalism, though clearly talented at making money — has long planned to give away his fortunes when he died. But he’s decided to move up the timetable.
From the article “Warren Buffett gives away his fortune” published today in Fortune Magazine:
Buffett, 75, has for decades said his wealth would go to philanthropy but has just as steadily indicated the handoff would be made at his death. Now he was revising the timetable.
“I know what I want to do,” he said, “and it makes sense to get going.” On that spring day his plan was uncertain in some of its details; today it is essentially complete. And it is typical Buffett: rational, original, breaking the mold of how extremely rich people donate money.
Buffett has pledged to gradually give 85% of his Berkshire stock to five foundations. A dominant five-sixths of the shares will go to the world’s largest philanthropic organization, the $30 billion Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, whose principals are close friends of Buffett’s (a connection that began in 1991, when a mutual friend introduced Buffett and Bill Gates).
The Gateses credit Buffett, says Bill, with having “inspired” their thinking about giving money back to society. Their foundation’s activities, internationally famous, are focused on world health — fighting such diseases as malaria, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis — and on improving U.S. libraries and high schools.
Giving money to charity can be a very good thing, if the money gets spent well, and infectious diseases are a great problem to address through private charity rather than government appropriations.
But when we hear Buffett and Gates claiming that this is their way of “giving back to society” (as though they were looters up to this point, rather than trading value-for-value with every day they worked) it all starts sounding like a scene from Atlas Shrugged — and not a good one.
If they really want to give to society, they should stop apologizing for their success and start promoting values like political freedom, private property, and free markets — values that not only allowed them to become wealthy, but will allow future generations to do the same.
Monika Kovacs Places 2nd in Canadian Provincials
I just received word that Atlasphere member Monika Kovacs (pictured below, at left) has won second place (in “medium class figure”) at this year’s Canadian Provincials female bodybuilding competition.
Congratulations, Monika! And… WOW. 🙂
“What makes this event especially amazing to me is what led up to it,” she writes. “I attended the first Provincials two years ago as a spectator and looked at the stage full of graceful beauties like a child looks at a window of a candy store, with eyes sparkling and wide open, wishing they could indulge.
“I went back last year. Then and there my passions and love of competing intensified, and I knew I wanted to be back, and I had to be there!
“I am soooo happy and at the same time so tired now! I am taking a little break as my body and mind are very exhausted. I cannot wait to be back on track again and set out to achieve my next goals.”
Keeping my fingers crossed that she can fit us in for a full interview at the Atlasphere one day soon.
UPDATE: I just learned that Monika also won the Northern Ontario Championship on June 10th. And she has agreed to do an interview with the Atlasphere, so hopefully we’ll have that ready within a couple weeks!
Has Google Peaked?
Anyone following Google’s adventures (and misadventures) in China may be interested in Glenn Reynolds’s latest opinion editorial:
Google has been a huge deal â?? its founders have become rich, its name has become a verb, and its influence is international.
Lately, though, I’ve been wondering if Google has peaked. The reason is that, for lots of different groups of people, Google’s reputation as good guys has been stained. And I’m not sure what Google really has to bank on, besides a good reputation.
Google has come under criticism from people on the left â?? and right â?? for its cave-in to Chinese demands for censorship. From “don’t be evil,” Google’s motto has seemed to be “don’t be evil unless there’s a really big market at stake.”
Will the Internet Help Do Away with Entrenched Two-party Politics?
From an excellent article at Newsweek by Jonathan Alter, updating us all on the age in which we live and why it’s going to prove significant during the next presidential election:
Bob Schieffer of CBS News made a good point on “The Charlie Rose Show” last week. He said that successful presidents have all skillfully exploited the dominant medium of their times. The Founders were eloquent writers in the age of pamphleteering. Franklin D. Roosevelt restored hope in 1933 by mastering radio. And John F. Kennedy was the first president elected because of his understanding of television.
Will 2008 bring the first Internet president? Last time, Howard Dean and later John Kerry showed that the whole idea of “early money” is now obsolete in presidential politics. The Internet lets candidates who catch fire raise millions in small donations practically overnight. That’s why all the talk of Hillary Clinton’s “war chest” making her the front runner for 2008 is the most hackneyed punditry around.
[…] To begin busting up the dumb system we have for selecting presidents, a bipartisan group will open shop this week at Unity08.com. This Internet-based third party is spearheaded by three veterans of the antique 1976 campaign: Democrats Hamilton Jordan and Gerald Rafshoon helped get Jimmy Carter elected; Republican Doug Bailey did media for Gerald Ford before launching the political TIP SHEET Hotline. They are joined by the independent former governor of Maine, Angus King, and a collection of idealistic young people who are also tired of a nominating process that pulls the major party candidates to the extremes. Their hope: to get even a fraction of the 50 million who voted for the next American Idol to nominate a third-party candidate for president online and use this new army to get him or her on the ballot in all 50 states. The idea is to go viralâ??or die. “The worst thing that could happen would be for a bunch of old white guys like us to run this,” Jordan says.
[…] But funny things happen in election years. With an issue as eye-glazing as the deficit, a wacky, jug-eared Texan named Ross Perot received 19 percent of the vote in 1992 and 7 percent in 1996. He did it with “Larry King Live” and an 800 number. In a country where more than 40 percent of voters now self-identify as independents, it’s no longer a question of whether the Internet will revolutionize American politics, but when.
This is a very exciting possibility for those of us who are perennially frustrated by the current two-party dynamics in the United States.
See the full article for more.
UPDATE (6/1/06) – Peggy Noonan has a timely article in the WSJ on a related topic, namely, the continued crisis of two-party politics, and the increasing likelihood that only a third-party candidate could deliver the kinds of reform that American needs in order to stay safe, free, and fiscally responsible.
UPDATE (6/2/06) – And today, more on this topic from Instapundit.
The Soda Fountainhead
A couple of our members have sent me the link to this whimsical story (one part fun, two parts pun) in New York Magazine about a NYC juice bar with an Objectivist twist.
Check it out if you like the sound of a fresh-squeezed carrot/ginger drink called the “Howard Roark.”
I guess as long as there are no ripe orange rinds….
Lecture on Passing Judgement Available Online
Tara Smith’s lecture “Passing Judgement: Ayn Rand’s View of Justice” is available online on the Registered User Page of the Ayn Rand Institute (the registration and the video are free). The lecture was delivered on May 9th in Irvine, CA. Tara Smith is a professor of philosophy at the University of Texas and the author of the recently published Moral Rights & Political Freedom.
From the lecture summary:
In “Passing Judgment: Ayn Rand’s View of Justice,” Dr. Tara Smith will explore Ayn Rand’s unique conception of justice. After explaining why it is in one’s self-interest to be a just person, Dr. Smith will explore several related topics, including: the emphatic need to judge other people; how today’s pervasive egalitarianism is completely anti-justice; and when, if ever, forgiveness and mercy are justified.Â
Summer at Camp Millionaire
According to MSN Money, Summer Camps that offer pro-business programs are becoming increasingly popular around the U.S. A typical program teaches basic economics, budgeting, how the stock market works and how to run a small business. Educational entrepreneurs are tapping to a growing demand from parents and kids for a way to learn “the facts of life about managing and investing money.” According to a financial planner who runs such a camp:
Being a financial planner, I’ve worked with people for many years. It’s frustrating to me that so many of them don’t have basic knowledge. At their age, it’s hard to change their habits after they have developed problems with credit. I decided that teaching kids when they are young is the only way to go.
Read the article here.
Rand Fan: Tennis Star Billie Jean King
A squirrely review of HBO’s new Billie Jean King: Portrait of a Pioneer includes this bit:
For these early years, Billie Jean King: Portrait of a Pioneer sticks close to the story lines laid down in the autobiography she wrote in the early eighties with the help of Frank Deford, who is also interviewed here like a wise old tortoise. Though executive producers Ross Greenburg and Rick Bernstein choose not to mention her past enthusiasms for astrology and Ayn Rand, nor the fact that sheâ??s part Seminole, we do spend quality time in blue-collar Long Beach, with her firefighter father, homemaking mother, and baseball-playing brother (Randy Moffitt), among the grammar schools and concrete courts in the public parks where the lower classes could play tennis for free.
Here is a familiar story of upward social mobility via organized sports instead of organized religion or organized crime. But here as well is a less familiar story, of democratizing from below. The genteel world of tennis into which Billie Jean entered at age 12, a chubby five feet four with glasses, was as white as it was male and moneyed, a country club of people born at center court. She never forgot scrounging for lessons, being sent home for not knowing better than to wear shorts when a skirt was required, having to make do without a scholarship despite the fact that she was Cal Stateâ??s best player, nor the coach who told her, at age 17, â??youâ??ll be good because youâ??re ugly, Billie Jean.â? So she attacked every net. And grew up from her first Wimbledon win, in doubles in 1961, to her feminist coming-of-age in the tumultuous sixties, to her organizing of the Virginia Slims tour, her unionizing of women players, her developmental work for the Womenâ??s Sports Foundation and World Team Tennis, and, of course, her thrashing of Bobby Riggs in three straight sets, after which she would show up on The Odd Couple and Sonny & Cher and even talk at a press conference about bisexuality as if it werenâ??t a war crime.
Somehow ‘astrology and Ayn Rand’ doesn’t come off as a compliment, but King seems like someone in whom we shouldn’t be surprised to find an individualist streak.
Apparently Atlas Shrugged turned her around, when she was going through a bad period in tennis, and considered quitting.