The Fall 2005 issue of the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies is out. For more information, see the table of contents, which is available online, together with the full text of Chris Sciabarra’s article “The Rand Transcript, Revisited” (PDF).
Category: News
GoDaddy Commercial for Gastronomic Meditations
The GoDaddy commercial mentioned in our interview with Jennifer Iannolo is now available on the Gastronomic Meditations web site.
Lisa VanDamme on C-SPAN Radio, Sun 4 Sept
From the Ayn Rand Institute:
On Sunday, September 4, 2005, at 10 AM Eastern Time, C-SPAN Radio is scheduled to broadcast a talk given by Lisa VanDamme at Objectivist Summer Conference 2005, “Reclaiming Education, Part 2.” Please consult your local listings for broadcast times in your area.
C-SPAN Radio is currently available on XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio. For other information on C-SPAN radio broadcasts go to: http://www.c-span.org/listen/satellite.asp
Wanted: Additional Programmers for AI Protype
It looks like Atlasphere member Peter Voss‘s Adaptive AI Inc is now hiring programmers to help with their accelerated development of a functional prototype for general artificial intelligence.
You can learn more about Voss and his company by reading our recent interview with Peter Voss.
Private Developer Turns Table on Justice Souter
Press release by Atlasphere member Logan Darrow Clements, CEO of Freestar Media:
Could a hotel be built on the land owned by Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter? A new ruling by the Supreme Court which was supported by Justice Souter himself itself might allow it. A private developer is seeking to use this very law to build a hotel on Souter’s land.
Justice Souter’s vote in the “Kelo vs. City of New London” decision allows city governments to take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.
On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr. Souter’s home.
Read the full press release for more information.
Ayn Rand Fan Rep. Christopher Cox to head SEC
According to several news stories (Reuters, Fox News, CNN), President Bush has named U.S. Rep. Christopher Cox as the White House’s choice to head the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The choice will need approval of the U.S. Senate.
Rep. Cox wrote a favorable review of The Letters of Ayn Rand for the New York Times Book Review and is widely recognized as a strong advocate of free markets, limited government, and lower taxes. A U.S. House Republican from California since 1998, Rep. Cox has a JD/MBA from Harvard.
New Auction: The Library of Ayn Rand
Via member Michael Montagna:
On June 28, 2005, tony West Coast auction house Bonhams & Butterfields will hold an auction of The Library of Ayn Rand in San Francisco and Los Angeles, possibly also NY. Materials include items from Rand’s personal library, many with her own marginalia, as well as signed first editions of Rand’s own books, signed documents, photographs and other Randabilia. This is the most important Rand auction since Butterfield’s 1998 auction of “The Papers of Ayn Rand”. The inventory for this auction appears on bonhams web site and goes from lot # 3129 to #3200. Please let collectors and admirers know about this.
New Zealanders Come to Shania Twain's Defense
From a press release by the New Zealand Libertarianz:
RMA Surely Don’t Impress Shania Much
“Shania Twain’s proposed home doesn’t impress Queenstown’s busybodies, but their personal views should not be the business of law,” says Libertarianz spokesman to deregulate the environment, Peter Cresswell. “Unfortunately the RMA has given them that power. It doesn’t say to property owners ‘Come on Over,’ instead it screams ‘I’m Gonna Getcha Good’!”
“The Resource Management Act (RMA) has given unelected power to busybodies who now consider they have rights over other people’s property,” says Cresswell. “It seems nothing will allow Twain’s house past Andrew Henderson, the planning stickybeak from CivicCorp who rejected the application and Julian Haworth, head busybody from the Upper Clutha Environmental Society, who between them have decided that ‘the complex would not be in harmony with the surrounding landscape,’ and ‘man-made mounds to screen the house’ were ‘not appropriate.'”
“I guess even a camouflage net wouldn’t have satisfied these meddling arseholes,” says Cresswell. “Remind me again how the RMA is “permissive” as Owen McShane has called it, and “far-sighted environmental legislation” as Nick Smith has described it. The RMA is neither,” says Cresswell. “It has destroyed property rights in this country, and it is time that the RMA itself were now destroyed.”
As author Ayn Rand once observed, when the productive have to ask permission from the unproductive in order to produce, then you may know your culture is doomed. “Time to put a stake through the heart of the RMA,” concludes Cresswell.
The Libertarianz advocate abolition of the RMA, replacing it with common law protection of property rights and the environment.
Letter to Ayn Rand Gets Award from NJ Governor
A fascinating announcement via the Free State Project:
Lucille Davy, Special Counsel to the Acting Governor of New Jersey, Richard J. Codey, presented a Governor’s Proclamation to Ethan Nappen, State Finalist in the national reading-writing contest sponsored by the Library of Congress, Center for the Book. The contest is called Letters About Literature. After reading Anthem by Ayn Rand, Ethan composed a letter to the author as required by the contest rules. The Library of Congress received and judged over 50,000 entries. There were over 2,300 entries submitted from students across New Jersey. Ethan, who is in eighth grade, was one of 34 Level II (7th-8th grade) finalists.
New Jersey, which was just named the third most-indebted state in the U.S., is infamous for its overregulation of business, political corruption, erosion of personal freedom, distain for individual rights, aggressive enforcement of Malum Prohibitum laws, legal embrace of political correctness, and high taxation. Rand’s Anthem deals with a future society in which collectivism and the good of the State reign supreme over the individual and even the concept of individuality. It is therefore quite ironic that the Acting Governor of New Jersey “recognizes and commends” Ethan for an essay in praise of Ayn Rand’s philosophy of objectivism.
See the Free State Project’s original announcement for links to the winning letter, the governor’s proclamation, and a photo of the award ceremony.
'The Only Path to Tomorrow' by Ayn Rand (1944)
From William Dwyer:
I just received a hard-to-find copy of the January 1944 Reader’s Digest with an article by Ayn Rand entitled “The Only Path to Tomorrow.” The article is condensed from a project that Rand began in 1943 entitled “The Moral Basis of Individualism,” which she eventually abandoned.
I am taking the liberty here of transcribing the article, which is not very long, since it is virtually impossible to find a copy of it. I was very lucky to locate the January ’44 issue from an obscure book seller. You won’t find it on the internet.
The Only Path to Tomorrow
by Ayn Rand
by Ayn Rand
The greatest threat to mankind and civilization is the spread of the totalitarian philosophy. Its best ally is not the devotion of its followers but the confusion of its enemies. To fight it, we must understand it.
Totalitarianism is collectivism. Collectivism means the subjugation of the individual to a group – whether to a race, class or state does not matter. Collectivism holds that man must be chained to collective action and collective thought for the sake of what is called “the common good.”
Throughout history no tyrant ever rose to power except on the claim of representing “the common good.” Napoleon “served the common good” of France. Hitler is “serving the common good” of Germany. Horrors which no man would dare consider for his own selfish sake are perpetrated with a clear conscience by “altruists” who justify themselves by – the common good.
No tyrant has ever lasted long by force of arms alone. Men have been enslaved primarily by spiritual weapons. And the greatest of these is the collectivist doctrine that the supremacy of the state over the individual constitutes the common good. No dictator could rise if men held as a sacred faith the conviction that they have inalienable rights of which they cannot be deprived for any cause whatsoever, by any man whatsoever, neither by evildoer nor supposed benefactor.
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