Ayn Rand All Over Again - Dummies

Relaxing at my uncle's Westport, Conn. 'crib' in the summer of 1961, I read Ayn Rand's Fountainhead. I was 20 years old. I can't say that I was impressed in any way with Rand's book from either a stylistic or 'philosophical' point view or by its message. Rand's atheism was congenial to me, however. Messrs. Alan Greenspan - clueless former Federal Reserve chairman and Paul Ryan - clueless Republican House member fron Wisconsin are Ayn Rand enthusiasts - rugged individualists and entitled anti-entitlement puppets of the wickedly rich. Creepy Gov. Mitt Romney recently chose Mr. Ryan to be his presidential running mate.* Rep. Ryan is reckoned to be an intellectual by some of the GOP faithful. Newt Gingrich is so reckoned too. Standards for candidates and intellectuals seem to be quite low. Where would our Mitt fit in here? Let's term him an intellectual, since the standards are what they appear to be - quite low.

  Way back in the day, the less than bright males of the aristocracy were slated to become members of the clergy, so as not to mess with the family fortune. Later in the day, these less than bright males, who were not bright enough to become clergymen, became bankers. 

  I can't understand how anyone with a brain could find our two Randians or our former governor to be distinguished in any admiration-provoking ways - being free, white and twenty-one doesn't count a good-making characteristic here. Greenspan didn't see the economic depression coming. He also held the same budget-crunching solutions to the country's economic problems as Mr. Ryan - dismantle Medicare and Social Security, whilst enriching the military-industrial complex (among other complexes). What about Gov. Romney?

  Creepy Willard Mitt Romney reminds me of Rex Ryan, the coach of the New York Jets football team. Rex, we are told, is the son of a very good football coach - Buddy Ryan. Rex puts his foot (among other feet) in his mouth quite often. And he's not exactly a winning football coach. But he looks like a football coach, talks like  one, etc. It's rather like the title of coach has been given to him. He strikes me as someone who functions best after business hours and out of sight.

   Willard Mitt Romney is the son of a well known business and political figure, former Michigan Governor and American Motors chairman, George Romney. Willard suffers from foot-in-mouth mishaps. He ran a venture capital firm, Bain Capital (that's "Bain" not bane, but it may come to that). But I'm not exactly in the know about what he did there - except leaving the firm (whilst continuing to be paid) to save ("save" in some sense or other) a Winter Olympics from financial troubles, i.e., hustling tax-shelter opportunities for the silent minority, in other words the rich. Willard's tax returns would be fun to examine - tax-shelter-city, yea. Perhaps Willard hasn't been tithing to his church as he should have done, buying his way into the upper reaches of the heavenly hierarchy on the cheap - lower taxes and lower tithes, yea.
   I'm thinking now of Mabel Mercer's version of "Isn't He Adorable"; "Send In The Clowns" will do as well I reckon. "Here he comes. Woe is me...." Willard Mitt Romney in his jeans; getting down with the people in front of an aircraft carrier .... "Here we go again!" as TV's Earl might say to his brother Randy. Dummies! Oh snap!

*I got the creepy bit from Robert Paul Wolff.  http://robertpaulwolff.blogspot.com/