Atlas Asked For A Bailout

Lately, I've been hearing lots of people talking about Ayn Rand's book Atlas Shrugged. I should say right up front that I think this book is wrong about everything, and I've thought so since I read the book while on my honeymoon 9 years ago. (I know. I know).


It seems that sales of the book have spiked since January, and there is a renewed interest in discussing the book and seeing whether its ideas might apply to our current context. Some are even suggesting that we are on the verge of a generation of "John Galts" taking a cue from the book and dropping right out of our society.


In case you haven't read the book and aren't sure why it should have become so much more popular lately, here's a synopsis: in the world of the book society has become something of a socialist welfare state, where a few motivated individuals carry the rest of us on their backs of their genius. These titans of industry and commerce, one day, realize that they don't have to. Their intelligence and wealth have given them the ability simply withdraw from society, and that's just what they do. One by one, they withdraw to a valley that they've somehow hidden from everybody else (in Colorado, if my memory serves). There, they build their capitalist utopia while the rest of the world, robbed of its erstwhile sugar daddies, descends into chaos.


This is the scenario some think is playing out right now. In America. Especially given the presidency of Barack Obama and his obviously socialist ways.


This is, of course, ridiculously stupid. Monumentally dumb.


Let's review the current situation, shall we? Here's a quick synopsis: those titans of industry and commerce, the great capitalist leaders of our time? THEY'RE THE ONES WHO SCREWED EVERYTHING UP! The rest of us are bailing them out! The guys who run GM and Countrywide and AIG and Wells Fargo aren't carrying us on their backs. We're carrying them. Pure unbridled capitalism isn't the only thing holding our nation together. At this point, there's a good chance that only the "socialist" bailout is saving us from disaster.


Yes, the world right now is just like the world of Atlas Shrugged. Except it's totally opposite.


Attention right-wingers organizing book clubs around this book: stop for a second, use that "liberal" critical thinking skill for a moment, and take your copy back to Barnes and Noble for a refund. And send the $12.95 to a CEO in need.