Ayn Rand as the Ultimate Conservative Libertarian

As a chug though Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, I can see her game. See, there have been thousands of people who read Rand and then grudgingly change their political views. While they read the political treatise, they battled to find the flaw in her argument. No hope for that: Rand does not have a flaw in her argument. She successfully convinces people that greed is the route to absolute virtue. But remember people, Rand is testing her Libertarian views in a society of her own creation!

The inventors, businessmen, artists, etc. are all gifted in their fields in Rand's story. By creating products for society, they expect to be repaid for their achievement. Nothing wrong with that. Where Rand starts to sway is when she attacks socialists, crippled poor, and altruists as "looters". They take money and achievement from the gifted hard working people without earning it. My problem with her is that she does not accurately portray society. Sure, there are poor people who expect handouts, but many are poor because of social factor. A person born into a bad situation cannot be deemed a looter because he or she remains in that situation. Some people want to get out of that lifestyle, they just cant.

And since when are these businessmen, etc. selling products for their proper value? Rand makes it seem like the Businessmen would never take a dollar they did not earn. Here's some news: a guy on wall street made 85 million dollars last year while working 35 hours a week. His product must be amazing to generate that kind of value. We all know there are very poor people who work much harder than people like this. Should they be called looters because they demand that he pay tax on his money? I have no problem taxing someone when they make (not earn) money like that.

To all of you Ayn Rand lovers: look at the real world. Poor people work hard; rich people work hard. We should be taxing those who earn more than than the true value of their product. If a company monopolizes the market, pules political strings, and then capitalizes on their power by overcharging, TAX them. Why did Ayn Rand not include these people in her Magnum Opus? The world would be perfect if people traded value-for-value, but what we have is a society where the rich debilitate the poor and then rip them off in the market.