Ayn Rand Is In
Who would have thought? The Washington Post, which took two months to run a review of the two important new books about Ayn Rand that were published in October, now declares Ayn Rand to be “In” for 2010. Well, technically, in the paper’s annual New Year’s Day Out/In list, it declares “Twihards” (fans of the Twilight series, I take it) to be Out and “Randroids” to be In. But the splashy display in the print paper illustrates “Randroids” with a classic photo of Ayn Rand, the one that graces the cover of Barbara Branden’s biography The Passion of Ayn Rand.
Rand had a pretty good 2009, so it’s impressive that the Post thinks she’ll be bigger in 2010.
While the renewed interest in Rand has been noticed everywhere from the Times Higher Education Supplement to the Wall Street Journal to the left-wing Campus Progress, William Kristol apparently missed it entirely. He wrote on December 29 about the revival of conservatism in response to the challenge of the Obama administration.
Of course, as conservatives, we also know many of the very best ideas are old ideas. And I’m struck by how many people are rediscovering Hayek’s “The Fatal Conceit,” Irving Kristol’s “Two Cheers for Capitalism,” or Tocqueville’s account of soft despotism in “Democracy in America.”
There are great ideas to be found in that list of books. But as everyone but Kristol has noticed, the author who’s really being rediscovered in this first 18 months or so of financial crisis and government expansion is Ayn Rand. Consider the sales figures for the different books. In 2009 about 2000 copies of The Fatal Conceit were sold. (Kristol should have cited The Road to Serfdom, which sold 21,000, more than double its sales the year before and about six times its sales in 2007, before the financial crisis began.) About 20,000 copies of various editions of Democracy in America. And 300,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged, along with 95,000 copies of The Fountainhead and even 60,000 copies of Anthem. (Two Cheers for Capitalism is out of print, so its rediscoveries can’t be tracked by BookScan.) It’s clearly Ayn Rand who has gotten the most help from the Bush-Paulson-Geithner-Bernanke-Obama-Geithner-Bernanke policies of the past 18 months.
Note: In addition to the new books on Rand from two of the world’s greatest publishers, the revitalized Laissez Faire Books has just published, for the first time in book form, the lectures on Ayn Rand’s philosophy that Nathaniel Branden gave back in the 1960s. Known then as “The Basic Principles of Objectivism,” now published as The Vision of Ayn Rand, these lectures were instrumental in tying Rand’s fiction to philosophy, politics, and economics, and in creating one of the first organized libertarian movements. As I said in a jacket blurb:
This is the most important work on Objectivism not written by Ayn Rand, available at last in book form. These lectures were delivered by the person closest to Ayn Rand, designated by her as her intellectual heir, often with her sitting in the audience and answering questions about them, and endorsed by her. Rand’s subsequent falling out with Nathaniel Branden over personal matters doesn’t change that. This is the organized, comprehensive treatise on Objectivism that Ayn Rand never wrote. Philosophers, historians, and economists may — and should — debate the claims of Objectivism. In this book they have a systematic work with which to engage. These lectures were also a milestone in libertarian history, as the lecture sessions brought together for the first time large numbers of young people who shared an enthusiasm for Ayn Rand and the individualist philosophy. The lectures were given as taped courses in more than 80 cities, and people drove for miles to listen to them on tape. Wasn’t that a time!
Rick Santorum and Limited Government?
Scary news today from Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker: despite losing his reelection bid in 2006, former senator Rick Santorum is still thinking about running for president. He tells Parker that he represents the Ronald Reagan issue trinity: the economy, national security and social conservatism. And he’s the limited-government guy:
Both pro-life and pro-traditional family, Santorum is an irritant to many. But he insists that such labels oversimplify. Being pro-life and pro-family ultimately mean being pro-limited government.
When you have strong families and respect for life, he says, “the requirements of government are less. You can have lower taxes and limited government.”
But Santorum is no Reaganite when it comes to freedom and limited government. He told NPR in 2005:
One of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a libertarianish right. You know, the left has gone so far left and the right in some respects has gone so far right that they touch each other. They come around in the circle. This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues. You know, people should do whatever they want. Well, that is not how traditional conservatives view the world and I think most conservatives understand that individuals can’t go it alone. That there is no such society that I am aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.
He declared himself against individualism, against libertarianism, against “this whole idea of personal autonomy, . . . this idea that people should be left alone.” Andrew Sullivan directed our attention to a television interview in which the senator from the home state of Benjamin Franklin and James Wilson denounced America’s Founding idea of “the pursuit of happiness.” If you watch the video, you can hear these classic hits: “This is the mantra of the left: I have a right to do what I want to do” and “We have a whole culture that is focused on immediate gratification and the pursuit of happiness . . . and it is harming America.”
Parker says that Santorum is “sometimes referred to as the conscience of Senate Republicans.” Really? By whom? Surely not by Reaganites, or by people who believe in limited government.
Deep Thoughts from the Weekly Standard
Republican Party platform, 2012?
Sad to say, neoconservatism is clearly the dominant foreign-policy ideology of the Republican Party. George H. Nash apparently has written that “We are all neoconservatives now.” And after the strategic and political masterstroke the neocons produced in Iraq, who could blame the Republicans for doubling down with them?
So sometimes it’s good to stroll by the Weekly Standard blog, just to see what those folks are thinking about.
Today, for example, it’s war with Russia. (Now there’s a “stimulus!”)
If the Republicans were smart, they’d get rid of these guys before it’s too late.
Tea Party Conservatism and the GOP
This morning, Politico’s Arena asks:
Is Tea Party conservatism a help or a hazard for Republicans seeking a return to power?
My response:
Let’s start with some clarity: “Tea Party conservatism” stands for several things, but it is not the caricature one often finds in the mainstream media, to say nothing of the left wing blogs. It is a movement with deep historical roots, drawing its name and inspiration from the Boston Tea Party of 1773. As with that event, taxes brought it to the fore — on Tax Day, April 15. But taxes are simply the most obvious manifestation of modern government run amok, insinuating itself into every corner of life. Trillions of dollars of debt for our children, out-of-control government budgets, massive interventions in private affairs — the list of wrongs is endless, and under Obama has exploded. He stands for nothing if not for making us all dependent on the government he has promised us. That’s not America. That’s a foreign vision, which over the centuries countless millions have fled, searching for freedom.
To be sure, the Tea Party movement has its fringe elements, as did the revolt against British tyranny, which the establishment of its day disparaged. So too does the Obama administration, some of whom have already resigned. The basic question, however, is what does the movement stand for? What are its principles? And on that, the contrast with the Obama vision is stark: However much confusion there might be on specific issues, which is to be expected, the broad principles are clear. The Tea Party movement stands for limited constitutional government. At its rallies, on hand-written sign after sign, that was the message repeatedly seen. These are ordinary Americans – Republicans, Independents, and even Democrats — who want simply to be left alone to plan and live their own lives. They don’t want “community organizers” to help empower them to get more from government.
But they do need to be organized to bring that about — to get government off their backs. And the Republican Party should be the natural vehicle toward that end — the party, after all, that was formed to get government off the backs of several million slaves. But today’s Republican Party is a mixed lot: Some understand those principles; but others, as in the NY 23 race, are all but indistinguishable from their counterparts in the party of Obama. The problem in NY 23 was not that a third party entered the race. Rather, the party establishment botched things from the beginning, by picking a nominee who properly belonged in the Democratic Party, as her pathetic last-minute endorsement indicated, and that’s why a third party entered the race — with a novice of a nominee who nearly won despite the odds against him.
The question, therefore, is not whether Tea Party conservatism is a help or a hazard for Republicans seeking a return to power? To the contrary, it is whether the Republican Party is a help or a hindrance to the Tea Party movement? It will be a help only if it returns to its roots. The mainstream media, overwhelmingly of the Democratic persuasion, will continue to push Republicans to be “moderate,” of course – meaning “Democrat Lite” — to which the proper response is: Why would voters go for that when they can get the real thing on the Democratic line? If Tuesday’s returns showed anything, it is that Independents, a truly mixed lot, are up for grabs; but at the same time, they are looking for leaders who promise not simply to “solve problems” but to do so in a way that respects our traditions of individual liberty, free markets, and limited government. When Republican candidates stand clearly and firmly for those principles, they stand a far better chance of being elected than when they temporize. That is the lesson that Republicans must grasp — and not forget — if they are to return to power.
Gallup’s Conservatives and Libertarians
In today’s Washington Post, William Kristol exults:
The Gallup poll released Monday shows the public’s conservatism at a high-water mark. Some 40 percent of Americans call themselves conservative, compared with 36 percent who self-describe as moderates and 20 percent as liberals.
Gallup often asks people how they describe themselves. But sometimes they classify people according to the values they express. And when they do that, they find a healthy percentage of libertarians, as well as an unfortunate number of big-government “populists.”
For more than a dozen years now, the Gallup Poll has been using two questions to categorize respondents by ideology:
- Some people think the government is trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses. Others think that government should do more to solve our country’s problems. Which comes closer to your own view?
- Some people think the government should promote traditional values in our society. Others think the government should not favor any particular set of values. Which comes closer to your own view?
Combining the responses to those two questions, Gallup found the ideological breakdown of the public shown below. With these two broad questions, Gallup consistently finds about 20 percent of respondents to be libertarian.
The word “libertarian” isn’t well known, so pollsters don’t find many people claiming to be libertarian. And usually they don’t ask. But a large portion of Americans hold generally libertarian views — views that might be described as fiscally conservative and socially liberal, or as Gov. William Weld told the 1992 Republican National Convention, “I want the government out of your pocketbook and out of your bedroom.” They don’t fit the red-blue paradigm, and they have their doubts about both conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats. They’re potentially a swing vote in elections. Background on the libertarian vote here.
And note here: If you tell people that “libertarian” means “fiscally conservative and socially liberal,” 44 percent will accept the label.
Tuesday Links
- Well, is conservatism “brain dead” after all? David Boaz: “What does conservatism stand for today, other than opposition to President Obama?”
- Why Congress should not renew the PATRIOT Act’s “lone wolf” provision.
- Sex and security in Afghanistan.
- Barack Obama: “The omnipresent omnipresident.“
- Federal spending has doubled in less than a decade. Here’s what we can do about it.
- Podcast: “Unemployment and Stimulus Part II“
On What Larger Theory Is Neoconservatism Based?
There have been some interesting writings coming out of AEI’s new Center for Defense Studies recently. On Friday, Daniel Blumenthal offered some thoughts on China. In the course of making the case that Chinese leaders should realize that we are not trying to contain China, he wrote the following:
If countries acted in accordance with rational actor theories of political science, the Chinese would be pretty well assured that we are not going to contain it. We have made clear across administrations that we welcome China’s rise as a great power and urge it to act as a responsible one.
But countries do not act in accordance with political science theories.
Later in the piece, he wrote the following:
China is not the only country that is rising. So is India. But we do not worry about India’s rise. That is because India is a democracy. Almost everything it does is transparent to us. We share liberal values with India, including the desire to strengthen the post-World War II liberal international order of open trade and investment and the general desire among democracies to settle internal and external disputes peacefully and democratically. The fact that China is not a democracy matters greatly as it rises. It makes its rise more disruptive as countries have to divine its intentions and observe the gap between its rhetorical policy of a “Peaceful Rise” and some of its actions that are inconsistent with a peaceful rise.
He closed thusly:
Wouldn’t it be nice if China got on board with all the post-modern, feel-good notions about international politics put forth by the Obama Administration? In the 21st century, says the Obama team, all countries have common interests in confronting transnational issues like climate change and proliferation. Sorry guys, those who lead China think 21st century international politics will look more or less like it did in the past. They favor good old fashioned power politics. Unfortunately for Obama, that forces us to do the same.
There’s an awful lot of interesting stuff going on here. First, Blumenthal’s claim that “countries do not act in accordance with political science theories” is strangely incoherent. As his second and third quotes above make clear, Blumenthal has a political science theory–two actually.
Tuesday Links
- After last weekend’s 9/12 March, you’d have to be deaf not to recognize that small-government conservatism remains a vital part of the national conversation. That, or you watch too much MSNBC.
- Nothing is simple when dealing with the so-called Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. But here are a few ways the U.S. can engage the nuclear armed nation.
- Questions that must be answered before we proceed deeper into Afghanistan.
- Why it’s time to abolish the Department of Transportation, and devolve federal transportation programs to the states.
- Podcast: New police suit records every move an officer makes while on the job. Radley Balko weighs in.
Rush Limbaugh Is Not the Problem
Brink Lindsey’s post, triggered by Jerry Taylor’s controversial critique of conservative talk radio at National Review online, is part of a much-needed debate about the changes needed to create more fertile soil for limited-government — a task that is especially difficult given the GOP’s decade-long embrace of statist economic policy.
But in the spirit of friendly disagreement, the problem is not Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. Talk radio, after all, existed when Republicans were riding high and promoting small government in the 1990s.
The real problem is that today’s GOP politicians are unwilling to even pretend that they believe in limited government. In such an environment, it is hardly a surprise that anti-tax and anti-spending voters decide that talk show hosts are de facto national leaders.
This does not mean that Rush Limbaugh is always right or that Sean Hannity never engages in demagoguery. But I suspect if any of us had to be live on the air three hours every day and support our families by attracting an audience, our efforts to be entertaining might result in an occasional mistake – either factually or rhetorically. Heck, when I had to be on the air for just one hour each day in the mid-1990s for the fledgling conservative television network created by the late Paul Weyrich, I’m sure I had more than my share of errors.
This being said, I agree with Brink’s main points about conservatism being adrift. How come there were no tea parties when Bush was expanding the burden of government? Why didn’t conservative think tanks rebel when Bush increased the power of the federal government? Where were the supposedly conservative members of the House and Senate when Bush was pushing through pork-filled transportation bills, corrupt farm bills, a no-bureaucrat-left-behind education bill, and a massive entitlement expansion?
I sometimes wonder if the re-emergence of another Reagan would make a difference, but Brink (and Posner, et al) offer compelling reasons to believe that the problems are much deeper.
He Has a Point
Stung by accusations that he is a “socialist,” President Obama pointed out to two New York Times reporters that, “it wasn’t under me that we started buying a bunch of shares of banks. It wasn’t on my watch. And it wasn’t on my watch that we passed a massive new entitlement -– the prescription drug plan — without a source of funding.”
Not to defend Obama’s unprecedented increase on government spending or plans to involve the government in almost every area of our lives…but he does have a point. As I pointed out in Leviathan on the Right, the Bush administration’s brand of big-government conservatism was, at the very least, the greatest expansion of government from Lyndon Johnson to, well, Barack Obama.
Who’s Blogging about Cato
Here’s a weekend round-up of bloggers who are writing about Cato:
- Anthony G. Martin links to Michael D. Tanner’s recent article about universal health care on his blog, The Liberty Sphere.
- Thomas Stone‘s web log Philosopher’s Stone links to the most recent Cato Weekly Video featuring Ted Galen Carpenter on Mexico’s drug war.
- The editors at Fiscons.com quote Alan Reynolds in a post about President Obama’s spending plans.
- Peking University Professor Michael Pettis quotes Daniel J. Ikenson on his blog, which covers trade policy in China. The quote was pulled from Ikenson’s latest op-ed in the South China Morning Post.
- Pajamas TV hosts a video debate between Will Wilkinson and Stephen Green over the idea of “liberaltarianism,” the fusion of libertarianism and liberalism.
- Fr33 Agents blogger Morgan Ashcom cites Gene Healy’s Examiner op-ed that criticizes conservative foreign policy.
Let us know if you’re blogging about Cato by emailing cmoody@cato.org or drop us a line on Twitter @catoinstitute.
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