PROMETHEAN ANTAGONIST

"...Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can’t exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?..."

"...If you ask me to name the proudest distinction of Americans, I would choose-because it contains all the others-the fact that they were the people who created the phrase “to make money.” No other language or nation had ever used these words before; men had always thought of wealth as a static quantity-to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted, or obtained as a favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created. The words “to make money” hold the essence of human morality..."


I don't really consider myself a "Randian" even though I agree with many of Ayn Rand's observations, particularly regarding the pervasive assaults made upon the individual by collectivism.

If you haven't yet, I strongly recommend, reading Francisco D'anconia's statements regarding money in Atlas Shrugged. Some excellent insight into the nature of money as it symbolizes the mental energy invested in it by competent individuals.

You'll notice in the comments after the link's post, someone who either didn't read the speech or still doesn't understand the very simple idea that a world of free and striving individuals is not a world of cruel citizens unwilling to help others. This is a classic phony myth that the left -- and more than a few religious nuts -- continues to conjure. It's based on their belief that people are essentially bad and "need" to be controlled, coerced, and "reeducated" to sacrifice to the altar of any leech who demands that a powerful state be erected to rob for them. In such a worldview, anyone who chooses to take responsibility for their own life and drive themselves toward success can only be evil "heartless" and cruel. In truth, most leftists don't have even a fragment of the "heart" they demand of others.

On a side note, notice that most "feminist" intellectuals teaching women's studies courses make little or no reference to one of the twentieth century's greatest female philosophers, Ayn Rand, or her novels (which are still among the list of best sellers). It turns out that she doesn't qualify as being a true woman, the same way Condoleezza Rice doesn't qualify as being a "true" black woman. Of course, the entire "multi-cultural" con scheme has nothing to do with culture or "multi-" anything. It's just another demand from leftland that everyone tow the party line.

Ayn Rand was a brilliant spokeswoman for the values of individuality, free commerce, and being left the hell alone by the phony brigade of authoritarian socialists and their concocted communal circus.



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A Comic Commentary from Promethean Visions:


The truth about equality and justice.


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Promethean Quote from The Promethean Observer:

"Creating the socialist state and a belief in Santa Claus are both idealistic, but with a belief in Santa Claus, nobody gets hurt."


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Pop Hegemony And The Democratization Of Food, Entertainment, And Technology

(The following essay was originally posted at this site last year)

If you ask a socialist (hard core or, “lite”) if they think it would have been better if the Soviet Socialist police state had won the cold War, they’ll pause. They may not answer you. If they do, they’ll qualify any reluctant support they may have for freedom with, “But…”

Many on the left are disappointed that the socialist “experiment” in Russia failed, that a free economy (e.g. capitalism) won its battle with collectivist tyranny. Such authoritarians make no secret of their disdain for Coke, McDonald’s, Starbucks, or Microsoft. One could speculate that, if they could, they’d close down a kid’s lemonade stand to honor their hatred for free commerce. Remember, their ultimate hatred is for self-striving and human nature itself. Hatred of a free-market is virtually indistinguishable from a hatred of freedom in general (as economist Milton Friedman so insightfully observed).

The left’s polemic crusade against capitalism and America of course defaults to a bitter hatred for globalization – seen by them as nothing more than ‘cultural imperialism.”

America does, indeed, play a dominant role in spreading the attributes of open society – a widening diversity and availability of products, services, ideas, and cultural / artistic expression.

Decrying the supposed horrors of, “cultural hegemony” and “McWorld,” is an attempt to conjure a fictional crisis that isn’t there. While screeching the standard socialist whine that bland uniformity is engulfing the world, quite the opposite is actually taking place. (Remember, such criticisms are coming from the same clowns who actually believe “diversity” is something fostered from the imposed edicts of government clerks).

Go to any major world-city today and you will find a surging dynamism unseen in human history. The lights, colors, shapes, and sounds being mere symbols of the underlying energy of human creativity unleashed; beautiful architecture, products, ideas, and aesthetics from around the world, low cost food, transportation, and entertainment. While some note the signs that say McDonald’s, they seem to miss the one’s that say Toshiba or Renault. While some see, The Gap, they miss the fact that everyone around them is wearing a variety of garb in a variety of styles from different times and places. Look around you – poor, rich, and middle class, all alive in a way unseen before our time. As you watch people walking about with cell phones, digital cameras, and I-pods, you may realize that those old comic book sci-fi images of an imaginary future have actually fully materialized, cars looking more like space ships, gliding on delicate ribbons of modern engineering design. Did this all come about from some unseen vibrancy in the plans of socialist bureaucrats? – Hardly. The US and the system which honors the creativity of free society has been the prime catalyst to this new world. If all this is “hegemony” then hegemony is hardly a just target for complaint.