Yeah, well, how about first you put down your copy of "Das Kapital"?
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) asked Republicans to stop reading Ayn Rand books and help Democrats pass legislation aimed to give struggling Americans a hand.
“I say to my conservative friends, put down those Ayn Rand books for a minute and take a look at the real world,” Durbin said on the Senate floor Wednesday. “If we can’t stand behind those who are struggling in life, who are we; what are we?”
I swear, if Ayn Rand hadn't existed, we would have had to invent her. She was a little extreme for my taste with her selfishness-praising, downtrodden-bashing uber libertarian zeal, but she had a clearer understanding of the evils of bowing to the group than just about anybody. LBJ's War on Poverty, which Durbin was celebrating the 50th anniversary of with his speech, created exactly the kind of permanent dependent class Rand warned of and discouraged individual effort and creativity just the way she said it would.
