Laziness Unfair to Ayn Rand

In response to Brent Budowsky's Laissez Unfair article published at http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/032309b.html#When:10:15PM

Mr. Budowsky calling Ayn Rand Alan Greenspan’s goddess of laissez-unfair is unnecessary, inaccurate and intellectually lazy (something Ayn Rand, Objectivists and most thinking humans would oppose). Alan Greenspan moved away from Ayn Rand’s idea of Objectivism long ago and Alan Greenspan’s mistakes are Alan Greenspan’s mistakes, not Ayn Rand’s (a point with which Ayn Rand, Objectivists and most thinking humans would agree). But, for the intellectually lazy, what is one more blight on the pyre of misunderstanding of Objectivism?

In “The Virtue of Selfishness,” Ayn Rand clearly states that the selfish person is a self-respecting, self-supporting human being who neither sacrifices others to her/himself nor sacrifices her/himself to others. The primary virtues of the Objectivist ethic are rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, trade and pride. The Objectivist ethical code is one of rational self-interest. Laissez-faire capitalism is the objectivist social system. Objectivists, and it would be hard to call Alan Greenspan an Objectivist, are opposed to any government intervention in business. “Government ‘help’ to business is just as disastrous as government persecution... the only way a government can be of service to national prosperity is by keeping its hands off,” states Rand. Ayn Rand would be no more supportive of the U.S. government bail out of industry then she would have been of the Chicago School Projects tyrannically imposed privatization in Latin America.

Why, Mr. Budowsky, would you finish an otherwise poignant and prescient article with a statement that calls into question your intellectual rigor?

The Neo-Radicons

Obama has been President for less than three months and before that had been a Senator for three years and eight months and in that time missed 314 of 1300 votes or 24% (I know that because I watched some Fox News during the run up to the election), how could a man with so little time in office and so little experience have anything to do with the U.S.’ current economic situation. Even if you could blame the U.S. economic collapse on sub-prime loans, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac or even the Clinton Administration’s hard line against Redlining (Clinton was eight years ago), where was the canary in the coal mine? Where was the partisan outcry twelve, ten, eight, six, four or even two years ago while all these bad notes were being written?

“Are there no more Conservatives in D.C?” “Can the U.S. survive four years, God forbid eight, of Obama?” William Ares survived Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush and Bush. You Neo-Cons have a few choices; you can love it or leave it, you can arm up (okay, just load what you got) and take the country back or crawl into your Cold War bomb shelter and ride it out. Any way you choose, it will be hard to plot a future without severing your moorings to the ghost of Ronald Reagan (he was 20 years ago). This is it though, your time to shine, everybody loves the underdog, you're not the majority any more you don’t have to be silent, let your hair down and your freak flag fly you neo-radical anti-government conservatives, you Neo-Radicons.

SOP: Callunion.com - 2

In the interest of getting and keeping an audience I have decided to drop the "SOP Chronicles". Lenny Bruce had an audience before he started reading his arrest and court reports.
Yes, Callunion.com did refund my money.

SOP: Callunion.com

SOP or Standard Operating Procedure will be the category in which I chronicle my "inconveniences" and the responses and/or resolutions to those inconveniences provided by the provider of said inconvenience.

My girlfriend currently resides in Beiruit studying, in a nut shell, how telecommunications, telephony and internet, effect and affect culture in Lebanon by the Lebanese, both in Lebanon and the diaspora. Keeping in contact with her is neither cheap nor convenient.

Below is my email to Callunion.com after several failed attempts to make a call through their service.

I have a transaction reference. I have a username and a password.
I don’t have the time or patience to download or wait for the mail to get your instructions.
I use a lot of these services and none of them has required so much to do so little. It’s really just a phone call isn’t it? You don’t even post a customer service telephone number. A telecommunications company that can’t be reached by phone, I should have known better.
Also, you would be better to advertise, “Possibly The Cheapest Internet Phone Calls” rather than “Probably…” as many more things are possible than probable.
I would like a refund.

Callunion.com did respond, instantly I should add, to my email with a form response;
Your Ticket has been received and a member of our staff will review it and reply accordingly. Listed below are details of this Ticket. Please make sure the Ticket ID remains in the subject at all times.
Please do let us know if we can assist you any further,
VoIP Support
Call Union Support Team E: support@callunion.com W: www.callunion.com


I will continue to chronicle my communications with Callunion.com.

And, will post any corrections Kristin is sure to have to my oversimplification of the work she is doing.