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If You Could Ask Ayn Rand One Question....

Posted by awebb 8 years, 4 months ago to The Gulch: General
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If you had the opportunity to ask Ayn Rand any one question, what would it be?


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  • Posted by $ WilliamShipley 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    You are clearly responding to someone other than Jan since nothing Jan says would inspire such hostility. She is neither agitated nor spewing venom. As an accomplished female she does not feel that achievement is limited to the masculine gender.

    It is a sad commentary on men if you feel that the only way a man can have a romantic relationship with a woman is if she is clearly his inferior. It is astonishing that such a strong voice as Rand's should adopt this attitude.

    Jan has very much found her way and is quite comfortable with who she is. She does not feel the need for others to be small for her to be large.
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  • Posted by $ jlc 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Thank you. Ayn Rand rose head and shoulders above most of us in transcending her environment to describe a vision of a world that faced peril, but also potential magnificence.

    I can only attribute her narrow view of women in power to reflecting Victorian sensibilities. This is certainly a 'human fallibility' that I am quite capable of overlooking - but I would want to ask her about it, if I had the chance.

    Other than that, I think the allosaur has the right of it: try to squeeze her brilliant brain about 'how you would make a Gulch in today's visible world'.

    Jan
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  • Posted by Flootus5 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I thought Jan's post was well thought out and articulate.

    I wonder if Ayn Rand ever met Margaret Thatcher?
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  • Posted by Flootus5 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I agree with Stephen Ambrose. The Founding Generation was the Greatest Generation.

    My Dad's generation engaged in winning WWII and are due all the respect that it requires.
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  • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Surely you can do better than that. For example. Matriarch. Though a poisiton of power is a sexist word. Shouldn't it be personarch . No that won't do per SON is also sexist.

    Are women not capable of rational behavior even under stress of the monthlies? You can argue that point. I know how difficult it is having been the recipient of wierd on schedule behaviour

    I'm thinking some examples of your samples might be simpler for those of us who are awaiting for something besides personal opinion.

    Remember the FemNazi movement proved their worth during the Clinton era. and destroyed the viability and the credibility of the WomanMovement. Since then relegated do just another minor role in later years supporting the Bimbo Brigades.

    Most don't even remember that term unless they listen to Limbaugh nor is it relevant.
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  • -7
    Posted by Wnston 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Thank you. You come across as a very agitated old female who's never found her way so spews venom like a pit viper. Bug off.
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  • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    In order to be successful by his standards he has to use martial law as that is a requirement to subvert the military from their oath of office.

    What he wants to do according to his own statements is against the law but not against the Law Of Obama. It is his stated desire to make the DHS equal to or greater than in power and strength than the military. Why?

    The military swear it's oath of allegiance only to the Constitution nothing else. But if he can get them to violate that oath once he changes the parameters and redefines everything.

    Same as Cruz running for the Presidency. There is conjecture and some support for Cruz but the law has never been changed from it' s context of the times written definition. If it were different then I could run for President but it isn't and I was born of US parentage in another country. Ihad truly changed that part would be the subject of an amendment. It wasn't and therefore the context of the time definition stands.

    Change would require a constitutional amendment or a SCOTUS decision and one not contested by Congress. Same thing with suborning the military. No difference.

    The military were given a certain stated requirement as as part of their oath of office. As were all federal officials elected or hired. 'support and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.

    Changing the meanings by ignoring them is the act of a domestic enemy. No problem if it was filed as an amendment or as a case before the supreme court. Big problem when it's the individual edict of some lower level judge or the President.

    So it's a test of will and a test of morals standards and values. All the military has to do is say. We're not allowed to do that and quote the law ....unless the law is legally changed. It's not a strike for they are still up holding their oath of office.

    They are not allowed to decide anything except one thing. Is the Constitution in danger. And then they are given an obligation to protect the constitution.

    I happen to believe the country is worth the effort nor are the citizens. the Constitution however is worth defending. Those that try to weasel snake their way around it are Enemies Domestic.

    I have not changed my evaluation of country nor citizens but it changes nothing. The country and the citizens as a group were and are not worth defending. They gave up that privilege. The Constitution is worth defending. We who took the oath without mental reservation retain that privilege.

    The military is in a unique position of being left, by the constitution to decide for themselves and if they do decide it is a legal counter revolution. legal, authorized, and required. Their duty, responsibility and their job. It is a hard hard decision for any soldier to make, especially when we are taught and learned to live a life of almost unquestioned obedience. Key word is 'almost' The careerists poor example made sure of that.

    Will the uphold that oath? One answer is doesn't matter. I will. The other answer is...

    50 50 they will or they won't.

    The majority that won't uphold it are found at the top of pecking order. By royal appointment. but when they retire having not upheld their oath they are liable. The Congress has, not doubt exempted itself. Legally. Who knows?

    Now Obama can threaten even declare martial law and then demand the obedience of the second part of the oath. The military is relieved of zero responsibility for their action or dereliction of duty regardless of the order given.

    It's a hard job but someone has to do it. They are after all the last line of defense.

    Either way it would mean martial law. The difference is one group will return you to the Constitutional Rule like it or not. The other will rewrite the oath of office and the Constitution to one of their own liking.

    Damn.. speaking of responsibility How are you going to vote?
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  • Posted by $ jlc 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Huh again? Me femnazi? Rand femnazi? Your reply to my original comment was inaccurate (I am able to say whether I am a man-hater or not after 63 years of intensive knowledge of self.). I took the time to make a detailed response and you reply with a worthless epithet: "Feminazi BS."

    If you do not make a worthy reply, I will cease to respond to your comments.

    Jan
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  • Posted by Wnston 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    A true "John Galt" would oppose Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and other liberal progressive Facists.
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  • Posted by johnpe1 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    yes, unfortunately, the progressives have taken the first move
    into a war for the future. . using government force is the move
    which amounts to initiating civil war. -- j
    .
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  • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    For the same reason a man must have a woman or did you really mean women to look up to and.....dangling participle look up to and what? and admire would work.
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  • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    She went at that in great detail when she was alive. I would put it a different way or two ways. Why in a country that is supposed to be for religious freedom is there so much interest in everyone else's business. It end to view long noses the same way i view 'we are from the government we are here to help you.

    As for Rand she went into that in great detail but you have to read. and then reason and then take your bit of newly won knowledge elsewhere.

    Freedom of Speech, Assembly, religion and the press is also freedom from speech, assembly, religion and the press.

    Wnston give me a valid, proven reason why you are pro-whatever. Finish with mathematical proofs.
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  • Posted by $ jlc 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Huh! Hate men? I don't hate men - how did you ever get that out of what I said?

    Quite the opposite: I object to Ayn Rand's worldview that the only possible relationship between a man and a woman is that the woman must look up to a man as her superior (not as her friend) and that if the woman herself has a large amount of power then she 'cannot find a man'.

    Here is more of what Ayn Rand said on that topic:

    "...the higher [a woman’s] view of masculinity, the more severely demanding her standards. It means that she never loses the awareness of her own sexual identity and theirs. It means that a properly feminine woman does not treat men as if she were their pal, sister, mother - or leader.

    Now consider the meaning of the presidency: in all his professional relationships, within the entire sphere of his work, the president is the highest authority; he is the “chief executive,” the “commander-in-chief.” ...In the performance of his duties, a president does not deal with equals, but only with inferiors (not inferiors as persons, but in respect to the hierarchy of their positions, their work, and their responsibilities).

    This, for a rational woman, would be an unbearable situation. ... To act as the superior, the leader, virtually the ruler of all the men she deals with, would be an excruciating psychological torture. It would require a total depersonalization, an utter selflessness, and an incommunicable loneliness; she would have to suppress (or repress) every personal aspect of her own character and attitude; she could not be herself, i.e., a woman; she would have to function only as a mind, not as a person, i.e., as a thinker devoid of personal values - a dangerously artificial dichotomy which no one could sustain for long. By the nature of her duties and daily activities, she would beome the most unfeminine, sexless, metaphysically inappropriate, and rationally revolting figure of all: a matriarch."

    That is a spectacularly twisted view of male-female relationships. While I admire most of Ayn Rand's work, her definition of a 'properly feminine woman' is boggling to my mind. The limits she sets on relationships demean both men and women...and are not accurate. We live in a later era and have examples all around us of various successful permutations of relationships of all sorts.

    Jan
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  • Posted by johnpe1 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I would suspect that she might answer, "Finishing a good novel,
    or an essay at least. . And, sometimes, learning something new
    from a friend." . just thinkin' -- j
    .
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  • Posted by $ allosaur 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I'm not going to give up, roll over and play dead, thank you very much.
    I'm not going to be one of a "few good men" who do nothing about evil either.
    Okay, a few good ladies too. I was thinking about a quote that just has "men" in it.
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  • Posted by Wnston 8 years, 4 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Don't bet on BHO not becoming a dictator by martial law. Americans are lazy. And most patriots are old and limited in physical ability to push back. Strong words but weak bodies.
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