Cast recommendations for Atlas Shrugged: Now Non-Fiction?

Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago to Movies
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Does anyone want to put together a cast for "Atlas Shrugged: Now Non-Fiction"?

A place to start would be Glenn Beck's compilation of Obama's czars.
http://www.glennbeck.com/content/article...

Mr. Thompson - Mr. Barack Obama
Hugh Akston - Dinesh D'Souza
James Taggart - Jeffrey Skilling (GE CEO)
Do not forget that GE has a trains division.

Starnes' heir - Auto Recovery Czar Ed Montgomery or car czar Ron Bloom

Floyd Ferris - Energy and Environment Czar – Carol Browner
Robert Stadler - former Energy Secretary Stephen Chu

Claude Slagenhop - Green Jobs Czar Van Jones

Tinky Holloway - Regulatory Czar Cass Sunstein

Mr. Larkin - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner

Cuffy Meigs - Craig Becker (Associate General Counsel of the Service Employees International Union)

This is a start. I'm very open to suggestion.

All Comments

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  • Posted by $ stargeezer 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I'd pretty much agree. Snowden is a wuss that could never be a Ragnar. I'd actually place him as James Tagert, a wimpy tool being used by a government to fight against the people. Of course the government is Russia, but the "tool in their hand" is valid.
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  • Posted by $ stargeezer 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I'd expect him to have been very integral in "negotiating" 10-289. In fact, I'm certain he'd have no problem with any of it's concepts based on his positions in the Senate over the past twenty years.
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  • Posted by Temlakos 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    You are correct, of course. Robert Stadler was a total naïf. Floyd Ferris was the cynical and "realistic" operator. But I could almost see Floyd Ferris as female. Try Lisa Jackson of EPA. (Who reminded me very much of Moira Baccarin as "Queen Anna" in "V (2009).")
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  • Posted by Temlakos 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    If his motive was sound, yes. Understand, though, I'm thinking of someone who could go "all the way" with this. It occurred to me that, if a real-life John Galt had the secret of electrostatic motors, then Ragnar Danneskjöld could easily hijack an aircraft carrier now due to be scuttled, that has already had its nuclear reactors removed for decommissioning. I refer to USS Enterprise CVN-65. And what a name for a privateer in the cause of freedom of production and trade!
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I think Nicholas Cage has been tossed aside at this point. Let's recommend someone else.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Indeed. That would be hilarious.
    I swear Obama is using AS as a script on how to screw up America.
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  • Posted by skidance 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Why Nicholas Cage? There's something about his face that, to me, seems weak and wooden.
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  • Posted by barwick11 11 years, 3 months ago
    It would be funny beyond belief to take snippets from the book, post them in a video, and then post a real-world person saying them today.

    "Ayn Rand, 57 years ago:" "XYZ person, today"
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  • Posted by $ dhinet 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Yes, we need the actors reading their lines to be famous, so they will attract an audience.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I think I mentioned Holdren at one point as well. I think I recommended him for Floyd Ferris' role, though. He would work for Stadler, too.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Having a patent myself, I understand completely what you are saying. Every company I ever dealt with requires NDA's, and so do I. In fact, one of my companies suffered because of "first to file".
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    If the pilot of the Malaysian airliner did get those passengers hijacked safely, perhaps he should be Danneskjold.
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  • Posted by khalling 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    well I draw the line at stealing. Both companies lobbied hard to get patent laws changed from "inventor" to "first-to-file." Think if you are an inventor trying to build support for your invention or sell it-you show it to a big company (most don't sign non-disclosure agreements) and with their resources they run to the patent office and file an application on your invention. Before, the patent office always recognized the inventor-that's the meaning of the word, right? Now after that law has passed, it's the first one to get it in the patent office. That bill was overwhelmingly passed btw.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago
    My purpose in this was not to name all the cast members, but to get all of us talking. In that, I think I succeeded.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    I can't disagree with Gates and Jobs' protection of their own interest once they had made their success. Where does one draw the line between protecting one's fortune from the looters and not violating other Galtish principles?
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  • Posted by khalling 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Both Gates and Jobs worked actively, once their companies enjoyed success, to pass laws that were skewed toward big business and against the independent inventor. Neither company has a very good record on respecting intellectual proprty rights while vigerously enforcing their own.
    As far as Galt goes, every invention in the world is built from known elements.



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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago
    Galt invented an industry from first principles without building on prior knowledge. Is that even possible today? That is part of the reason that I am not a harsh judge of Jobs and Gates. As many do today, they took something interesting that had been invented by others and dramatically improved on it. The closest thing I can think of to inventing a whole industry out of almost nothing was probably J. Craig Venter's Celera Genomics.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago
    Historically, Andrew Carnegie and John Rockefeller would have been likely inspirations for characters like Rearden and Galt. Rockefeller was prosecuted for his monopoly for instance. Admittedly, they weren't perfect. They did buy off politicians to protect their interests after they had made their fortunes (President McKinley, for instance). The philanthropy that Carnegie and Rockefeller exhibited late in life would have been "going Galt" in that time period.

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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    OK, Fiorina and Whitman go down. Someone mentioned the CEO of Yahoo. Tell me more about her.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Steve Jobs didn't consider what he did with Xerox theft. Jobs and Wozniak bought the GUI technology. Gates - now there was a copier of technology, but once again, he would consider it building off of someone else's success. It is not as clear cut in the real world, as opposed to in a novel.
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  • Posted by plusaf 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Fiorina? NFW! I was at HP when she 'downsized the company to success.' --- Not.
    She is NO Dagny Taggart.
    And many HP ex-pats aren't all that impressed with Meg's track record so far, either!

    Too bad there were so few female moochers in AS... Pelosi and her ilk would be naturals!
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  • Posted by khalling 11 years, 3 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Reality, MM, reality. Property rights are based on creation. Creators are OWNERS. it's simple. If someone uses somebody else's property without permission-well, they are a moocher. I take my stance from Rand who took it from Locke and Blackstone:
    “What the patent and copyright laws acknowledge is the paramount role of mental effort in the production of material values: these laws protect the mind’s contribution in its purest form: the origination of an idea.” Rand, Ayn, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, Signet, New York, 1967, p. 130.
    your blade is dull, MM-hone it...;)


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