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There is no intellectual leadership on the right, and there still isn't. The ideas are painted with the brush of obsolesce and patted on the head by the left, where much superior (but wrong and misleading) messaging is used.
To change this course we need some group to clarify the value of individualism and work ethic. Like Mike Rowe, but much bigger.
It sounds prophetic now. Her genius deducted with stunning accuracy where the path is going to lead.
Her words on the lack of intellectual leadership on the right is especially painful. We see the results daily at the abdication of Republicans of their responsibility and guilty conscious. Anyone found out what the right feels guilty about? Why do they succumb to the left at every corner and let evil prevail?
They are not ideologically based organizations, but simply take advantage of what the voters seem to want.
There is no "right", there are only individuals who hold various combinations of premises at this point. The right isnt a monolithic group, with some holding mystical beliefs, others going for more rational explanations of the world.
The leftists are , IMHO, totally engulfed by emotion, to the exclusion of reason. Therefore, its easier for them to be united together on an emotional basis. They are 'stronger together' as Hillary was claiming.
Its emotion vs thinking. Its easier to succumb to emotion than to think about things.
The intellectual leadership of the Right is coming from places like Prager University, Hillsdale College, the Heritage Foundation, and others like them and (I will actually disagree with Rand here) is quite vigorous and active and effective. One can also add in such talk show hosts as Rush, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Lars Larsen, and other editors and commentators such as Andrew Klavan, Ben Shapiro, Steven Crowder and the Right is far from devoid of ideas.
If you want to talk about more libertarian outposts, you have the Cato Institute and John Stossel, among others.
Is it too little, too late? Perhaps. There is certainly an ideological war being waged all around us. The question is if (or when) it actually becomes a physical contest.
This creates an opportunity for universities like my own Florida Tech to be a "Patrick Henry University". I am doing my best to fulfill that.
How to you debate a person programmed to metaphysically feel that just saying something like, “All lives matter”, or “Not everything is racist” is proof of your racism.
-Howard Roark
The tactic of ignoring them doesn't work. It has been proven and it is being proven now.
They poison the environment in which we exist and make normal daily functions difficult to perform.
It is not a solution.
On the other hand, combatting emotional manipulation with reason doesnt work either.. I am not sure what would work particularly after a person is already controlled by emotion from childhood- to the exclusion of reason. This choice is probably made at a very early age by how they are raised.
There are times when I go that route as well.
Then I realize that the "enemy" became worse and more destructive during the time I ignored them.
The world is worth saving, at least the component that is still thinking, working, and productive which is about half of the population.
The other half is destined for extinction by their own hands.
Here are quotes attributed to Lenin, the father of Soviet communism:
"The goal of socialism is communism."
"A lie told often enough becomes the truth."
"Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted."
"Any cook should be able to run the country."
"You cannot make a revolution in white gloves."
"No amount of political freedom will satisfy the hungry masses."
"The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency."
"Give us the child for 8 years and it will be a Bolshevik forever."
Do they sound familiar? Do you recognize the left's direction in this country?
to destroy a nation and its culture, first destroy their language.
Today's examples:
antifa = fascist thugs
progressivism = going back to the stone-age
fair share = my gang wants more
The heroes in Atlas Shrugged did not "escape", and Dagny did not join the others in the Valley at all until the very end when it was no longer needed. They all continued to work to change the culture. The Valley was a private estate originally used as a place for invited individuals to be together one month each year as a vacation, then as a place to exchange ideas. Later in the plot it became a place for progressively more to stay permanently for safety, until they were almost all there at the end, just before the collapse. But it was never an escape from reality, always a strategy for change as part of the plot.
We do not have the "luxury" of any kind of Valley, which was a fictional device intended to show Ayn Rand's vision of how the best people should live and should relate to each other under proper circumstances.
John Galt said,
“I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.” The hard part of this for me was to understand the full extent of how much of my life was spent living for the sake of another men and women.
Take Dagny and John Galt.
Didn't John live for Dagny for a long period of time, even before the two met? Yes, he was living for his own objectives, but at the same time he factored in Dagny's existence.
When we help someone, we exercise our connection to the universe. Being one, by reaching out. It is almost always a gratifying experience as it enhances our self esteem (Nathaniel Branden, Rand's disciple and lover practiced enhancing self esteem).
By living for others, on the other hand, we compromise our integrity and independence. In most cases we also give up a substantial part of our reasoning power because we want to justify that it is all right to do it even if evidence indicates otherwise.
Self esteem as a value is a consequence of successful pursuit of one's own rational values, not taking emotionally gratifying actions in the hope of feeling self esteem. Whatever Branden may have said to the contrary was well after he was thrown out for his contradictory behavior.
But I don't think that Harvard and Yale are going, in themselves, to change soon enough to do us any good. Perhaps some people should get together and start an Objectivist college or university.