Monday, January 25, 2016

PRIVATIZE EVERYTHING PAUL RYAN

We all seem to have the same goal, which is to share prosperity, so how can our politics be decisive? The answer should be obvious; we have different ideas about what that means. However, within that context, when I look for a basis for the divisiveness that exists we find something interesting. We do not share a common sentiment about our feeling for other people. Of course, it is not a yes and no, or a black and white thing; it operates on a finely graded scale. To complicate the picture, some of having stronger or more intense feelings and emotions about things than others do regardless of what those feelings are, which is pervasive and seen almost wherever one cares to look. For example, I can read this disparity in ideas and the intensity of feeling about those ideas in nearly every Facebook post, ranging from the most trivial to the most important. Referring to the example of sharing the prosperity most of us feel we all should share in the prosperity of the United States but only if we work for it. At one end of the scale, Ayn Rand immediately comes to mind, which is of current interest because Paul Ryan is currently the Speaker of the House, which the third in the line for the presidency but also is in the most powerful financial position. He is a disciple of Ayn Rand. Obviously, he cannot be as intense as his feeling as was Ayn Rand, but the feelings are identical. To explain the intensity and impact of Ayn Rand’s philosophy is difficult even though it is extremely simple. The simplicity of it all reminded me of a time when my wife was arguing with an Australian couple who were facetiously disparaging the United States while packing all their newly purchased sheets and, pillowcases and other linens to return to their homeland after a year in the United States. They brought up the way we treat black people. My wife’s retort was, what about the way you treat Aborigines in Australia. Almost in unison, they dismissed her question, meaning it was an innate feeling that they could express without thinking, by declaring, “They are not people!” That is precisely the way Ayn Rand looks at people who do not work. They do not matter as if they are not people. There is not grading or attempt to evaluate their circumstances; collectively, they do not matter. Most of us have a different feeling in regards to people who cannot work based on the why not gainfully employed; a wounded war veteran, a mentally retard, or an old aged person, for example, compared to a lazy person. The Ayn Rand approach is to lump them all into one bunch, and that is it; no metal fatigue will develop establishing that position. Hogwash, you say, while take a moment and look at the Paul Ryan budget idea of privatizing everything including social security notwithstanding that Social Security all but wiped out old age poverty. His basis for his privatization scheme is the belief that everyone will save for his or her retirement. The fanciful Paul Ryan “group”, the one he has in his mind he bases on everyone having a job, is earning a living wage, and can afford to save. If they cannot save for retirement, they are like Aborigines, who are not people; therefore, they are of no concern. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

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