Topic: Newsmax
Wayne Allyn Root misapplies the lessons of Ayn Rand in his June 21 Newsmax column:
The central plot of "Atlas Shrugged" is that in response to being demonized, overtaxed, over-regulated, and punished for success, America’s business owners were disappearing and refusing to work 16-hour days to support those unwilling to put in the same blood, sweat, and tears. They were going on strike. Because of that, the original proposed title of "Atlas Shrugged" was “The Strike.”
They were going on strike to teach that civilization cannot survive when people are slaves to government. If you punish the wealthy, the risk-takers, and the innovators, you kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. In Obama’s America, fiction is becoming fact.
The lesson of "Atlas Shrugged" is that without the $100,000 earners paying into Social Security, there are no pensions for the poor and lower middle class.
Without the wealthy owners of million-dollar mansions paying $25,000 and $50,000 annual property tax bills, there is no funding for public schools. Without the wealthy paying into Medicare, there is no “free” healthcare for the elderly.
Without capitalists motivated by profit, there are no discoveries to eradicate polio or create miraculous cancer and AIDS drugs. Without capitalists motivated by profit, there are no jobs, period!
Ayn Rand was warning the looters that there are consequences to their overzealous actions. She was warning that if the productive classes felt used, demonized, ripped off, and taken for granted, they would go on strike.
The latest census proves Ayn Rand right. Under Obama the wealthy are striking, voting with their feet. They are moving to low-tax red states in droves, escaping from high-tax blue states where they are being demonized and punished by the millions.
The census proves that Obama’s tax and spend philosophy is a dismal failure, an economic disaster killing jobs.
But it's not Obama raising taxes in those "high-tax blue states" -- it's the states themselves. Obama has no control over state tax rates.
And moving to "low-tax red states" is hardly the same thing as the total work stoppage depicted in "Atlas Shrugged." Going to Florida or Texas is not "going Galt" if the person is otherwise employed.
