Rand Paul Takes Kentucky

Rand Paul Wins Republican Senate Nomination in Kentucky

Rand Paul, one of the early leaders of the Tea Party movement, won the Republican nomination for Senate in Kentucky on Tuesday night, delivering a powerful blow to the party's establishment and offering the clearest evidence yet of the strength of the anti-government sentiment simmering at the grass-roots level.

Mr. Paul, the son of Representative Ron Paul of Texas, easily defeated Trey Grayson, the secretary of state from Kentucky. Voters turned against Mr. Grayson even though he had the support of the state's best-known political leader - Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader.

Take note, Washington.

And I'm happy to see the evil racist violent teabag movement found their voice at the ballot box. It's also pleasant to see the G.O.P. got their man handed back to him in that ballot box.

The grassroots raised money for Rand in small donations.

Trey Grayson had fundraisers thrown for him by the establishment. 21 Senators at one fundraiser, AIG lobbyists throwing another, endorsements from McConnell, Dick Cheney, Giuliani. And with all that weight and cash -- their horse got it's head chopped off.

That's awesome.

A Doctor Drops Question

Dear Cap'n and Blasphemes,

Let's get to the bottom of something. I'm a doctor. How much do you think I should make?

To the folks in favor of a single-payer option should realize this would create a monopsony on health care, essentially leading to the government dictating what physician salaries would be. Now...this isn't necessarily a bad thing for physicians. For example, in the Dutch single-payer system physicians are compensated very well, resulting in salaries which are actually higher than their American counterparts.

My pertinent professional details: Education and Training: 4 years college, 4 years medical school, 5 years post-graduate training. The 4 years of college and 4 years of medical school represent, together, a total of ~$180k of tuition and another 8 years x whatever you want to allot of room and board. Salary during residency is dictated essentially by the US government (socialism!) and averaged ~$45k a year or so. I went "straight through" the system and got my first real job at age 31.

I average 50 to 55 hours of work a week and am available 24 hours a day M-F by phone for my patients currently on treatment*. I share weekend call with 5 other physicians in town.

*On treatment? What does that mean? I am a radiation oncologist, meaning I use x-rays to treat cancer. I am trained in brachytherapy implants for gynecologic cancers, breast, head and neck, and prostate cancer, as well as the use of external beam radiation therapy and stereotactic radiosurgery for the treatment of both intra- and extra-cranial malignancies. (Got a bit technical there, I know, but I naturally always assume you guys to be intelligent and well-versed in the ways of The Google. I could have said "I'm a cancer doctor" and been done with it.

So... if the US were to move to a "single-payer" system, as dictated by the economics of the situation, the governement's reimbursement rates would essentially dictate my yearly salary.

What do you think that should be? Just curious.

(To note, please do not take the chance to assume I'm one of those doctor pricks who only focus on the dollars- they do exist. Just today I told a patient I would treat her absolutely for free because she couldn't pay.)

OTN

Dear OTN,
Thanks for taking the time to write. Just wondering, you know, why? I can't speak for the other folks who contribute to Blasphemes.blogspot.com, but I am in support of you earning whatever you are worth.

However, I think you have brought up some valid questions, and I am interested what our readers think. Come on gang. Let's hear from you.

Chavez seizes oil service firms

In an attempt to recreate the opening chapter of Atlas Shrugged, and to show America the next step in 'real' socialism - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has sent the troops in to take over companies that provide services for his oil industry.

"This is a revolutionary offensive," he told workers near Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela's main oil-producing area.

Military vehicles were used as the state oil company [You'll remember that Mr. Chavez nationalized his country's main oil assets two whole years ago] seized supply boats and two US-owned gas facilities. It seems the dip in oil prices put his finances under pressure?

The move places hundreds of boats, several ports and an estimated 8,000 oil workers under state control.

My thought on is that on the surface he'll save some money - at first. However, no one with half a brain will invest or build infrastructure in Venezuela - if such a person still existed? The revenues eventually lost by the lack of service providers to Venezuela in extraction, support, and transport will eventually cost him more than he's gaining on this take over move. The Oil companies will simply wait out the rest of Mr. Chavez's political life - they are very patient people. And seeing as how (in my useless opinion) he will eventually drain the pocketbook quicker - his political life is now significantly shorter.

If you would like to help end Mr. Chavez's reign of terror on his people, I recommend that you stop filling up at Citgo stations. Citgo is incorporated in the US, but is owned by Venezuela.

Vote with your pocketbook.

Shrugging

With 'Atlas Shrugged,' Hollywood may have its first anti-bailout movie

Hollywood could soon be going Objectivist.

After decades in development hell, Ayn Rand’s capitalism-minded “Atlas Shrugged” is taking new steps toward the big screen — with one of the film world’s most prominent money men potentially at its center.

Rand’s popular but polarizing book — it’s derided by many literary critics but has a huge public following — tells the story of Dagny Taggart, a railroad executive trying to keep her corporation competitive in the face of what she perceives as a lack of innovation and individual responsibility.

A number of stars have expressed serious interest in playing the lead role of Taggart. Angelina Jolie previously had been reported as a candidate to play the strong female character, but the list is growing and now includes Charlize Theron, Julia Roberts and Anne Hathaway.

Although it was written a half-century ago, producers say that the book’s themes of individualism resonate in the era of Obama, government bailouts and stimulus packages -- making this the perfect moment to bring the 1,100-page novel to the big screen.

“This couldn’t be more timely,” said Karen Baldwin, “It’s uncanny what Rand was able to predict — about the only things she didn’t anticipate are cell phones and the Internet.” Baldwin may be on to something -- love it or hate it, "Shrugged" is seeing a resurgence, with book sales spiking as debates rage in Washington and around the country about the government's role in a faltering free-market economy.

The author’s final novel offers an embattled railroad company as a metaphor for a society that Taggart (and Rand) sees as succumbing to socialism at the expense of individual creativity. Its backbone is a 50-page speech by the mysterious but major character John Galt in which he lays out the Rand principles of Objectivism, which argues for an aggressive free market and against government activism. Let's just say it's probably not on the president's nightstand.

With all the long speeches and with plot points often a Trojan Horse for Rand's ideas, it's not an easy writing or directing gig, but producers believe they've got the man who could do it. Randall Wallace, the writer on other crisis-era, politically themed works such as “Braveheart” and “Pearl Harbor,” has written the latest draft of the screenplay and is also interested in coming on to direct.

An “Atlas Shrugged” movie has gone through endless development fits and starts. Faye Dunaway and Clint Eastwood had been attached to earlier versions -- if that doesn't give you an idea of how far back it goes, we don't know what will -- but with both Rand and the Rand estate very particular about how the story was handled, those iterations didn’t get traction.

The Rand involvement on earlier versions -- along with the verbiage-heavy sections -- is probably why there hasn't been a Rand project on the big screen in 60 years, not since Gary Cooper played Howard Roark in Warner Bros.' "The Fountainhead." With some big-time entrepeneurs potentially coming board, there now may be a lot less shrugging and a lot more shooting.

By Steven Zeitchik

Who's John Galt?

You know how I keep mentioning that you don't have to read "Atlas Shrugged" since you're living it?

Well, the sales, via Instapundit, of Ayn Rand’s books are reportedly rising. Bonus: in this economy 1200 pages is a real bang for one's dollar. Double bonus: you can use it as toilet paper when you're done and re-purpose those dead tree pulps.

Have you seen a few “Who is John Galt?” bumper stickers cropping up too?

And, here's a sign at the anti-porkulus protest in Denver last week...

There was a story in the Wall Street Journal about it.

Of course, one could say that the antagonists of Atlas Shrugged were the government stooges who nationalized profitable industries to distribute wealth to the worker and the corrupt government officials, which defeated the individual and stifled independent creative thought and work - once those creative industrial individuals could take no more, they stopped working. In a sense, the creative class went on strike.

...Versus the current US situation which issues stimulus packages and bailouts which creates a pseudo-default-nationalization of industry to try to force said industry and capital markets to perform at their previous level of graft, corruption and waste.

Totally different.

The Pursuit of Happiness

“The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened.”

- Norman Thomas,
-American socialist

Tricky part about that is the few of us who do know.

On one side: we've got the historic American Spirit - to pursue anything goal you wish to pursue (provided it does not infringe on the freedoms of others). You could work hard, enjoy the fruit of your labor, buy land or accumulate wealth, help others pursue their goals by providing jobs and opportunities to pursue their own happiness. What you could not do, though, was infringe on the basic rights of others while achieving your own goals. We'll pull ourselves out of this funk.

The other side of the canyon, is the ideology known as Socialism. Despite countless historical examples that prove the long-term failure - it keeps coming up as the great equalizer. Socialism’s philosophy relies on government to distribute wealth by taking from the “producers” and giving to the “non-producers”… in a sense, it gives people something they didn’t work for… it gives the populace handouts at the expense of the working class. Socialism’s ideals are fueled by the politics of class envy that just because one group of people shouldn’t be penalized for not having the wherewithal to work harder or produce more than others. It is fueled by the philosophy of “fairness” when ‘fair’ actually means the ‘excess’ wealth of the ‘rich’ should be taken by force and given to the ‘poor’ because it’s not ‘fair’ that some have more than others, even when those some worked twice as hard for it. Under socialism, the worker is not rewarded for their labor - although most of the propaganda celebrates the worker and showers them with praise.

An example? Okay, take a classroom. After giving a test, the teacher gives the entire classroom a C-. It takes the achievement out of those A+ students who studied harder (or cheated better) to the hillbilly in the last row who is pre-verbal a passing grade. Everyone isn't elevated, it brings everyone down to same level. The least common denominator. In the classroom example, there's no reward for having worked harder, so eventually, there will be no incentive to work at all.

However, in a free-market society, when you have one person get rich through the fruits of his company, he is not the only one making money because, as it is said, “a rising tide raises all boats.” When that one company owner prospers, he can employ more people, create new jobs, profit neighboring distribution companies and retail establishments which create more jobs, and with all those jobs comes families making more money, allowing them to consume more goods. This "Trickle Down" allows everyone (who cares to participate) to share in the blessings of the Pursuit of Happiness.

"Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

-Thomas Jefferson
-The United States Declaration of Independence

These three aspects are listed among the "inalienable rights" of man. Note it is not the government mandated guarantee of happiness.

The phrase is based on the writings of English writer John Locke, who expressed that "no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions." (Yeah, the guy from LOST!)

If you've never read Atlas Shrugged, don't worry, now you don't have to. Because you're living it.