From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Objectivism and Libertarianism
Keywords: Objectivism Libertarianism
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1992 12:04:04 GMT

In article <Bx45qL.49A@quake.sylmar.ca.us> brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
}What do you mean by "free enquiry"?  Peikoff & friends don't object to 
}free inquiry, he just doesn't like anti-objectivist ideas to be called
}objectivism.  The reason he (and the rest of us) rejected Kelley was 
}because he disagreed with objectivism and wanted to still call his 
}ideas "objectivism".  The LP would be much further ahead if it would
}define it's ideas consistently and call out those who claim to be 
}libertarians by that definition, but actually disagree with the party.
}Failing to do so makes the LP amorphous and weak.

Which is why he had the door to the room some friends of mine who went
to an Ayn Rand Institute (ARI) conference wanted to discuss the Kelleyite
purge in locked.  Which is why he denounced Kelley for doing exactly the same
kind of thing Rand once defended now-Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court
Rehnquist for, giving a talk to a group, some of whom may have had immoral
beliefs.  Which is why he maintained that the Brandens were liars, and thus
immoral, then admitted that they told the truth, but failed to revise his
estimate of their character.  Which is why John Ridpath told some students
at this conference not to think of this in religious terms, only to be
contradicted by Pope Leonard the First of the Objectivist Orthodox Church,
who got up on stage at a podium in front of an audience of conference
attendees and told dissenters to get out, at which point George Reisman
chimed in to say that that means all dissenters, even if it means that only
the two of them would be left.  Yes, quite clearly, this is how people are
moved by the spirit of free inquiry and tolerance.

}Actually, he has convinced a lot of the kooks to leave the objectivist
}movement and for that I thnak him.  

Kooks like George Walsh, who had a career as an Aristotelian philosophy
professor before Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged, whose courses on Marxism are so
good that Ridpath has plagiarized them since, whose analysis of Marcuse in
the Objectivist periodical is right on.  Like Robert Hessen, who ran the
Objectivist book service until Barbara Branden's biography of Rand persuaded
him that associating with Pope Lenny et. al. was wrong, who's a historian
at the Hoover Institution, author of a biography of Charles Schwab, "In
Defense of the Corporation," and also contributed to "The Objectivist".  Like
Kay Nolte Smith, whose latest book, "A Tale of the Wind," is a hell of a lot
better romantic novel than anything Rand ever wrote - and I like Rand's
fiction.  Like the publishers of Aristos, the best Randian journal of
esthetics I've ever seen.  Like Roger Donway... like what's-his-name, the
millionaire owner of the hockey team.  Good riddance to bad rubbish.

}Just how do you define "dogmatism" and why do you think it is bad?
}I think that dogmatism is bad too, but I don't think that objectivism 
}is dogmatic.

Objectivism isn't dogmatic, but Pope Lenny is.  A rationalizing intrinsicist,
as Kelley as proven in his monograph, "Truth and Toleration."

}>One other thing I think I should throw in:
}
}>Someone mentioned Peikoff supporting the Republican Party.  
}
}I think you need to read what he wrote.  He has said that he's voting for
}Clinton, but not for simple reasons.  I believe he said that he's a registered
}Republican (probably to allow him to vote in primaries).  Personally, I
}am undeclared, and I have not had any flak from other objectivists.  

Oh, so it's alright for him to sanction evil as long as he has a complex chain
of reasoning with which to rationalize it, and no one else can originate
reasons of their own to associate with those who aren't pure objectivists,
but can only do so according to Pope Lenny's Central Plan.

}>Well, if that's
}>not bad enough, when Binswanger spoke at Ohio State a few years ago, he 
}>said he advocated limited gun control--something about nobody needing
}>anything more than a bolt-action rifle.
}
}I think you need to look at what he said in context.  I don;t know what he 
}said in that speech, but I doubt that's exactly what he said.  I can 
}imagine that he was discussing the question of whether a proper government
}could limit access to nuclear weapons or something. 

What a double standard!  Enemies get condemned for any imperfection by an
absolute standard, but friends get judged in historical context.  Just like
the socialists who condemned fascist or capitalist faults, but apologized
profusely for Cuba, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, the USSR, Peru...


Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu

"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
oneself and others." - Voltaire