Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard: The Verdict after Fifty Years

Americans for a Free Republic ^ | 3-2-15 | Nelson Hultberg

[Nelson Hultberg]

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. What I will be discussing in my talk today is the crucial role that the ideas of Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard have played in the defense of liberty and Western civilization.

All Americans, well read in political affairs, know of these famous thinkers. They were two of the most powerful and revolutionary intellectuals in the 20th century, contributing many valuable insights to our knowledge of philosophy, politics, and economics. As with most intellectual rebels, their major ideas about freedom and government were highly controversial. What I will do in this talk is explain what these controversies are, demonstrating the wisdom and folly of their ideas. As to which is the more prevalent, wisdom or folly, stay tuned.

I will also explain a new way for libertarians and conservatives to look at the political spectrum and the egoism-altruism clash that Ayn Rand promoted so dramatically. This will be done by using the Greek philosopher Aristotle's famous Doctrine of the Mean and applying it on the macro-level instead of just the micro-level.

In doing so, I hope I can alert you to the immense importance of Aristotle to the cause of freedom and how his philosophical approach compares to that of Ayn Rand and Murray Rothbard.

Why is this so important? Because freedom has always been a fragile orchid in a jungle of rapacious ideologies bent on snuffing its presence out. Freedom requires rational, irrefutable thought to be won and maintained. If we have built our defense of freedom upon a false philosophy with faulty premises, then we are fighting in vain.

CLICK HERE to read the entire speech: http://afr.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Rand-Rothbard-Speech.pdf

[Nelson Hultberg]

This is a speech given by Nelson Hultberg to Freedom Fest, Las Vegas, NV

[gorush]

[brooklyn dave]

I tend to prefer Rothbard over Rand but still want to give her “her due.”

[ifinnegan]

“They were two of the most powerful and revolutionary intellectuals in the 20th century”

That’s funny.

[SeeSharp]

Thus technically speaking anarcho - capitalists are not anarchists. They don't want to eliminate the protective government functions; they just want to change them from state provided to privately provided institutions.

Bzzzzzztt!!! Thanks for playing.

Anarcho-capitalism asserts that private sources will provide those institutions of protection that the market demands. Not even close to what the author is representing.

[Rebel_Ace]

"If a man proposes to redistribute wealth, he means explicitly and necessarily that the wealth is his to distribute. If he proposes it in the name of the government, then the wealth belongs to the government; if in the name of society, then it belongs to society. No one, to my knowledge, did or could define a difference between that proposal and the basic principle of communism."

- Ayn Rand

[Publius]

Rand ping. It’s about philosophy, and it’s a bit heavy to read.

[Uversabound]

I would argue that Communism has actually retarded the human race altogether.

God wants us to work at freedom I swear it!

He wants us to understand that it is not to be taken for granted. Hence Oblah blah.

[Billthedrill]

Thanks for the ping. The author's modeling is straightforward and reasonably congruent to what I know of the constituent pieces. His treatment of anarcho-capitalism is more on the Rothbard model than Tannehill mode, whose adherents tend to be skeptical of all statutory law and hence somewhat outside the author's model or at least at the far end of the continuum. There are a number of flavors of anarcho-capitalism and not all of them fit.

Nevertheless, mapping this model of the Golden Mean to ethics is wonderfully illustrative but subject to the same sort of objection. Rand's problem with Judaeo-Christian ethics was itself problematic: despite a visceral rejection of such concepts as Original Sin her actual applied ethics were not only reminiscent of, but impossible to divorce from, her own Jewish upbringing. Can you have that without God? Rand says "yes", the author says "no".

Fun stuff. It catches me at work and so I'll have to self-ping it for later.

[4Liberty]

Let's have you name ONE book by Rothbard that you've read before you start mocking the statement.

Waiting..........

[4Liberty]

Murray Rothbard was the “Breitbart, Levin and Limbaugh” all rolled-into-one of his time.

Rothbard was a philosopher, political theorist, economist, historian and classical liberal activist.

Rothbard kicked Statist’s butts with many written works of covering Austrian economic analysis, political philosophy, and historical scholarship.

Rothbard was tossing around the terms “Statism” and “Statist” long before Mark Levin did.

He also wrote a pro-liberty, 4-volume history of the American Revolution titled “Conceived in Liberty” which predates Rush Limbaugh’s themes in his children’s books.

Rothbard was a huge figure, a powerful mind and a major influence in the fight against socialism.

Certainly he influenced me. I read his many works in college and grad school. I continue to use his thoughts and ideas in my college Economics classes. :)

[ifinnegan]

That’s the point.

No one even knows who he is.

[4Liberty]

Oh. Sorry. You omitted the “sarcasm/”
:)