Why I said "Ayn Rand is not the DIRECT solution to today's problems of America"

[Reason Man]

A member on another forum has posted a topic comparing the possible collapse of America with that of Rome in 476 AD.

http://forum.objectivismonline.net/index.php?showtopic=14463.

My reply there is the reason why I said "Ayn Rand is not the DIRECT solution to today's problems of America". It is reproduced below.

4. Comments on Quotes about Democracy – And – The “Collapse Clause” of Democracy

Proceeding on the above lines of degeneration of rulers due to mass psychology, the pattern of collapse of American democracy is very nicely explained by the following ancient quote (though the existential situation is almost like small-town, rural India). See if anybody can recognize the following sentences, purposely listed serially (instead of paragraph) by numbers used for comments that follow:

i. The characteristic of the democracy is equal freedom and open speech to all, with liberty to each man to shape his own life as he chooses.

ii. …. even horses, asses and dogs go free about, so that they run against you in the road, if you do not make way for them. ……

iii. The subversion of such a democracy arises from men who rise to be popular leaders in it: violent, ambitious, extravagant men who gain the favor of the people by distributing amongst them confiscations from the property of the rich.

iv. The rich, resisting these injustices, become enemies to the constitution.

v. The people, in order to put them down, range themselves under the banners of the most energetic popular leader, who takes advantage of such a position to render himself a despot.

vi. He begins his rule by some acceptable measures, such as abolition of debts, and assignment of lands to the poorer citizens, until he has expelled or destroyed, the parties opposed to him.

vii. He seeks pretences for foreign wars, in order that the people may stand in need of a leader, and may be kept poor by the contributions necessary to sustain war.

viii. But presently he finds, or suspects, dissatisfaction among the more liberal spirits. He kills or banishes them as enemies:

Does anybody recognize the similarity of the situation in the above lines and today’s large democracies? See comments in the table below, against sentences which bear the same number as in the original quotation, but regrouped appropriately.

Statement and Statement number. Comment

i. The characteristic of the democracy is equal freedom and open speech to all, with liberty to each man to shape his own life as he chooses.

Comment: This is the most important clause of democracy, and should be called as its “Freedom and Equality Clause”. But at the same time it also includes a crucially important characteristic because of which I have also called it as the “Collapse Clause of Democracy”, and used it ahead in the solution to the problems due to democracy. * See ‘Note’ below.

ii. …. even horses, asses and dogs go free about, so that they run against you in the road, if you do not make way for them. ……

Comment: Today’s US may be different from this in terms of material wealth, but small-town rural India is similar, and the author has surely not visited India!

iii. The subversion of such a democracy arises from men who rise to be popular leaders in it: violent, ambitious, extravagant men who gain the favor of the people by distributing amongst them confiscations from the property of the rich.

vi. He begins his rule by some acceptable measures, such as abolition of debts, and assignment of lands to the poorer citizens, until he has expelled or destroyed, the parties opposed to him.

Comment: This role has today been taken up in the US by the Democrats, in India by several parties etc. Direct confiscation is sometimes resorted to (known as nationalization), but the major means today is ‘printing excess notes’, Woodrow Wilson’s ‘elastic money’. Granting debts and then waiving them off and expanding reservation of government jobs (as affirmative action) prior to important elections, are common tricks in India.

This competition of giving hand-outs is an important part of the “Collapse Clause of Democracy”.

vii. He seeks pretences for foreign wars, in order that the people may stand in need of a leader, and may be kept poor by the contributions necessary to sustain war.

Comment: This role is taken up in the US mainly by the Republican Party as an answer to Democratic Party’s onslaught to gain popularity by ‘socialism’. In India, a large ‘conservative’ party is raring to take it up. It will be difficult for both these parties to give up this role – they will not have an election pitch. And this is the other side of the “Collapse Clause of Democracy”.

iv. The rich, resisting these injustices, become enemies to the constitution.

v. The people, in order to put them down, range themselves under the banners of the most energetic popular leader, who takes advantage of such a position to render himself a despot.

viii. But presently he finds, or suspects, dissatisfaction among the more liberal spirits. He kills or banishes them as enemies.

Comment: These divisions are in nascent stage in the US because the change takes place ‘imperceptibly’, but the original US constitution is now rendered substantially useless to protect the individual. The massive “anti-capitalism” protests there are mark of ‘rich-poor’ division, but meaningless because capitalism does not even exist there. Recession can also lead to secession – point in case is the negligible Texas movement suddenly coming into national focus in April ’09, and talks of states shifting to their own currencies. In India the groups have taken a definite form in different regions, and are now set to coalesce into larger groups with more destructive powers.

* Note: This crucially important characteristic of democracy has not been identified by the above quoted writer or by any other intellectuals since his time, because of which civilizations fail at this point in their development. It is because of this contradictory nature of democracy that the ASPs laud the first amendment as well as curse democracy and multi-culturalism at the same time. Beyond this point, this clause is referred to only as the “Collapse Clause”, because only that part is important for the analysis of moral degeneration due to democracy. One person on a net forum, who saw my write-up prior to its completion, criticized me for talking about “one piece solution” to democracy’s multitudinous, multifarious problems. But just above him, another person had commented that an overwhelming majority of man-kind does not think about these issues! So I could show them there itself that that is the essence of the “Collapse Clause” – that they do not think at all, but they are overwhelmingly large in numbers, so they overwhelmingly determine the government and the quality of rulers. Lead that overwhelming majority to either of foolishness or wickedness, and you have a foolish or evil government. Contain them correctly – which is difficult over the long term, but can be done as shown at the end of this book – and you have a Rational Society which the US was close to at the time of its founding, and more importantly, had far less of moral degeneration.

Coming back to the above-quoted writer, barring development of physical sciences, the situation is the same between the time of the above quote and now. Note one important point – politics, the concept of justice etc were highly developed during the above period, though there was almost nil physical science. Most science, that too school-children’s level by today’s standards, came much later – the above passage was written in 380 BC, which means concept of democracy, justice etc were at least 2 – 300 years older (say about 600 to 500 BC) to write with the above accuracy! From this point of view, we must admire those peoples’ quest for reason, justice etc, and the fact that they had reached up to same level of democracy as modern America! The passage is from Plato’s The Republic – unfortunately, I do not now know the name of the English translator, I vaguely remember the name George Grote but my memory could be wrong. I have the photocopy of page nos 26 to 119 of the book from Mumbai’s “Library of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society”. Page no 26 is the last page of the Dialogue Kleitophon, the rest is The Repbulic. Several developing countries merely borrowed the concept of democracy from the Europeans / British – but being far away from concept of justice, they collapsed like pins after WWII.

The Greeks were fully aware of this problem, and written material is also available of how Olympic sportsmen, Orators (not necessarily rational in thinking but good at oratory irrespective of rational thinking, i.e. sophists and such) will take-over democracy! It is similar to sportsmen, small time female actresses, comedians, media personalities etc taking over democracy in our times – principle is the same, I have called it as ‘irrational soul pleasing’. Despite being so much aware (Plato’s quote being a sample), the Greek and Roman rules collapsed because of this clause.

America had gone far above everybody else, due to Greek / European experience, but more as a consequence of the ASP Revolution, of those peoples’ commitment to reason! They had come very close to ensuring a Rational Society, but are slipping because of the above-mentioned Collapse Clause of Democracy. Now they have substantially turned back, and we have to see which way the coin falls, heads or tails! The Founding Fathers of US were fully aware of this problem and had taken several measures to keep it under control. In an article titled “Democracy and Majority Rule” on the website Atlasphere dated May 29, 2009, the writer Walter Williams tells about the measures taken against ‘majoritarian tyranny’ by the framers of the US constitution; there is a quote from James Madison’s writing against injustice by majority, etc. Further he says, [John Adams predicted, “Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”]

Though ASP society in its ascent phase was morally even more advanced than the Greeks, we are now back to square one, same place as predicted by Plato for his City in The Republic, back to 380 BC. The same concepts of morality, justice and selfishness, which the Greeks knew during pre-science days, it is now difficult to explain to men watching landing on the Mars on their TV!

And I found following quotes on a web site / article titled “Cabin Dreams” by J M Cornwell, dated March 11, 2009. Below the article is the title: Words of a Prophet and below it the photo of a serene, wise, typically “classical English” man with a hint of a smile, Thomas Jefferson, followed by the quotes:

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who do not.

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debt as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the Government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.

My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.”

Those truly are the words of a prophet – unfortunately I have to say to him, “Sir! Your words are those of a wise man – the only problem is that your kind of wisdom is no more welcome in the country you perspired to establish. Your people now consider you to be very ancient, out-dated. A hundred years after you another saint and his apostles arose, and your people love them – FDR, JFK, BHO et al. They take so much away from those who are willing to work and give to those who do not! And the other half is indulging in what you tried to avoid – mountainous debts and wars. And both violate the next three of your statements Sir!”

Ayn Rand herself referred at several places to fall of America, for example “For the New Intellectual” starts with America being bankrupt and following a suicidal course; The title: The New Left – the Anti-Industrial Revolution is self-explanatory and articles like “From A Symposium” describe how America is being led to collapse; or the very essence of Atlas Shrugged is the building of a new society out of the collapse of the present one (and the villains are seen in multiple copies, where are the heroes?); Anthem starts with a collapsed modern society of about 1930s (means too much more developed than Greece) – just read the April 1946 foreword she wrote for it to know what she meant by the world proceeding to collectivism, we have progressed so much towards that world; In several essays in Capitalism the Unknown Ideal, she talks about what type of dictatorship is likely to emerge in America – e.g. the title of article (of 1965): “The New Fascism: Rule by Consensus” is self-explanatory and ends with the type of dictatorship America is heading towards; (If I am not wrong, Ominous Parallels was endorsed by her? And today, has the situation deteriorated far beyond?); in the 1971 article “Don’t Let It Go” (from the book Philosophy Who Needs It), she says “If America drags on in her current state (which is unlikely) for a few more generations, dictatorship will become possible.”

Here she was only addressing better Americans to “Don’t Let It Go”, but the unlikely has become a reality, America has dragged on and the speed of getting closer to collapse is now progressively increasing. What was a more distant possibility during her life-time (huge erosion having already happened since 1900) is now a reality – in fact in an article titled “Dismantling America” on the web-site the Atlasphere, dated Oct 27 2009, Thomas Sowell gives a horror-list of government’s atrocities that were not imaginable even one year back! (The meaning of what she meant by saying that they are taking you, not to the days of pre-science, but the days of pre-language, is given ahead.)

What matters now is the solution to this decay of democracy, take-over of the political machine by the so-called ‘lower classes’ released because of the efforts of heroes.

It is said that civilizations have a limited life. Every civilization in the past has perished – and by implication today’s western civilization too, led by the US, is destined to end so. At this point it is important to bring out the connection between Greek, Roman and modern western civilizations / democracies – only these three are based on Aristotle’s philosophy – the importance of this statement is that only these have added far more knowledge than any other civilizations. Some other civilizations have lived for longer time than these three democracies – e.g. the Egyptian civilization lived for 3000 years, Christianity and Islam held sway over major areas for more than 1000 years, etc. The common point amongst these is that either there was very low addition to knowledge or retrogression and priestly monopoly over it. And there was no democracy or freedom, but men were owned by the priests / rulers. This is what differentiates the three Aristotelian civilizations from all other civilizations, and it is important to save the present one with its freedom in democratic form.

Without meaning any disrespect to the people named above, I want to state firmly, that democracy need not kill itself, need not lead civilization to collapse, that a solution is available to this “problem of civilization” – that today, the US may be sliding towards the abyss, but it is not beyond redemption, the slide can be stopped, the rot can be stemmed – provided the men Aristotle called as ‘the wise and the noble’, George Washington called as ‘the wise and the honest’, and identified herein as the 0.5% Good Group, along with their 15% assistants join hands over the correct course of action. That correct course of action is described at the end of this book. No other course of action and piece of knowledge will stop the slide, please note. All other things will get buried once the collapse occurs.

5. Democracy and the First Amendment

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

In finally looked at the Article line awaiting approval. Sorry for the delay.

Michael