Alayn Greenscum

Alan Greenspan has been taking some heat (not nearly enough) for his putrid double-dealing about Social Security.

But how could a hard-core Ayn Randian not hate Social Security? It'd be an article of faith.

I'm still surprised by the number of people who are not aware that Greenspan is a Randian. He was, in fact, a member of what could charitably be called her "salon," but seems awfully cultlike in fact.

Here's a good roundup by Bill Bradford of the Alan Greenspan and Ayn Rand. Read it and you'll see why it's no wonder the guy's a dickhead, even with his small indiscretions against pure Randianism.

Lest you think this infatuation with Objectivism was a youthful indiscretion, read to the bottom of the Bradford piece linked above.

And, as his friend Joan Mitchell Blumenthal has observed, “Alan is very devoted to Ayn. He still thinks of her most kindly

Or

Journalist Michael Lewis recently wrote that Greenspan “has preserved a hard core of fanaticism, encas- ing it in a shell of pragmatism. No more waiting for everyone to realize that extreme laissez-faire capitalism is the best system: He’s taking control of the process himself, ever so quietly.”

What would you expect from someone devoted to the writer of the following loathsome prose:

The man at the top of the intellectual pyramid contributes the most to all those below him, but gets nothing except his material payment, receiving no intellectual bonus from others to add to the value of his time. The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in his hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above him, but receives the bonus of all of their brains. Such is the nature of the 'competition' between the strong and the weak of the intellect. Such is the pattern of 'exploitation' for which you have damned the strong.

-- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

It's no wonder Greenspan wants Social Security killed. He's smarter than the people who need it to live on in their old age.