Hey hey! I've got to finish up a little homework before class, but I figured I'd make a quick post for the hell of it. My summer reading is going very well. I am currently reading Reagan's War and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. I finished reading Ayn Rand's The Virtue of Selfishness last week. Brilliant, that's all I can say for now. Here are a just a few sweet tidbits of Objectivist philosophy found with TVOS:

Objectivist ethics is the moral base needed by that politico-economic system which, today is being destroyed all over the world, destroyed precisely for lack of a moral philosophical defense and validation: the original American system, Capitalism.

The right to life is the source of all rights -- and the right to property is their only implementation.

No human rights can exist without property rights. Since material goods are produced by the mind and effort of individual men, and are needed to sustain their lives, if the producer does not own the result of his effort, he does not own his life.

In a compromise between good and evil, only evil can profit. <--- Someone please explain this to the U.N.

Inflation, man... inflation...

I find it ironic that Europe is actually proving that monetarist theory is sound... Friedman rocks.

Dude, I've got a broken dell!

My laptop won't start up properly, so I'm having to author this post at Rice Library on the beautiful, and very hot USI campus. Jake E, my fellow teammate/roommate, has been studying for the DAT (a dental school entrance exam). From what I hear, it's pretty darn tough and he's been studying 4-6 hours a day for the past month. Whatever the case, he's been getting help from an older fellow by the name of Dana. After Jake and I had gotten into a heated debate over the war on drugs during an 8 mile run, he told me that Dana had similar views to mine. Two days later, Jake came home with two books by Ayn Rand that were a gift to me from Dana: The Virtue of Selfishness and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. Thus far, I am a quarter of the way through The Virtue of Selfishness and I find it to be an awesome read. The book is very similar to the economic philosophies found in Friedman's Free To Choose, but it focuses on the individual's ability to achieve happiness in life through freedom rather than the positive economic impacts of individualist policy. One of the only things that I do not agree with is Rand's idea that the belief in a higher power is irrational (she was an atheist), but this does not take away from the rest of the ideas she introduces. I highly recommend this read. Thanks Dana... you rock!

Iraq or D.C? Where would you rather be?

An interesting factoid for the day.

Grandma Has the Right To Burn One Down

I don't smoke pot, but I find this quite disturbing. Apparently the Supreme Court has rejected the use of marijuana for the terminally ill. Over the past year I have moved further away from conservativism and closer to libertarianism because of actions like this. Not only does this decision limit individual freedom, but it has also turned the terminally ill and elderly seeking cheaper and safer pain relief into criminals. How absurd would it be to see an 80 year old woman, who lives next door and used to make you cookies when you were five, get arrested for smoking a bunch of leaves to relieve her arthritis pain or glaucoma? Many of the pain relievers that are approved by the FDA have harsher side effects than marijuana, such as nausea and vomiting. Gee, that sounds like a lot of fun. But hey, most of those guys on The Hill or in the Supreme Court don't suffer from glaucoma, AIDS, brain tumors, or polio.... so what do they care? ~ Rich

I had an epiphany of sorts the other day that has been long in coming..... my site is ugly. It needs a facelift. Maybe I can get around to that. Or not. We'll see. ~ Rich

"compare me, uh, with anyone else, and I think you’ll see that my forecasting record is not great" ~ Paul Krugman

The New York Times never ceases to amaze me; however, in this instance it's actually for the better. Paul Krugman, the raving assclown "economist" of the Left, has been torn apart by his former public editor at the Times for his ridiculous distortion of economic statistics to promote his own biased opinions and assertions. In his final piece in The Times, Okrent comments on how Krugman, "has the disturbing habit of shaping, slicing and selectively citing numbers in a fashion that pleases his acolytes but leaves him open to substantive assaults." After Krugman asked for some valid proof of Okrent's assertion, Okrent hammered back. Kudos. ~ Rich