Friday, October 24, 2008
What Hath Ayn Rand Wrought?
Alan Greenspan says he is shocked to have learned that his free-market philosophy has a flaw. Banks wouldn't protect their stockholders' interests in the absence of regulation. Really. Read his mea culpa here. And here is prescient Murray Rothbard on Greenspan.
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I was watching a left-wing news show and they brought some guy on to mock Greenspan for about 10 straight minutes. Truth to tell it was pretty bizarre. The funniest comment was "Gee I don't know why Greenspan suddenly realized free markets don't work, maybe he found a flaw in one of his Ayn Rand novels or something!".
People think that what Alan Greenspan oversaw was a free market. That is absurd, but people think it anyway. A government created banking monopoly is not a free market. Lowering interest rates every time the the boom slows down is not a free market. Guarantees, subsidies and bailouts are not a free market. Fannie and Freddie are not a free market.
Yet most people think it is. It is we who have failed, for standing idly by while people redefined our philosophy. The "free market" has been tarnished in the same way "tax cuts", "deregulation" and "privatization" have been tarnished. Any advocacy of smaller government is now equated with the Republicanism that gave us the single largest government in all of human history.
It will take decades to repair the damage that "libertarian" conservatives have caused.
Rothbard's article is excellent. It actually can be applied to tons of people who call themselves Objectivists.
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