Hold Your Nose and Vote for Obama

Prior to now, I have indicated my intention to abstain from voting for either McCain or Obama. Frankly, I despise both of them. After some extensive soul-searching, however, I have changed my mind. I will vote for Obama. Not as an endorsement of him or anything he stands for—but as a rebuff of everything his opponent stands for.

America is at a philosophical crossroads. We can either move further in the direction of the values of faith and altruism—or take a significant step away from those values. We are not yet being given the positive option of moving toward reason and individualism, but we do have the option of endorsing or rejecting our culture’s prior trend. The best outcome we can hope for in this election year is a clear, strong repudiation of everything the Republicans stand for—most importantly religion and religious morality.

In this respect, McCain is even worse than Bush. His pathetic defense of America’s greatness is exactly 180 degrees wrong. He defends America as a nation of great sacrifices—i.e., pure, undiluted altruism--and compounds that evil, disastrous viewpoint by choosing a devout mystic--a Christian creationist with even less experience than Obama--for his running mate.

Yes, Obama’s policies will do further damage to the economy, but we can scarcely deny that the Republicans are almost as bad if not worse. At least the Democrats do not camouflage their statist policies with free market rhetoric, making it much more difficult for the public to understand that government intervention is the true source of our current severe troubles.

Obama has made clear that he will continue to prosecute the war on terror, and hopefully he will do so in a less timid and self-sacrificial fashion than we have seen from Bush. He has shown some signs that he might do exactly that. We will see. In any case, how could he do worse than sacrificing 4000 innocent soldiers and bankrupting our economy in a doomed altruistic crusade to save a nation of America-hating savages?Most Americans seem to understand that a radical change is needed—a radical change in the sense of a change in fundamental values--and Objectivists can help them validate that premise. We can join with America’s voters to send a single message: “America does not buy into the Republican view of America’s values.”

We have to knock down that evil, repugnant, faith-based viewpoint before we can begin building a better one. It will not take long for Americans to see clearly that the alternative Obama offers—socialism—is equally destructive. Americans will learn that lesson very quickly—and hopefully begin to look for a new and better direction. Let us hope that an eloquent, rational spokesman will step forward to offer what they are seeking: reason, individual rights, and genuine free market capitalism.

Obama does indeed represent “change,” and we do need a bold statement of that now, in the form of a clear rejection of what the Republicans have offered and continue to offer. Obama is an empty suit and a zero point. He offers nothing but a negative—but a negative is all we can ask for at this primitive stage of our nation’s philosophical development.

It is tragic that America has come to such a dismal choice—but true change can only begin with self-acceptance. I will hold my nose, but I will vote for Obama.

Voting for the "Lesser Evil"

An amusing letter-to-the-editor is making the rounds which offers a number of obviously sarcastic arguments for voting Democratic in the coming election. Allegedly authored by someone named Robert A. Hall, it offers such “reasons” as the following:

“I'm voting Democrat because Congress has done such a wonderful job under Democrat leadership the last two years, that I want a lot more of the same.“

"I'm voting Democrat because I want to get my health care from the same competent, efficient, cost-effective, customer-service-focused folks who run the US Post Office, the Pentagon, FEMA and the state Registry of Motor Vehicles.”

It is hard to believe that so many well-meaning people still believe that the Republicans represent the “lesser evil.” Here is an alternative (and equally sarcastic) “argument”:

I’m voting Republican because John McCain and George Bush are so obviously superior to the Democrats—they have done so much to curtail the size of government, the power it exerts over our lives and to further the cause of freedom—and such pragmatic “benefits” clearly outweigh the long-range cultural damage of promoting religion as the foundation of capitalism, which is the philosophy of the Republican Party (as symbolized by Bush and now Sarah Palin).

For the record: I am not voting for either, but if I wanted to vote for the lesser evil, I would vote for Obama.

Please don't miss Craig Biddle’s excellent article, McBama vs. America, in The Objective Standard.

The Dark Knight

I rarely see a movie more than once. “Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life” was an exception. Another was “Moulin Rouge,” which I truly loved. I have seen “The Dark Knight” no less than four times—and was totally thrilled and delighted each time. The intricate plot, the brilliant direction, the cinematography, the performances—most especially the breathtaking acting performance by the late Heath Ledger—all were nothing short of magnificent. To the extent that the story’s theme elevated evil to a level of metaphysical potency—and it did—I would certainly have to challenge its validity. But the essential romanticism of the story—the awesome portrayal of an intransigent hero’s refusal to yield to a vicious, nihilistic, irrepressible evil—was as inspiring as anything I have seen on the big screen in a long, long time.

Screwing the Pooch

Question: Is it possible that The Altruist Society finally grew some cajones and fired their pet Bulldog--Otto—for his gushing endorsement of Bible-thumping Sarah the Impaler and her running mate, John (“America is great for her sacrifices”) Mc Pain?

Answer: Probably too much to hope for. An organization that pretends to be Objectivist but endorses Christian “Just War Theory” and GW’s wanton sacrifice of 4000 innocent American soldiers in an altruistic crusade (the so-called Iraq “war”) has no fundamental principles, and is unlikely to be motivated by anything but pragmatism—i.e., their (well-deserved) financial troubles. Their slick, crypto-libertarian magazine (The New Individualist, previously edited by the pooch himself) had to drastically curtail its publishing schedule, and that’s probably a key reason underlying the split.

What a crying shame. This subjectivist goofball has such a pathetic, dim, garbled grasp of Ayn Rand and her philosophy. He and the unprincipled, dissipated Altruist Society were a match made in nether-nether land. But the good news is that, without TAS as a platform, Bulldog Otto will do much less damage to the long-range success of Objectivism.