Running head: SUBJECTIVISM 1

Subjectivism

The Immorality of Applied Objectivism

Joshua Sullivan

SUBJECTIVISM 2

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate both the inherent problems and the consequences of the

philosophy of Objectivism when applied as a modern school of political thought. Through a brief

look at the history of Objectivism, we will track its progress from cult­like dogmatism all the

way to Wall Street. This paper also explores the negative externalities that have arisen due to the

conservative Libertarian interpretation of Objectivism, and how they pose even greater threats in

the years to come.

Keywords: Objectivism, Tea Party, conservative, Federal Reserve

SUBJECTIVISM 3

Subjectivism

The Immorality of Applied Objectivism

In 2009, less than a month into Barack Obama’s tenure as president, the catalyst for

America’s next major political movement occurred. Recently, the Obama administration had

announced plans to help out homeowners if their mortgage swelled to eclipse the price of their

property. This did not sit too kindly with CNBC investment analyst Rick Santelli, who ranted for

a few minutes live on­air about his opposition to “paying losers’ mortgages” and how Americans

should not have to carry the water for those who are sinking. He called for a meeting of a “Tea

Party” in Chicago to protest government intervention (Elving, 2015). To any viewer who had no

idea about the greed and immorality that caused the 2008 recession, Santelli’s words must have

been inspiring. What Santelli failed to mention is Americans already had paid for the mistakes of

a relatively small number of individuals in a huge way via taxpayer­funded bailouts of major

mortgage and Wall Street institutions. The housing and stock market failure of 2008 had

systemic causes that reach all the way back to 1987, with the appointing of Alan Greenspan to

Federal Reserve Chief. Greenspan brought with him a philosophy known as Objectivism, which

he had acquired through a close relationship with the conservative idealogue Ayn Rand. The

conservative ideology built around a foundation of Randian Objectivism thrives in

modern­day America, uninhibited by actual objective analyses of its tenets. Although

Objectivism preaches adherence to absolute truth, its followers only pay heed to truth when they

stand to gain from it. Objectivism’s call for unbridled capitalism and relentless pursuit of

self­interest has already had, and will continue to have, a devastating effect on the majority of

Americans.

SUBJECTIVISM 4

While a majority of conservatives may have never heard the term “Objectivism,” they

most certainly are being trained to subscribe to it as a motivating political and social philosophy.

The beginning of Objectivism’s intrusion into politics began in the 1950s, when future Federal

Reserve Chief Alan Greenspan began meeting with noted author Ayn Rand and several other

like­minded individuals. They called themselves the “Collective” and used these meetings as a

sort of think­tank to shape their beliefs and the tenets of Objectivism. According to Matt Taibbi

in his book Griftopia (2010), “Rand’s belief system is typically broken down into four parts:

metaphysics (objective reality), epistemology (reason), ethics (self­interest), and politics

(capitalism)” (p. 41). He explains that the flaw in Objectivists’ belief in objective reality is that it

frees them from the practice of self­examination; if they believe a certain thing to be true, then

they find no reason to listen to any naysayer who offers opposing evidence. The current

conservative movement, specifically the Tea Party, is ripe with this trend. Taibbi (2010) goes on

to explain how the latter two tenets, self­interest and pure capitalism, comprise the center of

gravity for the GOP: “Randians believe government has absolutely no role in economic affairs;

in particular, government should never use “force” except against such people as criminals and

foreign invaders. This means no taxes and no regulation” (p. 41). The hierarchy of self­interest

over the welfare of society as a whole and its engrainment into conservative ideology is further

illustrated by cognitive scientist George Lakoff (2014), who explains that there exists a “strict

father parental model” that guides conservative ideology. The model teaches that the world, and

the people in it, are dangerous and out for their own self­interest and that there will always be an

absolute right or wrong moral decision. This reinforces the Randian ideal of self­interest because

in a world where everyone else is looking out for themselves, one needs to do the same to

SUBJECTIVISM 5

survive. Lakoff then goes on to explain that the economic link between the strict father parental

model and laissez­faire capitalism is “the morality of self­interest, which is the conservative

version of Adam Smith’s view of capitalism . . . that if everyone pursues their own profit, then

the profit of all will be maximized by the invisible hand. . . Go about pursuing your own profit,

and you are helping everyone” (p. 5). The inherent hypocrisy being that the self­proclaimed

“religious right” is ignoring the “love­thy­neighbor; feed­and­clothe­the­poor” teachings of Jesus

Christ. by focusing on one’s own economic and social self­interest, much less of an emphasis is

placed on helping those who are unable to help themselves. The strict father model and

Objectivism go hand­in­hand, and their results have already proven to be detrimental to our

society.

Negative Externalities

The economic effects of Objectivism and its adherence to unbridled capitalism were felt

worldwide with the crash of 2008. While subsequent years of research have unveiled the

astoundingly selfish actions of Wall Street and companies like AIG and Goldman­Sachs that led

to this collapse, the GOP seems to not have learned its lesson. While the causes of the crash were

systemic, they all fall under the umbrella of deregulation, and the one holding the umbrella was

Alan Greenspan. Matt Taibbi (2010) gives a simplistic summary of Greenspan’s effects on the

American economy:

The financial services industry inflated one speculative bubble after another, and each

time the bubble burst, Greenspan and the Fed swept in to save the day by printing vast

sums of money and dumping it back on Wall Street, in effect encouraging people to

“drink themselves sober,” as Greenspan biographer William Fleckenstein put it. (p. 53)

SUBJECTIVISM 6

By lowering interest rates, Greenspan would take advantage of the poor by using their money to

flood Wall Street in a green tide, rewarding the irresponsible speculators for their failures. This

became known as privatizing winnings and publicizing losses. The burden of bailing out these

high­finance gamblers came to rest on the citizens. The right­wing media took advantage of the

fact that the average citizen had no idea about the mezzanine and equity­level mortgages being

compounded into AAA collateralized debt obligations , which were often invested in by using

collateral from security lendees for a high­risk profit (Taibbi, 2007 p. 85­94, 102­105), or the

massive credit default swaps issued by AIG with virtually no money to back them up (Taibbi,

2007 p. 97­100), so the conservative media (Fox News, WSJ op­eds, etc) spun a narrative of

irresponsible homeowners being the cause of the crash. This false narrative justified the

taxpayer­funded bailout of these “too big to fail” criminals in the minds of many Americans and

made a case against helping out the homeowners who were taken advantage of. This type of

bottom­up wealth redistribution is characteristic of the big­money funders of the Tea Party and

other conservative groups; they preach vehemently against using taxpayer’s money to help the

poor, yet they devour giant sums in the form of government subsidies. Vermont Senator Bernie

Sanders (2014) details that, “General Electric, for example, posted U.S. profits of almost $34

billion from 2008 to 2013, but the Internal Revenue Service ended up sending them checks

totaling $2.9 billion” which makes for an effective tax rate of ­9%. Yet the GOP still runs on a

platform of lower taxation for the upper class.

In 2012, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s tax plan called for more of

these cuts. He was heralded as a savvy businessman who would restore our nation’s economy.

However, researchers Brown, Gale, and Looney at the Brookings Institute (2012) reviewed

SUBJECTIVISM 7

Romney’s tax plan and estimated that the proposed tax cuts would cost $150 billion in just 2015,

and that over a ten­year period would ultimately swell the debt to an alarming 86% of the GDP.

Upper­class tax cuts are proposed in the name of supply­side or “trickle­down” economics, the

theory being that once corporations are freed up from taxation, they will use the money to create

more jobs and more economic prosperity all around. Now, if Objectivists were truly concerned

with knowing the objective truth, they would look at the increasing wealth gap and the erosion of

the middle class and see that trickle­down economics has not been proven to work. Since Ronald

Reagan first popularized the idea, the rich have gotten richer and the poor poorer. Research by

Fuentes­Nieva and Galasso (2014) at Oxfam has found that the world’s 85 richest people now

own at least as much wealth as the entire bottom 50% of the world’s population. If trickle­down

economics worked, the average American would be feeling its effects. But with 1­in­3 American

children living in poverty, one of the highest childhood poverty rates out of any industrialized

country (Ingraham, 2014), America’s economic gains seem to only benefit the top 1%.

On top of the economic consequences, the denial of climate science that is spread through

the conservative think­tanks and media outlets will have damning implications on the world.

Although a resounding 97% of climate scientists agree that anthropological climate change is

real and actions need to be taken (“Global climate change: consensus,” 2010), the conservative

party refuses to believe it for the most part. This refusal to examine what one holds to be true is

once again directly tied to Objectivism. This is how climate change denier Jim Inhofe holds a

seat as the head of the Senate Environmental and Public Works committee, despite his absolute

ignorance of prevalent scientific data. The conservative media’s main outlet, Fox News is

infamous for ignoring science and bringing in shills for oil companies who decry climate science

SUBJECTIVISM 8

as a “liberal hoax”, despite the fact that we continue to have consecutive years of

record­breaking temperatures (Romm, 2015). The ignorance of climate change will prove to

have devastating consequences that will far outweigh and outlast any economic effects of

Objectivism.

Conclusion

Although there are many responsible, caring, and intellectual conservatives in America,

the ones who seem to hold an alliance to Objectivism are not among them. Through continuous

distortion or ignorance of facts, the super­rich who fund the conservative movement are creating

a more dire future for Americans, and the world in general. After the 2008 crash the Dodd­Frank

reform was passed. It was not as sweeping as some would had liked, but it at least made an

attempt to curb the harmful practices of Wall Street. However, in 2014, a Citigroup­written

provision in the Congressional budget allowed for investors to once again gamble on risky

derivatives with FDIC­backed money (Protess, 2014). This once again sets up American

taxpayers to pay for the losses of Wall Street. If looking objectively at where that had gotten us

before, there can be no rationale for taking the lock off of Pandora’s Box once again. The rise of

Objectivism has brought with it the downfall of truth and rationality in politics, instead it has

been replaced by greed, denial, and xenophobia. This country was built by free­thinkers who

knew how to compromise, valued truth above rhetoric, and held progressive ideas for an ideal

society. The dangerous and self­serving philosophy of Objectivism would have had no place

among the Founding Fathers and it poses a threat to the integrity of America.

SUBJECTIVISM 9

References

Brown, S., Gale, W., & Looney, A. (2012). On the distributional effects of base­broadening

income tax reform. Urban Institute­Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center. Retrieved

March 16, 2015, from www.brookings.edu

Christopher, I. (2014, October 29). Child poverty in the U.S. is among the worst in the developed

world. Retrieved March 20, 2015, from

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/10/29/child­poverty­in­the­u­s

­is­among­the­worst­in­the­developed­world/

Elving, R. (2015, February 25). 6 years on, is the tea party here to stay? Retrieved March

20, 2015, from

http://www.npr.org/2015/02/25/388901979/remembering­when­the­tea­party­ignited­nati

onwide

Fuentes­Nieva, R., & Galasso, N. (2014). Working for the few: Political capture and economic

inequality. Oxfam Briefing Papers.

Global Climate Change: Consensus. (2010, January 1). Retrieved March 20, 2015, from

http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific­consensus/

Lakoff, G. (2014). Don't think of an elephant!: Know your values and frame the debate : The

essential guide for progressives (2nd ed.). White River Junction, Vermont: Chelsea

Green Pub.

Protess, B. (2014, December 9). Wall street seeks to tuck dodd­frank changes in budget bill.

Retrieved March 20, 2015, from

SUBJECTIVISM 10

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/12/09/wall­street­seeks­to­tuck­dodd­frank­changes­in

­budget­bill/

Romm, J. (2015, January 5). 2014 was the hottest year on record globally by far. Retrieved

March 20, 2015, from

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/01/05/3607735/2014­hottest­year­by­far/

Sanders, B. (2014, April 15). tax day for you and me but not GE. Retrieved March 20, 2015,

from http://www.sanders.senate.gov

Taibbi, M. (2010). Griftopia: Bubble machines, vampire squids, and the long con that is

breaking America. New York, New York: Spiegel & Grau.