Puppet Masters

Obama and the Pope versus the Ayn Rand corporate front groups

Pam Martens
Wall Street on Parade
Thu, 05 Dec 2013 00:00 UTC

Yesterday, President Obama appealed to fellow Americans to help him focus Congress on efforts to stem the unprecedented income inequality in our Nation. Tonight, one of the denizens of the greed-is-good corporate front groups, Yaron Brook of the Ayn Rand Institute, will attack that message in a speech at NYU.

New York University presents an ideal forum for Brook. It's a microcosm of the pitched battle for the soul of America. The Wall Street cartel has oozed itself into NYU's boards, municipal bond issuance, student loans, mortgage loans, credit cards and naming rights on buildings and auditoriums. NYU now has the highest tuition in the country, crippling student debt, while it simultaneously doles out forgivable loans to elite administrators for mansions in the suburbs.

As a determined group of over 400 faculty attempt to restore the University to its core educational mission and reduce the need for student loans, they are being maligned by the pro Wall Street university leadership much as any populist message is maligned on the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal.

In a speech hosted by the Center for American Progress yesterday, the President said the U.S. now ranks along the lines of Jamaica and Argentina in terms of income inequality. "The top 10 percent no longer takes in one-third of our income - it now takes half," said the President. "Whereas in the past, the average CEO made about 20 to 30 times the income of the average worker, today's CEO now makes 273 times more. And meanwhile, a family in the top 1 percent has a net worth 288 times higher than the typical family, which is a record for this country."

Read the rest of the article here.

Reader Comments

rbateman · 2013-12-06T22:56:05Z

False idealogy

"...some people even work 80 hours a week and they can't make ends meet." Brook responds: "Nobody owes them anything."

Oh, yes they do. The hirer owes the laborer, who is worthy of his hire, a wage commensurate with a decent living. The corporations and corporate heads are getting filthy rich by cheating the workers. Other countries, even our allies, are aghast at the obscene salaries that the top feeders get.

gdpetti · 2013-12-07T13:24:34Z

Well...

as usual, some of it is true, most seniors collecting SS, didn't pay anywhere nearly as much in, but in that equation is any idea of compounded interest or investment through the decades, as that 'box' is full of Tbills that now earn next to nothing, so one branch of the govt is bankrupting another branch, usually the strong vs the weak. This pattern can be found in the attacks on the Post Office which is required to set aside 2x what any corporation has to for future retirees, as the political puppets in DC are paid by the PO's competitors in the 'private sector', and not by members of the PO, this is also why private corporations like Walmart grow so fast... they get special treatment as 'new businesses', as old ones are merely an expense, thus seen as a burden.... same with the fracking industry... new business is always the shining light that gets all the attention by those forever seeking funding for their political egos in competition with others doing the same, by the time any expense of cleanup is needed, those companies will be long gone if not bankrupt themselves, as most of these deposits are very small puddles and not the lakes the majors need for their size of operations... so it resembles a guerrilla type business environment currently as the competition heats up.

Stossel is just another 'useful idiot' in this parade of fools, like most economists, he uses the data to prove his point and excludes all the rest that does not. If he pisses off enough people, he is helping out by getting some of them to look at the data and learn for themselves, thus perhaps 'waking up' and realizing why this farce continues, one civilization at a time.

JohnDonohue · 2013-12-07T13:31:29Z

You are winning.

I never understand Progressives who claim they are buried and defeated in the United States. You are winning:

Federal Government Budget:

63% Social Redistribution
24% Defense
06% Interest on Debt
07% Miscellaneous: Courts, administration, infrastructure etc.

Plus, in the century since the Triangle Shirtwaist tragedy, located exactly where NYU now stands, you have eliminated hard money in favor of Keynesianism, placed a confiscatory tax on producers and changed the U.S. from a republic of sovereign citizens into a social democracy.

As for Ayn Rand's supporters attempting to influence education, this is laughable; you have achieved an iron grip on education in the name of Progressive ideology. The countering of it by the spread of Objectivism is a lonely attempt to slow down your juggernaut.

Stop crying.

Burke · 2013-12-08T07:52:04Z

Rights not power

Notice the "protestors" in Stossel's video shouting "you got the power."

That's their real game: power, not rights or any kind of social justice.

Because no one has the right to force others to provide them with a job at all-and sure as hell not on terms they dictate.

Just like Yaron Brook said.

And really, do the leftists who goad them on care anything for them? Or for any of the causes leftists claim to champion? Or are they just using these causes to advance their real agenda?

What Ayn Rand described as "hatred of the good because it's good," which is destruction for the sake of destruction.

One can argue that we are all better off without minimum wages, etc., as Brook does, but that's giving leftists a sanction they don't deserve, as I read Ayn Rand. Leftists are fundamentally anti-life and are in no way seeking better lives for anyone.

But you need to read Ayn Rand's works to fully understand that.

Hsolomon · 2013-12-08T11:34:12Z

Government is the Oppressor

Why is it that all the complaints are about the oppression of corporations with not concern about the real oppressor: government coercion.

Burke · 2013-12-08T12:07:36Z

Corporate "oppression"

If a corporation doesn't give you a job with pay and benefits you want, you are being "oppressed." And you are entitled to force them to give you what you want.

After all, your income isn't yours according to Obama. It's "ours" and should be "distributed" equally without regard to who earned what, but according to need.

Or, as Marx put it: "From each according to his ability to each according to his need."

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Obama and the Pope versus the Ayn Rand corporate front groups

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