>The recipient of a public scholarship is morally justified only so long as he regards it as restitution and opposes all forms of welfare statism. Those who advocate public scholarships, have no right to them; those who oppose them, have. If this sounds like a paradox, the fault lies in the moral contradictions of welfare statism, not in its victims.

Basically things that Ayn Rand hates are bad--except when Ayn Rand does them and then it's because the things are unreasonable, not Ayn Rand.

Ayn Rand didn't use force to take anyone's money. That's what she hated. When those who took her money offered her a small portion back, her philosophy didn't require her to refuse it.

Like if she was in a forced labour concentration camp, her philosophy wouldn't require her to refuse to eat the food she was offered.

Rand was extremely influential to me, but you're absolutely right on this. I stopped calling myself an Objectivist long ago because I kept getting into arguments with others who took the label over things that Rand did that are blatantly against her first principles, but that Rand held a contradictory position.

In particular, Rand supported US foreign aid to Israel in her later years despite strongly denouncing the concept of foreign aid in its entirety prior.

It wasn't taken by force but instead by Rand's personal complicity and implicit consent by living within a society that has decided to enact the Social Security and Medicare programs and levy fees and taxes associated with those programs. And given that she received more than she put in, there was no principle for her to stand behind.

If that's the case, then I hope you will be just as eager to take personal responsibility for the US's war crimes, if the day of reckoning ever comes. But I have a feeling you will instead try to focus on your personal efforts to end US wars, rather than get sucked into the implication that being a US citizen made you a de facto supporter of the war crimes.

I would be the first person you might ask to admit my complicity in war crimes perpetrated by my government. I am involved in anti-war and pro-human movements but I readily admit that my quality of life is built on the backs of many innocent lives and deaths.

So, you're just as much of a hypocrite as Rand? She also dedicated her life to ending behaviors she hated in the US government, but was nevertheless subjected to the consequences of her failure to stop them.

No, I am what you would call honest and imperfect, whereas Rand is dishonest and imperfect.

No, you're not. You live in the US. You pay taxes. Those taxes pay to kill/torture/subjugate people around the world. If you don't leave the country, giving up an entire life that you made for yourself with friends and family here, then you are the exact same type of hypocrite. You say you hate the wars. You even take some actions to try to stop them, but in the end, you pay for them and/or work for the entity that is perpetuating them.

(note: I obviously believe neither of you are hypocrites. I'm just trying to make a point.)

You may have won an Internet Argument(TM) (or they gave up). The glory!

She was against it. She specifically did NOT give the government her consent. But she was forced to pay it anyway under threat of jail.

If you threaten to kidnap people and put them in a cage, you can't go around saying you have their "consent" when they give in to your threats.

By your logic, any slave in the Old South who didn't try to escape the plantation "consented"to whatever was done to them.

You don't think government taxes by force? What about all the people imprisoned for not paying their taxes?

She became a wealthy woman from her successful books, so she paid far more in than she ever took out. Her estate was valued at about a million dollars when she died in 1982. Her total receipts from social security $14,000.

>given that she received more than she put in

Do you by any chance have the numbers ?

Do you have numbers that prove me otherwise?

Of course I am repeating a common talking point of the critics of Social Security. I am ok with her having received more than she contributed, monetarily.

>Do you have numbers that prove me otherwise?

burden of proof is on the person making the claim.

> I am ok with her having received more than she contributed, monetarily.

Its not relevant what your personal opinion on the matter is. You made a specific claim, ask is for you to back it up.