ORDER, ORDER!

In a review of the movie based on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", the comment was made that Miss Rand was opposed to "natural law". Not so.

Early man must have marveled at the order in the Universe. The sun rose, traversed the sky, and set. Over and over again. The seasons came and went. The harvest was gathered, and renewed. Life begat new life, which begat new life. There was order everywhere.

Our distant ancestors were also, no doubt, baffled by the order they perceived. Without science to guide them, the order was incomprehensible, unexplainable, to them. And where did the flowing streams, the schools of fish, the mountains and clouds, come from? And most importantly to them, where did they come from?

It is not in the least surprising that our original forefathers the world over answered these questions, and many more, in one word: God. The Creator (of all order), the Almighty (the power to produce all order), the First Cause (of all order). All questions answered.

Miss Rand's philosophy of Objectivism, at the heart of the new movie, is rooted in the recognition that it is the nature (order) of man and the world in which he lives that is the only proper standard to apply to all philosophic questions... including: What is the proper code of morality for man? What is the only political system suited to man? How does man find happiness and fulfillment?

What Miss Rand was opposed to was the understandable but unreasoned ancient anthropomorphizing of the source of order. Science has since taught us what caveman did not and could not have known...and what the nature of our reasoning mind can learn.

To those who still feel the humanizing need, may I introduce you to Mother Nature.

ROYAL NONSENSE

How I deplore the mindless fawning over, and reverence extended toward,royalty again with the pending wedding of William and Kate. I cannot and will not refer to them as Prince or Princess.

Royalty is code wording for majesty, high and honorable descent, upper class... abhorrent concepts that are the enemy of the American dedication to equality, and repugnant to the memory of every soldier who died to preserve it.

William/Kate is not the wedding of the century...that will be reserved for my children, and yours and yours.

And no, Americans' celebration of this event is not innocent...it implants in the minds of the young the insidious specialty of some and the bestowing of totally unearned and undeserved honors to them purely on the basis of ancestry or marriage.

Shame!

THE ILL PILL

I have designed a new pill...actually 7 new pills. Each pill will give you one of the following ailments for 1 day:

alzheimers, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, autism, pancreatic cancer, parkinsons, multiple sclerosi. Other pills are being worked on.

No politician voting on any issue affecting those diseases, no politician voting on any expenditure bill of any sort, no politician giving his opinion about any expenditure bill in Congress, in public, on television, may lawfully do so without first taking the pill that produces the illness(es) affected.

When the President speaks about sending millions and billions of dollars to help the Libyan or Egyptian people, or any other people around the world, he must first sequentially take all 7 pills...so that he can begin to know and experience first hand the craving needs of the American people whose money he is giving away. Right now, he has not a clue. The funds he proposes to give away ought AND MUST first be given to drug research companies to be utilized to find cures for these afflicting ailments, diseases, conditions. And, yes, those cures should then be given to the Libyan and Egyptian people and to all the peoples of the world.

There is an old Chinese saying to the effect "You cannot really know my plight until you have walked a mile in my shoes".

Or one day, Mr. President...just one day.

GOODNESS THE MEASURE

It has traditionally been believed that happiness is derived from the attainment of values, most commonly identified as tangible goods. And there is certainly a measure of truth to that belief. But the new toaster, the shining new car, the exquisitely furnished home, do not bring enduring happiness on their own. Their impact is muted and/or short-lived unless they are coupled with the primary value: recognizing the glory of life.

Benevolence, compassion, kindness, concern, are not mere social graces, manners and niceties. They are not mere acts of religious tenets. They rest on, and reflect, the deepest conviction, persuasion, and affirmation, They cannot be bought in a store, they cannot be gifted to another. Each of us must must come to own them on our own, through our own quiet reflection on the grandiosity, the majesty, the nobility, of life itself.

It is goodness not goods that measure a man and his ultimate bounty.