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  • Smell This - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    "But the damned and the guiltiest among you are the men who had the capacity to know, yet chose to blank out reality, the men who were willing to sell their intelligence into cynical servitude..." - John Galt
  • Smell This - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link


    Who are the special interests and "looters,' anyway ??
  • GreenReaper - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    In this context, looters are those who take without compensation from those who generated wealth.

    An extreme case would be nationalising an entire company "for the people", but also smaller cases of expropriation such as appropriating patent rights, and taxes in general - as opposed to payments given willingly by a person or group for a particular service.
  • boeush - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    Whereas the moochers would be those who build their businesses and companies on public-funded infrastructure and public-educated work force, defended by public-funded military, fed by public-funded basic research, and regulated by public-funded law enforcement - all while refusing to contribute a single red cent in taxes to the maintenance or advancement of any of the above...
  • Spunjji - Friday, December 20, 2019 - link

    Rand types think that skipping out on those obligation makes them smart. "Gee-whizz, look at me, I'm the first person to resent paying taxes because I think I'm superior to everyone around me!"
  • Spunjji - Friday, December 20, 2019 - link

    "In this context, looters are those who take without compensation from those who generated wealth"

    The fundamental derp of Rand advocates is the belief that wealth is generated by owners, not by workers. At *best* you could call it a collaboration where workers play the starring role in actually getting things done.

    Your compensation for the taxes you pay is a functional society. Have fun doing business without one of those.
  • boeush - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    Sounds like he was talking about the entire Republican constituency in Congress (re: the impeachment), the Trump base (re: everything Trump), as well as anthropogenic climate change denialists and anti-vaxxers.
  • Spunjji - Friday, December 20, 2019 - link

    Alas, most of those groups are able to read Rand without the slightest pangs of irony. Delusion, denial and projection are base requirements for the fandom.
  • TheJian - Wednesday, December 25, 2019 - link

    Climate change...LOL. OK. Yeah, we've had 4 seasons for a long time...Go figure. It's real, but you don't control it. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...Not rocket science. You can't predict the weekend weather for me to go to a beach, but you can predict it 20-50yrs out? If that was true we'd all be dead in ~1970. What happened to that ice age? LOL. I could go on, but these people can't predict squat. Spending on pipe dreams is DUMB, and will bankrupt you. ~12% of energy comes from the crap you want. Good luck with the other 88% and winters etc.

    Impeachment? For what? A call we can all READ ourselves and see NOTHING is there. Do US a favor not do ME a favor. Biden is in VIDEO telling ukraine you have 6hrs to fire the prosecutor (who happens to be looking into my son's FAKE ENERGY JOB for 83K a month he knows NOTHING about), or you won't get 1B in US funds. Son of a B...Yeah, they did it, fired the guy, and Biden let go of the billion. That is EXACTLY what they WISH trump had done...LOL.

    You can thank trump for fixing your 401k, unemployment, energy, killing nafta, 1st pres in a while to NOT start a war (yet?) etc etc etc...Jeez, your 401k alone should be enough to shut most up, even if you're stupid, 40% is a lot of extra retirement money. You can read your bank statement can't you? It's comic you have to impeach a guy to beat him and even then it's faked.

    Heard it from a friend, who, heard it from a friend who, heard it from yet another friend who, heard you made a bad call...ROFLMAO. EVERYONE involved IN the call - NO QUID PRO QUO. What did the president say MR Sondland? "no quid pro quo"...er, uh, but he probably didn't mean it, impeach him!...LOL. I can read his mind, and it's not saying what is coming out of his mouth, so impeach, even though he's said over and over NO QUID PRO QUO, he must mean, he wants one...LOL. Jeez, people are stupid. Not ignorant, or we would not be on 3rd or 4th fake scam by now. 35mil Mueller report, no collusion by ANY US CITIZEN (not just Trump...LOL), IG report same story, IG fisa report shows wiretapped the crap out of trump campaign etc (fisa judge now wants answers!). Give it a rest, you lost, he's innocent, try again in 2020. I can't wait to see the Senate Trial, where Biden and son should be the first witnesses, followed by schiff, comey, mueller (why you keep a fake thing going for years?), THE FIRED PROSECUTOR from Ukraine, Steele, etc etc. I can't believe Nancy went for a call without READING it first...ROFL. Yeah, idiots, you have to READ it to find out what is in it first. Then impeach IF there is a crime, but alas, no crime...Not even a hint of it, unless you're talking Biden (also problem in China, and romania maybe more...ROFL) How do you get millions of dollars for jobs you have NO clue how to perform? QUID PRO QUO. Why do you think Obama gave ALL of Ukraine to Biden? That is why Biden said to them, call Obama, he'll tell you the same thing. Obama was getting out of THIS DAY when Biden's crimes came out. "ER, UH, Biden had 100% control, I just gave them tents and food - I plead the 5th on everything else, er, uh, it was Biden"...Why do you think he doesn't back him? Because he is dirty, and going down at some point (or at least NOT electable).

    Please link to ANY vid showing someone saying he DID something, rather than they THINK he was THINKING something...No fact witnesses other than Sondland who said NO QUID PRO QUO. If impeachment is so important, and trump is going to destroy the world, why are they so afraid to actually DO IT, and send the articles (LOL) to senate for JUDGEMENT?

    1st impeachment in history bi-partisan AGAINST it...One of those dems is switching to republican over it...It would be nice if dems started actually following the law, due process, accepting free speech, you know, crap like that. Everything they have accused trump of, literally everything, they have actually done. Russian collusion - Clinton paid for dossier, bought from russian info gathered by Simpson on behalf of Steele's credentials. LOL. I'm bored, and it's christmas.

    Merry Christmas even to the dems, who seem to forget if trump wins, WE ALL DO. Same as Obama, never rooted for him to fail either, though I totally disagree with everything he stood for. If your president fails so does your country, yet millions wish for failure...How dumb are people? If you're one of the 47% who don't pay a dime in taxes, you shouldn't even get a vote. No skin in the game, no VOTE in the game. You get what you earn. KISS principle at work.
  • The_Assimilator - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    Forcing willing sellers to jump through government hoops to sell to willing buyer... truly the GOP are the party of small government and capitalism.
  • webdoctors - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link

    This will be probably help my MU stock but not sure if this will be bad for national security....
  • brucethemoose - Saturday, December 21, 2019 - link

    Way I see it, these chip industry restrictions are a net national security loss anyway.

    Free trade and economic ties are basically what stabilize post WWII U.S's foreign relations and economic strength, and you'd be hard pressed to find a more interdependent and prolific industry than the chip making one. But it might not have been such a net loss if the White House had worked with the EU instead of against them...

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