For Rand, the great achievement of America’s founding was to create a society based on rights, in which peaceful, voluntary coexistence among men was possible. People were free to deal with one another on mutually agreeable terms, or else go their own way. The entitlement state blasted that peaceful coexistence, turning politics into a mad scramble by warring pressure groups for other people’s money.
Ryan’s goal, by contrast, is not to end the entitlement state but to save it. His budget reflects that view: it preserves Medicare, albeit in a less costly form, and it actually increases Social Security spending, from 4.75 percent of GDP to 6 percent, according to the CBO. Although Ryan regularly invokes individual rights, he does not stand by them consistently. Not even on economic issues, where he is best.
For anyone who believes in limited government, it is a positive sign that a leading politician talks seriously about individual rights, and this clearly is due in part to Rand’s influence. But to take rights seriously, as Rand advised? That will require a much more principled agenda.
Don Watkins is a fellow at the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights and coauthor, with Yaron Brook, of Free Market Revolution: How Ayn Rand’s Ideas Can End Big Government. He blogs at freemarketbook.com. The Ayn Rand Center is a division of The Ayn Rand Institute.
