What is The Objective Standard?
TOS is a quarterly journal written from an Objectivist perspective, Objectivism being Ayn Rand’s philosophy of reason, egoism, and laissez-faire capitalism. Learn more about TOS here. Join our mailing list here. Subscribe here.
Winter 2009–2010Vol. 4, No. 4
Articles
Pharmacide: The Pharmaceutical Industry’s Self-Destructive Effort to Loot America
Provides an illuminating view of the pharmaceutical industry, showing that industry executives have advocated and continue to advocate rights-violating legislation through which the companies gain revenue taken coercively by the government from American taxpayers—and further showing that the pharmaceutical industry’s advocacy of such legislation is killing . . . the industry itself. Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Antitrust with a Vengeance: The Obama Administration’s Anti-Business Cudgel
Zeros in on the arbitrary, rights-violating nature of antitrust law; surveys the Obama administration’s efforts to bolster antitrust enforcement; considers the unprincipled arguments put forth by today’s most vocal opponents of antitrust; and calls for Americans to take a principled, rights-based stand—not only against the administration’s reinvigorated antitrust assault, but against antitrust law as such. Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
What the “Affordable Health Care for America Act,” HR 3962, Actually Says (accessible for free)
Asks ten crucial questions regarding the proposed law; examines what the proposed legislation actually says with respect to these questions; and evaluates the bill accordingly, showing that, if passed, it would massively expand government power over the health-care industry, virtually eliminate the remnants of freedom left in this market, and thus increase the U.S. government’s violations of individual rights by orders of magnitude. Read the article.
The California Coastal Commission: A Case Study in Governmental Assault on Property Rights
Surveys the history and nature of the Coastal Commission; examines three recent cases showing how the Commission violates property rights; points to similar agencies that are violating rights in similar ways in other states; and indicates what Americans must do if they want to put an end to this assault on their property rights. Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
The Barbary Wars and Their Lesson for Combating Piracy Today
Examines the key events surrounding the Barbary Wars (two wars the United States fought in the early 19th century to end North African piracy), zeros in on the reasons why the First Barbary War failed to end the pirate attacks but the second succeeded, and draws from this remarkable and clarifying history a vital lesson for the United States today. Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Objective Moral Values
Zeros in on the nature of objective, life-serving values; demonstrates that man’s most fundamental value is his faculty of reason; and shows that both physical survival and spiritual health require keeping one’s thinking tied to reality (via reason) so that one’s ideas, values, actions, and emotions correspond to reality, too. Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Book Reviews
Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right,
by Jennifer Burns (accessible for free)
Heaven and Earth: Global Warming, the Missing Science, by Ian Plimer
Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud, and Deception to Keep You Misinformed, by Christopher C. Horner
Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Islamic Imperialism: A History, by Efraim Karsh
Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
The Israel Test, by George Gilder
Read the opening paragraphs (full article accessible to subscribers).
Correspondence
We value your thoughts on articles in The Objective Standard, and we welcome your letters to the editor—whether critical, argumentative, or complimentary. Well-written letters will be published in our "Letters and Replies" section toward the front of the journal and, when appropriate, may be accompanied by writers’ responses. Letters may be edited.
The Objective Standard (print ISSN 1559-1905, online ISSN 1559-1913) is published quarterly by Glen Allen Press, LLC, P.O. Box 5274, Glen Allen, VA 23058. Although The Objective Standard publishes articles by writers from the Ayn Rand Institute, the two organizations are entirely separate and distinct. The views expressed in any given article in The Objective Standard are those of the author of that article and do not necessarily reflect the position of the journal or of the Ayn Rand Institute. The Ayn Rand Institute retains copyrights to articles by its writers. Copyright ©2009 by Glen Allen Press. All rights reserved. Material on this website may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form or manner, without prior written permission from the publisher. To request permission, please Craig Biddle.
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