• • • Remembering Rand, Bud and Lou 
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Atlas Shrugged  |Individualism  | Who’s on first? It’s been obvious the past few years, as anti-collectivist, screenwriter-turned novelist Ayn Rand returned to vogue among many who want profound answers in incredibly thick doorstops of fiction. The signs were everywhere, often in the hands of nebbish protesters and painted on the sides of public buildings. Who is John Galt? the signs said, referencing the hero engineer of Rand’s heaviest (speaking avoirdupois-ly) book, “Atlas Shrugged.” I figure Galt would have played, briefly, on his college team, the Patrick Henry University Mighty Individualists, or Mighty Egos, as they were known to their cultish and devoted fans.      View blog reactions

• Jawing about gum prices 
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Atlas Shrugged  | How do restless young girls in old movies, yearning to get out of “this dump of a town,” indicate their freedom-loving ways? By talking out of the side of their mouths while snapping gum. You know these independent young women will soon be absorbed in copies of “Atlas Shrugged.”      View blog reactions