Since when did Paul Ryan become an intellectual?

Jonathan Chait is justifiably bemused: "Since When Did Paul Ryan Become a Liar?"

Ryan’s Tampa speech, while pretty dishonest, was not especially so by Ryan’s standards.... Ryan has been saying things like this, and worse, all along....

The thing about Ryan is that he has always resided in a counter-factual universe. He is a product of the hermetically sealed right-wing subculture. Many of the facts taken for granted by mainstream economists have never penetrated his brain.

Which leads to the closely related question: Since when did Paul Ryan become an intellectual?

Any grown man who sees Ayn Rand's brooding, adolescent objectivism as evidence of a towering intellect and excavating philosophy is also a man of remarkably limited cognitive abilities. Mr. Ryan is, incontrovertibly, a liar--and a world-class liar at that. Yet allowances must be made, for he's also little more than a hack, a parrot, an immature, unoriginal "thinker" of extraordinary credulity.

And what's even more disturbing and most astounding is that among the "conservative intelligentsia," he sits at the very top.

Comments

[Peter G]

Once upon a time, intellectuals debated how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. They were nevertheless considered intellectuals. The current iteration of this sort of intellectual, personified by such as Ryan, prefer to debate how many pinheads can dance on the heads of angels or cut children off from food stamps. Whichever comes first.

[Robert Lipscomb]

Please endulge a brief tour through Christianity. I promise it is not a lame attempt at prothelytizing.

When asked what is the most important law, Jesus answered that it was to love God. Then, he added that there was a second which is the same as the first, "Love your neighbor as yourself." He said the whole of the law was summed up inthese tenets.

For the first time today, I read an extract from "Atlas Shrugged" which quoted the definition of objectivism, and that definition was to pursue pure self-interest.

You don't need a degree in theology, or to even be an interested party, to recognize that these are two diametrically opposed philosophies. If you deem either correct, you cannot possibly embrace the other. They are mutually exclusive.

Period.

You can reject both, but you cannot embrace both.

So how the hell can any Christian embrace objectivism?

Leaving theology aside, how can Objectivism be considered anything but antisocial personality disorder?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder

I simply do not see how current Republican political philosophy can be considered anything but a mandate for prioritizing all government and religious organizations toward individual self-interest, except possibly immediate family and tribe. I am not sure how it encompasses family and tribe.

[Ansel M.]

The bar is set pretty low for one to be seen as an intellectual inside "the hermetically sealed right-wing subculture".