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“I think a lot of people would observe that we are right now living in an Ayn Rand novel, metaphorically speaking. Ayn Rand, more than anyone else, did a fantastic job of explaining the morality of capitalism, the morality of individualism.” -Paul Ryan, 2009.

“I reject her philosophy,” Ryan says in 2012. “It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview.”

Reddit guy: “Ayn Rand rejected judeo-christian values was because they were waaay to altruistic for her taste. Ryan is trying to have his cake and eat it too by swearing by the bible’s relevance as a moral guide and also subscribing to quasi-Austrian views on economic policy.”

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For bragging rights, I called Paul Ryan on Clantily Scad two months ago in:

“Marco Rubio’s Book Comes Out. He Does Not Do Himself Favors.”

I actually originally called Ryan around March or April in a private bet, when I wasn’t feeling the way Marco Rubio was handling the media. As more campaign trail reports came out, I became more confident that the other contenders were either too boring or had too many skeletons to rattle the fundamentalists.

Ryan fits my prediction that Romney’s strategy as the campaign moves forward is going to attack the state of the economy, nitpicking any aberrant number in the economic reports and trying to peg Obama’s name to it. I also think that this strategy is doomed to fail, since even in times of trouble, independent voters are unlikely to sway from the status quo. (I mean, we had Bush for 2 terms).

Talking about deficit reduction is boring, and people mostly only care about what they can see right now. And what they see right now is massive economic inequality and no government participation to ease unemployment. Obama hasn’t helped much on those fronts, but Mittens and Co. don’t seem to understand all the economists who say their plans will make things worse.

I’m sure many downtrodden denizens have not read HR 6110. But I’m also sure they’ll be hearing a lot about it in the next three months filtered through attack ads. Women will hear about how Ryan supports states that want to criminalize abortion. Seniors in former swing-state Florida will be listening when Team Obama rips into Ryan’s Medicare coupon, er, voucher plan.

Good job, Mittens, good job. You’ve successfully energized your white millionaire demographic. The rest of us will be stockpiling birth control and making plans to ship grandma and grandpa to Canada upon your 28% chance of winning.

Link Time

Paul Ryan’s Voting Record: http://www.ontheissues.org/House/Paul_Ryan.htm

Buzzfeed Video List: 10 Defining Videos Of Republican Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan

Nate Silver three days ago, saying that Ryan would not have much effect on swing states: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/08/how-romneys-pick-of-a-running-mate-could-sway-the-outcome/