This is kind of directed to Bert and Mikka, as it shows a couple of ideas that have been floating around in previous posts - but anyone may be able to get a kick out of this
Here is a link to a really interesting lecture from Dr Jennifer Burns:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Goddess+of+the+Market%2C+Ayn+Rand+and+the+American+Right+-+Miller+Center+Forum%2C+Part+One+&oq=Goddess+of+the+Market%2C+Ayn+Rand+and+the+American+Right+-+Miller+Center+Forum%2C+Part+One+&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_l=youtube-reduced.3...16461l16461l0l16923l1l1l0l0l0l0l70l70l1l1l0.
The book can be bought at the Mises institute if interested (I just heard of it today) - and I guess burns used the Mises archives to write her book
Here is a Jeffery Tucker review of the book:
http://blog.mises.org/10890/elated-with-jennifer-burnss-book-on-rand/
Some points I want to make about the lecture:
a) Dr Burns seems to be a top notch scholar, speaker, and teacher for what she does. I wouldn't mind seeing her speak or getting this book even though it isn't a subject I have all that much interest in.
b) I still think she's leftist and it shows a little bit. I think in picking Ayn Rand - it's sort of doing a geneology or whatever to point out "the opposition" - it may be subtle, and overall it does not detract from the lecture, but I still think it's there. Or maybe I'm just wrong and paranoid now, because this has been my pet peeve this week, so I'm just rationalizing.
c) in Pt 4 of the lecture a question was asked about individualism / altruism by some young kid and he appealed to Darwin / evolution as some imperative. I think this form of scientism has been really ingrained in people's heads, which is odd, because it doesn't really make much sense.
e) something was brought up about the tension of the right with "elitism" and "populism" and how it seems a hard issue for it to resolve; which brings me to my past point and frustrations about leftism on how it ought to have major tensions between elitism and populism, but somehow has managed to escape it.
Either way, I look forward to seeing more work of hers - she's very good
"As in a kaleidoscope, the constellation of forces operating in the system as a whole is ever changing." - Ludwig Lachmann
"When A Man Dies A World Goes Out of Existence" - GLS Shackle
Interview with Burns at New Books Network: link