Obama vs. "the virtue of selfishness"

(Caught via Diana Hsieh's NoodleFood blog)

Obama railed against McCain and Palin:

"John McCain and Sarah Palin they call this socialistic," Obama continued. "You know I don’t know when, when they decided they wanted to make a virtue out of selfishness."

ABC's Jake Tapper follows up:

It's unclear if this was a nod to the Ayn Rand book "The Virtue of Selfishness," with all that the invocation of Rand implies. [sic]

It would seem to be, given the themes of Rand's work, what happens when independent achievers are demonized.

Which would fit with this description of those who want to keep their hard-earned tax dollars as "selfish."

Atlas may not be shrugging, but Obama is.

As someone with more than a passing familiarity with Ayn Rand's philosophy, I can virtually guarantee that when her name gets invoked in public discourse, the whole discussion is usually poisoned by misconceptions. Sure enough, Rand wrote a book (specifically, a collection of essays and articles) titled The Virtue of Selfishness. Sure enough, she also said that she was advancing "a new concept of egoism."

In matter of fact, there exists little excuse any longer for people to characterize Ayn Rand this way or that without some supporting evidence from The Ayn Rand Lexicon, which has been made available online. Fairness and accuracy quite literally demand that her words be referenced directly.

What, for instance, does Rand have to say on the subject of "selfishness"? With a few keystrokes and clicks, I found this:

There is a fundamental moral difference between a man who sees his self-interest in production and a man who sees it in robbery. The evil of a robber does not lie in the fact that he pursues his own interests, but in what he regards as to his own interest; not in the fact that he pursues his values, but in what he chose to value; not in the fact that he wants to live, but in the fact that he wants to live on a subhuman level....

There just is not any room for a straw-man view on this that Rand proposes a kind of selfishness that disregards rational principles for living. If one is going to criticize Rand, one is going to have to come up with something better than "She advocates selfishness and selfishness is obviously evil."

As for McCain vs. Obama, the debate on its face is something other than one involving a well-considered understanding of Rand's views, but involving a more popular understanding of what the term "selfishness" denotes. Obama says he doesn't mind paying higher taxes himself; in his corner, he has Warren Buffett, who says he would not mind paying a tax rate at least as high as what his secretary pays. Buffett is hardly selfish under the popular understanding of the term, but under a Randian understanding there is area for questioning: Just what should someone consider to be in their rational self-interest? This opens up an entire realm of normative discourse.

I don't see the question as being whether a sound vision of rational self-interest can be established, but how. And I don't see Obama's tax proposals as involving a moral vision in which "independent achievers are demonized." Obama is one heck of an independent achiever himself. Shouldn't we take a more careful look at what's going on here?