Sajid Javid & Ayn Rand

[Jazzrook]

The Business Secretary, Sajid Javid, is said to be an ardent follower of Ayn Rand's extreme individualist, free-market, weakest-to-the-wall 'philosophy'.
Will this have any influence on his decisions over the current Port Talbot steel crisis?

[rauschwerk]

Bound to, I should say, even when the Tory MP for Corby urges him to re-nationalise the industry.

[Beef Oven!]

The Business Secretary, Sajid Javid, is said to be an ardent follower of Ayn Rand's extreme individualist, free-market, weakest-to-the-wall 'philosophy'.
Will this have any influence on his decisions over the current Port Talbot steel crisis?

Weakest to the wall? That's a bit of an extremist and hysterical take on Ayn Rand's philosophy, I would say.

Anyway, are you surprised that Sajid Javid would be a supporter of individualism and free-markets and an opponent of extreme collectivism? I know I'm not.

Does anyone know when he became an ardent follower? Does anyone know why he's believed to be an ardent follower - what does that look like?

[Jazzrook]

Weakest to the wall? That's a bit of an extremist and hysterical take on Ayn Rand's philosophy, I would say.

Anyway, are you surprised that Sajid Javid would be a supporter of individualism and free-markets and an opponent of extreme collectivism? I know I'm not.

Does anyone know when he became an ardent follower? Does anyone know why he's believed to be an ardent follower - what does that look like?

Beef Oven - I recommend you read 'Ayn Rand Nation' by Gary Weiss.

JR

[Beef Oven!]

Beef Oven - I recommend you read 'Ayn Rand Nation' by Gary Weiss.

JR

Thanks JR, but in all honesty I don't see her views or her followers as very important, so I'll spend the time reading 'The Rough Guide To Jazz'

[ahinton]

Thanks JR, but in all honesty I don't see her views or her followers as very important, so I'll spend the time reading 'The Rough Guide To Jazz'

Without having the authority to commit myself to the assumption that Javid was, is or might have become some kind of acolyte of Ayn Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum O'Connor Rand or whatever anyone might pick from that to call her, it is nevertheless perhaps worth bearing in mind that it would not be unreasonable for some to assume that the author of Philosophy: Who Needs It? and The Virtue of Selfishness might seem to be rather less than the most appropriate or helpful mentor-in-absentia for the current UK Business Secretary (and ex-Financial Secretary to the Treasury) as he wends his way to Portalbot to pontificate to a bunch of about-to-be-ex-steel-workers; with due respect, I would counsel that it's not whether you might regard her views or followers as important but whether or to what extent Javid does.

[Richard Barrett]

Presumably conservativehome.com, not a site I often visit, is reporting accurately when it states:

"Javid explained that [The Fountainhead, a 1949 film based on Rand's novel] isn’t his favourite movie, but it is the most important to him. He first watched it on television in 1981, aged 12, and even then it struck him as “a film that was articulating what I felt”. From there, he soon read the book, wore out a VHS copy of the film, and brought his enthusiasm for all things Fountainhead with him to university. He even admitted, with a self-deprecating grin, that “I read the courtroom scene to my future wife! The Culture Secretary now makes sure to read that scene to himself at least twice a year. You can watch the movie’s version of it here."

So I would imagine that his supporting the workers in Port Talbot is about as likely as Cameron joining the SWP.

[ahinton]

Presumably conservativehome.com, not a site I often visit

Really? I'd never have guessed! You ought to visit it occasionally, you know; you might learn something useful. NOT...

is reporting accurately when it states:

"Javid explained that [The Fountainhead, a 1949 film based on Rand's novel] isn’t his favourite movie, but it is the most important to him. He first watched it on television in 1981, aged 12, and even then it struck him as “a film that was articulating what I felt”. From there, he soon read the book, wore out a VHS copy of the film, and brought his enthusiasm for all things Fountainhead with him to university. He even admitted, with a self-deprecating grin, that “I read the courtroom scene to my future wife! The Culture Secretary now makes sure to read that scene to himself at least twice a year. You can watch the movie’s version of it here."

One assumes that it is indeed reporting accurately, nevertheless apparently ignorant of the fact that it might have been wiser not to have reported that little nugget at all, lest sheer braggadocio's the name if the website's game (which is hardly to be discounted).

So I would imagine that his supporting the workers in Port Talbot is about as likely as Cameron joining the SWP.

Since I doubt that those workers would appreciate, let alone trust, his support even were he to give it, I wouldn't be bothered to witness that (and they'd surely be more likely to say "ta-ta" to him if they were being polite and restrained), but watching Cameron switch allegiances to SWP really would be entertaining (even if only because he'd probably assume that it stands for Support Witney's Profiteers); that said, I somehow don't see the party welcoming him as a new member, although the fact that it hardly ever fields candidates in General Elections might not bother him as he's already announced his intention to step down after the present government's term in office.

Anyway, better get off all that stuff, for obvious reasons!

[Beef Oven!]

Really? I'd never have guessed! You ought to visit it occasionally, you know; you might learn something useful. NOT...


One assumes that it is indeed reporting accurately, nevertheless apparently ignorant of the fact that it might have been wiser not to have reported that little nugget at all, lest sheer braggadocio's the name if the website's game (which is hardly to be discounted).


Since I doubt that those workers would appreciate, let alone trust, his support even were he to give it, I wouldn't be bothered to witness that (and they'd surely be more likely to say "ta-ta" to him if they were being polite and restrained), but watching Cameron switch allegiances to SWP really would be entertaining (even if only because he'd probably assume that it stands for Support Witney's Profiteers); that said, I somehow don't see the party welcoming him as a new member, although the fact that it hardly ever fields candidates in General Elections might not bother him as he's already announced his intention to step down after the present government's term in office.

Anyway, better get off all that stuff, for obvious reasons!

"Some good points Baldrick, but you still get no reply."

[ahinton]

"Some good points Baldrick, but you still get no reply."

What's yours here, then?

[jean]

Her form of extreme laissez-faire capitalism has never gained much of a following here, even among extreme economic liberals, so you're probably safe not worrying too much about it in this context.

What's noteworthy over there is that Trump is far too much of an interventionist for their taste. Interesting to see how that one plays out...

[ahinton]

Her form of extreme laissez-faire capitalism has never gained much of a following here, even among extreme economic liberals, so you're probably safe not worrying too much about it in this context.

Well, that's certainly true as far as I am aware, but one hopes that Javid's apparent advocacy thereof isn't to become a harbinger of change in that regard. In any case, such as I've read of her work suggests that the kind of capitalist practice that she appears to have sought to promote was not merely insensitive and fundamentalist but also woefully impractical and the noisiness with which she expressed it rings hollow - a tale told by an ideologist, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing more than a bizarre right-wing equivalent of Militant Tendency (without the capitals), one might say.

What's noteworthy over there is that Trump is far too much of an interventionsit for their taste. Interesting to see how that one plays out...

Well, one might suppose that US could be said to have a rather larger share of contrasting right-wing candidates, factions, institutions et al than do most European states; even if the Trumpet player of eternity ends up having to play on the Cruz of a lifetime (as ISIHAC might have it), I somehow think that there'll be little cause for sighs of relief...

[Jazzrook]

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/31/nationalisation-state-save-steel-port-talbot-tata-industrial-policy

[Daniel]

I heard a very interesting environmental engineer (Julian Allwood) talking on the radio a couple of days ago, saying that stocks of steel have built up, so that all the steel produced in the last 50 years is still around. We now have so much steel in the UK that we now throw away 10 million tons of scrap each year, which is then exported to be recycled abroad. So we're in the odd position of importing iron ore form Brazil to make steel, while throwing away all of our scrap to be recycled in other countries, rather than just recycling the steel we already have.

According to him the industry could transform to moving away from iron ore and upgrading the scrap we've got. Apparently no country or company has yet taken the initiative to make high quality steel from scrap rather than iron ore. And with some investment Port Talbot could become a world leader in this.
Because of the enormous stock of steel already in the world, all future growth could be met by recycling, i.e. we don't ever need any more capacity for making steel from iron ore, than we have in the world today. Pretty interesting I thought.

[Bryn]

Re. #14: when I worked as a steel technician at the East Moors steelworks, Cardiff, back in the '70s, GKN, which had owned the works prior to nationalisation, has 're-cycling' steel in an arc furnace just up the road from us. Before installing that facility, GKN had been a/the major customer, able to phone up and order a specific steel formulation on spec. I left the industry and moved back to London not long before the redundancies started at East Moors. I do recall that the quality of the steel coming out from the arc furnace installation was considered to be of somewhat inferior quality to that coming out of the SIP* installation at East Moors.

* SIP = Submerged Injection Process.