THE VIRTUE OF CLUELESSNESS.

I have noticed that, while once Ayn Rand fans boldly lorded over the littlebrains the wisdom of their hero, and were forever threatening to Go Galt, lately they've grown quieter and more defensive. Maybe they flew a little too close to the sun with their 47%/"looters and moochers" talk in 2012, from which waves of mockery (some of it from Obama!) ensued, and now even Paul Ryan has forsaken Rand. Her acolytes have retreated to worship secretly in their catacombs, only rarely emerging to issue apologetics, such as that Robert Tracinski piece about how Rand characters were not all about money but actually on a transcendent quest for love.

The latest of these, by Hunter Baker at The Federalist, offers more of the same -- the title, "The Devil And Ayn Rand: Extending Christian Charity To John Galt’s Creator," tells you most of what you need to know. But it also has one of my all-time favorite Randsplaining paragraphs, and it's at least as good out of context:

At this point it makes sense to return to the famous scene from “Dirty Dancing” in which Rand’s accusers put words in her mouth and leave no room for response. “Some people count and some don’t.” The implication, given the class dynamics in the film, is that the rich have worth and the poor do not. But Rand would have been outraged at the thought. In her economy, a shiftless man of wealth would rank well below a blue-collar welder who performs his craft with excellence (and probably also a talented dancer at a resort).

I would love to hear Baker's Randian exegesis on the walk-off challenge from Zoolander and how it shows the refinement of craft in the spirit of competition.