One of the most important fiction works ever turns 50 this month. Mark Skousen's article on Atlas Shrugged emphasizes the importance of this work as well as its shortcomings.

Skousen makes a great point about one of Rand's many Objectivist oddities throughout the book: "This philosophy transcends politics and economics into romance. The novel's sex scenes are narcissistic, mechanical, and violent. Are the lessons of her book any way to run a marriage, a family, a business, a charity, or a community?" Of course, Rand's writings are littered with narcissism and bizarre, mechanistic sexual rituals. I loved Atlas Shrugged though I found Dagny to be almost too cold and unfeeling to be likeable. I thought The Fountainhead was even more of a stretch than Atlas Shrugged, and that whole story was too impossible for me to dig.

Skousen's review is fair, however, he surprisingly cheerleads for the stakeholder concept when he says:

Today's most successful libertarian CEOs, such as John Mackey of Whole Foods Markets and Charles Koch of Koch Industries, have adopted the authentic spirit of capitalism that is more in keeping with Smith than Rand.

Theirs is a "stakeholder" philosophy that works within the system to fulfill the needs of customers, employees, shareholders, the community, and themselves. Their balanced business model of self- interest and public interest shows how the marketplace can grow globally in harmony with the interests of workers, capitalists, and the community – and can even displace bad government.

It's disappointing to see Skousen fall into the "stakeholder" trap that is romanticized by many folks, including John Mackey. Perhaps, then, there's a reason why Rand's story is uncompromising and robotic in its delivery and characterizations - she understood all too well the difficulty of renewing human liberty in a world of collective groupthink and follow-the-leader thought processes. She knew that human nature was such that people were easily persuaded by emotional pleas and public interest arguments. Most human beings see themselves as part of a larger whole, a collective society. Rand's robotic points went far in emphasizing that the individual was supreme, and that extreme reason and logic were essential to staving off the warm and fuzzies from the brainwashed masses.

For all of its weak points, a great book.