The philosopher Ayn Rand has been condemned to 40 years of pillory time for causing the financial crisis, $30 trillion in losses, the collapse of banks and the Barnard Madoff fraud. Because she opposed government intervention, regulators did not sufficiently control financial firms, resulting in mayhem.
She may have also passed air without getting a license and government permission. The breaking of wind, left largely unregulated for centuries, is widely blamed for creating bubbles. Recently a new bureau, the Federal Agency for Rectal Transmission, was set up to supervise the passing of air and prevent systemic excess.
A spokeswoman said that Rand’s voluminous writings on individualism are sufficient evidence that she subverted regulatory controls and would be enough to convict her. But the agency will not press charges because Rand has been dead for 27 years. “If she were not deceased, she would have faced criminal charges,” said the spokeswoman.
Instead, an effigy of Rand will be set up in a plastic pillory along the Long Island Expressway, to remind drivers that opposition to interventionist regimes leads to incompetence and excessive greed. But it may take seven to 21 years to prepare the fiberglass effigy and the pillory.
Patsy’s Plastics, the government contractor that produces effigies and pillories, needed several large bailouts in the past year and has postponed pillory deliveries indefinitely. Patsy’s says it will need much more money to deal with losses and production problems.
Senator Van Trillin said that Patsy’s will have be capitalized with at last $1 trillion for the business to be restructured and put on a sound basis. “We as a society have a moral obligation to do this, because otherwise everything will go out of control and civilization as we know it will end,” he said.
Meanwhile, Patsy’s has hired 78 lobbyists to make sure it gets bailouts.
