Herbert Hoover... A great man?

[musashi]

I’ve long held a low opinion of Herbert Hoover. In the economics courses I’ve taken Hoover was consistently criticized for delaying implementation of Keynesian ideas for economic expansion. A recent article in Chemical Heritage (a history journal) has moved my opinion and raised some questions for me.

The article illustrated how Herbert (an orphan) and his talented wife Lou studied Geology at Stanford. Together made their fortune mining in Australia and China. On a vacation in London they found a rare baroque folio on mining written in Latin.

• “Between 1907 and 1912, Lou and Hoover combined their talents to create a translation of one of the earliest printed technical treatises on mining: Georg Agricola's De re metallica, originally published in 1556. At 670 pages, with 289 woodcuts, the Hoover translation remains the definitive English language translation of Agricola's work.” (from Wikepedia)

A huge undertaking by two increadibly creative minds. At face value I admired the story from an Objectivist’s perspective. And then I began to think about the timeline. Hoover became President of the US three years after Ayn Rand imigrated to the US. Certainly then, as now, the personal history of leaders and their wives are quite public.

Hoover must have dramatically influenced an impressionable Ayn Rand, delivered from hell on earth (by her own accounts) into a gleaming capitalist society. What bright light made that society gleam but its leader? Also think about Ayn’s world veiw at the time. She experienced first hand that Comunism can be nothing better than a brutal dictatorship. The 1929 worldwide economic depression must have felt like global colapse was immenent. Hoover fits the epic hero role very well.

We the Living , her first novel was published in 1936. From first hand experience I can tell you that a novel lives inside of you for a very long time before it gets on to paper, in my case for more than a decade. Perhaps Ayn’s novels gestated in a similar fashion?

Could Herbert Hoover be Hank Rearden? Could Lou Hoover be Dagney Taggart? Doesn’t the Hoovers' life story share similarities with the plot line of Atlas Shrugged?

• Both stories involve mining, refining, and industry.

• HR and DT find a motor in the wilderness. They salvage it together. HH and LH find a long overlooked and unappreciated tome of immense importance. They salvage it together.

• Hoover was a strong supporter of the (from Wikepedia )“Efficiency Movement component of the Progressive Era, arguing there were engineering-like technical solutions to all social and economic problems.” An engineering like focus is what John Gault proposed as the only salvation for a dying world in Atlas Shrugged.

Perhaps my previous low opinion of Hoover, is merly villainous echo of the collectivist educational systems that indoctrinated me.

[Talur Lokarn]

Perhaps my previous low opinion of Hoover, is merly villainous echo of the collectivist educational systems that indoctrinated me.

Just like the educational systems in Atlas Shrugged which indoctrinated the hate of successful capatilists and turned Hank Rearden and Dagny Taggart (and the other "Strikers") into villains ?

[musashi]

Perhaps my previous low opinion of Hoover, is merely villainous echo of the collectivist educational systems that indoctrinated me.

Just like the educational systems in Atlas Shrugged which indoctrinated the hate of successful capitalists and turned Hank Rearden and Dagny Taggart (and the other "Strikers") into villains?

Education has long been a collectivist institution. Luckily for me I studied in Science and Math, collectivist indoctrination is extreme in most other areas. If you write a paper that conflicts, with your professor’s opinions it is almost a certain failure. Subjectivity is the fertile soil where the collectivist plants his seed.

The book does a great job of illustrating the nature of indoctrination (brain washing). Self-loathing is a natural by-product of a broken reasoning mind that has been coerced into accepting dogma. A river of hate flows through it. Rand has just taken altruism to its final destination.

Dough has a fantastic illustration of collectivism in academia. He may not graduate because the Professors are on strike. The Profs are teaching classes (presumably to remain on the payroll), but refusing to administer exams. I’ll let D describe it in more detail, I don’t want to get the facts wrong.

[dough]

That's pretty much bang-on, musashi. Academics have always been socialist in nature; at least, that's how it is here in Europe. The main issue is that they're unionized and are complaining about lower salary -- that it doesn't scale well with the inflation -- and, on a humorous note: with that of the Vice-Chancellor (the guy who runs the University).
Well, of course not. He runs the University, the academics are just plebs.

They've said they won't mark coursework or set exams which will affect when or how we will have our exams.

There's a lot more to it than that.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4984284.stm

[Uhlan]

Educators at University are "liberal"? hmmm, I must have missed that when I attended.

If you can't get a job, teach.
If you can't get a teaching job, become a principal/superintendent.
If you can't do that become a school councilor.
If you have no skills at all become a coach.

Both of my parents were teachers, so the logic is little flawed, but their perspecctive was who in their experience put the students "first".

This was meant to be funny not as an affront to coaching.

[dough]

Educators at University are "liberal"? hmmm, I must have missed that when I attended.

If you can't get a job, teach.
If you can't get a teaching job, become a principal/superintendent.
If you can't do that become a school councilor.
If you have no skills at all become a coach.

Both of my parents were teachers, so the logic is little flawed, but their perspecctive was who in their experience put the students "first".

This was meant to be funny not as an affront to coaching.

So, I ask, where in all this does "dads driving kids to soccer" fit into this