The Bigsibling Blog

In Ayn Rand’s novel “Atlas Shrugged” all of the industrialists, the movers and shakers of the world, went on strike. They just up and quit doing business, and withdrew from the world into a secreted mountain valley. They did not sell their businesses, rather, they simply chained the doors and walked away. They went away until such a time as the world, without rational, logical, thinking people to work in it, simply fell into chaos.

They were driven to this desperate act by the governments. All of which (with the exception of the good ol’ US of A) were referred to as People’s Republics, i.e. “The People’s Republic of Argentina”, “The People’s Republic of Mexico”, “The People’s Republic of France” etc etc etc. The problem occurred because there was so much interference with business by the governments that it was nigh impossible for the industrialists to get anything accomplished. The governments were too worried about competition, about alms for the poor, about making sure that everyone got a piece of everything. And then they were surprised when it all fell apart. They couldn’t understand why a person would not be motivated to produce more and better items when the actions and policies of the government amounted to what was essentially a “success tax” or punishment for achievements.

The EU is heading down that road, and it seems in a hurry. A smallish web-browser company named Opera is suing Microsoft in the EU, under EU anti-trust provisions, because Microsoft has its Internet Explorer browser integrated with its Operating System. Opera doesn’t think this is fair, and believes that the EU should force Microsoft to sell versions of its OS without an integrated browser. This comes on the recent heels of the EU determining that Microsoft, by integrating and bundling its Windows Media Player, with its Windows OS, was giving itself an unfair advantage, and required that Microsoft make available a version of the Windows OS without the media player to residents of the EU.

Microsoft complied and, shockingly, very, very few people are purchasing the version of Windows that does not include the media player. The anti-trust folks in the EU have gone even farther in their recommendations of late. As far as to say that no company should enjoy more than 50% of the market share. As far as to recommend that any computer – desktop or laptop – sold in the EU be completely free of any and all operating systems. Yes, that’s correct, no company would be allowed to sell a computer with an OS pre-installed. I am assuming this includes Apple. Which, if they want to talk unfair choices, the only OS you can get from any manufacturer on an Apple brand computer is the Apple OS. At least with the normal PCs, HP and Dell are now offering a flavor of Linux pre-installed. And when I bought the kinder a new PC several years ago from MicroCenter, it came with Lindows pre-installed. Of course, that was wiped pretty fast as none of their games will run under Linux.

Oddly enough, the EU commission putting forth this recommendation claims that by giving the consumers no operating system on their new computers, they are giving the consumers more choice. The amount of newspeak the EU commission uses, in order to exact some control over how much one company can hold onto, is an anathema to the capitalist way of thinking. “No Options are More Option” ranks right up there with “War is Peace”, “Freedom is Slavery” and “Ignorance is Strength”.

Back in the late 90’s, when Microsoft was being dragged over the coals here in the US, I touched on Rand’s concept of a strike, but didn’t even know it at the time. I hadn’t yet read the book. My thought was; ‘If I were Bill Gates, I’d just say to hell with it all. Buy and island and lock the doors. Then let everyone try to get along with out Microsoft as there whipping boy.’ This is, exactly, what the industrialists did in “Atlas Shrugged”. She wrote from experience having migrated from fled Communist Russia in 1926. She was there as it happened. Watched the country mediocre itself into chaos and abject poverty. The EU, it seems, is hell-bent on doing the same thing to Europe.

I’m back to that same idea I arrived at in the ’90s. If I were Bill Gates, or Michael Dell, or the chairman of HP, I would have the inkling to thumb my nose at the Europeans, and simply not do business with them. I would have to wonder if it was worth being so severely crippled to do business with those type of people.

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With all the talk of how European countries are so ‘enlightened’ these days with regards to just about everything; race, religion, sexuality, drugs and on and on, I would never have expected this type of thing from the EU. Especially in light of how some are saying that the term ‘race’ is an outdated term that doesn’t really apply to groups of people in the traditional sense (i.e. Hispanics, Blacks, Asians, Arabs etc).

The EU comes out now with an idea that should send chills through the spine of any thinking person. The EU wants to classify people based on their race. That’s correct, the European Union is moving to direct member states to collect race information on all of their citizens, and pass that onto Brussels.

People who have knowledge of history, may be worried (and rightfully so) that this kind of thing cannot lead to any good whatsoever. Will Jews’ passports soon be stamped with a “J”? Will the passports of Muslims be emblazoned with an “I”? When something happens in the EU, will ’rounding up the usual suspects’ simply mean folks of a specific race?

All of this and more is certainly not only possible, but probable if the EU follows through with this directive.

Read all about it at the European Parliament website.

h/t Atlas Shrugs

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