In the book Atlas Shrugged, the first page asks “Who is John Galt?” That question is asked continually throughout the book. In the third Part of the book’s three parts — you find out who John Galt is.
Back in 1998, I decided I’d had enough of the interference with running a business that employed a couple of hundred people, paid millions a year in taxes, and spent $400,000 a month in expenses to stimulate the economy — so I threw in the towel and sold. The people who bought it ruined the business and four years later there were 4 people left — losing money. A couple of people told me I was like John Galt — and I was clueless who he was other than he was in the book Atlas Shrugged.
When I sold three of my remaining businesses for virtually nothing (to three managers who had worked for me for over 20 years) in 2008 when it looked like Obama was going to be elected, and folded three more by just paying off all liabilities and dissolving them — more people told me I was John Galt.
All of this peaked my interest enough to read the book. I just recently got the chance to start reading it, and I’m now on page 3000 of 4700 on the electronic version at the text size I like (1400 pages for the hardcover version) and have finally learned who John Galt is. While I did some of the same things for some of the same reasons as John Galt — he took it to a far higher level while I spent more time with family and reliving my childhood with Drag Racing. If there was ever a real John Galt — he’d be a better man than I.
Reading this book is a real eye opener. You can associate a current name to everyone in the book, and a current company to every company in the book. We are living that book right now. It is amazing!
I know that I spend a lot of time harping on this book — but it is a remarkable eye opener about the evils of World Socialism — and how it is destroying places like Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, and Italy — yet we walk in the same footsteps. It is a story of corrupt government bureaucrats, corrupt labor Unions, Communist college professors, Communist main stream media, and “Progressives” in general destroying success because the feeling that success = greed and failure = never having a fair chance because of that greed. The concept of each giving based on his ability and each receiving based on his need sees needs getting overinflated and success giving up, and corruption and cronyism flourishing.
