Either Maddow has not read Ayn Rand — in which case she should not be reporting on the content of Rand’s works as if she had — or she has read Rand but utterly failed to understand her. Either way, she owes her viewers a correction and an apology.
Ayn Rand, author of the 1957 classic Atlas Shrugged, is one of history’s most celebrated champions of capitalism. Her books have sold in the tens of millions, and her ideas continue to be debated thirty years after her death. Many of today’s top opinion leaders, businessmen, and politicians—everyone from Rush Limbaugh to Mark Cuban to Paul Ryan—have cited Rand as an important influence on their development.