Libertarian Developer's Ayn Rand Fantasy Is Detroit's Latest Nightmare

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/economy/libertarian-developers-ayn-rand-fantasy-detroits-latest-nightmare



Check out what the loopy Ayn Randroids are up to now. In long-suffering Detroit, a libertarian real estate developer wants to buy a civic crown jewel, Belle Isle, the 982-acre park designed by Frederick Law Olmstead—think the Motor City’s Central Park—and turn it into an independent nation, selling citizenships at $300,000 per. Not, mind you, out of any mercenary motives, says would-be founder Rodney Lockwood—but just “to provide an economic and social laboratory for a society which effectively addresses some of the most important problems of American, and the western world.” (Sic.)

Address how? Well, let’s say I’ve never seen a document that better reveals the extent to which, for libertarians, “liberty” means the opposite of liberty—at least since Rick Santorum held up the company town in which his grandpa was entombed as a beacon of freedom.

An aspiring Ayn Rand himself, Lockwood has set out his vision in a “novel,” poetically titled Belle Isle: Detroit’s Game Changer. Although he’s actually done the master one better, by imagining he can get his utopia built. Last week he presented the plan, alongside a retired Chrysler executive, a charter school entrepreneur (who apparently enjoys a cameo in the novel running one of the island’s two K-12 schools) and a senior economist at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, to what The Detroit News called “a select group of movers and shakers at the tony Detroit Athletic Club,” who included the president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce.

Never let it be said Rod Lockwood (perfect pornstar name? You be the judge) hasn’t thought this thing through. The plan is foolproof: “Belle Isle is sold by the City of Detroit to a group of investors for $1 billion. The island is then developed into a city-state of 35,000 people, with its own laws, customs and currency, under United States supervision as a Commonwealth.” Relations with neighboring, impoverished Detroit will be naught but copacetic, and not exploitative at all: “Plants will be built across the Detroit River…. with the engineering and management functions on Belle Isle. Companies from all over the world will locate on Belle Isle, bringing in massive amounts of capital and GDP.” (Because, you know, tax-dodging international financiers of the sort a scheme like this attracts are just desperate to open and operate factories.) Government will be limited to ten percent or less of GDP, “by constitutional dictate. The social safety net is operated charities, which are highly encouraged and supported by the government.”

[NickB79]

1. Reminds me of New Detroit from Robocop

OCP running this show or what?

[quaker bill]

2. When the revolution comes

having them all in one place will be convenient. Not that I encouage or support such a thing, just say'n.

[reformist2]

3. Ayn Rand has destroyed and continues to destroy so many minds.

Selfishness is such an innate quality, and we all know that it must be tempered, if not suppressed, in order to have a functioning civilization. By elevating selfishness to a virtue, Ayn Rand has given a huge segment of the population an excuse to "opt out" of any sense of responsibility and revert to the mentality of 2-year-olds.

[DetlefK]

4. A financial and legal fiasco for the US:

This would be simply a gated community that doubles as a tax-haven, protected by the land-mass and the US-military and using the infrastructure of Detroit for free.

Own currency? What should keep them from printing their own worthless money and buying worthy dollars for it? (Almost happened in Germany after WWII.)

No charity and social safety-net? Only works because of the charter-school-principle: Needy people need not apply.

Investments in the US? Since when does the HQ of a company have to be in the same country as the factories?

Own laws and customs?
What about workplace-regulations and so forth?
Will they rely on exploiting "illegal immigrants" from Detroit to clean their fancy sky-scrapers and mansions? You bet, they will.
Will snorting cocaine be illegal?

Will they be allowed to donate money to political campaigns, now that they are foreigners?

How much will the US charge them for electricity and water?