It was Jim Valliant who, in The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics (2005), first brought to attention Dr. Gotthelf's research that Rand could not have taken her name from a Remington Rand typewriter.

Well it’s that time of year when our sin-rent hearts turn from the concrete bound to the rarified world of abstractions from abstractions.

This is a collection of links to material on Ayn Rand's life and the new biographies.

No word yet from the following people who defended James Valliant's The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics.

July 10th was the 500th anniversary of the birth of John Calvin, one of the greatest humanity diminishers in history.

Let's look at a few gems from Calvin:

Folks,

This book will be released in a little more than three months. Should be the "publishing event" of the year for those interested in Ayn Rand.

Ayn Rand and the World She Made

Here is an interview with Jennifer Burns, author of the forthcoming Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right.

It's time to start a new thread.

One of PARC's greatest hits is Jim's claim that Barbara Branden doesn't tell her readers that Allan Blumenthal (and by implication his wife Joan) left Rand (rather than the other way around).

Here is another excerpt from PARC concerning the 1967 loan.

Since Valliant's defenders are apparently unable to respond to part 1 (about the financial statements) because they are putting in frenzied calls to their accountants to explain Jim's "fuzzy math," I'

On a recent post I asked James Valliant’s defenders to justify his claim that Nathaniel Branden conceded in 1968 that the 1967 loan from The Objectivist to The NBI depleted most of the cash reserves

Here is the final version of my critique of James Valliant's atrocious book.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/9421...

Introduction 

Here are ten books that I've always wanted to read, but never got around to. Maybe I'll read them in 2009. Five are "classics" and five are more recent.

Folks,

Financial Exploitation 

Financial Wrongdoing

The September 1968 Business Plan  

In The Passion of Ayn Rand’s Critics, James Valliant claims that “[i]f we are to take the Brandens’ word for it, the O’Connors’ marriage was an empty fraud.

In The Passion of Ayn Rand, Barbara Branden says that she met Rand in 1981 and wrote Rand a letter thereafter. (PAR, pp. 397-400.)

Since my two critiques of PARC, I've moved on to other projects, but here are a few things worth mentioning.

1. Frank's Drinking

Objectivists often accuse non-Objectivists, anti-Objectivists and apostates from ARI Objectivism as suffering from “rationalism.”

Valliant accuses Nathaniel Branden of alleging that Rand engaged in “grandiose dishonesty” in making her claim in the About the Author postscript to Atlas Shrugged that “no one helped me . . .