The 2026 midterm elections resulted in a decisive victory for the Democrats over the Republicans. But does this signal support for the Democratic agenda, or merely a rejection of the party in power?

In a joint livestream of New Ideal and The Yaron Brook Show, Dr. Onkar Ghate and Dr. Yaron Brook examine the election’s significance for America’s political future. They discuss the failures of both parties, the growing influence of nationalist and socialist factions within them, the prospects for alternative political leadership, and the absence of serious proposals for addressing the country’s economic problems.

Among the topics covered are:

• Whether the Republican defeat could open the door to new leadership

• The growing influence of nationalist and socialist factions within both parties

• How the welfare state fuels conflict between generations

• Trump’s shifting immigration rhetoric and the lack of serious economic proposals

• The morality of voting for the lesser of two evils and the individual’s role in politics

• Ayn Rand’s influence on entrepreneurship and growing hostility toward business and AI

• The risk of increasing authoritarianism in America

• The role of education and intellectuals in political change

Resources:

• Ayn Rand, “What Can One Do?” in Philosophy: Who Needs It

This discussion was livestreamed on November 9, 2026. Watch archived podcasts here.

Image credit: ROBERTO SCHMIDT / AFP via Getty Image

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have become a major force to contend with in U.S. politics, as seen in Zohran Mamdani’s election as mayor of New York and in a series of congressional electoral successes. However, while many see the DSA as an idealistic alternative to the status quo, their ideals are deeply rooted in dogmas held on faith, such as their faith in “economic democracy,” in the future promise of socialism, in the evil of Israel, and in the view of capitalism as inherently exploitative.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Tristan de Liège and Ben Bayer expose the DSA’s agenda as a series of articles of faith, one based especially on a religious approach to morality.

Topics include:

• How democratic socialists conceive of exploitation

• Socialists’ obsession with democracy

• Evading socialism’s failures in the 20th century

• Why democratic socialists defend dictatorships like Iran and Venezuela

• How altruism sustains the belief in socialism

Resources:

• Ayn Rand Lexicon entry on “socialism”

• ARI Podcast, “What Democratic Socialists Truly Want,” Aug. 27, 2026

• ARI Podcast, “The Marxists’ Exploitation Myth,” Feb. 26, 2025

• Ben Bayer, “The Dishonesty of ‘Real Socialism Has Never Been Tried’,” New Ideal, Aug. 9, 2020

• Ben Bayer, “Meet the New Socialism, Same as the Old,” New Ideal, Sept. 2, 2019

• Ben Bayer, “One God Further: Preface to Breaking Free from Faith-Based Morality,” New Ideal, Oct. 6, 2026

This episode was recorded on October 28, 2026.

Ayn Rand famously held Aristotle in high regard, describing him as a “philosophical Atlas who carries the whole of Western civilization on his shoulders.” Given such a statement, it’s not surprising that there are rich connections to be found between Aristotle’s philosophical system and Rand’s, which she called Objectivism. Scholars of Aristotle and Rand have found deep connections between the two in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Tristan de Liège, Jim Lennox, and Greg Salmieri explore some of these connections, discussing issues such as the nature of logic, how humans form universal knowledge, and what it is to live a good life.

Topics include:

• Axiomatic concepts and the laws of logic

• The problem of universals

• Scientific knowledge as fixed versus dynamic

• What biology can tell us about ethics

• Nobility and virtue

• Convincing academia to take Objectivism seriously

Resources:

• James Lennox and Gregory Salmieri, eds, Two Philosophers: Aristotle and Ayn Rand

• Allan Gotthelf and Gregory Salmieri, eds, A Companion to Ayn Rand

• Allan Gotthelf and James Lennox, eds, Concepts and Their Role in Knowledge

• Allan Gotthelf and James Lennox, eds, Metaethics, Egoism, and Virtue

• Allan Gotthelf and James Lennox, eds, Foundations of a Free Society

This episode was recorded on October 19, 2026.

Image credit: Pach Brothers

Recently, author and ARI’s VP of Fundraising and Marketing Don Watkins was interviewed on the Texas Talks podcast, where he discussed Ayn Rand’s unique moral admiration for productive work, her new conception of self-interest, and ARI’s work to preserve and spread her philosophy today.

Topics include:

• Why Ayn Rand has an enduring appeal

• The morality and spirituality of wealth creation

• Working, marketing, and fundraising at ARI

• News about the Ayn Rand Center in Austin

• Why we need a new conception of self-interest to defend capitalism

• ARI’s work and programs

Resources mentioned in the interview:

Yaron Brook and Don Watkins, Free Market Revolution: How Ayn Rand’s Ideas Can End Big Government

Bradley Swail is the host of the Texas Talks podcast, not an employee of the Ayn Rand Institute.

Recently, ARI Senior Fellow Ben Bayer was interviewed on the Texas Talks podcast, where he discussed Ayn Rand’s unique approach to philosophy as a practical means for living, the life-promoting philosophy she developed as a result, and how her idealist-realist heroes dramatize it. Bayer contrasted Rand’s approach and views with the dominant ones in today’s culture, focusing specifically on Stoicism and altruism.

Topics include:

• The essence of Rand’s philosophy.

• Why today’s philosophers don’t dramatize their philosophies in stories.

• Why Rand’s heroes resonate with so many people.

• How the philosophy in The Fountainhead compares to that in Atlas Shrugged.

• How Objectivism differs from Stoicism.

• Today’s confused oscillation between Judeo-Christian altruism and pragmatism.

• Bayer’s forthcoming book, Breaking Free from Faith-Based Morality.

Bradley Swail is the host of the Texas Talks podcast, not an employee of the Ayn Rand Institute.

In her recent book The Mattering Instinct, philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein argues that much of what human beings do is driven by a universal need to matter — to prove to ourselves that we are worthy of consideration. She argues that efforts to fulfill this need are responsible for a wide range of human projects, from the greatest achievements of scientific discovery and artistic creation, to the worst atrocities of murder and genocide.

On this episode of ARI Bookshelf, Greg Salmieri, Ben Bayer, Mike Mazza and Sam Weaver discuss Goldstein’s book. The episode includes discussions of the merits and limitations of Goldstein’s account of mattering and her emphasis on the idea that life involves resisting entropy. They also comment on the book’s brief mention of Ayn Rand and relate her ideas to Goldstein’s.

Topics include:

• Goldstein’s basic account of why people have a need to matter

• Her conception of what constitutes objective mattering

• The absence of businessmen and entrepreneurs from her categories

• The book’s quotation of Ayn Rand in a section about intolerance

• How Goldstein uses the concept of entropy in her account of mattering

• Her apparent unwillingness to radically rethink conventional ideas about morality

This episode was recorded on September 19, 2026.

Topics include:

• How Salmieri became interested in Ayn Rand

• Rand’s view of “libertarianism”

• Rand’s admiration of Aristotle and her improvements to his philosophy

• What Objectivism as “an ordinary, high-powered philosophy” means

• The Ayn Rand Center and Austin’s intellectual scene

• Rand’s view of religion

Resources mentioned in the interview:

• James G. Lennox and Gregory Salmieri, Two Philosophers: Aristotle and Ayn Rand

• Allan Gotthelf and Gregory Salmieri, A Companion to Ayn Rand

Bradley Swail is the host of the Texas Talks podcast, not an employee of the Ayn Rand Institute.

In its lawsuit against the FCC, Disney, the parent company of ABC alleges that Chairman Brendan Carr violated the First Amendment by using unprecedented early license renewals for all ABC-owned stations in retaliation for content decisions President Trump disliked. The FCC responds that early renewal is a tool to get Disney to cooperate in the FCC’s equal-employment/DEI investigation. But Disney argues that numerous threats by President Trump and Carr to revoke licenses in response to content decisions prove that investigations are pretextual. The real harm here is the self-censorship of broadcasters: a threat left hanging forces every editorial decision to be weighed against the possibility of losing the license.

In this episode, Robertas Bakula and Onkar Ghate commend Disney for making their case on fundamental constitutional grounds rather than settling behind closed doors. Too few of Disney’s defenders ever dare to challenge the FCC’s underlying licensing authority or the employment mandates that also violate freedom of association. They warn that Carr is trying to reinvigorate and expand the FCC’s power over speech and argue that no depoliticized FCC is possible. The only real solution is privatizing the spectrum.

Topics Include:

• Disney’s lawsuit against the FCC for violating the First Amendment

• How self-censorship works in practice

• Broadcaster’s historical complicity in creating the FCC

• Brendan Carr’s goal to expand the FCC’s power

• Why defenders of free speech do not challenge the FCC and its DEI policies as violating intellectual freedom

• The only way to remove the FCC’s ability to chill speech is to privatize the broadcast spectrum

Resources:

• Ayn Rand, “Choose Your Issues,” The Objectivist Newsletter, 1962

• Ayn Rand, “Have Gun, Will Nudge,” The Objectivist Newsletter, 1962

• Ayn Rand, “Vast Quicksands,” The Objectivist Newsletter, 1963

• Ayn Rand, “The Property Status of Airwaves,” The Objectivist Newsletter, 1964

• Ayn Rand Institute Podcast episode “Trump vs. CBS: How Government Pressures Companies to Self-Censor”, Jul 31, 2025

• Ayn Rand Institute Podcast episode, Trump vs. Kimmel: The Tribal Weaponization of the FCC against Free Speech, Sep. 25, 2025

Image credit: Potjanan Surirug / iStock / via Getty Images.

In 1947, Ayn Rand published Screen Guide for Americans. Her analysis of how collectivist ideas can penetrate American art and culture remains as relevant today as when she published it seventy-nine years ago. Rand wrote the original twelve-page guide while she was working as a contract screenwriter in Hollywood. At the time, she was actively engaged in efforts to oppose communist influence in the motion-picture industry. The guide was, in part, a response to those Americans (and especially American filmmakers) who believed that ideological and philosophical issues were irrelevant to their work.

Rand believed that because the defenders of Americanism had abdicated the realm of ideas, that this vacuum was filled by collectivist intellectuals. They did not necessarily spread their ideas onscreen through explicit political slogans, but built-in moral assumptions, such as portraying the pursuit of wealth as evil.

In this discussion, Elan Journo and Brandon Lisi explore the historical circumstances that led Rand to write the essay, the deeper philosophical ideas behind her analysis, and the significance of ARI Press’s new authoritative edition. They also discuss Michael Berliner’s new afterword and the archival materials that illuminate Rand’s work in Hollywood, including additional documents now available through the Ayn Rand Archives.

Topics include:

• What’s new in ARI Press’s authoritative edition of Screen Guide for Americans

• Why Ayn Rand wrote Screen Guide for Americans in 1947

• Communist influence in 1940s Hollywood

• How propaganda can influence a culture without explicit political slogans

• How to access additional archival materials related to the “Screen Guide” online

Resources:

• Ayn Rand, Screen Guide for Americans

• Archival Supplement: Screen Guide for Americans archival supplement

Recorded on August 25, 2026.

A previous version of this article stated that Screen Guide for Americans was published in 1946 and was seven pages long. The correct year is 1947, and the original pamphlet was 12 pages long. The seven-page count referred to a condensed version published in Plain Talk magazine. We regret these errors and apologize for the oversight.

Thumbnail image: Bettmann via Getty Images

9/11 was one of the most consequential events of the 21st century. Yet twenty-five years later, the attacks and their aftermath are still widely misunderstood. In two consecutive talks at our student conference in Austin, Onkar Ghate and Elan Journo analyzed America’s failures before and after 9/11, drawing on more than two decades of work on the subject. They show how the self-abasing morality of altruism shaped American policy, leading the US to betray its ideals, appease its enemies, sacrifice its soldiers, and lose its wars. This double lecture is a must-watch for anyone who cares about America and wants to make it secure.

Among the topics covered are:

• How 9/11 was experienced and perceived in the immediate aftermath

• The religious, modernity-hating motivation behind 9/11

• America’s emboldening of Islamists in the decades before 9/11

• America’s abject, craven response to the Danish cartoons of Muhammad

• The intellectual rot 9/11 exposed and Objectivism’s potential to change it

• How American altruism crippled its troops’ ability to fight

• How America refused to recognize or defeat its enemies

• The devastating consequences of our altruistic approach to the Afghanistan and Iraq wars

• Q&A

Resources:

• Onkar Ghate and Elan Journo, Failing to Confront Islamic Totalitarianism: What Went Wrong After 9/11.

The livestream was recorded on September 11, 2026 at the Ayn Rand Con event for students in Austin, Texas.

After the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy released its entry on capitalism, critics online slammed it for apparent Marxist bias. However, if there is a scandal here, it is not merely that one entry is lopsided; it is that contemporary academic philosophers are willfully blind to the real-world phenomenon of capitalism, seeing it only through the unquestioned lens of the altruistic morality.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Robertas Bakula, Ben Bayer, and Onkar Ghate discuss the entry’s Marxist leaning, Ayn Rand’s absence from the entry, and more broadly the failure of academic philosophy to understand the subject. They argue that Ayn Rand’s view of capitalism should have played a more prominent role in the entry, and how Rand succeeded in defining “capitalism” while the entry does not bother trying. They conclude that the entry should give more serious attention not only to Rand, but also Locke, Smith, and economic scholarship more broadly.

Topics include:

• The Stanford Encyclopedia’s cultural impact

• Marxist dominance in academic philosophy

• Academic philosophy’s economic ignorance

• The failure to define capitalism

• Ayn Rand vs. intellectuals

• Ayn Rand’s definition of capitalism

• How to reform the SEP entry

Resources:

• Ayn Rand, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

• Ayn Rand, “What Is Capitalism?” in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

• Ayn Rand, “ For the New Intellectual” in For the New Intellectual

• The Ayn Rand Lexicon entry on “Capitalism”

This episode was recorded on August 24, 2026.

Image credit: Getty AI via Getty Images

September 11, 2001 — and America’s response to it — shaped the 21st century. Confidence in America’s ability to win wars cracked, trust in leadership and experts went down, and, in response, populism, nihilism, and conspiracism raised their ugly heads. From day one, the Ayn Rand Institute’s experts grasped the meaning of the attacks and the significance of a proper response. They called for war with Iran and opposed Bush’s altruistic wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their advice was not followed, but their predictions held.

In this special livestream marking the 25th anniversary of 9/11, Yaron Brook, Elan Journo, and Onkar Ghate — the Institute’s three leading experts on the attacks — trace what went wrong in its lead-up and aftermath, and how Ayn Rand’s philosophy let them foresee what most people still struggle to understand.

Among the topics covered are:

• The events and evasions that led up to 9/11.

• How shocking 9/11 was, given the atmosphere in the 1990s.

• The corrupt failure of intellectuals to warn of and explain 9/11.

• How both the government and academia whitewashed religion and Islam.

• Why and how ARI commented on 9/11 and its aftermath.

• How Objectivism helped ARI’s experts to predict America’s failures.

• The disgraceful Western response to the Danish cartoons of Muhammad.

• The rise of populism and nihilism as a result of 9/11.

Resources recommended in the episode:

• Onkar Ghate and Elan Journo, Failing to Confront Islamic Totalitarianism: What Went Wrong After 9/11.

Livestream recorded on September 2, 2026.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute Podcast, Robertas Bakula and Onkar Ghate discuss the political platform, moral goals, and philosophical motivations driving the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

Topics include:

• Radical goals of the DSA

• DSA versus past communism

• Lack of intellectual argument

• Miseducation versus willful ignorance

• Fantasy world of socialism

• Ayn Rand on producer hatred

• Hypocrisy or true goals

• Foreign policy and authoritarian regimes

Resources:

• Ayn Rand’s title essay in For the New Intellectual

This episode was recorded on August 25, 2026.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Onkar Ghate and Tristan de Liège discuss Zohran Mamdani’s record $323 million culture budget for NYC aimed at supporting the arts, and why government attempts to fund artistic endeavors are unjust and ineffective in creating thriving conditions for artists.

Topics include:

• The Culture Budget’s Purpose

• The “Affordability Crisis”

• The Disdain for the Market

• The Effects of Subsidizing Art

• The Alternative to Subsidies

Resources:

• Ayn Rand, “What is Capitalism” in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

• Ayn Rand, “To Dream the Non-Commercial Dream” in The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought

This episode was recorded on August 5, 2026.

Image credit: Michael M. Santiago / Getty Images News / via Getty Images

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Itamar Feldman interviewed Mike Mazza about his new book of essays, Freedom to Launch, which explains how deregulation of the space industry enabled today’s space renaissance and what the government’s role in space should be going forward.

Among the topics covered are:

• Why Freedom to Launch was written

• The space industry’s current state

• Space law and property rights

• Private vs. Commercial space industry

• The government’s historic role in space

• What’s next for the space industry?

• Should NASA exist?

Resources recommended in the episode:

• Mike Mazza, Freedom to Launch

• Ayn Rand, “The Property Status of the Airwaves,” in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

In this episode of The Ayn Rand Institute Podcast, Sam Weaver interviews Onkar Ghate about the American system of checks and balances and the rise of a religious mentality in America, topics discussed in his OCON 2026 talk “America at 250: Politics, Religion, Morality.”

Topics Include:

• What checks and balances are

• Erosion since the founding

• Rise of religious mentality

Resources:

• “America at 250: Politics, Religion, Morality” by Onkar Ghate

This episode was recorded on July 30, 2026.

In this episode of The Ayn Rand Institute Podcast, Don Watkins, Onkar Ghate, and Keith Lockitch discuss the Institute’s recently announced educational program on Objectivism: ARU Core.

This year marks the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States of America. Yet, given how far it has drifted from its founding political ideals, is America still worth celebrating?

In his opening address at the 2026 Objectivist Summer Conference, “America at 250: What Do We Have to Celebrate?” Gregory Salmieri argues that the answer is yes. America’s founding made possible a distinctive way of life centered on independent judgment and productive achievement, one that endures and continues to benefit Americans today.

Drawing on history, Salmieri traces the emergence of this way of life and argues that Ayn Rand’s conception of the producer best captures the ideal implicit in it. He maintains that America is still “the country of the producer,” citing advances in artificial intelligence, energy, spaceflight, and supersonic flight. However, Salmieri stresses, the culture behind these achievements remains more felt than understood, leaving the country vulnerable. Celebrating America, he concludes, requires understanding and living up to the principles that made this way of life possible.

Among the topics covered:

• America’s crisis of national self-esteem

• The Enlightenment roots of America’s founding principles

• The producer as the ideal implicit in the American way of life

• The continuing vitality and vulnerability of America’s culture of production

• Americanism as an achievement rather than a birthright

This talk was recorded live on June 26 in New Orleans as part of the 2026 Objectivist Summer Conference and is available on The Ayn Rand Institute Podcast stream. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Watch archived podcasts here.

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Ben Bayer and Tristan de Liège examine recent socialist electoral victories, and analyze critical reactions that fail to identify the philosophical essence of the movement.

Topics include:

• Allegations of “extremism”

• What the “extremism” charge hides

• Are socialists “democratic”?

• Socialism and communism

• Socialist and MAGA populism

• Religious communism, godless capitalism

Resources:

• Ayn Rand “Extremism’: or the Art of Smearing,” in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

• Entry on “socialism” in the Ayn Rand Lexicon

• Ben Bayer, “Meet the New Socialism, Same as the Old,” New Ideal, Sept 2, 2019

• Ben Bayer, “ICE Tyranny Is What Democracy Looks Like,” New Ideal, Feb 25, 2026

• “Why Socialists Fear the Republican Party Platform,” ARI Podcast, Jul 25, 2024

• “Trump’s Anti-Capitalist Control Over Businesses,” ARI Podcast, Sept 18, 2025

This episode was recorded on July 23, 2026.

Image credit: AI via Getty Images

In this episode of the Ayn Rand Institute podcast, Robertas Bakula interviews Dr. Onkar Ghate, the author of the new book The Moral Idealism of Ayn Rand, peeking into the themes explored in the essay collection, including the literary essence and profound moral idealism found within Ayn Rand’s fiction.

• Fiction vs. Philosophical Propaganda

• The Moral Ideals in Dramatic Fiction

• Superhuman Character Misconceptions

• Admiration vs. Compassion

• Metaphysical Irrelevance of evil

• The Death Premise

• Dramatization of Moral Principles

Resources:

• Onkar Ghate, The Moral Idealism of Ayn Rand

• Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

• Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

• Ayn Rand, We the Living

• Ayn Rand, Anthem

• Ayn Rand, “The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made”

• Ayn Rand, “The Age of Envy”

• Leonard Peikoff, “My 30 Years with Ayn Rand”

This episode was recorded on July 15, 2026.