With the death of Steve Jobs, one of the founders of the Apple, a struggle has begun to claim the entrepreneur’s legacy. Who and what Jobs was depends upon what aspect of his life one regards as important.
Rush Limbaugh states Jobs was a great capitalist, an entrepreneur who changed the world, not by protesting or engaging in politics, but by creating products that people wanted to buy and selling them at a profit. Limbaugh notes how Jobs was a contradiction. Why, like a lot of other Silicon Valley businessmen, Jobs was a political liberal and gave to liberal causes and candidates, he did not run his business like a liberal. While the corporate culture at Apple is not as button down as traditionally with most corporations, Jobs did value creativity, results, and profit.
Bill Maher, the HBO ranter, is having none of the image of Jobs as a money making entrepreneur and captain of industry. Maher noted that Jobs was a pot smoking Buddhist who voted for Obama and therefore not the sort of person the right wing should embrace. Jobs, after all, lost control of Apple for a while, “proving” that he was out of step with corporate America.
I think Maher is, as he tends to do, underestimating the right’s capacity for tolerance. Most on the right are not dope smoker or Buddhists and certainly do not vote for Obama. However a lot of people on the libertarian right support relaxation of drug laws. Even most evangelicals by my observation are tolerant of people who are not Christians. They take the admonition of “love thy neighbor” seriously.
As for the voting for Obama, it is regrettable, but it is nothing compared to one overwhelming fact. The iPad and the iPhone are just so very cool and Jobs was instrumental in bringing those and other products into existence. Besides that, unfortunate political choices are relatively meaningless.
An intriguing peek into what really drove Jobs can be found at the Quora site. It seems that Steve Wozniak, Jobs’ partner in founding Apple, once was quoted as saying that Jobs was a fan of Ayn Rand. This is a fascinating idea. Rand’s greatest heroes in her books like “Atlas Shrugged” were captains of industry, like Dagny Taggart and Hank Reardon. In a way, Steve Jobs would fit right in. Of course none of Rand’s characters smoked pot or practiced Buddhism, not to mention voted for liberal Democrats. But that just goes to show that real life is more complex than an Ayn Rand novel.
Sources: Steve Jobs: American Exceptionalism, Rush Limbaugh, Rush Limbaugh.com, Oct. 6, 2011
Maher tells conservatives: Do not try to claim former Apple CEO Steve Jobs, Jeff Poor, The Daily Caller, Oct. 9, 2011
How influential was Atlas Shrugged upon Steve Jobs? Quora, Oct 6, 2011