Re: the future long term financial apocalypse of the USA

On Tue, 28 May 2024, Chris Buckley wrote:

On 2024-05-28, James Nicoll <jdnicoll@panix.com> wrote:

In article <v34o3q$seb$1@panix2.panix.com>,
Scott Dorsey <kludge@panix.com> wrote:

D  <nospam@example.net> wrote:

>
Well, I do like Rands Atlas Shrugged and We the living, but that is of
course not SF.

>
I'd call Atlas Shrugged more fantasy than SF, but the deus ex machina of
the free power technology has some SF elements.  I have to admit that I
liked the book even though it was totally unrealistic.  However, it has a
bad reputation because of the number of people who believe it could come
true and that miraculous technologies just drop from the sky.
>
Although, now that I think about it, I think that for most people, they
have the general perception that miraculous technologies DO drop from the
sky because they never see the enormous effort in developing them and only
see them when they arrive complete and functional on the market.
>

In terms of SF, Neal Stephenson I appreciate, the early stuff, and
Heinlein as well. The moon is a harsh mistress is good.
>
Ohh... and then there was another one... Poul Andersons Nicholas van Rijn
books, those are quite nice as well. =)
>
Anything else, based on that, you could recommend?

>
Ever read the Gateway series by Pohl?

>
Kritzer's Liberty's Child is about a teen who lives in a utopian
libertarian seastead.
>
Marcia Martin and Eric Vinicoff's The Weigher details first contact
between humans and some obligately libertarian aliens.

>
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Prometheus awards, honoring
libertarian science fiction.
  https://www.lfs.org/awards.shtml
They have 2 awards yearly since about 1980; one for the current year
and one for all-time Hall of Fame.
>
The current year award is somewhat uneven.  I've only read about
half of them, and there's only one strong Favorite bookcase among them
(_A Deepness in the Sky_) though several near-Favorites.
>
The Hall of Fame winners are much stronger. I've read a vast majority, with
at least 10 solid Favorites and many other good books.
>
Chris
>

This one I am aware of, but I think the quality is kind of uneven. I've read several on this list, but the ones I mentioned previously were the ones that stuck with me.
I might be a libertarian, but there is a problem with many modern libertarian sci fi books in my opinion and that is that some of them are written based on politics first and story afterwards and that makes some stories kind of thin.
I like my politics to complement the story and not the story to complement the politics.
In terms of the list, some books I read but were not good enough for me to read again were Seveneves and Rich mans sky.
I did love to concept of the Unincorporated man though, really enjoyed that one!