http://www.samizdata.net/blog/ A blog for people with a critically rational individualist perspective. We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. en-us PdeH@samizdata.net Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:23:43 +0000 http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/lets_hear_it_fo.html I am grinding my teeth trying to restrain myself from commenting on some of the drivel being written about the recent murder of US soldiers by a muslim US army officer... but this is just a measure of the ignorance that permeates the profession and which is directly responsible for the growth of so called 'new media', i.e. things like blogs. Nick Allen writes in the Telegraph in an article titled "gunman used 'cop killer'... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/samizdata_quote_566.html I am the only libertarian who has read all six VAT directives - Philip Chaston.... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/ignorance_is_bl.html Researchers are claiming that there is a link between individualism and depression. Some may take offence to this notion but it does not surprise me at all. That said, I am far too cynical to automatically assume that the 'researchers' are not grinding some ideological axe, but nevertheless I find the basic idea quite believable. Frankly collectivism is a form of mass delusion, an 'opiate for the masses' method of replacing profane objective truth with... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/a_nifty_new_pro.html It is Friday, and I cannot be bothered to ponder the latest outrages of our political oligarchy. For our mental health, let us ponder the lines of this new little beauty from Porsche. Burn that carbon, baby!... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/remember_rememb_2.html http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/we_can_leave_if.html Blogger and debunker of various economic fallacies, Tim Worstall, points out something that tends to be forgotten in some of the angrier, gloomier commentary about the European Union and the recently ratified Lisbon Treaty. We - the UK that is - can leave if we wish to do so, and it will be a lot less complex than such a process can be made to appear. That surely is the 800 llb gorilla in the... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/a_credulity_of.html "David Cameron ditches referendum and backs away from EU bust-up" chuckles the Guardian... followed by "Eurosceptics welcome 'never again' rhetoric". So in effect Cameron is saying "yes I know I said we get a vote before... "iron clad" was the words I used... but if those mean old Euros want to grab even more power than all that stuff you are not going to get a vote on after all, we will have a referendum... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/it_is_official.html A British court has ruled that environmentalism is 'protected' as it is functionally indistinguishable from a religion and thus cannot be discriminated against by a company. We are now only one logical step away from disestablishing the Church of England and making environmentalism the official state religion, a mandated one in fact, complete with inquisitors and witch finders.... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/unfortunate.html Although much will be made of the GOP victories in Virginia and New Jersey, I do not think they really matter that much. The one that did matter, the third party insurgency in New York, was won by Obama's man... that was the important one. All the wrong conclusions will now be drawn. The doom-loop has not been broken.... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/learning_the_ri.html Simon Heffer has a pretty good - and by his standards, measured - take on how Mr Obama has been doing. Latest election results in Virginia and New Jersey were clear slaps in the face for him, and a boost to the GOP. But as we have found here with Mr Cameron's Conservative Party, which has profited from the sheer, plodding ghastliness of Gordon Brown, the welcome fall from grace of Mr Obama, a puffed... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/pot_calls.html For the New York Times writer Mr Frank Rich to complain of "Stalinism" among conservatives is interesting, considering that the New York Times correspondent Walter Duranty helped cover up the murder of tens of millions of people in the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Indeed the New York Times won a Pulitzer Price for Mr Duranty's reports (which were one long cover up of the above mentioned murder of tens of millions of people) a... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/what_matters_is.html In New York 23 Hoffman is going up against both the Democrat and the Republican machines (Dede S. having endorsed the Democrat and working closely with him on get-out-the-vote) so if he wins it will be a big upset in a district that supported Barack Obama. Actually the New York Conservative party may evolve (from an unimportant group that just follows in the wake of the Republicans) into something like the "Barnburner" (later Van Buren)... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/so_that_explain.html I had a good chuckle after reading this over on Goat in the Machine: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is concerned that her Pakistani hosts have failed to grasp the nettle of good governance, and reminds them of the high purpose and duty for which democratic societies entrust their representatives with the sovereign power: "We (the US) tax everything that moves and doesn't move, and that's not what we see in Pakistan." That sure... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/samizdata_quote_565.html Today, I will give this cast-iron guarantee: If I become PM a Conservative government will hold a referendum on any EU treaty that emerges from these negotiations. - David Cameron in 2007. The obvious conclusion being that he must not be allowed to become Prime Minister as his "cast-iron guarantees" are as firm as limp wet paper. Pathetic.... http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/11/enabling_the_en.html Bishop Hill: Devil's Kitchen has a must-read post up, detailing the increasing use of enabling legislation by the government. And he doesn't swear at all - must be serious. Indeed. I daydream that one day, a British Cabinet Minister will grab hold of one of the laws that DK writes about, where it says that, if there is a crisis (and it is up to him to decide), then he, the British Cabinet Minister, may...