We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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The Perils of Polly Brexitstop “Heyulp! Heyulp”
Who will rescue Polly this time? Who will answer her call?
Will it be those apparently reformed criminals, the Ant Hill Mob?
“Come to parliament, Sinn Féin, as saviours of Ireland – and Britain”
Or will it be her trusted guardian Sylvester Sneekly and his business associates?
“Business must speak up, and save Britain from Brexit”
Two desperate appeals in five days have gone unanswered. Oh, won’t somebody come?
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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Poor Polly! Maybe DangerMouse will help? Skippy, the bush Kangaroo, can’t help you. She wouldn’t be allowed into the country (quarantine laws). We do have, here in Australia, an ex-deputy Prime Minister, who recently resigned over a sex scandal. He might be able to help.
Eastern Europe is Europe with a soul and commonsense. Western Europe is a shithole. Get out and make Britain great again and make friends with Eastern Europe.
France, Germany, Scandinavia etc are NOT your friends. When a former malarial swamp with sand has passed Great Britain in GDP per capita, you need to change. That country is the
one your foreign service and Royal Family have avoided for 70 years – Israel. You cold learn from them, and I hope you do.
Send for Sherlock Holmes.
Spend much time there, do you?
My spies tell me that William Rees Mogg and Boris Johnson are now undercover and travelling through Europe, hotly pursued by the Napoleon of Crime Martin Selmayr accompanied by his assassin and shikaree Kolonel Verhofstadt.
Information received is that they are now staying at a small hotel near to the Reichenbach Falls.
Populist revolt in Italy leaves young at risk of measles – Ian Birrell for The Times.
I feel quite offended at Drunker calling the Italian vote the EU’s “worst case scenario”. Does this mean the Brexit vote is now demoted to second place or lower? 🙂
Eurodame?
Staghounds,
You are our only hope Eurodame! For anyone who has forgotten her, more info here: The EU Fairy.
Polly Toynbee has called upon the sworn enemies of the United Kingdom, IRA-Sinn Fein, to help her work against British independence.
This is treason.
In a colloquial sense, I think the now surely getting-on-a-bit Polly Toynbee has been the enemy of anything we’d define as Britain for a long time (though sometimes a bit all-over-the-place in her incoherence). Back in the 80s, her rants worshipping those who protested against Reagan’s and Thatcher’s wicked nukes annoyed even student lefties I knew – and helped the Russian interference-in-our-politics of that era.
However, I assume it is also an example of that the free speech (that we no longer have for some other subjects but retain for that), not high treason, thought it might (I cannot be bothered to find and read it – I recall Polly’s style from long ago) be hate speech were that vile law ever enforced in an impartial manner.
BTW, the beeb described Sergei Skripal as having been convicted of “high treason” in Russia. I assume this was an error and in fact he was charged with treason, there being no such legal term as high treason in Russia, at least since the revolution and maybe never (as is so in most countries outside the UK – even in the US I’d guess?). I may be wrong about this, but while the Tsar’s Russia might have had a translatable term – but also might well not considering the absolutism of the Tsar and the much greater closeness of serfdom to slavery at the other end of the scale – it seems counter to every understanding of communism that the soviet system of law from which modern Russia derives would have done so. ‘High treason’ is a splendid-sounding relic of the days when the king was ‘first among equals’ and wanted to emphasis the ‘first’ bit.
http://www.russian-criminal-code.com/PartII/SectionX/Chapter29.html
The Russian Wikipedia article linked to the English Wikipedia article on Treason discusses the above, while using a term the literal translation of which is ‘state treason’.
OK, the first link I posted is just someone’s translation, so not really helpful.
In the US, the Constitution defines “treason” as follows: “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.” (Art. III, Sec. 3, Cl. 1) The statutory definition is “Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason . . . .” (18 U.S. Code § 2381) You might have a different definition over there, but in the US nothing Polly Toynbee has done (with the possible exception of giving aid and comfort to Sinn Fein during the hostilities, if in fact she did so) would constitute “treason”. Arguably unpatriotic, sure, but that’s not a crime.
FWIW, a lot of people over here also lack an understanding of what “treason” actually is, and toss about the word with abandon.
Laird, here’s the definition of high treason in English law, as stated by the Treason Act of 1351. That Act is still in force, and defines high treason as:
o Killing or planning the killing of the King, his wife, his heir, or his heir’s wife.
o “Violating” (i.e. shagging) the King’s wife, or the wife of his heir (yes, all those, other than Charles, who slept with Diana prior to her divorce were, technically, traitors 🙂 )
o Levying war against the King in his realm
o Adhering to the King’s enemies in his realm or elsewhere, giving them aid and comfort
o Killing the Lord Chancellor, any of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury (whose numbers include the Prime Minister), or any of the King’s Justices
There were a couple of other things that used to be high treason but aren’t anymore, like counterfeiting the coin of the realm, or counterfeiting the Great Seal.
The Founding Fathers pretty much lifted the third and fourth clauses above (though, obviously, changing references to the King to the United States) and stuck them in the Constitution. They wanted there to be no doubt as to what was, and equally importantly, what wasn’t, treason. The English law was similarly strict, and contained a clause directing judges to only regard those things in the law as treason.
I have read that in the time of Queen Elizabeth I, it was high treason to predict the monarch’s death by e.g. discovering (or ‘discovering’) an ancient prophecy or interpreting (or ‘interpreting’) an astrological chart.
It was a fact about the renaissance-period English, one of several peculiarities commented on (sometimes amusedly) by continentals, that movements of rebels and/or usurpers were often very eager to bolster their confidence and sense of legitimacy by reference to some ancient prophecy (of Merlin or whoever) that appeared to predict their actions and success. Thus the law made some sense in its social context – and was dropped when that context changed.
Treason Act 1351 (25 Edw III St. 5)
That’s a translation into English, the original is in Norman French as that was the language of the law at that time. I suppose you could have prophecies predicting the death of the Sovereign under “compassing and imagining”
*The office of Lord High Treasurer is in Commission, so all of the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Treasury are covered. The First Lord is the Prime Minister.
Bit of a bugger, really. Up until recently you could be hanged for killing a junior Government Whip. If ever there was a case for justifiable homicide… 😉